How Do You Face Evil? - A Questionnaire {HRI 20020201-V1.0.1}
Koos Nolst Trenite
1 February 2002
{HRI 20020201-V1.0.1}
(Version 1.0.1
on 9 Jun 2007)
(suitable for foreign
language students)
(layout for typewriter font)
'
Many philosophic texts and books of
knowledge tell different things about
how to understand the obvious sufferings
that some or many experience in life.
'
There is this bright and lively five year old girl and she intensely
wants to live life, and to enjoy it to the fullest.
'
I will try to quote or reconstruct - from the many books I studied
and from the many people I looked at and listened to - the very
different things that would be said to her, and also, if not voiced,
the things that have been thought at her, said to her if she could
hear those thoughts.
'
She arrived by train at the concentration camp of Auschwitz.
*(a)
'
I list many views, that I have read and heard about and looked at and
listened to, for your interest and consideration, and for your
opinion to be heard and noted.
By offering you to compare the various views presented,
these viewpoints are held in a much wider perspective.
That makes it more easy to make up one's own mind - and to
better understand the mind of others - rather than to have
attention fixated on what felt like 'the most beautiful-
sounding viewpoint,' or 'the most convincing viewpoint.'
*(b)
'
First I let the concentration camp commander, or those he commands,
voice thoughts and explanations that seem to them to be right or
appropriate.
And in the next sections, I let others - whose books I found or who
otherwise made their viewpoints known - tell the child how they want
her to understand what is happening to her.
I visit with you various circles and schools of thought or philoso-
phy, to ask their viewpoints on the matter.
'
They are put next to each other with the intention to make it easier
to sort out any confusions, that may have been presented to you and
to me. *(c)
If you feel like answering any or all of the questions -
and I suggest you do - you may want to use the boxes.
For instance by pasting the text into your own word
processor. Should you want to aid my research in this
matter, then return the results to plato_wo...@yahoo.com
Yes, I agree - Maybe - No, I disagree
[_] [_] [_]
'
'
___________
Section One
I will now let the concentration camp commander - or those he com-
mands - voice such thoughts and such explanations as seem to him or
them to be appropriate and applicable.
y m n
[_][_][_] 1. "When you die, all that we did and that we will do to
you, will be wiped out and will be without effect on
you or on anybody, and could as well never have happen-
ed. As soon as you die, you will become nothing again,
without identity, without feelings."
y m n 2. "What we do to you, is not different from digging a
[_][_][_] spade in a heap of sand, you are simply a talking mass
of molecules; but when we do medical experiments on
you, then you at least will serve some good purpose and
you possibly could help diminishing the suffering of
others."
y m n 3. "You are soon going to be dead anyway. You have no life
[_][_][_] to lead anymore, so for you it doesn't really matter,
whatever we do to you now, for it will soon all be over
for you anyway. You won't even remember after your
death what we will do to you while you are still alive.
So we can actually do anything to you, no matter how
destructive or mean or repulsive or painful or treach-
erous it is to you."
'
'
___________
Section Two
We go to a different circle of people now, with viewpoints that are
maybe more familiar to some, and probably less known to others.
And we are listening to how these people give the little girl advice
to understand the situation she is in.
y m n 4. "Everybody has his own free will. So you are here
[_][_][_] actually out of your own will, you must have chosen at
some time to want to experience this."
y m n 5. "'It takes two to (dance a) Tango!' (Both sides have to
[_][_][_] agree to it, for one person to be able to do something
to the other person.) So it is actually also your own
fault, you must have somehow agreed to be subjected to
this."
y m n 6. "It is necessary for your development - nothing happens
[_][_][_] without purpose: 'There is a reason behind every-
thing'."
y m n 7. "Only because you suffer now, will you learn to appre-
[_][_][_] ciate and really enjoy happiness later, in your next
life."
y m n 8. "You somehow deserve this, because 'what goes around,
[_][_][_] comes around.' (What you do to others comes back to
you. The same intention that you had for others, you
will be subjected to yourself.)
