1947-02-18, #4: Doctors' Trial (late afternoon)
THE MARSHAL: The Tribunal is again in session. May it please your Honors, Dr. Rudolf Brandt he availed himself of the excuse granted him and is absent for the remainder of the afternoon.
THE PRESIDENT: The Secretary General will note for the record the absence of the defendant Rudolf Brandt pursuant to an excuse. The defendant Handloser has been excused as a witness. The Marshall will summon the witness, Paul Wuerfler, in behalf of the defendant Handloser.
PAUL WUERFLER, a witness, took the stand and testified as follows:
JUDGE SEBRING: The witness will raise his right hand and be sworn, repeating after me:
I swear by God, the Almighty and Omniscient, that I will speak the pure truth and will withhold and all nothing.
(The witness repeated the oath.)
JUDGE SEBRING: You may be seated.
DIRECT EXAMINATION BY DR. NELTE:
Q: Witness, would you please state your first and surname?
A: Paul Wuerfler.
Q: When and where were you born?
A: On the 4th of February 1895. Born in Wetzlar/Lahn (Wetzlar an der Lahn).
Q: Won't you please describe your educational career until the year of 1939?
A: I visited the secondary school and in 1913 in 1913 do my matriculation. I studied medicine in Goettingen and Berlin, and served as a soldier from August 1914. During the first World War I was a member of the Medical Corps and on the 31st of January 1919 I was discharged as a Feldhilfsarzt. During the War I had my premedical examination and I passed. After the war I ended my studies and in 1929 male my State examination and had my medical production. At that time I was active as a practical physician n**r Weimar.
And, in 1925 began a communal area district plysician which office I hold for two years. Then I became the physician at the Institution, a psychiatrist at the Mental Institution at **********. I served for eight years, that is until 1935. I then voluntarily volunteered for re-entry into the Wehrmacht since the work in the psychiatric field became very difficult. I could not cope with the currents which at that time prevailed in the psychiatric field and I could not combine then will my medical conception. On 15 April 1935 I entered the Reichswehr. On the first of July of the same your I was transferred to the Luftwaffe, that is to Koenigsberg in Prussi. I was a troops physician with an anti-aircraft unit. From that, on the first of October 1936, I was transferred to the Medical Inspectorate of the Air Force and I stayed them as an expert. This activity I continued for three years. After the Polish campaign I became air gau physician — at first in Posen, since 15 of July 1940 in Muenster. On the first of October 1941 I was transferred to tie Medical Inspectorate of the Air Force as Chief of Staff where I was active until the new agency, Wehrmacht Medical Service was created. From the first of September 1942 I was appointed chief of Staff with the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service. As such I remained until the end of the War.
Q: Then you are tie first and only chief of Staff of the Agency Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service?
A: Yes. That was my position.
Q: What happened after the capitulation?
A: After the capitulation I was imprisoned and I stayed in imprisonment up to 12 Jane 1946. I was released from imprisonment by request of the Military Government at Duesseldorf.
Q: What is your activity today?
A: I am now an employee as Prison physician in the Penal Prisons at Cologne.
Q: In particular I want to ask you what the position of the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service was and how the work and activity was carried out in this agency from the year of 1942 until the end of the war. I have shown you the decrees of 20 July 1942 and the decree of 1911, together with the official regulation, in order to ask you to refresh your memory. At first I should like you to answer the question, on the basis of the decree of 28 August 1942, do you know how this decree came about and I mean this decree of 1942?
A: The creation of the agency, Wehrmacht Medical Service, was caused by the difficulties of the winter of 1941 and 1912. In January, 1942, there were urgent demands from the Army which went to the Navy and Air Forces in order to obtain medical officers. We were mainly concerned with transport difficulties and welfare difficulties in winter.
Q: How was this cause of the creation expressed in the decree?
A: The basic thought in the decree was to use the available personnel and material and use them in a planned fashion. That is, at places where they were most urgently required.
Q: Is that what is called, in the decree, "the material and personnel coordination"?
A: Yes, that is right. Personnel that, for instance, was at one Wehrmacht branch was to be transferred to another Wehrmacht branch which needed them more urgently.
Q: What were the further tasks which were given to the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service?
A: All the medical tasks which occurred simultaneously with all Wehrmacht branches were to be worked upon by one central Agency and this was in order to save personnel.
Q: Will you please name occasions where one could speak of mutual matters concerning the entire armed forces? For instance, affairs of troop hygiene which occurred with ground troops and army troops and were the same in both cases?
