1947-04-21, #2: Doctors' Trial (late morning)

GERHARD ROSE — Resumed DIRECT EXAMINATION — Continued

DR. FRITZ (Counsel for the defendant Rose): Mr. President, regarding Rose's attendance at the consultants' conference, I should like to read from Rose Document No. 6, Rose Exhibit No. 6, in Rose Document Book No. 1, pages 15 to 19. This is an affidavit by Professor Dr. Schnell. I have already read the first part of this and should like to read from page 17 the last paragraph and thereafter:

I took part in the session of the section Hygiene in the Conference of Consultants held in 1943 in the Military Medical Academy in Berlin, and I can remember the following about the discussion between Rose and Ding. As I had talked to colleagues in the corridor, I was late for the lecture in question and therefore heard only a small part of it. An SS medical officer, perhaps Dr. Ding, — not Mr. Mrugowsky — had spoken on the subject of typhus vaccine and mentioned in the course of the lecture that the various vaccines and their comparative value had been tested on human beings and that their effectiveness was more or less equal. I cannot remember any more whether I heard, this part of the lecture myself or whether I asked others who had heard it to tell me about it, owing to the ensuing sharp attacks by Rose. It is sure, however, that the lecturer did not mention where and in what way experiments on humans were carried out. After that Rose demanded the floor and said in an excited and aggressive way that both from a humane and medical viewpoint he had to object to human beings being sacrificed in order to secure certain facts. He voiced disapproval of such experiments In this protest Rose had the vivid sympathy of us all, as apparent in the ensuing whispered mutual questionings among the participants of the meeting where it was murmured that those were probably experiments in concentration camps. The discussion between Ding and Rose was before others could participate, interrupted by the chairman — probably Professor Schreiber — with the remark that a discussion of this matter was not the subject of our conference but that we were here solely to discuss questions of hygiene.

He continued that the persons used for these experiments had exclusively been criminals legally sentenced to death, anyway.

In this same matter I should like to put in another affidavit. The affidavit in Rose Document Book No. 2, Rose Document No. 18, an affidavit on the part of Professor Nauck on page 6-7. It will be put in as Rose Exhibit No. 14. This, as I said, is an affidavit on the part of the present director of the Institute for Ship and Tropical Diseases in Hamburg, Professor Nauck, dated 5 February 1947. In the second paragraph it reads:

In May 1943 I took Part in the Congress of Consulting Physicians of the Military Medical Academy in Berlin. At one of these sessions Professor Rose, during the discussion, protested against experiments on human beings for the purpose of testing typhus vaccine. The exact words of the opinion he expressed I do not recall. I know, however, that Professor Rose quite unmistakably opposed such experiments on human beings.

I am the present director of the Institute for Ship and Tropical Diseases. Hamburg, 5 February 1947.

And there fellows the signature and certification.

THE PRESIDENT: Just a moment, counsel. Is that the document on page 6 of Book 2?

DR. FRITZ: Yes. That is Rose Exhibit No. 14. I read from this second paragraph. In the same document book I now put in Rose Document 19, Pages 8 and 9, as Rose Exhibit 15. This is an affidavit by Professor Water Blumenberg of 22 February 1947. I should like to read from the second paragraph on page 8.

MR. HARDY: May it please Your Honor, the defense counsel now has read two or three documents wherein it states that Professor Rose objected at the May 1943 conference of medical consultants. He is now about to introduce two or three other documents to that same effect. The prosecution will stipulate that Rose has objected at that meeting as he has stated on the stand.

I see no reason for reading these further documents. We are not objecting to admitting then into evidence but reading them into the record seems to be purely repetitious and unnecessary.

THE PRESIDENT: The record, may show that counsel for the prosecution has stipulated for the record that at this meeting of hygienists and consultants Dr. Rose objected to the experimentation upon human beings and made the objection as show by the evidence, both oral and by affidavit. There is no objection to the admission of these documents in evidence but in view of the stipulation by counsel the Tribunal sees no necessity for taking up the time in reading affidavits unless counsel can show some occasion for reading them.

DR. FRITZ: In that case I should like to say regarding the contents of this affidavit, I should, like simply to point out that in paragraph 2 he states that Professor Rose was regarded as an expert in the combatting of typhus and not as an expert in the production of typhus vaccines or in typhus research. There is a great difference here. It can be seen from this affidavit on page 9 that Professor Schreiber saw to it that this protest was not set down in the minutes of the meeting. In this same matter I submit Document Rose No. 21 in the same document book as Rose Exhibit 16, pages 12 to 14. This also concerns Rose's protest at this conference. This witness describes in his affidavit with particular perspicuity the way in which Dr. Rose expressed, himself at that time and that it was tried to allay his misgivings with the statement that the experiments were carried, out only, on criminals condemned to death.