By simply reversing logic, it is then obvious, that, if
something bad is done to you now, you must have pre-
viously intended bad onto others - probably in a past
life that you don't remember or don't know about."
y m n 9. "People determine their own life; and you have, obvious-
[_][_][_] ly, chosen to be born and living in Germany as a
Jewish girl at this time, so in fact your situation is
all caused by yourself. You have yourself chosen this
life when or before you were born."
y m n 10. "If you had kept your Aura - the Life Energy around you
[_][_][_] - free from bad Energy, you would never have been put
on the train that brought you here to the extermina-
tion camp."
'
'
_____________
Section Three
We go to a different circle of people again, with viewpoints that are
maybe more familiar to some, and probably less known to others.
And we are listening to how these people give the little girl advice
on how to understand the situation she is in.
y m n 11. "What will you learn from this life of yours on Earth,
[_][_][_] and what lesson will you learn - from being raped and
from being tortured with medical experiments, and then
being gassed, now, as a little five year old girl?"
y m n 12. "This is fate, predestination; you must die now; that
[_][_][_] is the fulfillment of your current life's purpose in
the great scheme of things."
y m n 13. "This concentration camp commander and Heinrich Himmler
[_][_][_] (who executes the extermination plan) are necessary, so
that you can fulfill your destiny."
y m n 14. "The Great Masters are guiding events, so they have
[_][_][_] determined this to be necessary for life at this time,
else Himmler with his concentration camp commanders
would not be doing this to you."
y m n 15. "You or others would not be able to become a good
[_][_][_] person - without being raped, tortured and murdered.
There is only good when there is evil.
This is the law of duality, the very nature of life
itself. And what comes up must go down. What goes down,
will go up."
y m n 16. "There is the cycle of birth, growth and destruction.
[_][_][_] You have to make place for other life, now, like a
leaf does that falls and fertilizes the ground for the
tree."
y m n 17. "There is an eternal up and down curve of life growing
[_][_][_] and of life dying, in history, and we happen now to be
in a down-curve.
So that's why you and millions of others now are being
robbed, humiliated and then secretly murdered."
y m n 18. "Actually he does you a service by hating and ridiculing
[_][_][_] and raping and murdering you - so you can show how well
you take it: It builds character, in the bigger
picture. You are being tested, how good you are in not
hating him."
y m n 19. "He has to fulfill his purpose in life by murdering
[_][_][_] you now, he must inflict this on you so that he can
and will, in his next life times, learn and experience
himself what it is, to suffer. He must build that
Karma to be able to experience suffering in his life
times to come. That is necessary for his spiritual
evolution."
y m n 20. "He must do his quota (necessary amount) of evil, in
[_][_][_] order to become good again. It is like a pendulum that
has to go all the way to one end, before it can come
back."
y m n 21. "When we all have made these experiences, and you too,
[_][_][_] then we have increased our awareness and can move to a
higher level of existence. That is the purpose of life.
If he did not do these things to you, you would not
learn from them: Earth is a school to experience and to
learn."
y m n 22. "Without war and slaughter there is no progress, and
[_][_][_] people would have no impulse to improve things, nor
would they, without evil and ugliness, appreciate
happiness and beauty, nor would they want to strive
for it.
They would not be aware of good and of beauty, unless
there is evil and ugliness for them to experience."
'
'
____________
Section Four
We go to a different circle of people now, with viewpoints that are
maybe more familiar to some, and probably less known to others.
And we are listening to how these people give the little girl advice
in understanding how to deal with the situation she is in.
y m n 23. "God wanted this for you."
[_][_][_]
y m n 24. "What is happening to you, is not reality. It is happen-
[_][_][_] ing only in the material universe. All of life is just
an illusion."
y m n 25. "God only wants good things - therefore this is not
[_][_][_] really happening to you."
y m n 26. "If there would not have been so much poverty and unem-
[_][_][_] ployment here, then they would not murder you and
these others."
y m n 27. "The concentration camp commander simply is not educa-
[_][_][_] ted enough about life and its laws, else he would not
do this to you. There are no people who want to be
evil, only people who are ignorant of the true nature
of life. Criminal minds do not exist."
y m n 28. "The planets Jupiter and Mars were radiating their
[_][_][_] Energy from the same direction, when you were born on
Earth. This is why you are now caught up in war, and
how you were destined to be murdered at the age of
five."