A: Protective measures, malaria prophylaxis, productive vaccinations against the various epidemics and, finally, medical education.
Q: How do you understand the decree of 1942, bearing in mind the point of view of the creation of a new agency? Was it an agency which, at the moment of its origination, had a very definite sphere of effectiveness? That is to say, almost automatically came under the authority of the chief of the agency?
A: No, that wasn't the case at all. We were concerned with the question to build up this agency and only gradually to deal with one task after the other.
Q: Did the chief of this agency have a special authority which, in the military way, one can designate as an authority to issue commands?
A: No, he had no military authority to issue orders. In the official regulation, which is not available here, it was expressed that he had the right of directives?
A: The difference is teat a superior naturally has authority to issue orders. But you can only speak of the right of giving directives where there is rat a relationship of superior and subordinate and, therefore, no authority to issue commands.
Q: Will you please make it clear to the High Tribunal how this was exercised and practiced which enabled the Chief of the Medical Service to solve the problems which he had?
A: It was our task to made it clear to armed forces branches whatever was necessary to be done. They had to be convinced and won over so that they could cooperate and that could only be done by discussions and conferences.
Q: Now, if such a task could not be dealt with in this friendly manner, what could the Chief of the Medical Services do?
A: He, on his own initiative, could do nothing further but report the lack of success of his efforts to the Chief of OKW and in this manner would have to bring about an issuance of an order.
Q: Did the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service have any official supervision about the Medical service of the Armed Forces branches?
A: No, he did not have that.
Q: Did he have a right to gain information?
A: I cannot toll you exactly whether that was laid down in official regulations but we always assumed that as a matter of course.
Q: How was the relationship to the individual Wehrmacht branches that is, to the medical service of the Armed Forces branches?
A: The attitudes adopted ware not always the same. This can be understood by taking into consideration the various tendencies which prevailed among the Armed Forces branches in contrast to the tendency of the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service. The Wehrmacht Branches endeavored to give up as little as possible of their rights, while the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service has the task to deal with the mutual tasks himself. Naturally, tensions arose from that situation, partly some peculiar situations arose. Maybe I could relate an episode to illustrates: New Year, 1943, the Chief of the Wehrmacht Services gave a directive to all the 3 Wehrmacht branches where, in a friendly manner and in friendly words, he thanked them for their cooperation up to the present time and asked all medical offices to continue working in order to help the wounded soldiers.
During the course of January we received a letter from the Supreme Commander of the Navy protesting, in polite words, that the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services had thanked his Navy medical officers and wished them a good new year.
Q: What was the relationship to the Waffen-SS, that is, the medical service of the Waffen-SS?
A: Just us little us the other Wehrmacht branches; the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service was tic superior of the Waffen-SS. We were never concerned with the entire Waffen-SS. We were always concerned with those branches which were committed with the Wehrmacht, that is to say, fighting front troops.
Q: Shortly, how would you describe the relationship of the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Service to the Chiefs of the Medical Services of the other Armed Forces Branches? Try to define it.
A: On the strength of tie decree, the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services was elevated above the other Chiefs of the Medical Services. He had to represent the medical services of the entire 3 branches; he had to represent them in front of the civilian health system and towards the medical services of abroad. Furthermore, he had the task to coordinate all mutual problems and deal with them in a unified and planned manner. For this task he had the right of giving directives.
Q: On the strength of the decree of 1942 was the research system in the Wehrmacht branches and the Waffen-SS touched upon?
A: No.
2. Did you have a department for research in your agency?
A: No. The agency consisted, apart from the departmental chief and myself, of one medical officer of the Navy, one pharmacist of the Army, later a second pharmacist of the Air Force; then there was a registration clerk and a few typists.
Q: Did the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services have any means in order to exercise research work?
A: No. We had no means whatever. We could not expend anything on that.
Q: Was the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services, this Professor Handloser, in his position as Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services, in an influential and strong position?
A: No. This is was only a beginning which had to be developed.
Q: Wherein lay the strength and the influence which Professor Handloser no doubt had?
A: The influence consisted in his position as Amy Medical Inspector, that is, as inspector of the strongest Wehrmacht branch.
Q: Do you know whether, in 1942, an official reputation was added to the decree?
A: Yes, there was an official regulation, but it is not attached here.
Q: We do not know it here up to this point but you, who for years after the official regulation was issued, had worked in that office, would perhaps be also to tell us something about it. Most of all we are interested in the question of research which I mentioned before. In that official regulation was there any mention made of research, research generally, or research with regard to the Wehrmacht branches?
