Chapter XXVI: Book 11: , Page 26 of the German book. You remember this is the report (6)

With the carrying out of these orders, Hitler’s pledge of 18 March would be kept, namely, that it would not be necessary “....to take into consideration the basis which the people would need to continue a most primitive existence. On the contrary, it would be better to destroy these things ourselves....” Considering the discipline which came into force in Germany in connection with every order, no matter what its contents, it was to be expected that these orders would be carried out. These orders also applied to those territories which had been included in the Greater German Reich.

During journeys into the most endangered territories, and by means of discussions with my associates, I now quite openly tried to stop the carrying out of these orders. I ordered that the high explosives which were still available in the Ruhr should be dropped down the mines, and that the stores of high explosives which were on the building sites should be hidden.

We distributed submachine guns to the most important plants so that they could fight against destruction. All this, I know, sounds somewhat exaggerated; but the situation at the time was such that if a Gauleiter had dared to approach the coal mines in the Ruhr and there was a single submachine gun available, then it would have been fired.

I tried to convince the local army commanders of the nonsensical character of the task of exploding bridges, which had been given to them, and furthermore by talking to the local authorities I succeeded in stopping most of the evacuation which had been ordered. In this connection the State Secretary of the Party Chancellery, Klopper, deserves credit in that he held up the evacuation orders which were to be sent to the Gauleiter.

When I came back from this journey, I was called before Hitler at once. This was on 29 March 1945. I had intentionally resisted his orders so openly, and I had discussed the lost war with so many of his Gauleiter that my insubordination must have become known to him. Witnesses are available from that period who know that that is what I wanted to achieve.

I did not want to betray him behind his back. I wanted to put the alternative before him. At the beginning of the conference he stated that he had had reports from Bormann to the effect that I considered the war as lost and that I had openly talked against his prohibition. He demanded that I should make a statement to the effect that I did not consider the war lost, and I replied, “The war is lost.” He gave me 24 hours to think, and it was during those 24 hours that the letter was written from which the extract has been quoted and which has been submitted to the Tribunal in full.

After this period of reflection, I intended to hand him this letter as my reply. But he refused to accept it. Thereupon, I declared to him that he could rely on me in the future, and in that way I was able to get him to hand over to me once more the carrying out of the destruction work.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: In this connection, may I submit Hitler’s order dated 30 March 1945, which the Tribunal will find on Pages 83 of the English and 79 of the French text in the document book. It will be Exhibit Number 28.

Then what did you do on the strength of this new order which you had?

SPEER: I had the text of it drawn up and it gave me the possibility of circumventing the destruction which had been ordered. I issued an order at once re-establishing all my old orders for the safeguarding of industry. In this connection, I did not submit this new order of mine for Hitler’s approval, although he had expressly made this proviso in his order.

Contrary to the promise which I had given him, namely, that I would stand behind him unconditionally, I left as early as the following day to see Seyss-Inquart, who has testified to that here, and two other Gauleiter to tell them too that the war was lost and to discuss the consequences with them.

On that occasion I found Seyss-Inquart very understanding. Both my decree for the prevention of destruction and my discussions were contrary to the promise I had given Hitler on 29 March. I considered that this was my natural duty.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: I submit as Exhibit Number Speer-29 the instructions issued by Speer on 30 March for carrying out the order which has already been mentioned. In the French and German texts of the document book it appears on Page 81 and in the English document book on Page 85.

SPEER: In spite of this, the orders for the destruction of bridges still remained in force; and everywhere in Germany, Austria, and Poland and elsewhere you can see the results today. I made numerous journeys to the front and had many conferences with the commanders of the front-line troops. Perhaps that may have brought about relief in some form or other. Finally, I succeeded in persuading the commander of the Signal Corps, on 3 April 1945, to forbid at least the destruction of the signal, postal, railway, and wireless installations by means of a new order.

Finally, on 5 April I issued six OKW orders under the name of General Winter, who has been a witness in this courtroom. These orders were to insure the preservation of important railway lines. The orders are still in existence. I issued these orders through my command channels and the channels of the Reich railways; and considering the tremendous mix-up of orders at the time, such orders, which I was not empowered to give, would at least have a confusing effect.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: Herr Speer, a number of attempts on your part to shorten the war became known to the press. Could you please describe to the Court the situation which has been hinted at in the press.

SPEER: I do not want to spend too much time on things which did not succeed. I tried repeatedly to exclude Himmler and others from the Government and to force them to account for their deeds. To carry out that and other plans, eight officers from the front joined me, all of whom held high decorations. The State Secretary of the Propaganda Ministry made it possible for me on 9 April to speak briefly over the entire German radio system. All preparations were made, but at the last moment Goebbels heard about it and demanded that Hitler should approve the text of my speech. I submitted to him a very modified text. But he forbade even this very modified text.

On 21 April 1945 it was possible for me first of all to record a speech at the broadcasting station at Hamburg. This was to be broadcast as the instructions for the final phase. The recording officials, however, demanded that this speech should be broadcast only after Hitler’s death, which would relieve them of their oath of allegiance to him.

