Chapter VIII: Part I: , p. 1457.) Moreover, there is no proof that any of the (5)

The fact that the defendant Karl Brandt was the only member of the SS who at the same time retained his position as a medical officer in the army shows that his honorary rank in the SS was really only a formality, and that he was no true member of this organization.

When the defendant Karl Brandt testified here that he wore the uniform of the SS with pride, this only shows that he, like the majority of the SS men, knew nothing about the criminal aims. In judging the organization of the SS, the International Military Tribunal was aware only of a small part of the whole, looking, so to speak, through a keyhole into a dark corner.

Nor could the defendant Karl Brandt have any personal knowledge of Himmler’s secrets, for Himmler rejected him personally, as is shown by a number of affidavits. Since the defendant Karl Brandt could not obtain information even in his own sphere of medicine, how is he to have obtained knowledge of other matters?

I do not want to repeat the affidavits which give information about the basic attitude of the defendant Karl Brandt and show that he adopted an attitude which was incompatible with the mentality supposed to be typical of the SS. In this connection I merely refer to the statements made by Pastor Bodelschwingh, Dr. Gerstenmaier, Meyer-Bockhoff, Philipp Prince of Hesse, and others.

If I, as the defense counsel, consider Karl Brandt’s conduct as a whole and see the wounds he has received in the struggle of life, I must acknowledge that he is a man and not a criminal.

For the Tribunal’s decision, however, the only conclusive fact is that the defendant Karl Brandt did not disturb the circle of international law, for he committed no war crimes and consequently no crimes against humanity. I, therefore, ask that defendant Karl Brandt be acquitted.

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[31] Final plea is recorded in mimeographed transcript, 14 July 47, pp. 10797-10817.

[32] United States _vs._ Friedrich Flick et al. See vol. VI.

XI. FINAL STATEMENTS OF THE DEFENDANTS,
19 JULY 1947

A. Final Statement of Defendant Karl Brandt[33]

There is a word which seems so simple—order; and how colossal are its implications. How immeasurable are the conflicts which hide behind the word obey. Both affected me, obey and order, and both imply responsibility. I am a doctor and on my conscience lies the responsibility of being responsible for men and for life. Quite dispassionately the prosecution has brought the charge of crime and murder and they have raised the question of my guilt. It would have no weight if friends and patients were to shield me and speak well of me, saying I had helped and I had healed. There would be many examples of my actions during danger and my readiness to help. All that is now useless. As far as I am concerned I shall not evade these charges. But the attempt to vindicate myself as a man is my duty towards all who believe in me personally, who trusted in me and who relied upon me as a man as well as a doctor and a superior.

No matter how I was faced with the problem, I have never regarded human experiments as a matter of course, not even when no danger was entailed. But I affirm the necessity for them on grounds of reason. I know that opposition will arise. I know things that disturb the conscience of a medical man, and I know the inner distress that afflicts one when ethics of every form are decided by an order or obedience.

It is immaterial for the experiment whether it is done with or against the will of the person concerned. For the individual the event seems senseless, just as senseless as my actions as a doctor seem when isolated. The sense lies much deeper than that. Can I, as an individual, detach myself from the community? Can I remain outside and do without it? Could I, as a part of this community, evade it by saying I want to live in this community, but I don’t want to make any sacrifices for it, either of body or soul? I want to keep a clear conscience. Let them see how they can get along. And yet we, that community and I, are somehow identical.

Thus I must suffer these contradictions and bear the consequences, even if they remain incomprehensible. I must bear them as my lot in life, which allocates to me its tasks. The meaning is the motive—devotion to the community. If on its account I am guilty, then on its account I will be answerable.

There was war. In war, efforts are all alike. Its sacrifices affect us all. They were incumbent upon me. But are those sacrifices my crime? Did I tread on the precepts of humanity and despise them? Did I pass over human beings and their lives as if they were nothing? Men will point at me and cry “euthanasia”, and falsely, “the useless”, “the incapable”, “the worthless”. But what actually happened? Did not Pastor Bodelschwingh, in the middle of his work at Bethel last year, say that I was an idealist and not a criminal? How could he say that?

Here I am, subject of the most frightful charges, as if I had not only been a doctor, but also a man without heart or conscience. Do you think that it was a pleasure to me to receive the order to permit euthanasia? For 15 years I had toiled at the sickbed and every patient was to me like a brother. I worried about every sick child as if it had been my own. My personal lot was a heavy one. Is that guilt?