'
'
____________
Section Five
For those who like to perceive,
- without automatically being repelled by what spreads ugliness,
- without automatically hating what itself seeks to be hated,
- without automatically misunderstanding what itself demands
at all cost to be misunderstood and so wants to remain
un-remedied,
I add the following viewpoints.
y m n 29. "The concentration camp commander hates life for all
[_][_][_] 'it' has done to him, and so feels compelled to destroy
it."
y m n 30. "He wants to destroy any witnesses of his condition, he
[_][_][_] wants to destroy anybody who sees and experiences and
disagrees with his hating and destroying life."
y m n 31. "The concentration camp commander feels that he knows he
[_][_][_] must destroy the life in front of him, and has been
given logical, scientific reasons, that override his
feelings and justify his actions."
y m n 32. "The soul of the concentration camp commander has been
[_][_][_] mutilated into enjoying to feel the Energy of fear and
despair, such as is emanated by people who are tortu-
red or about to be murdered.
It gives him the feeling that he is 'finally in
command of life,' instead of being overwhelmed by it
constantly."
y m n 33. "In actual fact, the concentration camp commander is
[_][_][_] fully overwhelmed - by individuals that want to destroy
life. These mutilated and perverted his spirit and they
destroyed his ability and desire to care for life."
y m n 34. "The concentration camp commander wanted originally to
[_][_][_] oppose only that life that destroys life. He is lack-
ing in courage and ability to face those who want him
to destroy life. He has been perverted into feeling
that 'he does "assist life" when he exterminates the
"worthless life",' that 'he does "improve life" when he
ridicules and betrays the defenseless life in front of
him'."
y m n 35. "The concentration camp commander subconsciously wants,
[_][_][_] most intensely, to destroy those precise individuals -
if he could become aware of and recognize them - who
forever mutilated his soul and the souls of others and
made them into criminal minds, actually filled with
eternal hate."
y m n 36. "Basically he is hating those individuals who stamped
[_][_][_] out - in possibly a very distant past of his being -
his capacity to respect and care for life."
'
And they close the doors and down they let the Zyklon B gas come from
the ceiling, and they wait till the wailing and shouting dies and
the bodies don't move anymore.
'
'
In any public library, you can read the abundant accounts and
records of regression therapy, from people who live again to
talk about it - people who DO remember *(d) the millions of
people that have been murdered, murdered secretly, around 1940,
in Europe ... murdered, you were told, for WHAT purpose again?
'
Koos Nolst Trenite "Cause Trinity"
human rights philosopher and poet
'It is of no use walking
anywhere to preach
unless our walking
is our preaching.'
Saint Francis of Assisi
'
________
Texnotes:
*(a) A town (in Polish called Oswiçim) in the then German-occupied
country of Poland; Auschwitz was the secret site of one of
Hitler's most efficient extermination camps, governed and
instituted by the 'Geheime Staatspolizei' (Secret State Police)
and by Hitler's 'Schutz Staffel' (SS), commanded by Hitler and
his very 'efficient' secret and political chief, Heinrich
Himmler.
There were three main camps, with 39 smaller camps around it.
Between June 1940 and January 1945, more than four million (!)
people were murdered there, mostly Jews. The vast majority were
gassed in its chambers, but many others were shot, starved or
tortured to death.
['The Oxford Family Encyclopedia' Oxford University Press Inc.,
and other sources.]
*(b)'Feeling fine' is not necessarily proof of having found actual
understanding of the causes of evil.
But that very feeling makes one inclined to assume that one has
found understanding.
You will meet people who have been made to think that they have
found understanding, while in fact their curiosity for looking
deeper, and their natural drive for achieving responsible and
active understanding, has so been effectively stopped - by
"understanding": They "don't have to look further" - they "know."
'Feeling fine about evil' can be achieved by hearing a very
acceptable and seemingly logical reason that "explains it
all," that makes it acceptable why "you do not have to take
responsibility," or that even demands of you to not take
responsibility, as if "not acting is some higher purpose" -
though your very soul knows and very naturally screams, that
as a matter of course you should and will take responsibility
to prevent these things from happening now or in the future!