Furthermore, I was in contact with the chief of staff of an army group in the East, the Army Group Vistula. We were both agreed that a fight for Berlin must not take place and that, contrary to their orders, the armies should by-pass Berlin. To begin with, this order was carried out; but later several persons empowered with special authority by Hitler were sent outside Berlin and succeeded in leading some divisions into Berlin. The original intention however that entire armies should be led into Berlin was thus not carried through. The chief of staff with whom I had these conferences was General Kinzler.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: Were these attempts still of any avail at the beginning of April and later on?

SPEER: Yes. We expected that the war would last longer, for Churchill, too, prophesied at the time that the end of the war would come at the end of July 1945.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: You have described here how much you did to preserve industrial plants and other economic installations. Did you also act on behalf of the foreign workers?

SPEER: My responsibility was the industrial sector. I felt it my duty, therefore, in the first place to hand over my sector undamaged. Yet several attempts of mine were also in favor of foreign workers in Germany. In the first place, these foreign workers and prisoners of war, through the steps which I had taken to secure the food situation, were quite obviously cobeneficiaries of my work during the last phase.

Secondly, during local discussions on the prevention of blastings, contrary to the evacuation orders which had been received from the Party, I made it possible for the foreign workers and prisoners to remain where they were. Such discussions took place on 18 March in the Saar district, and on 28 March in the Ruhr district. At the beginning of March I made the proposal that 500,000 foreigners should be repatriated from the Reich to the territories which we still held; that is to say, the Dutch to Holland, the Czechs to Czechoslovakia. The Reichsbahn, however, refused to take responsibility for these transports, since the traffic system had already been so damaged that the carrying out of this plan was no longer possible. Finally, both in the speech I intended to make over the German broadcasting system on 9 April and in the attempted Hamburg speech, I pointed out the duties which we had toward the foreigners, the prisoners of war, and the prisoners from concentration camps during this last phase.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: Mr. President, may I draw your attention to Page 88 of the English text in this connection; it is Page 84 of the French, and I submit it as Exhibit Number Speer-30.

Herr Speer, you have described to us how much during the last phase of the war you were opposed to Hitler and his policies. Why did you not resign?

SPEER: I had a chance to resign on three occasions; once in April 1944, when my powers had been considerably reduced; the second time in September 1944, when Bormann and Goebbels were in favor of my resignation; and the third time on 29 March 1945, when Hitler himself demanded that I should go on permanent leave, which was equivalent to resignation. I turned down all these opportunities because, beginning with July 1944, I thought that it was my duty to remain at my post.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: There has been testimony in this courtroom to the effect that the last phase of the war, that is, from January 1945, was justified from the point of view that the nation should be spared unnecessary sacrifices. Were you of that same opinion?

SPEER: No. It was said that military protection against the East would have been necessary to protect refugees. In reality, until the middle of April 1945, the bulk of our last reserves of armored vehicles and munitions were used for the fight against the West. The tactical principle, therefore, was different from the one it should have been if the fight had been carried out with the aims which have been stated here. The destruction of bridges in the West and the destruction orders against the basis of life of the nation show the opposite. The sacrifices which were made on both sides after January 1945 were senseless. The dead of this period will be the accusers of the man responsible for the continuation of that fight, Adolf Hitler. The same is true of the ruined cities, which in this last phase had to lose tremendous cultural values and where innumerable dwellings suffered destruction. Many of the difficulties under which the German nation is suffering today are due to the ruthless destruction of bridges, traffic installations, trucks, locomotives, and ships. The German people remained loyal to Adolf Hitler until the end. He betrayed them with intent. He tried to throw them definitely into the abyss. Only after 1 May 1945 did Dönitz try to act with reason, but it was too late.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: I have one last question.

Was it possible for you to reconcile your actions during the last phase of the war with your oath and your conception of loyalty to Adolf Hitler?

SPEER: There is one loyalty which everyone must always keep; and that is loyalty toward one’s own people. That duty comes before everything. If I am in a leading position and if I see that the interests of the nation are acted against in such a way, then I too must act. That Hitler had broken faith with the nation must have been clear to every intelligent member of his entourage, certainly at the latest in January or February 1945. Hitler had once been given his mission by the people; he had no right to gamble away the destiny of the people with his own. Therefore I fulfilled my natural duty as a German. I did not succeed in everything, but I am glad today that by my work I was able to render one more service to the workers in Germany and the occupied territories.

DR. FLÄCHSNER: Mr. President, I have now reached the end of my examination of the Defendant Speer.

May I perhaps draw the attention of the Tribunal to the fact that statements have been made on the theme which was the subject of this afternoon’s session by the witnesses: Kehrl, in his interrogatory under 10 and 12; Rohland, under 5, 6, and 8; Schieber, under 25; Guderian, under 1 to 3, 7 to 9, and on point 6; Stahl, named by Speer, under Points 1 and 2 of his testimony; and Kempf, under Number 10 of her testimony.

