Goering (53 page)

JACKSON: But when it was State necessity to kill somebody, you had to have somebody to do it, did you not?

GOERING: Yes, just as in other states; whether it is called Secret Service or something else, I do not know. . . .

JACKSON: And there was nothing secret about the establishment of a Gestapo as a political police, about the fact that people were taken into protective custody, about the fact that there were concentration camps? Nothing secret about those things, was there?

GOERING: There was at first nothing secret about it at all. [
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Irritation began to show itself in both men; Jackson felt that Goering was purposely avoiding the direct answer he was supposed to give, Goering that he was not being given the trial of strength he deserved.

JACKSON: I can only repeat my question, which I submit you have not answered: Did you at that time see any military necessity for an attack by Germany on Soviet Russia?

GOERING: I personally believed that at that time this danger had not yet reached its climax, and therefore the attack might not yet be necessary. But that was my personal view.

JACKSON: And you were the Number Two man at that time in all Germany?

GOERING: It has nothing to do with my being second in importance. There were two conflicting points of view as regards strategy. The Führer, the Number One man, saw one danger, and I, as the Number Two man, if you wish to express it so, wanted to put through another strategic measure. If I had imposed my will every time, then I would have probably become the Number One man. But since the Number One man was of a different opinion, and I was only the Number Two man, his opinion naturally prevailed. [
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. 191]

Goering's main line of defense was to broaden his shoulders and take full responsibility for his loyalty to the Führer, to whom he had taken his oath of allegiance, and for his part in establishing a system of authoritarian government in which he believed wholeheartedly and which he knew was necessary in order to restore Germany to health and strength as Europe's first nation. What angered him was any attempt to implicate him personally in acts of inhumanity. The concentration camps were Himmler's affair, and he knew nothing of the atrocities conducted there in secret; he was on leave during the period when the R.A.F. prisoners were shot for escaping from Stalag Luft III; he was concerned with breaking the stranglehold of the Jews on the German economy and not with breaking their bodies. When regrettable things happened, as of course they must in times of violent change or of war, he always punished the wrongdoers—provided the matter was within his jurisdiction and was brought to his notice. So the arguments went on, interminably, hour after hour, in the fifth month of the court's session. Jackson labored on, often, it seemed, following Goering with his questions rather than leading him. For instance, the question of why Goering had not sought to warn the German people of the dangers involved in going to war with the Soviet Union:

JACKSON: And yet, because of the Führer system, as I understand you, you could give no warning to the German people; you could bring no pressure of any kind to bear to prevent that step, and you could not even resign to protect your own place in history.

GOERING: There are quite a few questions here. I should like to answer the first one.

JACKSON: Separate them if you wish.

GOERING: The first question was, I believe, whether I took the opportunity to tell the German people about this danger. I had no occasion to do this. We were at war, and such differences of opinion, as far as strategy was concerned, could not be brought into the public forum during the war. I believe that has never happened in world history. Secondly, as far as my resignation is concerned, I do not wish even to discuss that, for during the war I was an officer, a soldier, and I was not concerned with whether I shared an opinion or not. I had merely to serve my country as a soldier. Thirdly, I was not the man to forsake a man to whom I had given my oath of loyalty, every time he was not of my way of thinking. If that had been the case there was no need to bind myself to him from the beginning. It never occurred to me to leave the Führer.

JACKSON: Insofar as you know, the German people were led into the war, attacking Soviet Russia, under the belief that you favored it?

GOERING: The German people did not know about the declaration of war against Russia until after the war with Russia had started. The German people, therefore, had nothing to do with this. The German people were not asked; they were told of the fact and of the necessity for it. [
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. 192]

Goering sometimes talked as if he were a teacher explaining obvious points of principle to students whom he considered dull and unperceptive:

Of course, a successful termination of a war can be considered successful only if I either conquer the enemy or, through negotiations with the enemy, come to a conclusion which guarantees success. That is what I call a successful termination. I call it a draw when I come to terms with the enemy. This does not bring me the success which victory would have brought, but, on the other hand, it precludes defeat. This is a conclusion without victors or vanquished. [
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. 193]

Jackson, and occasionally the president himself, tried to force Goering to answer just yes or no, not adding his points of explanation until afterward. This went entirely against Goering's nature and led to frequent abortive interchanges: JACKSON: By the time of January 1945, you also knew that you were unable to defend the German cities against the air attacks of the Allies, did you not?

GOERING: Concerning the defense of German cities against Allied air attacks, I should like to describe the possibility of doing this as follows: Of itself—

JACKSON: Can you answer my question? Time may not mean quite so much to you as it does to the rest of us. Can you not answer yes or no? Did you then know, at the same time that you knew the war was lost, that the German cities could not successfully be defended against air attack by the enemy? Can you not tell us yes or no?

GOERING: I can say that I knew that, at that time, it was not possible. [
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. 193] . . .

JACKSON: I ask you just a few questions about Austria. You said that you and Hitler had felt deep regret about the death of Dollfuss, and I ask you if it is not a fact that Hitler put up a plaque in Vienna in honor of the men who murdered Dollfuss, and went and put a wreath on their graves when he was there. Is that a fact? Can you not answer that with “yes” or “no”?

GOERING: No, I cannot answer it with either “yes” or “no” if I am to speak the truth according to my oath. I cannot say, “Yes, he did it,” because I do not know; I cannot say, “No, he did not do it,” because I do not know that either. I want to say that I heard about this event here for the first time. [
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. 208]

On the question of his loyalty to Hitler he remained adamant.

