1947-02-21, #3: Doctors' Trial (early afternoon)
AFTERNOON SESSION (The hearing reconvened at 1330 hours, 21 February 1947.)
THE MARSHAL: Persons in the courtroom will please find their seats.
The Tribunal is again in session.
DR. SEIDL (Counsel for the Defendant Oberheuser): May it please the Tribunal, Defendant Oberheuser, in view of her physical condition, requests that she be excused from, the afternoon session. A certificate by the prison physician will be submitted.
THE PRESIDENT: The certificate from the prison physician is already before the Court. Defendant Oberheuser will be excused from attendance in court at the time of the afternoon recess, it being the opinion of the Tribunal that defendant's interests will no wise be jeopardized by her absence from the court. The Secretary General Will file her physician's note.
The objection interposed by defense counsel to the question propounded to the witness by the prosecution, is sustained.
PAUL ROSTOCK — Resumed CROSS-EXAMINATION (Continued)
BY MR. McHANEY:
Q: Professor Rostock, you testified yesterday that you did not know where the sulfanilamide experiments were carried out. Is that right?
A: Well, the place where they were carried out is unknown to me.
Q: And you did not ask where they were carried out, did you?
A: No.
Q: You knew that Gebhardt and Fischer were SS men, did you not?
A: Yes.
Q: Did you know that concentration camps were under the jurisdiction of the SS?
A: I did not know all the details about it and I do not know if it was an order by the SS or an order by the police.
Q: Didn't you have reason to believe, though, that concentration camps were in fact supervised and run by the SS?
A: I did not know that so exactly.
Q: I understand that you have never visited a concentration camp?
A: No.
Q: Were you ever in Danzig?
A: No. I have passed through the city of Danzig by train, yes.
Q: But never stopped over there?
A: I do not believe that I have ever been at Danzig or that I have left the train there.
Q: Weren't you curious as to where these experiments were carried out on persons condemned to death, that is, how they brought the experimental subjects and the facilities for the experiments together?
A: I understood how the experimental subjects were brought together. That did not interest me and I was not that curious.
Q: Can you tell us anything more definitely what Gebhardt and Fischer said about these experimental subjects?
A: I have already stated yesterday that Gebhardt said that persons who had been condemned to death were involved and that they had then been granted a pardon.
Q: You testified that Gebhardt reported that prominent jurists had approved this procedure. Did he tell you the names of any of the jurists?
A: He did not say famous or well known jurists but he said that the jurist's basis had been clarified and had been decided on. He has not used the word famous jurists, nor has he mentioned any names.
Q: He did not state who had approved of this procedure, is that right?
A: No.
Q: Were you told for what crime those persons had been condemned to death?
A: No, there was not sufficient time for that. The whole lecture only lasted for about 15 or 20 minutes.
Q: And I suppose you were not told whether these persons had been condemned for political crimes?
A: Nothing was said about that, only that persons were concerned who had been condemned to death. No details were discussed at all.
Q: Nor whether or not the subject had been tried by an ordinary criminal court?
A: About the trial procedure and about the court there was not a word mentioned.
Q: Nor whether the experimental subjects were German prisoners or non-German prisoners?
A: Nothing was said about that either.
Q: And you or no one else at the meeting made no inquiry about those matter?
A: I personally did not ask any questions. I do not know if anybody else did ask any questions about that.
Q: In your opinion, is there any obligation on the doctor performing the experiment to look into the status of the experimental subjects in the respect I have just mentioned to you?
A: Do you mean in this case if Doctor Gebhardt had been obligated to inquire why this people had been condemned to death, or that I should have inquired with Doctor Gebhardt? The question was not quite clear to me.
Q: I mean whether or not the doctor actually performing the experiment is under any obligation, in your opinion, to inquire into the status of experimental subject, and I do not mean that you have to take Gebhardt as an example since you have shown some reluctance to express an opinion with respect to your fellow defendants.
A: Well, I have never worried about what I would have done if I had been ordered to carry out experiments on human beings. I have never been in that situation. If you now ask me the question in this way and I have to answer it, then, without trying to make any judicial statement, not having any idea about it, I would say the following:
If the person was informed by an official that a death sentence had been imposed and that in the case of survival of this hypothetical experiment, the punishment would be amended, then I believe that perhaps I would have depended on the information which would have been given to me by the official. That is not a statement of facts but just my personal opinion — an answer which I am just giving to you without having considered it in detail. That is not an answer to the fact or statement with regard to the fact but it is only an opinion on my part.