Still outstanding are an interrogatory from the witness Malzacher and an interrogatory—which is most important to the defense—of the witness Von Poser, since he was the liaison officer between the General Staff of the Army and Speer’s Ministry; these will be handed in when received. Furthermore, still outstanding is the interrogatory of General Buhle, who was the Chief of the Army Staff, and Colonel Baumbach, who was commander of a bomber squadron. The remaining documents I shall submit to the Tribunal at the end of the final examination of the Defendant Speer.

THE PRESIDENT: Do any of the other defendants’ counsel want to ask any questions?

DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, during the negotiations which Sauckel had in 1943 and 1944 with Laval in Paris, were there representatives present who came from your department and did they support Sauckel’s demands?

SPEER: During these conferences representatives from my departments were sometimes present. They were present for the purpose of protecting the blocked factories and also to see to it that there were no encroachments on the production interests which I planned to protect.

DR. SERVATIUS: So that these representatives were, therefore, not acting to support Sauckel’s demands but were against them?

SPEER: It was not the task of these representatives to act for or against Sauckel’s demands, because Sauckel stated his demands in such a definite way that a subordinate official was not in a position to speak either for or against these demands in any way. This would have been a task which I would have had to carry out myself.

DR. SERVATIUS: So that these representatives did not fulfill any task?

SPEER: My representatives were the representatives from the armament, from the heavy armament and war production in the occupied territories, and as such they had their special tasks.

DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, did you in 1943, acting independently and without consultation with Sauckel, transfer 50,000 French Organization Todt workers to the Ruhr district?

SPEER: Yes, that is true. After the attack on the Möhne Dam and the Eder Dam in April and May 1943, I went there and in that period I ordered that a special group from the Organization Todt should take over the restoration of these plants. I did this because I also wanted the machinery and the technical staff on the spot. This special group right away without asking me brought the French workers along. This had tremendous repercussions for us in the West because the workers on the building sites on the Atlantic Wall, who had up to that time felt safe from Sauckel’s reach...

DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, we are not interested in hearing what was done there. I am only interested in the fact that these 50,000 OT workers were obtained without Sauckel’s agreement and by yourself independently; and that you have confirmed, haven’t you?

SPEER: Yes, that is true.

DR. SERVATIUS: Sauckel was responsible for the ruling on working hours in these plants. Do you know that the 10-hour day was later on ordered by Goebbels in his capacity as Plenipotentiary for Total Warfare, applicable to both Germans and foreign workers?

SPEER: That is probably true. I do not directly recollect it, but I assume it is right.

DR. SERVATIUS: Then you have stated that the Geneva Convention was not applied to Soviet prisoners of war and Italian civilian internees?

SPEER: Yes.

DR. SERVATIUS: Do you know that the Geneva Convention, although it was not recognized for Soviet prisoners of war, was nevertheless applied _de facto_, and that there were orders to that effect?

SPEER: I cannot give you any information about that, because it was too much of a detail and was dealt with by my departments directly. I should like to confirm it for you.

DR. SERVATIUS: I shall later on submit to the Tribunal a document which confirms this.

Do you know that Italian civilian internees, that is, those who came from the Italian Armed Forces, were transferred to the status of free workers and therefore did not come under the Convention?

SPEER: Yes, that is true, and it was done on Sauckel’s request.

DR. SERVATIUS: The factory managers were responsible for carrying out Sauckel’s orders in the factories. Is that right?

SPEER: As far as they could be carried out, yes.

DR. SERVATIUS: And you have said that if, on account of special events such as air attacks, it was not possible to carry them out, the supreme authorities in the Reich would have had to take them over?

SPEER: Yes.

DR. SERVATIUS: Which authorities in the Reich do you mean?

SPEER: The Plenipotentiary General for the Allocation of Labor.

DR. SERVATIUS: That would be Sauckel?

SPEER: Yes. And the German Labor Front, which was responsible for accommodations and working conditions.

DR. SERVATIUS: Which organization did Sauckel have at his disposal to stop these abuses? Was this a matter of practical assistance then?

SPEER: No. I think you have misunderstood me. The “catastrophe emergency” comprised conditions brought about by _force majeure_. Nobody could remedy them, even with the best will in the world, because every day there were new air attacks. But it is impossible, as Sauckel has testified, to hold the factory manager also responsible for the fact that these conditions could not be alleviated. I wanted to indicate that in such emergencies the leaders in their entirety must get together and decide whether conditions were still bearable or not. In that connection it was the special duty of Sauckel, as the official who made the reports and gave the orders, to convene such meetings.

DR. SERVATIUS: To whom then was he supposed to make such recommendations?

SPEER: To the Führer.

DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, you have explained your own administrative organization and you have said that you were an opponent of a bureaucratic administration. You introduced self-administration for the factories; and on the professional side, you formed “rings” and above them committees which were directed by you.

SPEER: Yes.

DR. SERVATIUS: And it was a closed administration which could not be penetrated from the outside by other authorities?