Was it not my first thought to limit the scope of euthanasia? Did I not, the moment I was included, try to find a limit and demand a most searching report on the incurables? Were not the appointed professors of the universities there? Who could there be who was better qualified? But I do not want to speak of these questions and of their execution. I am defending myself against the charge of inhuman conduct and base intentions. In the face of these charges I fight for my right to humane treatment! I know how complicated this problem is. With the utmost fervor I have tortured myself again and again, but no philosophy or other wisdom helped me here. There was the decree and on it there was my name. It is no good saying that I could have feigned sickness. I do not live this life of mine in order to evade fate if I meet it. And thus I assented to euthanasia. I fully realize the problem; it is as old as mankind, but it is not a crime against man nor against humanity. It is pity for the incurable, literally. Here I cannot believe like a clergyman or think as a jurist. I am a doctor and I see the law of nature as being the law of reason. In my heart there is love of mankind, and so it is in my conscience. That is why I am a doctor!

When I talked at the time to Pastor Bodelschwingh, the only serious admonisher I knew personally, it seemed at first as if our thoughts were far apart; but the longer we talked and the more we came into the open, the closer and the greater became our mutual understanding. At that time we were not concerned with words. It was a struggle and a search far beyond the human sphere. When the old Pastor Bodelschwingh left me after many hours and we shook hands, his last words were: “That was the hardest struggle of my life.” For him as well as for me that struggle remained; and the problem remained too.

If I were to say today that I wish this problem had never come upon me with its convulsive drama, that would be nothing but superficiality in order to make me feel more comfortable in myself. But I am living in these times and I see that they are full of antitheses. Somewhere we all must make a stand. I am fully conscious that when I said “Yes” to euthanasia I did so with the deepest conviction, just as it is my conviction today, that it was right. Death can mean deliverance. Death is life—just as much as birth. It was never meant to be murder. I bear a burden, but it is not the burden of crime. I bear this burden of mine, though with a heavy heart, as my responsibility. I stand before it, and before my conscience, as a man and as a doctor.

B. Final Statement of Defendant Handloser[34]

During my first interrogations here in Nuernberg, in August 1946, the interrogator declared to me:

First, you have been the Chief of the Army Medical Service. Whether or not you knew of inadmissible experiments does not matter here. As the Chief, you are responsible for everything.

Secondly, do not make the excuse that among other nations the same or similar things have happened. We are not concerned with that here. The Germans are under indictment, not the others.

Thirdly, do not appeal to your witnesses. They, of course, will testify in your favor. We have our witnesses, and we rely upon them.

Those were the guiding principles of the prosecution up to the last day of these proceedings. They have remained incomprehensible to me, because I always believed a criminal to be a man who did wrong, and because I was of the opinion that even the prosecution endeavored to be objective, at least after the end of the presentation of evidence. The final plea by the prosecution, however, has shown me that I made a mistake. The speech by the prosecution did not take into account the material submitted in evidence, but it was a summarized repetition of one-sided statements by the prosecution without taking into account that which was submitted in the course of the presentation of evidence in my case.

I am quite convinced that the high Tribunal has gained a true impression of my activity and of my attitude. Just as I have tried throughout my entire life to fulfill the tasks allotted to me by fate according to the best of my capacity and in the full knowledge of my responsibility, so have I also tried to stand this most serious task before this Court with the aid of the strongest weapon which I possess—that is the truth.

If there is anything which could console me for the mental suffering of the last months, it is the consciousness of knowing that before this Court, before the German people, and before the people of the world, it has been made clear that the serious general charges of the prosecution against the Medical Corps of the German Armed Forces have been proved to be without any foundation.

It can be seen how unjust these charges were by the fact that no charges have been raised or any proceedings initiated against a single leading doctor of the German Armed Forces in combat or at home. As the last Medical Inspector of the Army, and as Chief of the Medical Service of the Armed Forces of Germany, I think with pride of all the medical officers to whose untiring devotion countless wounded and sick patients of this dreadful war owe their lives and cure and their possibilities of existence. Never and nowhere were the losses of an army medical corps greater than those among the medical officers of the German Armed Forces in carrying out their duties.

More than 150 years ago, the motto and guiding principle created for German military doctors and their successors was “Scientiae, Humanitati, Patriae” (For Science, Humanity, and Fatherland). Like the medical officers in their entirety I also have remained true to that guiding principle in thought and in deed. Realizing the outcome of the events of these recent times, may the joint endeavors of all the nations succeed in avoiding in future the immeasurable misfortune of war, the dreadful side of which nobody knows better than the military doctor.

C. Final Statement of Defendant Rostock[35]

I have nothing to add to the pertinent statements by my defense counsel, Dr. Pribilla, regarding the individual points of the indictment in this trial; but with regard to the general position of German medical science during this war, there are a few words, which I would like to say from this dock.

During my direct examination I have already stated why I, as the Chief of the so-called “Science and Research” department undertook to work for medical science as late as 1943 and 1944. At that time the problem was to avoid, or at least to minimize, the great and acute danger of teaching and research, and with that Germany’s universities, becoming completely destroyed. When this had been prevented at the very last moment, there arose the task and the duty of improving the means and the possibilities of basic research which had been more and more restricted in the course of the war, and through dwindling resources research in Germany would have come to a standstill. Due to the chaotic development of the last year of the war, success was comparatively small. There were, however, some results and there were a few things which were saved after the end of the war.