Professor, do you have anything to add in this matter?

A: At the conclusion of this affidavit by Mr. Atmer an incident is mentioned, where he speaks of my alleged by the SS, and that there was some rumor to this affect at the conference. This was a misunderstanding, but a misunderstanding which was rather characteristic of the situation at that time. I have already said that for reasons of air security, and on that pretext, I attempted to transfer my department from Berlin. At that time I spoke with the gentlemen of the Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle [Coordination Center for Ethnic Germans] who were in charge of the resettlement camps. They offered me a camp which they no longer needed. The Volksdeutsche Mittelstelle was manned solely, or almost exclusively, by SS men at that time, and in order to take a look at this camp I proposed to the gentlemen that they should fetch me on the afternoon after the meeting. I told them to come at 5 o'clock. The conference lasted longer than that. The men became impatient and they made their way to the room where I was. When the conference was ended and I came out the two men who were waiting, SS majors in uniforms took me between them and we went down the stairs together, and left the building in their SS vehicle. That evening I did not come to the social gathering that took place at that time, because I was visiting this camp which lay outside Berlin. This event had been observed by several people, and the rumor spread that I had been arrested because of my protest. In reality there was not a word of truth in this, and I turned up the next day, but that threw a certain light on the whole situation.

Q: Did you not offend against military discipline in uttering your protests; Professor Hoering made statements on that matter?

A: I believe the expression "offense against discipline" which Professor Hoering used was a rather unhappy chosen phrase, because it was always my idea at such a consulting conference everyone could say during the discussion what he wished, but from the purely factual point of view what I said was an offense from the military point of view, on the one hand, an offense against the orders to maintain secrecy because it was completely clear that the lecturer and his sponsors intended that the audience, should not find out that those were experiments on human beings.

I had found out, after being told to maintain secrecy, that these were experiments on human beings, and made this fact intentionally known to a group of persons who should not have found out about it. Moreover in what I said I attacked my own superior, namely Gildemeister and Conti, and other leading personages in the future, for instance Himmler and Grawitz, and I asked to be disobedient to the directions of those high personages, and said what I did say in a rather excited tone of voice. I said "turn this matter over to a court martial." I said, and I said, "If you do so you will have a fine case on your hands in the matter of maintaining secrecy."

Q: Did you later discuss the matter of human being experiments before a large group of people?

A: Yes, that happened once more before a large number of people, but that was not about typhus experiments. That must have been about October 1944. The question at hand then was grippe [flu]. There was a meeting, a rather large meeting at which grippe vaccine was discussed. A number of gentlemen reported on the vaccines that they had theretofore been developed in the laboratory. Among others, Professor Herzberg on a vaccine made from dead grippe virus, and Professor Haagen on a vaccine made from living avirulent grippe virus, which he had already tested on personnel at the Strasbourg clinic. Someone in the meeting suggested, I don't remember who now, that the Haagen tests had not been sufficient, and that this vaccine should be tested on a larger number of persons. There was no mention of concentration camps then but of student companies. I had considerable misgivings about such experimental vaccination and expressed them. I said that I considered the experimental basis for this insufficient for these vaccines to be used on human beings. I was not convinced that the virus had been sufficiently attenuated. There was the danger that the vaccine would lead to infection, and one could not take that responsibility on one's self.

It was first of all intended to observe the effectiveness of the protection by observing whether people fell ill of grippe in natural ways after being vaccinated. Then someone else made the suggestion that that would take too long, and we did not know whether there would be an influenza epidemic during that time, and therefore after the vaccines the subject should be infected with a virulent virus. Since I had already expressed objections to the vaccination I opposed this proposal, even more strongly, and the result of this discussion was that infections were not carried out, but it was decided to carry out the vaccinations. Whether these vaccinations were carried out or not I do not know. At any rate I read no order to the effect that someone should make the vaccinations nor did I ever read a report that the vaccinations were carried, out. Only later in imprisonment did I hear that similar experiments, such as were then discussed, and which I disapproved of, were carried out by the English Service on Gorman PW's. Genzken probably had personally to do with this, but I had heard about this in internment hospital Karlsruhe where there were people who had experienced.