SPEER: Yes, I would not have allowed that.

DR. SERVATIUS: So you were actually the representative of these firms toward the higher authorities.

SPEER: Only as far as the technical tasks were concerned, as I have stated here.

DR. SERVATIUS: You limited yourself to the technical tasks?

SPEER: Well, otherwise I would have been responsible for food conditions, or health conditions, or matters which concerned the Police; but that was expecting too much. In that case one would have had to give me another post.

DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, did you not refer earlier to the fact that, particularly as far as food was concerned, you had given instructions which would benefit the workers; and are you not in that way confirming my view that you bore the entire responsibility for that sector?

SPEER: Not in the least. I believe that I undertook the actions of the last phase within my general responsibility, but not the particular responsibility for that sector.

DR. SERVATIUS: Then, Witness, you spoke about the responsibility of the Gauleiter as Reich defense commissioners with reference to the armament industries. Could you describe in more detail the scope of that responsibility, because I did not understand it.

SPEER: From 1942, responsibility was transferred to the Gauleiter as Reich defense commissioners to an ever-increasing degree. This was mostly the effort of Bormann...

DR. SERVATIUS: What tasks did they have?

SPEER: Just a minute ... who desired the centralization of all the forces of the State and the Party in the Gauleiter. This state of centralization had almost been achieved in full after 1943, the only exception which still existed being my armament offices, the so-called Armament Inspectorates. These, since they had previously come under the OKW, were military establishments which were staffed by officers; and that made it possible for me to remain outside the jurisdiction of the Gauleiter. But the Gauleiter was the central authority in his Gau, and he assumed the right to give orders where he did not have it. The situation with us was, as you know, that it was not so important as to who was vested with authority; it was a question of who assumed the right to give orders. In this case most Gauleiter did assume all the rights, by which means they were the responsible and central authority.

DR. SERVATIUS: What do you mean by “central authority”? Perhaps I may put something to you: The Gauleiter, as Reich defense commissioner, only had the task of centralizing the offices if a decision was necessary in the Gau, for instance, after an air attack, the removal of the damage, construction of a new plant, or acquisition of new grounds, so that the various departments would be brought to one conference table; but he did not have the authority to give orders or make decisions. Is that right?

SPEER: No. I should like to recommend that you talk to a few Gauleiter who will tell you how it was.

DR. SERVATIUS: In that case, I will drop the question. I will submit the law. You then went on to say, Witness, that during a certain period there was a surplus of labor in Germany. Was this due to the fact that Sauckel had brought too many foreign workers into Germany?

SPEER: There may be an error here. My defense counsel has referred to two documents according to which during the time from April 1942 until April 1943 Sauckel had supplied more labor to the armament sector than armament had requested. I do not know if that is the passage you mean.

DR. SERVATIUS: I can only remember that you said that there had been more workers than were required.

SPEER: Yes.

DR. SERVATIUS: You do not mean to say that this had been caused by the fact that Sauckel had brought too many workers in from foreign countries?

SPEER: No. I wanted to prove by that answer that even according to Sauckel’s opinion at the time he did not endeavor to bring workers to Germany from France, _et cetera_, corresponding to my maximum demands. For if in a report to Hitler he asserts that he brought more workers to the armament sector than I demanded, as can be seen from the letter, then it would be clear that he did more than I asked him to do. Actually, it was quite different. In actual fact, he did not supply these workers at all, and we had a heated argument because it was my opinion that he had supplied a far smaller number and had boosted his report to Hitler. However, for this Trial the document is valid.

DR. SERVATIUS: You have just pointed out also that there was an argument between you and Sauckel as to whether there were sufficient labor reserves in Germany; and if I have understood you rightly, you said that if workers had been mobilized in the manner used by England and the Soviet Union, one would not have needed any foreign workers at all. Is that true?

SPEER: No, I did not say that.

DR. SERVATIUS: Well then, how am I to understand it?

SPEER: I have expressed clearly enough that I considered Sauckel’s labor policy of bringing foreigners into Germany to be the proper course. I did not try to dodge that responsibility, but there did exist considerable reserves of German labor; that again is only proof of the fact that I was not responsible for the maximum demands made, and that was all I wanted to prove.

DR. SERVATIUS: Are the laws known to you according to which German women and youths were used to a very considerable degree?

SPEER: Yes.

DR. SERVATIUS: Do you also know that officers’ wives and the wives of high officials also worked in factories?

SPEER: Yes, as from August 1944.

DR. SERVATIUS: Well then, where were these labor reserves of which you are speaking?

SPEER: I was talking about the time of 1943. In 1943 I demanded in the Central Planning Board that the German labor reserves should be drawn upon, and in 1944 during the conversation of 4 January with Hitler I said the same thing. Sauckel at that time stated—and that can be seen from his speech of 1 March 1944, which has been submitted as a document—that there were no longer any reserves of German workers.

DR. SERVATIUS: Yes.