Today through the evidence produced in this trial, I know the reasons which paralyzed the work at the time. It was the striving for power on the part of certain organizations which used the effective support of certain executive departments of the Third Reich who held unrestricted power. It was the principle of totalitarianism which these organizations followed particularly in the case of what they called the “university science”. It was there, however, that we had founded the tradition of German science recognized the world over. In contrast to that, their aim, as shown in some of the testimonies given in this trial and some of the documents submitted, was to found a “politically directed science” of their own. That was the reason why my personal efforts and those of the health and medical services, which I have referred to in this trial, did not achieve complete success. Today, at the end of this trial, that is now clear to me. At that time, in the year 1944, we did not know of this masterly camouflaged and, therefore, so very dangerous opponent to that branch of science with which I myself had grown up.

Throughout my life I have never worked for one form of a state or another, or for any political party in Germany, but simply and solely for my patients and for medical science.

D. Final Statement of Defendant Schroeder[36]

It is very difficult for a defendant to find the right final words here. In methodical, detailed work throughout the last months, the defense has tried to rebut the charges of the prosecution.

When now the prosecution states in its final plea that details do not matter so much, but that the entire complex of questions has to be considered as a whole, that one has to look at matters as at a bundle of sticks, not as individual branches and twigs of the bundle. If, furthermore, the prosecution refers to a sentence pronounced in the Far East by an American Military Court, by which a Japanese general and military commander was sentenced only because, as a commander, he bore the responsibility for all the acts of his troops, regardless of whether he ordered them, knew of them, approved of them, or did not even know of them—if, gentlemen of the Tribunal, these principles are decisive for proceedings, then I have to ask, why bother at all to start proceedings of that kind, to prepare them, and to carry them out? Those decisions could be made much more quickly.

What can I, as a defendant, bring against these arguments? That can be said in a few words: myself, my work, my acts as a doctor and a soldier in 35 years of service. Not the craving for glory and honor was the purport of my life’s work, but the firm intention to put my entire capacity, my full knowledge, into the service of my beloved Fatherland; to help the soldier, as a physician, to heal the wounds caused by wartime and peacetime service, both as a physician for the individual, as well as a medical officer for the mass of troops which were in my care.

That was the aim and object of my work. I do not believe that I have deviated from that path. My eyes always looked towards the final goal: to help and to heal.

E. Final Statement of Defendant Genzken[37]

During my testimony I stated before the Tribunal that I took no part in the types of experiments of which I am accused. I have nothing to add to what my defense counsel Dr. Merkel has said. I have striven to lead a decent life as a doctor and as a soldier. If my fatherly concern for my 2,500 doctors and 30,000 men of the Medical Service of the Waffen SS was mentioned here in this courtroom, it is nevertheless my duty to speak from this place on behalf of those men who, in the majority, were decent and brave doctors and medical attendants. I am proud to have been their leader, a leader of those who sacrificed their lives and blood with unceasing fervor to help me in building up the organization of the Medical Service of the Waffen SS, and to overcome the tremendous losses among the ranks of our comrades at the front.

The soldiers of the Waffen SS have proved to history—in the focal points of uncounted battles during an uneven struggle—that they could rank among the finest troops on this earth as far as training, efficiency, readiness of sacrifice, soldierly valor, and contempt of death were concerned. Actions of modern warfare have presented to some extent a picture of murder and horror on both sides. Who dares to raise his head before God and gainsay that?

The men of the Waffen SS went as vanquished into captivity, out of unimaginable physical and mental war distress. That captivity was not free of bloodshed, ill-treatment and degradation of various kinds. To the men of the Waffen SS there was added to the weight of such captivity the frightful realization of the fact that their supreme commander, Himmler, had misused their cloak of honor and deceived them, that they had been cheated and then deserted by him. These decent men of the front Waffen SS certainly did not deserve that fate, the fate of being branded as members of a criminal organization.

My request and my wish is that our former opponents should realize the honest idealism of these victims, do justice to it, and give them back belief in justice.

F. Final Statement of Defendant Gebhardt[38]

I wish to thank the high Tribunal for having granted me an opportunity, in the witness box, to describe my personal position in 1942 in such detail.

The historical situation at that time placed me in a totalitarian state which, in turn, placed itself between the individual and the universe. Virtues in the service of the state were paramount virtues. Beyond that I do not know anywhere where the intellect was not debased as a tool for war. Everywhere, in some way values and solutions were put into the service of the war. And here again, in the intellectual field, the first step is the decisive one. I may be permitted to recall that in the war of nerves, it was propaganda with and for “medical preparations” which caused the first step, the order to examine the question of sulfanilamides.