JUDGE SEBRING: Doctor, let us assume that the physician who has been ordered or commissioned to make such experiments actually knew, or from past experience with the subjects had reasonable belief to know, that leniency would not, in fact, be given to these experimental subjects if they survived the experiment. What do you think, from the standpoint of medical ethics, would have been the duty of the physician in such a case?
THE WITNESS: I personally would have refused.
JUDGE SEBRING: Let us assume that sulfonamide experiments were conducted on concentration camp inmates without their consent, in the manner and by the methods contended for by the prosecution. Let us assume that, if you will. In your opinion, as a medical expert, would you say that the experiments were conducted in accordance with civilized medical ethics?
THE WITNESS: Even I would not have carried it out then, either.
JUDGE SEBRING: You think that would not be in accordance with medical ethics as you understand the ethics of your profession?
THE WITNESS: I would not have approved of these experiments.
BY MR. McHANEY:
Q: Professor, does it satisfy your sense of legal ethics to make a deal with a criminal condemned to death that he will be pardoned if he under goes a dangerous or experiment and survives?
A: I have already stated that if I was to be in the position of the criminal, I certainly would take that chance, but if I was the physician, I would refuse; I would refuse to carry out such an experiment. That is my private opinion.
Q: I understand, Doctor. Now, can you tell us in any more detail just exactly what Gebhardt and Fischer said at this meeting; I would like for you to cover the presentation of the curves that you have already mentioned; tell us how many curves, what the curves showed, etc.
A: I really cannot tell you that; I do not remember that anymore. We were assigned to hear so many lectures, conferences and meetings and there were quite a number of conferences every year, but it is completely impossible to remember them so completely that I could testify to that here. I am unable to do that.
Q: Can you recall whether or not he made any report on blood level tests, that is what they called blood level, at the time they were using sulfanilamide?
A: Yes, that was done. It was debated how much sulfanilamide was contained in the blood after a blood test had been made, but I do not know if Professor Gebhardt did that.
Q: As I recall from your testimony yesterday, you stated that Gebhardt also made a talk on nerve rejuvenation experiments; is that right?
A: I believe that Keestler was working on that; that Keestler gave a lecture on it.
Q: Well, did Gebhardt give a talk on any matter other than these sulfanilamide experiments; in other words did Gebhardt or Fischer or any of his associates report on the nerve and bone rejuvenation experiments?
A: No, I remember that this lecture about muscle and nerve rejuvenation dealt with the fact that the part of the muscle had to rejuvenated, as in the case of the shoulder blades, from other nerves which had been rejuvenated. That was a field in which Dr. Gebhardt had published quite a large number of articles in peace time for the rejuvenation of paralyzed nerves after cases of infantile paralysis. At the time I had the impression that whatever was presented was the result of all of this study, however, I have never talked about it with Gebhardt. I believe it was called nerve plastics, but I am not absolutely certain about it.
Q: But, to the best of your recollection Gebhardt did not speak on these subjects in May of 1943?
A: In May, 1943 a lecture was given about rejuvenation operations after the removal of nerves; it was made by Keestler. Dr. Gebhardt may have made the introductory speech, but Keestler gave the details.
Q: And there was no indication that these experiments had been carried out in a manner similar to the sulfanilamide experiments on which Gebhardt reported?
A: No nothing whatsoever was said about it.
Q: I understood you to say yesterday and again today that in 1942 you had planned to make certain experiments as to the use of sulfanilamide yourself; is that right?
A: Yes, I had discussed that.
Q: Were you going to carry out your experiments on wounded soldiers?
A: You cannot describe that as experiments, but as persons treated, soldiers wounded in combat and persons injured in accidents were to be treated. This method of treatment was to be observed and improvements were to be made and of curse that certainly is not an experiment.
Q: Your plan was to study the effects of sulfanilamide on wound injections by treating wounded soldiers; is that right?
A: Yes.
Q: And in your opinion, as a medical expert, would the results you obtained from that kind of testing sulfanilamide have been quite satisfactory?
A: The series of observations that are made, what the outcome will be no one can possibly know; that is to say I would have treated a number of injured persons and afterwards I would have combined the results, but if then the answer to the question would have been found if a wound should be treated with sulfanilamide or not, I cannot know that ahead of time, because if I know that, I would not have had to ask the examination.