SPEER: But at the same time he also testified here that he had succeeded in 1944 in mobilizing a further 2 million workers from Germany, whereas at a conference with Hitler on 1 January 1944 he considered that to be completely impossible. Thus he has himself proved here that at a time when I desired the use of internal labor he did not think there was any, although he was later forced by circumstances to mobilize these workers from Germany after all; therefore my statement at the time was right.

DR. SERVATIUS: Witness, these 2 million workers you have mentioned, were they people who could be employed in industry?

SPEER: Yes, of course.

DR. SERVATIUS: Were they employed directly as skilled workers in industry?

SPEER: No, they had to be trained first.

DR. SERVATIUS: Did they not first of all have to go through complicated transfers to be released from one firm to another?

SPEER: Only partly, because we had a possibility of using them in the fine-mechanical industry and other kinds of work; and also, as everyone who is familiar with American and British industry knows, these modern machines are perfectly suitable to be worked by women, even for difficult work.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal is not interested in all these details, Dr. Servatius.

DR. SERVATIUS: Mr. President, I am very interested in the basic question, because if workers were obtained from foreign countries in excess numbers and if, therefore, there was no necessity for the State to have them, it is of the greatest importance from the point of view of international law in considering the question as to whether labor can be recruited. That is what I wish to clarify.

I have two more questions, and perhaps I may put them now.

THE PRESIDENT: Yes, you can put two more questions, but not on those details.

DR. SERVATIUS: No, they are questions on other points.

Witness, you have stated that your attempt to subordinate Sauckel to yourself failed. Did you not achieve that subordination in practice by the fact that on the intermediate level Sauckel’s Gau labor exchanges would have to do what your armament commissions ordered?

SPEER: No. That is a matter into which I shall have to go in greater detail. If you want an explanation...

DR. SERVATIUS: But you have said “no”...

SPEER: Yes. But these are entirely new conceptions which should first be explained to the Court, but if “no” is sufficient for you...

DR. SERVATIUS: There is no need for any lengthy statement, because if you clearly say “no,” the matter is settled.

Witness, one last question. You said that Sauckel decided the question of distributing labor within his working staff.

SPEER: Yes.

DR. SERVATIUS: He himself says that the Führer made certain decisions. Must not one differentiate between the wholesale demands for a program where it is a problem of the distribution of labor over a lengthy period, and the distribution which was effected currently according to the progress of the program?

SPEER: According to my recollection, and also from having read the records I received of the Führer conferences, there are two phases to be distinguished. The first one ended in October 1942, during which there were frequent joint conferences with Sauckel, which I attended. During these conferences the distribution of labor for the next months was discussed in detail. After that time there were no longer any conferences with Hitler, which went into detail, at which I was present. I only know of the conferences of January 1944, and then there was another conference in April or May 1944 which has not yet been mentioned here. During those conferences there was only a general discussion, and the distribution was then carried out in accordance with the directives, as Sauckel says.

DR. SERVATIUS: But that is just what I am asking you. These were lump demands referring to a program, and the basic decision was made that 2 million workers were to be obtained from foreign countries; the subsequent distribution was carried out by Sauckel.

SPEER: Yes, that is right, and I can confirm Sauckel’s testimony that his orders concerning the occupied territories always came from Hitler, since he needed Hitler’s authority to assert himself in occupied territory.

DR. SERVATIUS: In that case, Mr. President, I have no further questions.

THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn.

[_The Tribunal adjourned until 21 June 1946 at 1000 hours._]

ONE HUNDRED AND SIXTIETH DAY
Friday, 21 June 1946

_Morning Session_

[_The Defendant Speer resumed the stand._]

THE PRESIDENT: Have you finished, Dr. Servatius?

DR. SERVATIUS: Yes.

THE PRESIDENT: Very well. Do any other defendants’ counsel want to ask any questions?

PROFESSOR DR. HERBERT KRAUS (Counsel for Defendant Schacht): Witness, on 25 January 1946 you handed two statements to my client here in the prison at Nuremberg. During his examination Dr. Schacht made brief mention of these, and for the sake of brevity I should like the Tribunal to allow me to read out the statement which the defendant gave me that day so that its truth may be confirmed. It is very brief. The first statement reads as follows:

“I was on the terrace of the Berghof on the Obersalzberg waiting
to submit my building plans”—this was in the summer of
1937—“when Schacht appeared at the Berghof. From where I was on
the terrace I could hear a loud argument between Hitler and
Schacht in Hitler’s room. Hitler’s voice grew louder and louder.
At the end of the discussion Hitler came out on the terrace and,
visibly excited, he told the people about him that he could not
collaborate with Schacht, that he had had a terrible argument
with him, and that Schacht was going to upset his plans with his
finance methods.”

Now, that is the first statement. Is it correct?

SPEER: Yes, it is.

DR. KRAUS: It is correct. The second statement deals with the events after 20 July. It reads as follows:

“It was on or about 22 July that Hitler said in my presence to a
fairly large group of people....”

THE PRESIDENT: What year?

DR. KRAUS: 1944, Your Lordship.