DR. FRITZ: Mr. President, regarding Professor Rose's protest against experiments on human beings at the conference, I should like, because of the importance of this point, to offer two further documents. First of all in Document Book II, Rose Document 23, Rose Exhibit 17, page 20 to 24, affidavit by University Professor Dr. Bieling on 11 December 1946 which concerns itself with Rose's protest regarding human being experiments in testing grippe vaccine. I should like to have read this into the record, Mr. President, because it can be seen from this that the defendant Rose himself——

THE PRESIDENT: If this affidavit refers to another meeting, other than the meeting with which we were concerned before, the Counsel may read this affidavit or the pertinent portions thereof into the record.

MR. HARDY: I wish to point out this discussion concerns information on influenza vaccine and grippe; we have not charged the defendant with any participation in experiments or tests as to influenza vaccine; therefore I object to the introduction of this documentary evidence as being immaterial to matters concerning this Tribunal.

THE PRESIDENT: The affidavit in question proposed, Exhibit 17, shows the attitude of the Defendant Rose on experiments on human beings the objection is over-ruled and counsel may proceed, BY DR. FRITZ:

Q: I read from the first page of this affidavit, the second paragraph:

On 30 October 1944 I attended a meeting at the Military Medical academy in Berlin, at which I had to state the result of my research into the production of influenza vaccine at Marburg. After I, and the other gentlemen, had reported about the results of laboratory research and animal experiments, it was proposed at the subsequent discussion that the vaccine should not be tried out on human beings as well. It was considered advisable that the first inoculations should be tested on students of the same age living in joint billets under somewhat similar conditions. I remember well that Prof. Rose strongly and forcefully disagreed with this proposal.

I remember this particularly well, since for technical reasons I could not understand his point of view and assumed that it was based on a misconception. I did agree with him however, that should investigations on human beings should only be made by specialist physicians, and then only after thorough preliminary animal tests.

If these conditions were, however, fulfilled and the harmlessness and effectiveness of the preparations were thus proved, there should be, in my opinion, no objection to make the step now from animal to human being, which always had to be made in such cases. From the experiences gathered in my laboratory, it seemed out of the question to me that considerable injuries or any infections could be expected, and my point of view was proved right by the many thousand experiences gained with influenza, vaccinations carried out, in recent years, e. g. in the American Army.

As far as I remember, it was only proposed to see the reaction of the inoculated persons to a natural infection later on. The effect of the inoculation should be ascertained immediately after the inoculation, by the examination of their serum. A useful procedure for these serological examinations was known in which a couple of ccm of blood are drawn in the ordinary way from the inoculated person. This procedure was elaborated by the American Hirst. During the first months of 1945 I tested the serum according to this procedure here in Marburg, on nurses and students who volunteered at lectures and who had been immunized with different influenza vaccines, previously tested in animal experiments. In this way I ascertained the effect of the inoculation.

It may be, that during the meeting, a further suggestion was made that this serum research should not be considered adequate but that those voluntary experimental subjects, immunized by the different influenza, vaccines, should be injected later on with living influenza virus. This was not decided on. But no objection against such decision, could be raised in principle, as it corresponds completely with the views of responsible physicians. As we now know from present publications in the scientific periodicals of America, the effectiveness of influenza vaccine on human beings has been tested according to this procedure, in the United States, and as I heard, also in Russia. Meanwhile, I have also had the opportunity to speak with American specialist colleagues, who were actually working on this special subject and who themselves carried out these investigations.

In their scientific papers a clear description was given to the specialist world, as to how they should inject inoculated persons and the non-inoculated control persons with living virus; viz. by atomizing the virus and making them inhale it. A comparison was then made as to how many of the inoculated and non-inoculated persons fell ill after the voluntary infection, and from this, the strength of the inoculation is taken in indivi ual cases.

From the information given here, it follows; that no matter whether only the first or the second suggestion as well, were made, no further objections existed in principle. But, as to how far this was the case was evidently not quite clear to Dr. Rose, from the statements of the specialists, and this explains why he raised a warning voice and made remarks about the principle of justification. It also shows clearly and distinctly Mr. Rose's great sense of responsibility, when he expressed in the most impressive was his subjective objections before a wide circle of people. If he did this here in opposition to suggestions which are not contradictory to the general medical ethics or the laws of humanity; it is quite out of the question to consider that he had approved of acts which did not conform to any greater degree with those demands which he had so strongly supported.

There follows the signature and the certification.