A: In this official regulation, according to my recollection, there was no such mention name, because this print was only mentioned in the new official regulation.
Q: The new one?
A: Yes, the me of 1944.
Q: Did the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services have a right of inspection after the official regulation of 1942?
A: No.
Q: Was any inspection ever carried out?
A: Yes, during 1943. Then the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services made an official trip to Italy and, according to my knowledge, inspected installations of the Army and Air Force. Italy was a Wehrmacht District, the Supreme Commander was a Wehrmacht Commander, and the medical officer in charge, in accordance with that, had Wehrmacht functions.
Q: That is to say he was co-ordinated?
A: Yes, and the very same situation prevailed.
Q: Did Professor Handloser at any time inspect an institute of the Wehrmacht Branches?
A: No. According to my knowledge, no.
Q: Do you know the institutes of the Waffen-SS which dealt with research, for instance the Hygiene Institute of Professor Mrugowsky?
A: I know none of the institutes of the Waffen-SS.
Q: Did you at any time her about the institute for Military Science and Research within the Ahnenerbe?
A: No, I never heard of that.
Q: This belonged to the General -SS. Did you know Professor Mrugowsky?
A: Yes.
Q: Where from?
A: He occasionally attended conferences where the experts of hygiene had to attend in order to deal with questions of troop hygiene.
Q: Do you know whether any questions of research, for instance typhus research, were discussed with him?
A: I cannot say that.
Q: Did you know Dr. Ding?
A: No. It is a name that is alien to me.
Q: I am sure that you repeatedly spoke to Professor Handloser. During such conversations, be they official or private conversations, was at any time the name of Buchenwald mentioned?
A: It was never mentioned during any such conversation or conversations.
Q: were you at any time in a concentration camp?
A: Before the capitulation never; only after the capitulation, as an inmate.
Q: Do you know the agency of the Reich Research Council?
A: Yes, I know about that but I don't know any details about it.
Q: Your agency chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services, did they have an official contact with the Reich Research Council?
A: No, we had no official contacts. On the contrary the Chief, Wehrmacht Medical Services, was of the opinion that he actually should have belonged to the Reich Research Council just as the civilian health leader belonged to it, but the efforts he made on that score were rejected.
Q: Do you know Generalarzt Dr. Schreiber?
A: Yes, I know him.
Q: What position did he hold?
A: He, at that time, was departmental chief in the Army Medical Inspectorate, department for science and research guidance. After that he became commander of educational group C within the Military Medical Academy, and approximately at the same time he was plenipotentiary of the Reich Research Council for the combat of epidemics.
Q: As plenipotentiary of the Reich Research Council for the combat of epidemics, was he subordinated to Professor Handloser?
A: No, he had correspondence with him under his own letterhead and used his own printed envelopes.
Q: The agency Chief, Wehrmacht Medical Services, did this agency receive reports on research work and assignments?
A: Yes, it is possible that we received copies of research assignments.
Q: Do you know whether this was the case ever since the beginning; that is, 1942, or whether that only came into effect later?
A: According to my recollection this came into effect a little later. I don't remember any definite subject, but I think starting from 1943 this may have come into effect.
Q: What was your position as chief of staff of the Wehrmacht Medical Service?
A: In the old official regulation it was laid down that I had to represent the chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services.
Q: That is to say, you were the representative. Would you please describe the practical course of dealing with matters within your agency; mail that may have arrived which you had to distribute and which then went to Professor Handloser?
A: The mail was delivered to the registration office. The ordinary mail was opened there and registered. Secret matters, top secret matters, were presented to me and opened by me. Then the mail was distributed to the various experts. Part of them were worked upon by cur little staff and the other part were worked upon by the experts on the armed forces branches. Then, whenever it was necessary discussions were held about these letters and everything was prepared to see that the important matters came to the signature of the chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services.
Q: I am interested in establishing the following thing. Whenever mail came to you and to the departmental chiefs, what was actually presented to the chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services of that mail and who decided what was to be presented to him?
A: Naturally only the most important things could be presented to the chief of Wehrmacht Medical. Services, and the departmental chiefs had the task to first present the important natters to me, and then I in turn decided what matters were to be presented to the chief personally.
Q: How was the situation when Professor Handloser was not in Berlin, but somewhere outside?
A: If there were urgent matters I made a telephonic report to him or he sometimes rang me up and commissioned me to deal with important tasks. There was a daily courier going back and forth so that the important letters could be sent out and sent back.