Q: I probably did not make myself clear, let me replace the question more directly. In your opinion, would the results which you hoped to obtain by testing sulfanilamide on wound infections of soldiers have produced scientific results as valid as these obtained by Gebhardt in the course of his experiments?
A: Such examination are carried out in many places in the world. One single examination is never so important and only when the results of your examination have been confirmed, or it has been disputed some other place, then you can speak of it as an important matter. Whatever the individual scientist achieves, that at the very best is a stone in the whole pattern of stones, but then of this one stone he can not claim that it was the foundation stone. This meets with the compilation of many examinations at various different places, also with varying applications.
Q: Well, assuming that you tested sulfanilamide on as many wounded soldiers as you thought statistically necessary, would not the results obtained by you have been as valid and as reliable as these obtained by Gebhardt in his experiments on an equal number of subjects?
A: Of course, I hope that my examinations, which after all were not carried out and this is a hypothetical question, that they would have been as valid, but of course I would have to leave criticism with others, it does not rest with me.
Furthermore, and I did not state this in detail yesterday, my work was more concentrated on basic research, therefore I tried to obtain psychological chemists, collaborators and other persons. We tried to discover in what manner the sulfanilamide had a different effect from what we had in these infecting drugs up to now.
With you permission, I can give you the basic lines on the subject in a very few sentences. If I put a disinfecting medicine into a wound, iodine, then we know with a certain concentration this iodine will kill the bacteria located in the wound. However, before it can do that, it will to a much larger extent harm the cells which surround the wound in the human body. As a result of this, the injury done to the cells in the vicinity of the wound is always bigger and always occurs in the earlier period of time than the harm which is done to the bacteria. These sulfanilamides have quite a different effect. They influence the metabolism of the bacteria without inflicting any considerable harm on the wound cells. They cause some harm, but it is not worth mentioning and then the result at the very best is that the bacteria within the wound can be consumed by the defensive mechanism in the human body or that the bacteria is prevented from growing and reproducing.
In 1945 the situation was not as yet as clear or as clarified as I have expressed just now and in order to achieve the clarification of this question that was my main interest at the time.
In the meantime exact results were achieved in various places throughout the world, and what I am describing now was the knowledge we had obtained in the years 1942 and 1943. I know today that research had progressed a little further abroad than it had with us. As a result of this my aim in these experiments varied considerably from what Gebhardt had intended because, on the basis of lectures which he had given, his questions were as follows: Are the results of healing a wound which has been infected with gangrene bacteria and other bacteria, are they better with the effects of sulfonamides than without them?
I believe that was the way that Dr. Gebhardt asked the question. However, I think it would be better if you were to ask him these questions yourself, but that is what I deducted from his statements.
Q: Well, in your opinion as an export, could Gebhardt have answered the question which you state he had posed by testing sulfanilamide on wound infections of soldiers?
A: That would also have been a way, and that is the procedure which I suggested.
Q: Did you know Schreiber very well?
A: I did not know him well, but I know who he was.
Q: What about Rose?
A: If I knew Rose well?
Q: Yes.
A: I know how he looked, and I know who he was, and I know what he had done in the field of science, and I know about his tropical hygienic knowledge, but outside of the usual social contacts I have hardly had anything at all to do with him.
Q: And you never heard about Rose's objections to Ding's experiments which he allegedly made at the hygienists meeting in May 1943?
A: No, I have heard that here for the very first time.
Q: Did you know Dr. Ding?
A: No. That name was completely unknown to me until I came here.
Q: And I think you told us this morning about Mrugowsky. Could you repeat briefly just how well you knew Mrugowsky and what contact you had with him?
A: I did not know him well at all. I knew from the faculty list that there was a lecturer of hygiene by the name of Mrugowsky, and I must have seen him some place or other. When the request came for a hygienist at the University to appoint him as a regular professor; then I had him send his scientific work to me and I perhaps talked with him for half an hour, when I had ordered him to see me so that the formalities could be dealt with, and furthermore, I was informed about it at the faculty meeting of the hygienists, and I have signed the request to the ministry for the faculty. It may be that I handed his diploma to him afterward, but I cannot say that with certainty, and that is all.
Q: Did you attend the meeting of consulting physicians in December 1942?
A: 1942? Yes, I probably was there.