“....that Schacht, as one of the opponents of the authoritarian
system, should be one of those to be arrested. Hitler went on to
speak harshly of Schacht’s activities and of the difficulties
which he, Hitler, had experienced through Schacht’s economic
policy as regards rearmament. He said that actually a man like
Schacht should be shot for his oppositional activity before the
war.”

The last sentence of the statement says:

“After the harshness of these remarks, I was surprised to meet
Schacht here alive.”

Is this statement correct, too?

SPEER: Yes, it is.

DR. KRAUS: Thank you.

THE PRESIDENT: Do any of the other defendants’ counsel want to ask questions?

Then, do the Prosecution wish to cross-examine?

MR. JUSTICE ROBERT H. JACKSON (Chief of Counsel for the United States): Defendant, your counsel divided your examination into two parts which he described first as your personal responsibilities, and secondly as the political part of the case, and I will follow the same division.

You have stated a good many of the matters for which you were not responsible, and I want to make clear just what your sphere of responsibility was.

You were not only a member of the Nazi Party after 1932, but you held high rank in the Party, did you not?

SPEER: Correct.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And what was the position which you held in the Party?

SPEER: I have already mentioned that during my pre-trial interrogations. Temporarily in 1934 I became a department head in the German Labor Front and dealt with the improvement of labor conditions in German factories. Then I was in charge of public works on the staff of Hess. I gave up both these activities in 1941. Notes of the conference I had with Hitler about this are available. After 8 February 1942 I automatically became Todt’s successor in the central office for technical matters in the Reichsleitung of the NSDAP.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And what was your official title?

SPEER: Party titles had just been introduced, and they were so complicated that I cannot tell you at the moment what they were. But the work I did there was that of a department chief in the Reichsleitung of the NSDAP. My title was Hauptdienstleiter or something of the kind.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In the 1943 directory it would appear that you were head of the “Hauptamt für Technik.”

SPEER: Yes.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And your rank appears to be “Oberbefehlsleiter”?

SPEER: Yes, that is quite possible.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Which as I understand corresponds roughly to a lieutenant general in the army?

SPEER: Well, compared to the other tasks I had it was very little.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you attended Party functions from time to time and were informed in a general way as to the Party program, were you not?

SPEER: Before 1942 I joined in the various Party rallies here in Nuremberg because I had to take part in them as an architect, and of course besides this I was generally present at official Party meetings or Reichstag sessions.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you heard discussed, and were generally familiar with, the program of the Nazi Party in its broad outlines, were you not?

SPEER: Of course.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You—there is some question as to just what your relation to the SS was. Will you tell me whether you were a member of the SS?

SPEER: No, I was not a member of the SS.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You filled out an application at one time, or one was filled out for you, and you never went through with it, I believe, or something of that sort.

SPEER: That was in 1943 when Himmler wanted me to get a high rank in the SS. He had often wanted it before when I was still an architect. I got out of it by saying that I was willing to be an ordinary SS man under him because I had already been an SS man before. Thereupon, Gruppenführer Wolff provisionally filled out an application form and wanted to know what my previous SS activities had been in 1932. It came up during his inquiries that in those days I was never registered as a member of the SS, and because of this they did not insist on my joining as I did not want to become a new member now.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And why did you not want to be a member of the SS, which was after all one of the important Party formations?

SPEER: No, I became well known for turning down all these honorary ranks. I did not want them because I felt that one should only hold a rank where one had responsibility.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you did not want any responsibility in the SS?

SPEER: I had too little contact with the SS, and did not want any responsibility in that connection.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now there has been some testimony about your relation to concentration camps, and, as I understand it, you have said to us that you did use and encourage the use of forced labor from the concentration camps.

SPEER: Yes, we did use it in the German armament industry.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And I think you also recommended that persons in labor camps who were slackers be sent to the concentration camps, did you not?

SPEER: That was the question of the so-called “Bummelanten,” and by that name we meant workers who did not get to their work on time or who pretended to be ill. Severe measures were taken against such workers during the war, and I approved of these measures.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In fact, in the 30 October 1942 meeting of the Central Planning Board you brought the subject up in the following terms, did you not—quoting Speer:

“We must also discuss the slackers. Ley has ascertained that the
sick list decreases to one-fourth or one-fifth in factories
where doctors are on the staff who examine the sick men. There
is nothing to be said against SS and Police taking drastic steps
and putting those known to be slackers into concentration camp
factories. There is no alternative. Let it happen several times,
and the news will soon get around.”

That was your recommendation?

SPEER: Correct.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In other words, the workmen stood in considerable terror of concentration camps, and you wanted to take advantage of that to keep them at their work, did you not?

SPEER: It is certain that concentration camps had a bad reputation with us, and the transfer to a concentration camp, or threat of such a possibility, was bound to reduce the number of absentees in the factories right from the beginning. But at that meeting, as I already said yesterday, there was nothing further said about it. It was one of the many remarks one can make in wartime when one is upset.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: However, it is very clear—and if I misinterpret you I give you the chance to correct me—that you understood the very bad reputation that the concentration camps had among the workmen and that the concentration camps were regarded as being much more severe than the labor camps as places to be in.