The truth is, that there indeed is a higher purpose by which
you can face evil somewhat calmly:
You can examine the evil so thoroughly, that you
actually and effectively can do something about it,
and you will act appropriately and effectively due to
having acquired a very precise understanding of the
circumstances and sufficient perception of the sources
and of the mechanisms that these sources use.
Which is a purpose that in actuality is very responsible,
and which is deeply satisfying to your soul.
*(c) This presentation could make it suitable for inclusion into
various kinds of magazines, as people like to be involved in
what they read.
*(d) People - that is, you too - have your memories and perception
stored not, as some quacks and charlatans want to have you
believe, in your brain.
[See 'The Nature Of The Cosmos' of 29 August 2001 - preferably
in its latest revision, Version 2.0i, to be issued shortly.]
[issued and revised, and starting with part 1]
'The Nature Of Life As Seen From Earth - Introduction: Life Forms'
{HRI 20010829-pi1-V1.1.1}
See References, below.
'
__________
References:
'Definition Of Insane - Relation To Humor'
{HRI 20030205-V2.3.3}
(5 Feb 2003 - Version 2.3.3 on 13 May 2007)
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.martial-arts/msg/83cdfa7c46d584d1
'Defining Love And Hate - A Law Of Life'
{HRI 20020729-V2.0}
(29 July 2002 - Version 2.0i on 7 January 2003)
http://groups.google.com/group/Koos-Nolst-Trenite/msg/40d2a6d4cadc84b1
'Living In The Present - Definition'
{HRI 20030102}
(2 Jan 2003)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.philosophy/msg/79b86c004f4c16ad
'Tolerance Defined In Holland (The Netherlands)'
{HRI 20021225}
(25 Dec 2002 - Christmas Day)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.rights.human/msg/17a80804e05335e0
(p1)'The Nature Of Life As Seen From Earth - Introduction: Life Forms'
{HRI 20010829-pi1-V1.1.1}
(29 August 2001 - part issue 1 Version 1.1.1 on 11 Sept 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/88a7a7b2d830d5e6
(p2)'The Nature Of Life As Seen From Earth - Introduction: Our Planet'
{HRI 20010829-pi2-V1.2}
(29 August 2001 - part issue 2 Version 1.2 on 12 Sept 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/06119c3448d82941
(p3) 'The Nature Of Life As Seen From Earth - The Denial'
{HRI 20010829-pi3-V1.2}
(29 August 2001 - part issue 3 Version 1.2 on 13 Sept 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/2c7d720f49c84375
(p4) 'The Nature Of Life As Seen From Earth
- Some Fine Particle Physics'
{HRI 20010829-pi4-V3.0}
(29 August 2001 - part issue 4 Version 3.0 on 14 Sept 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/c99ab8c8bdd57a1c
(p5) 'The Nature Of Life As Seen From Earth
- The Nature Of The Physical Universe'
{HRI 20010829-pi5-V3.2.1}
(29 August 2001 - part issue 5 Version 3.2.1 on 18 Sept 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.japan/msg/f433f1aa6f29a904
(p6) 'The Nature Of Life As Seen From Earth
- Opposing The Nature Of The Creation'
{HRI 20010829-pi6-V4.3.1}
(29 August 2001 - part issue 6 Version 4.3.1 on 27 Sept 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.japan/msg/2978c2606a0953c0
'Detecting Criminal Minds By Their Intentional Omission Of Vital
Truth'
{HRI 20020819-V2.2.3}
(19 August 2002 - Version 2.2.3 on 12 May 2005)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.brazil/msg/907447eab9a5f099
'The Mafia Code Against Mankind'
{HRI 20021018-V2.0}
(18 October 2002 - V2.0 on 10 October 2003)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.europe/msg/4ff16a259b5da25a
Note on the date of writing:
The working title of this article and questionnaire
was 'The Bright And Lively Five Year Old Jewish Girl'
which I have shown to some people. That main text
was - the actual questions that is, were - mostly
written on 1 February 2002. The text around the
questions was edited and rewritten on and after
26 January 2003, and issued on 20 February 2003.
'
____________
Verification:
http://www.angelfire.com/space/platoworld
Copyright 2002, 2007 by Koos Nolst Trenite - human rights philosopher
and poet
This is 'learnware' - it may not be altered, and it is free for
anyone who learns from it and (even if he can not learn from it)
who passes it on unaltered, and with this message included,
to others who might be able to learn from it.