Q: Did you hear the talk made by Holzloehner on cold problems?
A: It has already been stated here that this lecture was given in the physiology department, and since the meeting was at the same time as the surgical department, it was, of course, natural that I attended the surgical meeting.
Q: Well, I take it then that you did not personally hear his lecture. Did you hear any reports about it?
A: In the green booklets which have been presented here I may have perhaps read it, but I didn't read all of them individually. There is no scientist who can read the entire literature. The 24 hours in a day would not be sufficient to enable him to do that even if he wanted to.
Q: When did you first learn about treating shock due to prolonged exposure to cold by emersion in warn baths?
A: I do not know that either.
Q: If I understand your testimony correctly, you state that you had no contact with the Reich Research Council until after your appointment as chief of Brandt's office for science and research is that right?
A: I did not have any contact. I was not a member of the Reich Research Council, and I have never tried to obtain a research assignment from the Reich Research Council. Of course, I know Dr. Sauerbruch, who was the head, of branch, but of course I do not knew if you can describe that as a contact.
Q: And you became Brandt's alternate on the presiding council of the Reich Research Council early in 1944; is that correct?
A: I do not remember the exact date anymore, but I assume that it was in the beginning of 1944. It may also have been at the end of 1943, but I do not remember the date so exactly anymore.
Q: And you exercised no functions by virtue of that position? You had no activities whatsoever within the framework of the Reich Research Council?
A: I have already stated I did not do anything on behalf of the Reich Research Council, but in this morning's session I have given an example that had to turn to the Reich Research Council.
Q: Well now, on that subject I remember only three contacts which you have tell us about that you had in connection with the Reich Research Council and they were really with respect to your position as chief of the office science and research rather than by virtue of being Brandt's alternate on the presiding council.
A: I have never functioned as a deputy member of the presidial council. I have never carried out any functions whatsoever.
Q: And these three contacts which you have mentioned with the Reich Research. Council are, firstly, that they helped you with respect to calling of the meeting in connection with the electronic microscope; is that right?
A: Yes, with the penicillin discussions the electronic microscope discussions which had been arranged by us.
Q: And secondly, that you went to them in order to try to obtain some foreign medical literature?
A: I was trying to obtain foreign literature, and I wanted the men to see them who had to regulate the work.
Q: And thirdly, you had contact with them when you became interested in what you have described as special research assignments?
A: Yes, I turned to the head of the special field branch and asked him for some research assignments.
Q: These were the research assignments that were in connection with some study of tissue that you mentioned this morning?
A: Yes, these were tissue cultures.
Q: Well then, there was an additional contact. You will recall that you asked the Reich Research Council to advise you in your capacity as chief the office for science and research about the special research assignments they had made?
A: No, I don't think I have expressed myself clearly. At that time we also had discussions with the men from the Reich Research Council what larger fields we describe as requiring further research, also in view of conditions which had become increasingly difficult through the war, and the members of the, Reich Research Council also participated, in those discussions.
Q: Well, when were these meetings held and who participated in them?
A: That may have been around the middle of 1944. Schreiber was there. I do not know exactly anymore if Dr. Blome was there, but I assume that he was and i know that Dr. Sauerbruch was not there. He was unable to come, but Dr. Breuer came as his deputy, and I believe that this name has already been mentioned here.
Q: All right. You had a conference then with Schreiber and Breuer of the Reich Research Council. When did this conference take place?
A: In this summer of 1944. I would say in the summer of 1944.
Q: How many such conferences took place?
A: There were one or two such discussions, but there were not only the members of the Reich Research Council there. A man attended from the Krauch Agency. That was the Reich office for the extension of the economy.
Q: What was the purpose of this meeting?
A: I have already stated that. We wanted to find out what larger field we should continue to describe as requiring research urgently during times of war.
Q: Well, I take it then that you had some influence over what research assignment was to be considered urgent and what was not; is that right?
A: I had the sane influence as all the other men there. We just consulted each other there. There were views for and against voiced.
Q: Did just one such meeting take place?
A: I believe I can remember that two such meetings took place.
Q: Where were these meetings hold?
A: These meetings took place at Bielitz.
Q: That is in your office in Bielitz; is that right?
A: Yes.
Q: Couldn't you decide in agreement with these other gentlemen that the research work of August Hirt was urgent and should be supported?
A: I stated already yesterday or today that it was not a question of saying that any specific research assignment was important or not important, but it was only a question of determining these things within the large framework.