Now further I would like to put in Rose Document No. 20, Rose Exhibit No. 18, on pages 10 and 11 in the same document book. This is an affidavit by Dr. George Finger of 6 February 1947. In view of the fact that this affidavit also concerns the consulting conference, I shall dispense with reading it, but I point out that precisely Dr. Finger can very clearly remember the incident, which arose as a result of Dr. Rose's protest.

Dr. Schnell says at the conclusion of his affidavit that Professor Schreiber stated that the experimental subjects of Dr. Ding were criminals condemned to death.

Professor Nauck, who was also a witness to this occurance, says nothing about that. Dr. Blumenberg also says nothing on this point, but he does mention that your protests were answered in the conference. Dr. Finger says simply you maintained your point of view despite the fact that they were criminals condemned to death, but he does not say who made this statement. Dr. Atmer speaks of the possibility that another SS physician and not the man reading the paper had answered your protest, and which of these various statements are correct and who did make that statement?

A: It is of course comprehensible, after the four years that now have passed, that these men can no longer remember what happened word for word, but do remember the essential facts, and it is understandable that there are individual discrepancies in the testimony of just who did what. This matter, as I said, was stricken from the record and no one can refresh their memory with the help of the minutes. I remember very clearly that Ding answered me. Kogon also described here in his testimony as a witness that Ding had told him that he had a show-down with me. That is the way I remember it, and, as far as I know, Schreiber said that there were criminals condemned to death; no, Ding in his answer said that they were criminals condemned to death. Something which I know about but which the others attending the conference did not know about. Then, Schreiber interferred, when I spoke for the sound time, in order to put an and to this discussion. It is also possible, though I cannot swear to it today, that he said something to the effect that Ding said that they we. e criminals condemned to death so we would not have to get excited about it. That is possible and I don't knew today, he Dr. atmer was under the impression that this was another SS doctor, he said that at least that was possible. I can say that I remember that several SS officers were present, but I can only remember that they stayed entirely in the background and did not participate in the discussion at all.

Q: From the evidence submitted, it can be seen that you were particularly excited at the time; even Kogon, who had only heard of the matter, spoke of a particularly violent discussion here; now why were you so excited as to make such an impression on the witness.

A: The subject of this whole discussion was a matter of absolute fundamental principle to me in my profession, of course, this excited me greatly.

Q: What did you know about the type of the experimental subjects?

A: I know that Gildemeister had told me at our first meeting and what Conti had corroborated, what Ding again fenfirmed, in this public argument of the subject in that these were criminals condemned to death. Then I was also told by these in Buchenwald, who had not fallen sick, that they had been through typhus, to which they attributed their immunity, in?cahit before they had been condemned.

Q: Mr. President, I might say that Moahit was the pre-trial prison in Berlin, a prison known to every person in Berlin. There is a section of Berlin called Moahit and if someone says that he was sent to Moahit, that of course means he was sent to this pretrial prison.

Why did you make this such a principle problem; you as a doctor and as a research man knew that medical experiments not without danger had previously been carried out on criminals condemned to death?

A: You are now asking a question of decisive importance regarding my motives in this whole matter; and General Taylor in his opening statement on page 55 of the German record demanded, and I quote:

"It is our duty to expose with crystal clarity the ideas and motives that lead the defendants to do what they did," I agree with the Chief of Counsel.

This is one of the most important questions, and consequently I should like to answer this question here in some detail.

I shall state my own opinions and also what I know of my own experience about the motives of other scientists who are today dead and cannot answer for themselves.

You asked why I protested against the experiments on human beings. Of course, I know that such experiments had been carried out but several clear considerations helped to determine my attitude.

First of all the concept of the criminal condemned to death. This, of course, in the last analysis is a purely emotional reaction. For the jurist and many people who are accustomed to thinking in formal terms this may perhaps be a more simple question. When a man is condemned to death by law, then for them this is an order, and that is the way it must be The jurist concerns himself with the legal phases. He has a heavy responsibility to carry in making decisions. But the matter is settled and the judgment must be carried out. I am not a jurist, and my attitude is somewhat different. I have been around far enough in the world to know hew extraordinarily wavering and relative concepts of law are.