In my final statement today may I be permitted to describe my entire attitude. In doing so, I may perhaps utilize the most important of the four American freedoms, that is to say the freedom of speech, until the very end in such a way that I will refrain from any denunciation or from incriminating others.

Without exaggerating the importance of my own person, a physician can only be measured according to his conception of medical science. Basically, I was neither a cold technical specialist nor a pure scientist. I believe that I have always tried, for example when carrying out surgical experiments, to see every disease as a human condition of suffering. I did not look on my task as something to serve my own advantage, or as a cheap gesture of theoretical pity, but as a personal active support to the trembling existence of the suffering patient. My goal as a physician was not so much purely technical therapy for the individual patient, as therapeutical care for the particularly underprivileged group of the poor, the children, the cripples, the neurotics.

I am anxious that it should be believed that it was not due to moral baseness nor to the selfish arrogance of the scientist that I came into contact with experiments on human beings. On the contrary, during the entire period in question I had experiments in my field of research carried out on animals. It was only because I was the competent responsible surgical expert that I was informed about the imminent experiments on human beings in my field of surgery, which had been ordered by the state authorities. After the order had been given, it was no longer a question of stopping these experiments, but the problem was the method of their execution.

My problems as an expert consisted of the following: For one, the experiments that had been ordered had to be of practical scientific value, for the purpose of testing immunization to protect thousands of injured and sick. On the other hand, I considered humane safety measures for the experimental subjects most important. The main point for me was never the purpose and the object of the experiments, but the manner in which they were carried out. To realize that in a humane way I did not remain aloof and restrict myself to theoretical instruction in the field of surgery, but I myself took part, with my clinic and with all its safety measures.

I hope that this will show that in carrying out experiments I tried with the best of intentions to act primarily in the interest of the experimental subjects. We did not take advantage of the unlimited opportunities given us by Himmler, that is to say, the surgical experiments were not followed by others. I believe that as far as was possible at that chaotic period I fulfilled my duty as an expert, because these experiments did not increase in the field of surgery in spite of the crescendo of the catastrophic policy. My desire was to help and not to give a bad example.

In seeing my responsibility in this way I, of course, made a decision for myself. I hope that hitherto I have always faced criticism, even from foreign countries, without any secrecy, but also without any feeling of guilt for my activities as an expert.

Through these activities, however, as a military physician, not through my own initiative, I was brought into contact with concentration camps. I can understand how heavily that deadly shadow must lie upon anyone who was ever active there. In the ghostly phenomenon of that sphere, which at that time was unknown to me as well, we can now in retrospect begin to realize the frightfulness of the negative ideology of extermination becoming combined secretly with the negative selection of the guards. Only from the documents of the international trial have we been able to see definitely that of the 35,000 guard troops, only 6,000 were SS men who were unfit for combat. The rest were scum, conscripts, foreigners, etc., who with the greatest injustice and to our bitter shame were given the same Waffen SS uniform as we wore at the front. As head of a well-known clinic, known for its measures of safety, in the interest of the experimental subjects, within the framework of my duty as an expert as I saw it, I got in touch with concentration camp doctors. As far as it was at all possible I tried to exclude that atmosphere from my sphere of work. That my counter-actions went beyond purely clinical safety measures for the experimental subjects may, I think, be seen from the following fact: Of the several thousand foreign inmates of this concentration camp—among whom, as we were told here, there were at least seven hundred Polish women—only 200 were turned over to the Red Cross at the end of the war. Of these two-hundred, however, sixty were my experimental subjects, as was proved.

Just as I have tried to clarify my actions as a doctor and to explain my good intentions and possibilities for influence, so my final thought should be devoted to self-criticism, above all as regards on my moral obligation.

In a parody on the words of Heinrich Heine we see today that: “Just to have been an SS man is fate in itself”. Although I believe and hope that in that terrible confusion between the decent Waffen SS and the executive organization, I did my duty as a specialist, an officer, and a human being, I still feel bound to make every form of reparation for this confusion. My possibilities for doing that of course are limited.

Without seeking sensation I offered to undergo an experiment on myself as proved, and that without any surgical safety measures, as soon as the first opportunity arose. My responsibility for the execution of the experiments carried out with good intention, and especially for those who were my subordinates, I have emphasized. I have a further criticism and responsibility, which I spoke of not only now in the dim light of my own defense but already in May 1945 on the day when Himmler released us from our oath and from our orders, and he himself left his post without reserve. It was my endeavor with others to prevent any illegal continuation of an SS conception, and for that purpose to take the burden off the shoulders of our credulous youth by making the SS generals responsible.

Today as a private individual I can only repeat what I am ready to do, at least as far as my former professional standing is concerned.