SPEER: That is correct. I knew that. I did not know, of course, what I have heard during this Trial, but the other thing was a generally known fact.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, it was known throughout Germany, was it not, that the concentration camps were pretty tough places to be put?

SPEER: Yes, but not to the extent which has been revealed in this Trial.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And the bad reputation of the concentration camp, as a matter of fact, was a part of its usefulness in making people fearful of being sent there, was it not?

SPEER: No doubt concentration camps were a means, a menace used to keep order.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And to keep people at work?

SPEER: I would not like to put it in that way. I assert that a great number of the foreign workers in our country did their work quite voluntarily once they had come to Germany.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, we will take that up later. You used the concentration camp labor in production to the extent that you were required to divide the proceeds of the labor with Himmler, did you not?

SPEER: That I did not understand.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, you made an agreement finally with Himmler that he should have 5 percent, or roughly 5 percent, of the production of the concentration camp labor while you would get for your work 95 percent?

SPEER: No, that is not quite true.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, tell me how it was. That is what the documents indicate, if I read them aright.

SPEER: Yes, it is put that way in the Führer minutes, but I should like to explain the meaning to you. Himmler, as I said yesterday, wanted to build factories of his own in his concentration camps. Then he would have been able to produce arms without any outside control, which Hitler, of course, knew. The 5 percent arms production which was to have been handed to Himmler was to a certain extent a compensation for the fact that he himself gave up the idea of building factories in the camps. From the psychological point of view it was not so simple for me to get Himmler to give up this idea when he kept on reminding Hitler of it. I was hoping that he would be satisfied with the 5 percent arms production we were going to give him. Actually this 5 percent was never handed over. We managed things quietly with the Operations Staff of the OKW and with General Buhle, so that he never got the arms at all.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, I am not criticizing the bargain, you understand. I don’t doubt you did very well to get 95 percent, but the point is that Himmler was using, with your knowledge, concentration camp labor to manufacture arms, or was proposing to do so, and you wanted to keep that production within your control?

SPEER: Could the translation come through a bit clearer? Would you please repeat that?

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You knew at this time that Himmler was using concentration camp labor to carry on independent industry and that he proposed to go into the armament industry in order to have a source of supply of arms for his own SS?

SPEER: Yes.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You also knew the policy of the Nazi Party and the policy of the Government towards the Jews, did you not?

SPEER: I knew that the National Socialist Party was anti-Semitic, and I knew that the Jews were being evacuated from Germany.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In fact, you participated in that evacuation, did you not?

SPEER: No.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, I gather that impression from Document L-156, Exhibit RF-1522, a letter from the Plenipotentiary for the Allocation of Labor which is dated 26 March 1943, which you have no doubt seen. You may see it again, if you wish. In which he says...

SPEER: I know it.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: “At the end of February, the Reichsführer
SS, in agreement with myself and the Reich Minister for
armaments and munitions, for reasons of state security, has
removed from their places of work all Jews who were still
working freely and not in camps, and either transferred them to
a labor corps or collected them for removal.”

Was that a correct representation of your activity?

SPEER: No.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Will you tell me what part you had in that? There is no question that they were put into labor corps or collected for removal, is there?

SPEER: That is correct.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now you say you did not do it, so will you tell me who did?

SPEER: It was a fairly long business. When, in February 1942, I took over my new office, the Party was already insisting that Jews who were still working in armament factories should be removed from them. I objected at the time, and managed to get Bormann to issue a circular letter to the effect that these Jews might go on being employed in armament factories and that Party offices were prohibited from accusing the heads of these firms on political grounds because of the Jews working there. It was the Gauleiter who made such political accusations against the heads of concerns, and it was mostly in the Gau Saxony and in the Gau Berlin. So after this the Jews could remain in these plants.

Without having any authority to do so, I had had this circular letter from the Party published in my news sheet to heads of factories and had sent it to all concerned, so that I would in any case receive their complaints if the Party should not obey the instruction. After that the problem was left alone, until September or October of 1942. At that time a conference with Hitler took place, at which Sauckel also was present. At this conference Hitler insisted emphatically that the Jews must now be removed from the armament firms, and he gave orders for this to be done—this will be seen from a Führer protocol which has been preserved. In spite of this we managed to keep the Jews on in factories and it was only in March 1943, as this letter shows, that resistance gave way and the Jews finally did have to get out.

I must point out to you that, as far as I can remember, it was not yet a question of the Jewish problem as a whole, but in the years 1941 and 1942 Jews had gone to the armament factories to do important war work and have an occupation of military importance; they were able to escape the evacuation which at that time was already in full swing. They were mostly occupied in the electrical industry, and Geheimrat Bücher, of the electrical industry—that is AEG and Siemens—no doubt lent a helping hand in order to get the Jews taken on there in greater numbers. These Jews were completely free and their families were still in their homes.