They differ not only from country to country and from people to people, but within the same country they can change dramatrically in a short time. This is true in normal peaceful times and all the more true in politically fomenting times or war times. Often times a man is punished for a crime which ether thousands or persons regard as an act of heroism, and there is something else to be added here, and I said when I answered that those were criminals condemned to death, namely, that it was a fundamental professional question. For me in my profession as a hygienist and researcher into the question of immunity, I have already said here how we normally proceed in order to test a now vaccine. The tolerance is tosted on human beings because that is something that simply cannot be ascertained in the animal experiment. Of course, you can find exceptions. Bieling's affidavit states such an exception, where the protective value of the vaccine is tested by infecting the human being, but those are only exceptions; and so far as I could survey the whole field, those were exceptions which happened exclusively abroad and I, as a hygienist and immunity researcher did not want that this practice to become common in Germany. I foared such would establish a precedent. Of course, I also was perfectly aware of the crucial position in which we found ourselves with regard to typhus vaccines, but I shall clarify this when I discuss the technical side of the experiments, whereas now I am discussing the ethical aspects. I was afraid that if this method were undertaken in the question of typhus vaccines, that very soon there would be a demand to apply it also to other vaccines or other problems.

I am a specialist and know this field well enough, and I know what enormous advantages a research worker would have if we were perfectly at liberty to carry, out human being experiments, but here, as the advantage was evident to my reasoning, nevertheless my emotions revolted against it. I was acting on the principle of 'principe is abstat', and if one does not combat such tendencies in the very beginning they got out of hand. That was the second point. And then thirdly there was a purely practical consideration. From 1921 I worked in experimental medicine in many countries and I know with what prejudices my profession is beset. In wide public circles we are cursed out as torturers of animals, because our field of immunology has to work in animal experiments. Otherwise, we cannot work at all. If then in addition to this prejudice there should be brought also the much more serious charge of human being experiments then that would throw my profession even deeper into the sediment. Then there is a fourth psychological point. Mr. McHaney, in discussing Professor Hippko's attitude toward the breathing experiments, said and I quote:

If Hippko knew that those were criminals concerned to death then everything was in order and he need have no scruples.

I believe that this statement of Mr. McHaney completely misunderstands the psychological factors that play a role in this problem. I have already said that perhaps the jurist's attitude toward this is different. The jurist has the heavy professional responsibility of putting into execution the death verdict, or as prosecutor, he has the responsibility of requesting such a verdict, but once that has happened, the matter is closed so far as he is concerned, and then the matter applies, fiat justitia.

The very ethical researcher who is interested only in scientific knowledge, night also come to the conclusion that once a sentence has been passed, he may fool indifferent as to whether the man is hanged or whether he is killed in a medical experiment, but for a man who is not a research fanatic, very essential considerations of another sort play a role. In Buchenwald I myself saw the serious state of illness of the control persons who had not been vaccinated, and I was under that impression. After Holzlochner passed on the froozing experiments, I happened to speak with Professor Holzlochner, at Nurnberg. From his paper I could not clearly see the connection. Consequently, after his lecture I checked into this matter and saw what an enermous spiritual burden was placed on Professor Holzlochner by having to go through this experience, because even a person condemned to death is a human being. He can suffer pain and now return to Hippko, I know his personality and completely understand his attitude. How I can quite understand that if he found out the details from Hippko's report and from the other reports as to how such experiments took place, that that could have been quite enough for him to withdraw the permission he had previously given, not knowing what was going to go on.

And then there is the fifth point, and you can say about this; This is professional egoism and has nothing to do with ethics, but as a motive it also plays a role. Only the most important of experiments are carried out on human beings.

Many research persons, even after the State has given it's permission for them, will attempt to evade carrying then out, simply because they are not willing to take the spiritual burden upon themselves of doing such experimentation. Thus the danger a rises at the most important part of the research, that it should fall into the hands of the purely research fanatic, and he is not the happiest representative of our profession. You could say that this is not an ethical consideration but it is a consideration nevertheless, how old this problem of the research fanatic is in research. medicine can be soon from Hell's book which the witness Liobrandt quoted from here, a prosecution witness, and on page 557 it says, and quote:

If a doctor devotes himself to research he is more or less inclined to regard the patients from this point of view, is all too prune to use a patient who is trusted to him for the solution of a scientific problem and thus it happens that he puts the interest of the sick person in the second place. This conflict between the medical profession and the requirements of science has already been treated in French literature where the doctor sacrificed his patient to the interest of science.

Thus we see that the problem of the research fanatic is by no means a new one because those words I have just quoted were written in 1900.

THE PRESIDENT: At this time the Tribunal will be in recess, Counsel may finish after the recess.

(Tho Court adjourned for the noon recess)