Where, in spite of my earnest endeavors, reproach and guilt seem to cloud the picture in the sphere for which I was responsible, may the consequences affect me in such a way that I may make the path easier for the younger men who, believing in me, also joined the SS as surgeons. I believe that this pile of rubble, Germany, with its wasted biological material, cannot afford to let these fine young doctors perish in camps and in other inactivity. Also I know every measure which would make the work easier for the old German universities and their respected teachers.

I have summarized my point of view in order to help avoid possible mistakes. From unwholesome social conditions it is a pathological and deceptive escape, then as well as today—here and everywhere, to unite and combine spiritual with economic and political concepts. It is a disastrous error to confuse the organized unanimity of voices with harmony. Destructive criticism only brings intolerant lack of cooperation, which interrupts all cohesion. The private as well as the public conscience cannot be subjugated to any official virtue, nor to any temporal moral principles. It can only find its place within a God-given order.

In the spirit of “earthly constructive pessimism”, as I wrote before the war, in this alone consideration for the painful reality of this social catastrophe seems to be found.

My last sentence is to express our personal gratitude to Dr. Seidl who has stood by the side of my colleagues and myself so conscientiously and with such human kindness.

G. Final Statement of Defendant Blome[39]

I have testified quite openly before this high Tribunal that particularly up to the outbreak of war I was a confirmed National Socialist and follower. I have also explained why I became a Party member in 1931, and that because political conditions in Germany at the time were moving with giant strides towards a final conflict between Communism and National Socialism, as a result of the economic chaos and the impotence of the German governments after 1919. I have said that I joined the National Socialist Party because I rejected the dictatorial form of the Communist system. In my book “The Doctor in the Struggle”, which was put to me by the prosecution here in cross-examination, I also explained why I went over to National Socialism. This book, however, which was published in 1941, at the time of Germany’s greatest victories, clearly shows my repudiation of the Second World War, to which I do not refer with a single word, not even a hint, although my experience in the First World War takes up considerable space in this book.

After the First World War, Germany was in great difficulties. The situation became progressively worse and more unbearable, when at the turn of the thirties the economic crisis spread throughout the world and even seized hold of the United States. At that time I realized that in such hard times a nation which is drifting toward despair seeks a leader and follows him in blind confidence as soon as he can show great successes.

That in the case of Hitler these were only sham successes or temporary successes the German people realized only gradually, only step by step, and only at a time when it was too late to shake off the dictatorship again by their own strength. For years the German people were deceived by the leaders as to the true situation. With deliberately lying propaganda, Hitler’s governmental system until the last moment kept proclaiming final victory to the German people, even in the winter of 1944, and even in the spring of 1945, when the Reich cabinet and the Party leaders long knew that a terrible collapse was imminent. This governmental system thus irresponsibly imposed on the exhausted body of the German nation still further useless losses of life and property.

Since the collapse, particularly since the International War Crimes Trial at Nuernberg, we see clearly that this frivolous method of betrayal of their own people was a fitting part of the systematical murder of foreign peoples and races by the millions.

I believe that there is no other example in history of the boundless confidence of a people in their leader being so boundlessly misused and disappointed.

The German people were blinded in their faith in their Fuehrer, in a leader who constantly pretended to them and the world a love of peace, a humane character, a selfless care for the people. Thus the German people became the victim of a political gambler. His unrestrained supreme power apparently knew only the choice between ruling and destroying. Hitler’s ambition, as I know and judge it today, had only one aim: _At any price_ to go down in history as a great man. Hitler achieved this goal 100 percent. He went down in history as one of the greatest tyrants of all time, tremendous in his mania for ruling, tremendous in his brutality in the achievement of his ends, not hesitating even at the murder of his best friends, his oldest followers, if they were in his way.

Relying upon the blind confidence of his deceived people, Hitler created a system in which all individualism, all sentiment of freedom, all personal opinion of the citizens was nipped in the bud and turned into slavery.

He succeeded in this with the aid of a very small circle of closest associates, who had fallen under his hypnotic influence, in part perhaps themselves deceived by this man, but who became willing tools in his hand for the enslavement of the German people and the decimation of whole nations.

Under the fatal influence of a clever, deliberately lying propaganda, against which even other countries were as good as powerless, the German people and the German doctor, too, believed that they were following an honorable leader and serving a good cause; they all considered it the highest moral duty not to desert the Fatherland in times of emergency and particularly in wartime, but to do their duty to the very extreme, especially since in this war the life or death of the nation was at issue.