The letter by Gauleiter Sauckel you have before you was not, of course, submitted to me; and Sauckel says that he himself had not seen it. But it is certainly true that I knew about it before action was taken; I knew because the question had to be discussed as to how one should get replacements. It is equally certain, though, that I also protested at the time at having skilled labor removed from my armament industries because, apart from other reasons, it was going to make things difficult for me.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: That is exactly the point that I want to emphasize. As I understand it, you were struggling to get manpower enough to produce the armaments to win a war for Germany.

SPEER: Yes.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And this anti-Semitic campaign was so strong that it took trained technicians away from you and disabled you from performing your functions. Now, isn’t that the fact?

SPEER: I did not understand the meaning of your question.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Your problem of creating armaments to win the war for Germany was made very much more difficult by this anti-Jewish campaign which was being waged by others of your codefendants.

SPEER: That is a certainty; and it is equally clear that if the Jews who were evacuated had been allowed to work for me, it would have been a considerable advantage to me.

THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Justice Jackson, has it been proved who signed that document, L-156? It has got a signature apparently on it.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: There is a signature on it, I believe the plenipotentiary general for the employment of labor is my thought on it. We will look at that.

THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps the defendant could tell what the signature is.

[_The document was shown to the defendant._]

SPEER: I do not know the man. Yes, he must be one of the smaller officials in the offices of the Plenipotentiary for Labor, because I knew all the immediate associates of Sauckel personally—no; I beg your pardon, the document comes from the Regierungspräsident in Koblenz, as I see here. Then it is an assistant in the Government District of Koblenz, whom of course I did not know.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In any event, there is no question about the statement as you have explained it?

SPEER: No.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Now I want to ask you about the recruiting of forced labor. As I understand it, you know about the deportation of 100,000 Jews from Hungary for subterranean airplane factories, and you told us in your interrogation of 18 October 1945 that you made no objection to it. That is true, is it not?

SPEER: That is true, yes.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you told us also, quite candidly, on that day that it was no secret to you that a good deal of the manpower brought in by Sauckel was brought in by illegal methods. That is also true, is it not?

SPEER: I took great care at the time to notice what expression the interrogating officer used; he used the expression “they came against their wish”; and that I confirmed.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Did you not say that it was no secret to you that they were brought in an illegal manner? Didn’t you add that yourself?

SPEER: No, no. That was certainly not so.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, in any event, you knew that at the Führer conference in August of 1942 the Führer had approved of all coercive measures for obtaining labor if they couldn’t be obtained on a voluntary basis, and you knew that that program was carried out. You, as a matter of fact, you did not give any particular attention to the legal side of this thing, did you? You were after manpower; isn’t that the fact?

SPEER: That is absolutely correct.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And whether it was legal or illegal was not your worry?

SPEER: I consider that in view of the whole war situation and of our views in general on this question it was justified.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Yes, it was in accordance with the policy of the Government, and that was as far as you inquired at the time, was it not?

SPEER: Yes. I am of the opinion that at the time I took over my office, in February 1942, all the violations of international law, which later—which are now brought up against me, had already been committed.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: And you don’t question that you share a certain responsibility for that program for bringing in—whether it is a legal responsibility or not, in fact—for bringing in this labor against its will? You don’t deny that, do you?

SPEER: The workers were brought to Germany largely against their will, and I had no objection to their being brought to Germany against their will. On the contrary, during the first period, until the autumn of 1942, I certainly also took some pains to see that as many workers as possible should be brought to Germany in this manner.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: You had some participation in the distribution of this labor, did you not, as among different plants, different industries, that were competing for labor?

SPEER: No. That would have to be explained in more detail—I do not quite understand it like that.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, you finally entered into an agreement with Sauckel, did you not, in reference to the distribution of the labor after it reached the Reich?

SPEER: That was arranged according to the so-called priority grades. I had to tell Sauckel, of course, in which of my programs labor was needed most urgently. But that sort of thing was dealt with by general instructions.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In other words, you established the priorities of different industries in their claim for the labor when it came into the Reich?

SPEER: That was a matter of course; naturally that had to be done.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Yes. Now, as to the employment of prisoners of war, you—whatever disagreement there may be about the exact figures, there is no question, is there, that prisoners of war were used in the manufacture of armament?

SPEER: No, only Russian prisoners of war and Italian military internees were used for the production of arms. As for the use of French and other prisoners of war in this production I had several conferences with Keitel on the subject. And I must tell you that Keitel always adopted the view that these prisoners of war could not be used in violation of the Geneva Prisoner of War Convention. I can claim that on the strength of this fact I no longer used my influence to see that these prisoners of war should be used in armament industries in violation of the Geneva Convention. The conception, of course, “production of arms” is very much open to argument. It always depends on what position one takes, whether you have a wide conception of “armaments” or a narrow one.

MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Well, you succeeded to Dr. Todt’s organization, and you had all the powers that he had, did you not?

SPEER: Yes.