JACKSON: And there was no way to prevent the war from going on as long as Hitler was the head of the German government, was there?

GOERING: As long as Hitler was the Führer of the German people, he alone decided whether the war was to go on. As long as my enemy threatens me and demands absolutely unconditional surrender, I fight to my last breath, because there is nothing left for me except perhaps a chance that in some way fate may change, even though it seems hopeless.

JACKSON: Well, the people of Germany who thought it was time that the slaughter stopped had no means to stop it except revolution or assassination of Hitler, had they?

GOERING: A revolution always changes a situation if it succeeds. That is a foregone conclusion. The murder of Hitler at this time, say January 1945, would have brought about my succession. If the enemy had given me the same answer, that is, unconditional surrender, and had held out those terrible conditions which had been intimated, I would have continued fighting whatever the circumstances. [
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. 194]

He denied that he had made any attempt to oust Hitler during the last days of the war.

GOERING: I can answer only for myself; what Himmler did I do not know. I neither betrayed the Führer nor at that time negotiated with a single foreign soldier. This will, or this final act, of the Führer is based on an extremely regrettable mistake, and one which grieves me deeply—that the Führer could believe in his last hours that I could ever be disloyal to him. It was all due to an error in the transmission of a radio report and perhaps to a misrepresentation which Bormann gave the Führer. I myself never thought for a minute of taking over power illegally, or of acting against the Führer in any way. [
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. 194]

Goering's spirits soon rose to the point where he felt he could afford to joke with the court. The opportunity came when he was asked whether he was responsible or not for the Reichstag fire.

GOERING: That accusation that I had set fire to the Reichstag came from a certain foreign press. That could not bother me, because it was not consistent with the facts. I had no reason or motive for setting fire to the Reichstag. From the artistic point of view, I did not at all regret that the assembly chamber was burned; I hoped to build a better one. But I did regret very much that I was forced to find a new meeting place for the Reichstag, and, not being able to find one, I had to give up my Kroll Opera House, that is, the second State opera house, for that purpose. The opera seemed to me much more important than the Reichstag.

JACKSON: Have you ever boasted of burning the Reichstag building, even by way of joking?

GOERING: No. I made a joke, if that is the one you are referring to, when I said that after this I would be competing with Nero and that probably people would soon be saying that, dressed in a red toga and holding a lyre in my hand, I looked on at the fire and played while the Reichstag was burning. That was the joke. But the fact was that I almost perished in the flames, which would have been very unfortunate for the German people, but very fortunate for their enemies. [
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. 196]

At other times he answered with asperity, for example when he was pressed on the question of German acquisition of Austria and the Sudetenland.

JACKSON: You still have not answered my question although you answered everything else. They were not taken from you by the Treaty of Versailles, were they?

GOERING: Of course Austria was taken away by the Versailles Treaty and likewise the Sudetenland, for both territories, had it not been for the Treaty of Versailles and the Treaty of St. Germain, would have become German territories through the right of the people to self-determination. To this extent they have to do with it. [
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. 202]

In the private notes he kept during the trial, Sir Norman Birkett (later Lord Birkett), Lawrence's alternate as president of the tribunal, made this most significant comment on Goering on March 18:

Goering reveals himself as a very able man who perceives the intention of every question almost as soon as it is framed and uttered. He has considerable knowledge, too, and has an advantage over the Prosecution in this respect, for he is always on familiar ground. He has knowledge which many others belonging to the Prosecution and the Tribunal have not. He has therefore quite maintained his ground and the Prosecution has not really advanced its case at all. Certainly there has been no dramatic destruction of Goering as had been anticipated or prophesied.

The following day he added, “Goering has now taken complete control and dominates the whole proceedings . . . and unless he is controlled the Trial will get more and more out of hand.” Goering, he thought, had in fact made the occasion a “free platform . . . to explain and expand his ideas and beliefs for future generations of Germans,” and “he was able to present at least a plausible case on about every aspect of the matter.”

As Birkett considered it from the judges' bench, the cross-examination of Goering was a very critical moment, and, if unsuccessful, could only too easily threaten the fundamental value of the whole trial. The prestige of the tribunal as a solemn indictment of the Nazis and as a precedent in the administration of international justice was at stake. After the weary months spent in stating the elaborate case for the prosecution, with its inevitable overlaps, repetitions and expressions of national feeling, the fact that Goering was taking the stand had filled the courtroom once more and concentrated the attention of the world on this most prominent witness from the dark and defeated world of the Nazis. His counsel had given him every chance to place his actions and those of Hitler in a favorable light. Now was the chance to demolish the specious structure of his case while the world watched the valiant reassertion of humane and civilized values.

Goering presented the tribunal with a grave problem. His lengthy answers were for the most part just relevant enough to make it difficult for the president to intervene and stop him, except from time to time in a general way. As Birkett noted at the time, “This was where the cleverness of Goering was fully shown.” He held the stage for two days with “cleverly constructed statements which were not strictly answers to the questions at all.”

The result was that he proved more than a match for Jackson, who gradually began to show a certain lack of self-confidence. The parry and thrust of the cross-examination, the series of leading questions that carried the witness forward to some carefully prepared trap in which he would suddenly find himself placed in a difficult and unanswerable position, never occurred. Goering knew his documents, knew his answers, always was ready with his explanations and plausible excuses which only became more plausible as his confidence grew at the expense of the prosecution.