Q: Did you ask the Reich Research Council to tell you who they had working on special assignments in these urgent fields?
A: No, I stated that the card index filed with respect to research was just being started. The Reich Research Council had answered my question and had sent me some lists.
Q: Well, what was decided at these two conferences?
A: I have already stated yesterday or today that we agreed on what field should be given the most priority. There may have been a dozen or three or four more.
Q: Well, let's mention a few of them. I am interested in what fields you regard as being urgent.
A: It's too difficult to express or give an opinion about that under oath and it is especially difficult for me because I do not have a single piece of paper to support myself on. I have not had the possibility to confront myself or to discuss this question with one of my collaborators and I understand my oath in such a way that I can only testify about something which I know with the utmost certainty and in this way I have answered the question yesterday, that I consider that it is probably that the Chemical Warfare Agencies were contained in the list. I also say that today and under the same prerequisite I can name the penicillin, the combatting of epidemics and similar matters. All of these things, I believe were included in the list but if you ask me today under oath that I am to name these twelve fields to you, then I must say under this condition I am unable to do that. If I could consult with my collaborators I certainly would be able to give you these things in detail.
Q: Well, you have mentioned Chemical Warfare and combatting of epidemics a which, I assume, includes research on typhus vaccine?
A: I do not believe that it was late in the war especially but we said typhus, typhoid and diphtheria, etc., so it isn't especially probable and just stated the question of epidemics.
Q: All right; you decided in this conference that this or that field required urgent research and priorities to a certain field. What did you do then? Did you take any further action?
A: May I ask you — did I hear clearly that I decided it?
Q: Well, doctor, you decided it along with others; Schreiber and Breuer I think you mentioned, and some other gentlemen. I suppose you reached an agreement but a decision was made and you participated in the decision. Now, I am asking you if it was decided what fields were important and urgent. What did you do then?
A: After this list had been compiled I wrote to the Ministry for Armament that under special consideration of the war conditions we would also consider research in these fields as important for the continuation of the war and that is the technical term of that kind. We considered it as being of decisive influence in this respect. I must say that this was decided for the war. It is also an administrative term. I do not believe that any such research in any field would have had any decisive influence on the way any other way but it was only a term which was used in administrative work.
Q: I am curious to know, professor, how you can decide whether this or that field or research is urgent without being advised as to what man you are working with in that field and what they are doing with respect to it.
A: That wasn't the important factor. The important factor was to maintain the possibility that work could be continued in any field.
Q: Didn't you make any inquiry at all as to who was working in these fields and whether or not what they were doing was apt to produce anything worthwhile?
A: The decision about it, if something was valuable or not, this was afterwards decided with the other agencies. That is to say, when we had considered these 12 units as important then it was really the branch head and the Commissioner of the Reich Research Council now to say from the list I have here I shall now cross out a certain number of research assignments but then let us consider the way this would be done in practice; the head of the branch could only cross out the financial support which was given but nobody could prevent him from further working himself in that field. That would be the same thing if I was to tell somebody who was present here, you are not allowed from now on to think about this or that subject any more. And I do not think that anybody would consider me as stupid as that to say anything of that kind.
Q: Well, professor, I think you can push the other point a little too far. Now, as a matter of fact, if Haagen down at Strassburg and Natzweiler weren't getting money from the Air Force or from the Reich Research Council to carry on his typhus research the chances are he is just going to have to quit carrying them on, isn't it, doctor?
A: No. First of all this was not in the field of my competence. I was not allowed to permit it or prohibit it. Not, let us take a concrete case; Hagen had a certain such assignment with such and such a number and it was filed about typhus research. The head of the branch could have had him sent a notification from that and that would mean you will not receive your monthly financial support any more. Then this would have had the result that Hagen would have had to dismiss an assistant or collaborator because he could not have continued to pay him any more but after all, a research assignment did not have any other consequence and continue on with this experiment. The possibility to tell Hagen, you are not allowed to do anything any more in the Concentration Camp of Natzweiler, that wasn't the authority of the branch head of the Reich Research Council and the Medical Inspector of the Luftwaffe did not have that authority either but as far as I know that the only man who had that authority and decided that a man was to enter a concentration camp or not that was, in my opinion, the responsibility of the individual agencies and I assume it was correct.