During the times of total warfare, the times of air raids, hunger, and the danger of epidemics, working conditions for the German doctor were terribly hard; so difficult that today one can hardly imagine what German doctors accomplished in those days for friend and foe alike. Whether we twenty doctors here in this dock are accused justly or unjustly, it is a great injustice in any case to defame German doctors in general in public, as is constantly being done. As former Deputy Reich Physicians’ Leader I know conditions in the German medical profession during the Hitler period, and I must say even today that in its _totality_ the German medical profession was efficient, decent, industrious, and humane. Their willingness to work under the most difficult conditions that one can imagine, their unselfishness to the utmost, their courage and their helpfulness were exemplary. Beyond all praise were in particular the numerous old doctors who were already living in retirement and who, in spite of their great age, returned to the service of the sick, and those innumerable women doctors who, married, and often the mothers of many children, deserted their household duties for the difficult work of medical practice during wartime.

The whole German people knew this, in whose midst and under whose eyes the German medical professions spent the years of distress and fright, and who, therefore, will continue to place unlimited confidence in German doctors.

Of myself I can say that I have always, particularly during the Hitler period, devoted all my efforts to keeping the medical profession at a high scientific and ethical level and to developing it. And I found in this effort the full support of all German doctors, including the most famous scientists and chief physicians of medical institutions. Well-known scholars throughout the world supported this work, which was _above_ [unintelligible] parties and enjoyed an international reputation.

But in the course of this trial it has become clearer to me day by day just how criminal the Hitler system was, to which I sacrificed in good faith many years of my life, and I am so deeply moved inside me that I must confess to myself: For years I held a responsible position in a system which today I must curse just as much as I curse all those who forced upon the German people such a tyranny of crime and debasement of man.

It was my mistake that I stayed in the post where fate had placed me and in which I had hoped to be able to do good for our people and my profession. It would often have been simpler to give up this post when I began to realize, step by step, the depravity of the Third Reich. If I did not do so, but stayed at my post until the bitter end, I did this because I considered it my duty, especially in the hard times of total war, and because again and again I succeeded either in protecting the medical profession from harm or in preventing crimes against humanity. Even today I would have to consider it cowardice if I had left my post in 1941 or 1942 only to bring myself to safety or to evade threatened responsibility.

I feel myself free of the guilt of ever having committed or furthered crimes against humanity.

H. Final Statement of Defendant Mrugowsky[40]

My attorney and I made every effort during my examination on the witness stand and by means of the considerable evidence which we submitted to refute the charges which have been raised against me, just as much as we tried to assist in ascertaining the truth.

The outcome of the trial and the evidence against me is in the hands of the Tribunal and the closing brief, and in the reply to comprehensive documentation of the prosecution. I am firmly confident on the basis of this trial that this high Tribunal will examine the evidence objectively and carefully. Thus in my final speech I merely would like to draw your attention to the fact that my life in its entirety was solely devoted to my profession and my science. It was my aim, not by any means to represent some political ideology, but to go to the university and to reach the position of a free and independent doctor and scientist.

The prosecution has charged us, the defendants, with destructive tendencies which were supposed to have been the causes of our actions. I know that I am free of such tendencies. They never occurred to my collaborators and myself at any time. In the Waffen SS too, the troops of which were among the bravest divisions of the German Armed Forces, such tendencies never played a part.

As far as my own concepts of the ethical duties of the doctor are concerned, they are contained in my book regarding medical ethics, and I believe always to have acted according to the principles of that book and lived according to them. My life, my actions, and my aims were clean. That is why now that at the end of this trial I can declare myself free of personal guilt.

I. Final Statement of Rudolf Brandt[41]

Now, after this trial has reached its final stage, my conscience is confronted with the question of whether I consider myself guilty or innocent. My responsibility, in my opinion, is to be tested by a threefold question:

First, did I participate in the experiments directly and
actively?

Second, did I at least have any knowledge of the criminal
character of the experiments on human beings?

Third, what, if I had known, could have been my attitude towards
Himmler?

What my basic opinion is of crimes against humanity I did not only declare myself on the witness stand but this has also been testified to by a very competent foreign witness, a Swedish medical counsellor, Felix Koersten.

Before this Tribunal and in the full knowledge of what I say I confess that I abhor—and did abhor—any crime against humanity in the years past and during my activity as a so-called personal Referent of Himmler. But I also frankly declare that perhaps during the course of these last years my way of thinking was not always in my conscious mind as it is today. But I never participated in a crime against humanity knowingly, intentionally, or with premeditation when passing on the letters, orders, etc., which Himmler issued to third persons, and the result of which was the commission of cruelties on human beings.

I am confident that from the evidence and from the content of the various defense affidavits the Tribunal will be convinced that in truth my real sphere of power did in no way correspond to the face value of my official position. My real sphere of power was extremely small. It did not exceed that of a well-paid stenographer in the office of an influential man in Germany. If the Tribunal were to start from this fact, it would approach reality much closer than the prosecution did in its indictment.

I got into contact with Himmler when I was a young, immature man who came from a family in modest circumstances. Nothing else but my ability as a stenographer, which I had obtained through my industry, was the reason for that, and this was my position until the last days of the German collapse, in spite of promotions in rank. At that time I was only too glad to get that job because it enabled me to support my parents financially.