Less important matters, however, were kept in Berlin up to the time of his presence, were prepared so that he could then make a decision and sign his name. The so-called current matters were dealt with in the Army Medical Inspectorate or in cur little staff and were then signed by me by order.
Q: Was Professor Handloser frequently in Berlin?
A: No, he mostly stayed at the headquarters. Only occasionally did he come to Berlin for just a few days.
Q: Witness, I submitted to you the affidavit of Professor Handloser which he submitted to the Tribunal about the working activity and the sphere of the work in the leadership of the Army and Wehrmacht, and I asked you to read the part which referred to the Wehrmacht Medical Services. I asked you to investigate it. So as not to lose myself in too great details, I should like to ask you whether you can say under your oath that the description of Professor Handloser which refers to the agency of the chief of Wehrmacht Medical Services is true and correct?
A: I have read the statements with great care, and I can only confirm them.
Q: Do you think that the matters which are subject bf this trial, matters which you know according to their contents, are important matters if they happened to be subject of a report or any letter which came into your agency?
A: Yes, no doubt. Whenever any experiments were ordered and whenever any fatalities had occurred then it would have been an eminently important affair.
Q: Could you say with certainty that such a report, such letters, never were presented?
A: It was never presented to me.
Q: Did you perhaps receive knowledge that a certain matter was sometimes dealt with by circumvention of your person and reported immediately to Dr. Handloser?
A: No, that never came to my knowledge, and if that had happened, then I would have done something about it and acted very severely.
Q: So basically you would have to know about decisions, reports and letters which were important enough so that they had to be presented to Professor Handloser?
A: Yes, that was required of me. I never had the impression that Professor Handloser intentionally and knowingly did not inform me.
Q: On the 1st of September 1944 a new settlement of the agency chief of Wehrmacht Medical Services came about. What was the intention which lay behind the creation of this new agency?
A: It was the difficulty of the work. It made it appear necessary to create a clear relationship of superiority and to arrive at a general authority to issue orders.
Q: Did the agency on their own initiative make suggestions about this new settlement of the matter?
A: Yes, these suggestions were made by us. The conferences were very long and tedious and I think that the way we see it now constitutes the twelfth or thirteenth draft. These drafts had to be presented to the Wehrmacht branches, to the Waffen SS, to the Commissioner General, to the OKW, operational staff and to the Chief, OKW, and were also submitted to the chief of OKW.
Q: What is before you now as the decree of 1944 including the official regulation, is it something that Professor Handloser strove for as chief, Wehrmacht Medical Services?
A: No, unfortunately not.
Q: What were the misgivings and the objections which led to a change?
A: The Luftwaffe understanding cooperated. The SS made the old well known limitations with reference to their parts and units which were subordinated to the Wehrmacht, and since otherwise they were not concerned at all, was not interested in the further details. The army submitted a different draft, and the Navy made the strongest objections and did not want to allow the chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services any right of superiority and as little as possible authority.
Q: Did this situation, these rejecting attitudes or rather, were they expressed in the final text?
A: Yes, whoever knows the story can well recognize these points. The clear military concepts of superior and subordinate were left cut. The word subordination is not mentioned a single time. Rather, it is mentioned once. That is only with the medical — with the Wehrmacht Chief of Medical Services personally; that is, his subordination under the Chief of OKW. In addition the expression technical authority is used, and furthermore, these technical authorities are limited to the medical chiefs but not to people who were subordinated to them. That is to say, the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services could, for instance, issue an order to the Army Medical Inspector according to Figure 2-A but he couldn't issue an order to any army group physician or any lower echelon because he is not mentioned under this authority of issuing directives.
Q: You mean authority to issue technical orders in order to clarify that point?
A: Furthermore, the right of instruction was limited. The right to issue orders in emergency situation is mentioned in particular that it is not assumed as a matter of course as it would have been in a case of relationship of superiority. The reservation of the SS was added at the footnote on page 1 as it is cited down there.
Q: Well, would you please read it?
A: Yes, I am going to read it: in the sense of this regulation there belonged to the Wehrmacht, Army, Navy, Luftwaffe, the units of the Waffen-SS subordinate to the Wehrmacht and the units and organizations committed within the framework of the Wehrmacht. The rest contained in the official regulation is a program of future spheres of work which only gradually were to be introduced into the agency.
A: What was the intended extension of the functions as they are laid down in the text?