Q: Well, I don't want to pursue this too far, professor, but if the Luftwaffe sent an order down to Hagen, who was a consulting hygienist, and said you shall quit working on yellow fever vaccine because it looks like the German Wehrmacht is not going to get into West Africa but we are very much concerned about typhus problems in the East, you will devote your efforts to typhus vaccine research, I suggest to you that Hagen would start working on typhus vaccine.
A: He probably would have but that — I do not know that.
Q: And as a matter of fact, if the Reich Research Council were subsidizing Hagen for yellow fever experiments carried out on inmates of the Natzweiler Concentration Camp and they decided that that was no longer necessary in 1943 because it didn't appear you were going to need any yellow fever vaccine and said I no further give you any money, only for working on a typhus vaccine, don't you think as a practical matter that Dr. Hagen would work on typhus?
A: Well, that may be the case but I am not of the opinion that the man in the Reich Research Council, who gave Hagen the assignment to work on typhus, that this man would have told Hagen in the very words, that you are going to work in such and such a concentration camp and I assume today that was the case. I believe that Hagen turned to the Reich Research Council and said the following; —this is, of course, a hypothetical assumption on my part. I do not know what Hagen said but I Relieve that he said the following: "I would like to work on a new typhus vaccine; please give me a research assignment and support my work", but I will never believe that Hagen told the Reich Research Council or one of the men there: "I would like to infect people with typhus in Concentration Camp Natzweiler." Of course, I have to assume that this has taken place at all. I cannot say that but my personal opinion is that such negotiations actually never took place.
Q: Well, Professor, if it is any consolation to you, I rather doubt that Dr. Hagen would be that indelicate myself. If you decided in the first meeting with Schreiber and Breuer in that twelve fields of special research were urgent, for what reason did you hold the second meeting?
A: We had not clarified this matter completely. The first session was a preliminary one, because I had heard through other ways that the Ministry for Armaments had made some plans, had intended to do something, but afterwards we received instructions, not an order, and then we had to occupy ourselves with these concrete questions once more.
Q: We will return to this point a little later, but for clarity, let's start at the beginning of your position in the Office for Science and Research. How frequent was your contact with Karl Brandt after September 1943?
A: That varied. It may have been once per week or several times per week.
Q: Where was Brandt's office located?
A: First of all, it was located in the clinic, and then the office which he has mentioned in the Reich Chancellery and then again at Bielitz.
Q: Well, he maintained throughout the period from '43 until the end of the war an office in the University Clinic, didn't he?
A: He had his office there, yes.
Q: And where was your office located with respect to his?
A: It was located in the same clinic.
Q: In the same building?
A: Yes, in the same building.
Q: How close were the offices physically within the building?
A: Between our two offices there was one waiting room and two writing rooms.
Q: But physically, very close together? Is that right?
A: Yes.
Q: You spent most of your time in the office at Segelstrasse, didn't you? That is, the office in the clinic?
A: Yes.
Q: Now, I am not quite clear on the purpose for which the Office for Science and Research was created. What was the fundamental concept which gave rise to this office?
A: I gave the exact reasons for that yesterday.
Q: Professor, as I told you before I began my questioning, there would necessarily be a bit of repetition in this, for which we are all sorry, but in order that the picture is perfectly clear to me and the Tribunal, I think it is necessary that we have a little of this repetition, so will you tell me again what was the basic purpose of this Office for Science and Research?
A: I was trying to help German science, as I stated yesterday. It was threatened in an important part, namely, in the research that was carried out by these schools of higher learning. It was endangered with regard to its possibility of carrying out research, in its literature at home and also the foreign literature. This was one complex.
The other complex was that Brandt needed somebody for the economic questions, which in reality caused quite a lot of work. If I only mention one example in that sector, then that was only one example, but there were quite a number of those examples. This was very difficult. You can imagine that if you want to cause the chemical industry to reduce the production of some item, a large number of influences make themselves felt, and Brandt was trying to handle this matter from the clinical point of view as well as possible.
Q: Was not the basic principle that of coordination, as it says in these decrees?
A: The coordination, as I have already expressed several times here — That always was caused by the bad economic situation.
Q: Didn't it go a bit further than the economic situation? Weren't you concerned with the coordination of research itself?
A: No. I have already stated that for me the most important thing was to maintain the fundamental questions of research. Basic research will always be carried out, as a side product. It will not need any support, but the factor in which Germany had been great so far was about to be destroyed, systematic, unlimited research. I believe that it was in the interest of many men to maintain this work.