When I started work with Himmler, I got, without intermediate stages, into an agency, the chief of which was to combine, among other functions, the highest executive powers in his hands a short time afterwards.

I am convinced that I would not sit here under a grave indictment if I had had the opportunity to continue my education, if I had made a start in a subordinate agency, and had risen little by little into a higher position. Unfortunately, I have always been a lone wolf as long as I lived, and I never was fortunate enough to have an older friend who could have corrected my political inexperience and my gullibility.

If, however, through all those years, I represented Himmler’s ideology, I did so only because I did not know the criminal part of Himmler’s character. Since I lived, so to speak, divorced from the world around me and was only devoted to my more than plentiful work, I only learned after the collapse what stupendous crimes are to be booked on Himmler’s account.

The evidence has shown that I neither knew a concentration camp nor had anything to do with concentration camps in my official capacity; nor had any influence on the system of the concentration camps, their administration and management, nor on the treatment of prisoners. For this reason I didn’t know the measure of the tragedies which were enacted there.

Those matters, into which I had sufficient insight during my restless daily activities to permit me to distinguish between good and evil, were on a plane where they need not shun the light of sun.

I do not deny that some of the documents submitted here by the prosecution went through my hands, but I do deny—and I pray the Tribunal may believe me—that I knew the contents of the documents particularly the reports and therefore the essential core of the human experiments.

I know that appearances are against me. Only these external appearances led the prosecution to indict me in this trial and to pass their comment on me during their closing speech, without penetrating to the bottom of matters. This way they arrived at a completely wrong appraisal which does not correspond to the facts and overrates my position and my activities.

These appearances which speak against me will be dispelled as soon as my real position will be considered in which I found myself as [administrative officer] so-called personal Referent of Himmler for many years. On the witness stand I testified to the truth, which has been confirmed by witnesses who knew the real facts from their own experience.

It does not run counter to experience that among thousands of incoming and outgoing items of mail—that is, hundreds of thousands during the course of the years—there should be an insignificantly small number of documents which a personal Referent on the orders of his chief, passes on to third persons without knowing their contents more closely, the more so if they concern matters which have nothing to do with the normal duties of the personal Referent.

I believe that an American tribunal will know how to appraise the foregoing, though I am rather afraid that the situation as it existed in Germany during the years before the collapse and prevailed in high government agencies will never really be brought home to American judges.

Therefore, I refuse to discuss again my position at that time and the ignorance of criminal experiments on human beings which was the consequence thereof. In this respect I agree with my defense counsel. Neither need I fear Professor Ivy’s statement who declared that even a layman must have been outraged by reading the reports of Rascher, because the fact that the layman should have read the passages of the reports wherefrom the obvious violation of human dignity is evident was, as a matter of fact, the natural prerequisite for Professor Ivy’s opinion, and that prerequisite did not exist in my case.

In accordance with the truth I repeat what I have said in the witness stand, that I had a general knowledge of experiments on human beings, I can no longer say when and on what particular opportunity I gained that knowledge. But this fact alone does not deserve death, because I never had the feeling that I had participated in such crimes by my activity in the personal Referat [administrative office].

Such a knowing participation demands that the personal Referent knows the contents and the import of Himmler’s letters, orders, etc., and passes them on in spite of this knowledge of the contents and their import. I just said that appearances are against me, but I believe I did prove that I did not possess that knowledge. I pray the Tribunal to follow the line of this evidence and, I think, this is not asking too much since the experience of everyday life speaks in my favor.

The various affidavits which I have submitted and which were the subject of excited argument have found their explanation. In some points I have erred and I have tried to correct my errors. I did not want to speak an untruth knowingly which might be detrimental or unfavorable to a third person. I ask the Tribunal not to forget that I was in a very low general condition when I signed these affidavits. Only a few months previously I weighed only forty-four kilograms; consequently my mental power was reduced to a minimum.

During my activities which stretched over many years I exclusively acted on the express orders of Himmler without ever making a decision on my own initiative. I may take it that this fact has fully been proved.

The question what attitude I should have assumed had I known the details of inhuman experiments I can only answer in a hypothetical way. Had I had an approximate knowledge, as I have it today, I would have struggled against passing on such an order by virtue of my general view on questions of humanity. Since, however, I did not have that knowledge it could not come to any opposition on my part. I ask that consideration be given to the fact that during all those years, I regarded matters which were in my field from my own point of view, and tried to live up to my own ideals. I saw my duty in carrying out my task faithfully and in the conduct of a clean, personal life. I always strove not to cause any damage to any human being, but to understand the situation of any person in need of help, and then to help him as I myself would have wished to be helped or treated had I been in his position. I remind you of the statement of the witness Meiner, on 21 March 1947.