A: Certain progress was made. At first the position of the Wehrmacht Medical Services within the military rank was laid down and that by figure I it says there: he has the position of a departmental chief in disciplinary power of punishment according to Code No. 18 and all the authorities of the Commanding General. Thereby a difference was laid down as it prevailed in the case of the Army Medical Inspector who only had the disciplinary position of a Divisional Commander.
Furthermore, definite process was made in whatever is contained under II that is, to determine that the right of technical power to a given command was not determined yet. It was only a compromise. The right of information had orders in cases of emergency was laid down but limited.
It also noted that the right of appointing people in higher positions was not granted to the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services, and finally these fields of medical services were mentioned where such tasks were listed which concerned all the Wehrmacht branches and which could be settled by the Chief of the Wehrmacht medical Services.
Such a list was completed.
Q: Now the Tribunal, I am sure, is interested in what can be understood under the concept technical authority to issue orders.
A: According to my opinion, that has to be understood literally, quite literally. It is the right to issue orders in these fields of the Medical Service.
Q: Would you please clarify that point practically?
A: As far as the expression itself goes, this expression does net originate from your office. I think it was first used in the Wehrmacht Operational Staff in order to help the Navy. A technical superior would have seen a very clear concept, a concept which is used in the case of many official regulations, for instance, the Disciplinary Penal Code or the Army Medical Regulation, Quarter Master Regulation of the Air Force. That is, this expression does not mean to convey or rather conveys less than the expression of technical superior. Has it been different, then this official regulation would not have to list various authorities which are quite a matter of course for a technical superior.
So one can only say that with reference to the medical fields which are listed in the official regulation, orders could be issued if we are concerned with matters of the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services, that is to say, such matters which concerned all three Wehrmacht branches.
Q: We previously discussed a question what the situation would be if the Chief of the Wehrmacht branches would not follow any such directive, and in order to clarify that point, I must ask what would the situation be if a branch of the Wehrmacht would refuse to subordinate itself to this order in technical matters?
A: The Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services could not on his own initiative and himself penalize this medical chief. If the Chief of the OKW was not the superior of the three Wehrmacht branches, the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services, as only a part of this agency, could just as little penalize any medical chief of any command of the Armed Forces Branch.
In the case of refusal of obedience of an order, the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services would have to report this medical chief to his immediate superior in order to cause a punishment, a punishment which would be because of the non-obedience of a technical order. From this situation alone we can see how difficult this would have been in practice.
Q: Did any research institute of the Wehrmacht branches ever come to a subordination? In this Decree of 1944 you see a passage — I think it is II -
A: Yes, I remember that research was mentioned, but I never came to a subordination of the research institutes.
Q: Did the relationship, the official relationship to the Medical Service of the Waffen-SS change at all through the Decree of '44?
A: No. It was always limited these units which were committed at the Front.
Q: How in practice was the relationship of the Medical Service of the Waffen-SS?
A: I already said that the Waffen-SS was not very interested, and in spite of a request did not give us any collaborators in our working staff. I remember one incident that the SS did not follow an order which requested them to list all the material at their disposal.
Q: In order to complete the picture, I should like to ask you whether the relationship to the research institutes and the relationship to the Waffen-SS changed in the year of 1944?
A: No, it did not change.
Q: Why not?
A: Because the units who were subordinated to the Wehrmacht in the Front had no institutes.
Q: Did the Decree of 1944 — was it really effective up to the end of the war to its full extent?
A: No, not at all. When the working staff was built up, it took quite some considerable time. A few fields were taken over by the Chief of the Wehrmacht Medical Services, for instance, the medical welfare and care, the matter of voluntary nursing, the central dealing with medical supply of all kinds, partly medical matters concerned with the prisoner-of-war system, but that is something that we again lost at a later date because the prisoner-of-war system went over from the OKW to the Reserve Army.
The further up-building was disturbed by the fact that the agencies with which we had to be in constant touch were evacuated from Berlin, and finally we ourselves had to evacuate our agency to Thuringia in February, 1945. The difficult lines of communication and the difficulties in telephoning people made any connection with these agencies completely impossible. The rest of the agency was very busy with trying to care for wounded and sick who always tried to stream towards the heart of Germany from its various corners, and for whom all the time now hospitals had to be created and searched for, and in addition to that, we had to care for the civilian population because all of Germany had because a war territory.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will now recess until nine-thirty o'clock tomorrow morning.
(The Tribunal adjourned until 19 February 1947 at 0930 hours.)