Q: But you never in the course of your activities with this office exercised control over research in the sense that duplication in special research or basic research would be eliminated, to the end of more effective use of personnel and material?
A: No, I did not do that. I failed to do so for the following reasons: First of all, I considered it as something good when several people were working on the same project. That is the basis. It was not simple and still is not simple to make this situation clear to bureaucrats in the ministries. Therefore, I have actually never intervened. Therefore, if from the Ministry for Armaments — This is again hypothetical deduction on my part — If I had been told, "why don't you see that in this place or such a place the same thing is being done?", then I probably would have looked for reasons in order to be able to explain why it was necessary that both places engage in the same kind of work. That is the way I would have approached the problem. I would not have stated, "I have something to say here, and I am going to prohibit, and only this one place is going to do this work".
I believe that it is necessary throughout the world in order to achieve a goal that sometimes not absolutely straight ways be followed. Very frequently you can get further if you make a small deviation to the right or the left.
Q: Herr Professor, I am not inclined to disagree with what you have said. It makes considerable sense, but I also put it to you that it make equally good sense to coordinate those persons who are working in the same field, to bring them together, study the work being done by the others and to make a close-knit research group out of them. Did you never have that idea or use your influence in that direction?
A: I have carried out the idea, as I have already told you, in arranging discussions where scientists who were working in the same field of research were brought together and where they had to listen to lectures, who then had personal discussions and were able to discuss all these problems. Therefore, in order to further a problem, I would put two scientists together who were working on the same field of research, but I would consider it as an absolute mistake to tell one, "You can not work on this problem because another person is doing it," and I have never had the possibility, and I have never had myself informed at some institutions what such and such a professor is doing at that institute. First of all, that is not done with academicians. I would not consider this as honorable.
Furthermore, I would like to state, just where am I supposed to have gotten the time to do that. If I take a very small university, let us call it Abhausen, if I wanted to gain information as to what work was being done at that university, then I believe that four weeks would not have been sufficient for me to do that. How should I be able to do that, besides all my other activities? That would have been practically impossible. I believe that there is a somewhat wrong idea about the amount of work that a man can do, especially with regard to the conditions that prevailed in Germany in 1944. I do not knew how conditions are now, but then it took two days for us to go from Berlin to Munich, and perhaps it may be that things are even worse today; I don't know.
Q: That is very possible. Her Professor, did you ever undertake to coordinate with scientists working in the special research field, such as chemical warfare?
A: Yes.
Q: If you had been a member you heard of these names mention, I dare say, you know the. You heard the name of Hirt, and you heard the name Beckenbach?
A: Hirt, yes of course, he was known to me because he was consultant of the pharmacologist with the Army Medical Inspectorate.
Q: Let's take the name of Wirth?
A: Yes, Beckenbach and Wirth. Let's take Hirt who was at Strassbourg, who may have carried out the Lost experiments, that I did not even know, and I actually hesitate to say anything about a person who is dead, but I have all respects about the Generalarzt Wirth in the field of combatting chemical warfare agent. I did not think his results which he achieved was very outstanding, because what is contained in his report was generally known. He did not tell anything new to any practitioner or any surgeon. He stated in a report here of a certain protection for the liver which is appropriate in the case of injury; these are facts which even most of the laymen know in Germany today, and no new examinations are needed in order to find that out. If Beckenbak and Hirt knew each other, I don't know.
Q: In any event you never made any effort to bring them together?
A: I never tried that, no.
Q: You swear that you did not know the name of August Hirt in the period of 1943 to 1945?
A: Of course I knew the Anatomist Hirt, the name of the Hirt who was working at Strassbourg. That August was his first name, I did not know.
Q: Did you know he was working in the field of chemical warfare?
A: No, I did not know that.
Q: You heard mentioned of Beckenback, and his experiments on monkeys, which Karl Brandt went to great trouble to fly all the way from Spain, if I recall. What do you know about Beckenback?
A: Of Beckenback I know that he was not in turn a professor at Strassbourg; that he had been sent by the former chief Stein from Heidelberg to Strassbourg, and I was interested in him. That there was a cyclotron at Strassbourg, which was under the care of Stein, and another physician, whose name I do not know, and, since in the field of isotopes i was particularly interested, that is the reason I was thing of Strassbourg. with respect that there was another one in Germany I only found out in a later period of time.