The fact that my signatures are on the documents which have been submitted by the prosecution has moved me deeply because my entire view of humanity and the principles of humanity is quite opposed to that. What I understand by humanity, also begins to apply to the small details of life also for me.

In spite of my good intentions, and this I say in answer to a question put in the beginning—in spite of my good intentions I was drawn into a guilt, I see it as a guilt into which human beings can be involved by tragic circumstances without any intention on their part. But the recognition of this guilt was sufficient to shake severely my mental and moral balance.

J. Final Statement of Defendant Poppendick[42]

I joined the SS at a time not to commit crimes, but because a number of my friends whom I knew to be idealists were members of the SS. Their membership caused me to join. That I thereby became a member of a criminal organization was unimaginable for me at that time, just as it is incomprehensible for me today.

My activity in the Main Race and Settlement Office was devoted to the problem of the family, an activity which in view of the destructive tendencies during the period of the First World War seemed important to me. If my expectations as a physician were disappointed in more than one point, at least I considered myself justified to hope that in the end this activity would have positive results. The intentions were always toward a constructive policy for the good of the family. Never did I have anything to do with negative population policies, such as the sterilization program of the state. The assertion of the prosecution that positive and negative population policies belong together as the two sides of one and the same program, is erroneous.

Then there were purely organizational reasons which brought about my direct subordination under the office of that man whose name today has such an inhuman sound—I mean Grawitz. The impression which the prosecution has rendered of my activity and position in Grawitz’ office is not in accordance with the facts, in spite of some features which seem to support the assertions made by the prosecution.

As for medical experiments on inmates—experiments on human beings were nothing surprising to me, nor anything new. I knew that experiments were carried out in clinics. I knew that the modern achievements of medical science had not been brought about without sacrifices. However, I do not recall that in experiments in clinics the voluntariness of the person to be experimented on was an absolute requirement, which now seems to be taken as a matter of fact, according to the discussions in this trial. I knew furthermore, that some scientific problems can only be solved by experiments in series with conditions remaining constant, and that therefore soldiers and particularly soldiers in camps are used for experiments in all countries. Under these circumstances it did not appear surprising to me that during the war, scientists also carried out experiments in series in concentration camps. I did not have the least cause to assume that these scientists in the camps would go beyond the scope of that which otherwise everywhere in the world of science was customary. What I knew about medical experiments in the SS was, in my opinion, as little connected with criminal matters as those experiments of which I knew from my clinical experience before 1933.

In March of this year a young doctor, Dr. Mitscherlich, in a very one-sided way, published material for an indictment under the already prejudiced title, “The Dictates of Contempt for Human Life”. Of the problematic there was little in this book. The basis for a judgment and a conviction were clearly given. During the very last days, however, the chief of Dr. Mitscherlich, a well-known Professor from Heidelberg, Weizsaecker, published a study on the fundamental questions belonging to this subject under the title “Euthanasia and Experiments on Human Beings”, which he submitted to the defendants. But here now fortunately we find an entirely different language. The problem itself becomes obvious. If one reads this booklet then the extent of the problem with its complications becomes clear.

The oath of Hippocrates, according to Weizsaecker, has nothing to do with the problem. Weizsaecker applies entirely different ethical norms. Rightly, medicine of today as a whole is studied, not only the German medicine under Hitler. It shows that experts who consider themselves competent even today are only in the middle of their endeavor to clarify the problems at the basis, that being the first requirement for their solution.

Before this trial all of these matters were no problems for me. I did not know of any transgressions. Moreover, I was always convinced that anything which came to my knowledge about experiments on human beings in clinics of the state before 1933, and within the scope of the SS in later years, were conscientious efforts of serious scientists to the good of mankind.

The ethical foundation of these matters also seemed to be there until this trial. Therefore, after sincere examination of my conscience, I cannot find any feelings of guilt and expect with a clear and peaceful conscience the verdict of the Tribunal.

K. Final Statement of Defendant Sievers[43]

Your Honors, in his opening plea, my defense counsel already stated quite openly and frankly that all events were going to be presented with which I was in any way connected, and in this hour which is so important to me, I can state to the best of my conscience that when I furnished my defense counsel with information, and during my own examination on the witness stand, I always spoke the full truth.

I have, in fact, had the satisfaction to hear my testimony confirmed by a witness for the prosecution. During my examination as a witness on the stand, I said quite truthfully that the experimental subjects to whom I had talked in connection with the last experiment in Natzweiler had confirmed to me that they were voluntary subjects. Witness Nales, witness for the prosecution, confirmed my testimony during his examination on the 30th of June in this courtroom.

With regard to the charge of participation in the malaria experiments, I have stated that I had nothing to do with malaria experiments. Witness Vieweg, called by the prosecution, confirmed this testimony of mine, as also did witness Stoehr.