Q: There had been some mention here made by the defendant Brandt that Beckenback was working on phosgenes. Do you know about that?
A: I do not know anything at all about it.
Q: You said something about your jurisdiction over science and research being limited to Brandt's special tasks, is that right?
A: Yes.
Q: I take it then that insofar as Brandt's office undertook the work, connected with science and research for September 1943, that you were inform is that right?
A: Well, for example, as to the chemical warfare matter I was not informed. If I remember correctly Brandt had testified about it.
Q: He testified to some extent about it, but he did not testify to your knowledge of it, and it seems to me strange that if Brandt were given a task in the field of science and research at the time you would know nothing about it, inasmuch as your power as derived from Dr. Brandt. You were not mentioned in the September 1943 decree. That office of science and research was set up by Brandt, and I put it to you, that you must have been informed about Brandt's work in science and research, and that by virtue of your job, is that right?
A: No, that is a mistake. I did not have to deal with everything that dealt with science and research. I had to do this as you have describe here, and Brandt has testified to quite a number of other tasks that were handled by him alone, and one of them was combatting of chemical warfare age I perhaps may point out in this connection that this order for secrecy, which my defense counsel has presented I believe as Exhibit 3, it is clearly indicated that information was only to be passed on to another person if it was necessary for him to know it, and, if a person had the assignment to work in one field here, then he was not allowed to pass on the information which he had to the other person, even if that person was located in the next room.
Q: It is quite true Herr Professor that secrecy decree is a much used document by the defense. Suppose you were to receive a report on a scientific research, would it be passed on to you?
A: Not necessarily. May I point out a report of Hirt which had been mentioned, it was given to Brandt and I never received it. I have seen it here for the first time.
Q: Although you had designated chemical warfare research as being urgent, you never saw a report on chemical warfare research?
A: At the moment I can not remember exact dates, and I do not know the date of this report. I do not know when it may have been submitted. It is possible that was submitted previously, but I do not remember the date. I did not receive the report.
Q: Did you ever receive any medical report?
A: I have already stated today that every half year I received this booklet from the Reichs Research Council. Perhaps it may have contained the report of Hirt, but I do not know that any more today. I believe that it is asking too much that I should know all of that. I don't believe that one of the defense counsels could be asked to know of an article that were contained in a jurist weekly journal in 1944. I believe that this exceeds somewhat the power of concentration of a human being.
Q: Professor, you were laboring your own memory with that problem. I had not put the question to you. Did you ever receive any other medical reports, that is, other than these reports published every six months by the Reich Research Council?
A: It is quite possible. However, I would like you to consider that I must make my defense here without having any documents to measure it on, without having spoken one word that my collaborators for a period of two years. Therefore, it can perhaps be understood that I can not remember any details about a minor matter which occurred about three years age, that I should still remember it exactly at this time, in order to be able to testify to that fact under oath. But the fact, if I have to make my testimony in such a way that one day the same prosecutor confronts me, or some other prosecutor, to tell me I have committed perjury, then those details I can not remember.
Q: Well, Herr Professor, you can rest assured that I am not going to try to trap you or trip you up with any petty contradictions, and, if I should make an effort to do so, I am quite sure that the Tribunal will not be influenced by it. Now can you remember whether you received from any scientist working on a research problem a report?
A: That is quite possible, that may very well be the case, but if you were to ask me now, could you name any such report, I would be unable to do it, however, I received it.
Q: I thought that you might have personally be interested in a given research problem, and to have received reports on it. Did you have any such interest that you now remember?
A: My interests naturally were concentrated for the most part in surgical problems, and fields similar to it. If you need to have an example I can tell you that I had a rather lively correspondence with Mr. Kilian who occupied himself as to finding the formula in his research in order to find penicillin, because he did not have the penicillin sources of the United States in Germany, and persons who went ahead to take part in this discovery, and, since we were interested, we naturally were trying to find such a mold also. Killian at Breslau, and several men at Darmstadt, Posen and Berlin were trying much to discover that, and in order to come back to the other chapter, since sulfanilamide solutions did not seem as miraculous to us, I had the greatest interest to see that penicillin would be at hand.
Well, the fact that we were not successful was due to fate.
MR. McHANEY: Does the Tribunal wish to recess at this time?
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will be in recess for a few minutes.