None of my writings may be used, ever, to support any political
or religious or scientific agenda, but only to educate, and to
encourage people to judge un-dominated and for themselves,
about any organizations or individuals.
Send free-of-Envy and free-of-Hate, Beautiful e-mails to:
PlatoWorld at Lycos.com
Koos Nolst Trenite
(Nuremberg Trial Proceedings Vol.6)
Morning Session
M. DUBOST: With the authorization of the Court, I should like to
proceed with this part of the presentation of the French case by
hearing a witness who, for more than 3 years, lived in German
concentration camps.
[The witness, Mme. Vaillant-Couturier, took the stand.]
THE PRESIDENT: Would you stand up, please? Do you wish to swear the
French oath? Will you tell me your name?
MADAME MARIE CLAUDE VAILLANT-COUTURIER (Witness): Claude
Vaillant-Couturier.
THE PRESIDENT: Will you repeat this oath after me: I swear that I will
speak without hate or fear, that I will tell the truth, all the truth,
nothing but the truth.
[The witness repeated the oath in French.]
THE PRESIDENT: Raise your right hand and say, "I swear."
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I swear.
THE PRESIDENT: Please, will you sit down and speak slowly. Your name
is?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Vaillant-Couturier, Marie, Claude, Vogel.
M. DUBOST: Is your name Madame Vaillant-Couturier?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: You are the widow of M. Vaillant-Couturier?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: You were born in Paris on 3 November 1912?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: And you are of French nationality, French born, and of
parents who were of French nationality?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: You are a deputy in the Constituent Assembly?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: You are a Knight of the Legion of Honor?
203
28 Jan. 46
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: You have just been decorated by General Legentilhomme at
the Invalides?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: Were you arrested and deported? Will you please give your
testimony?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I was arrested on 9 February 1942 by Petain's
French police, who handed me over to the German authorities after 6
weeks. I arrived on 20 March at Sante prison in the German quarter. I
was questioned on 9 June 1942. At the end of my interrogation they
wanted me to sign a statement which was not consistent with what I had
said. I refused to sign it. The officer who had questioned me
threatened me; and when I told him that I was not afraid of death nor
of being shot, he said, "But we have at our disposal means for
killing that are far worse than merely shooting." And the interpreter
said to me, "You do not know what you have just done. You are going to
leave for a concentration camp in Germany. One never comes back from
there."
M. DUBOST: You were then taken to prison?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I was taken back to the Sante prison where I
was placed in solitary confinement. However, I was able to communicate
with my neighbors through the piping and the .windows. I was in a cell
next to that of Georges Politzer, the philosopher, and Jacques
Solomon, physicist. Mr. Solomon is the son-in-law of Professor
Langevin, a pupil of Curie, one of the first to study atomic
disintegration.
Georges Politzer told me through the piping that during his
interrogation, after having been tortured, he was asked whether he
would write theoretical pamphlets for National Socialism. When he
refused, he was told that he would be in the first train of hostages
to be shot.
As for Jacques Solomon, he also was horribly tortured and then thrown
into a dark cell and came out only on the day of his execution to say
goodbye to his wife, who also was under arrest at the Sante Helene
Solomon Langevin told me in Romainville, where I found her when I left
the Sante that when she went to her husband he moaned and said, "I
cannot take you in my arms, because I can no longer move them."
Every time that the internees came back from their questioning one
could hear moaning through the windows, and they all said that they
could not make any movements.
Several times during the 5 months I spent at the Sant& hostages were
taken to be shot. When I left the Sante on 20 August 1942,
204
28 Jan. 46
I was taken- to the Fortress of Romainville, which was a camp for
hostages. There I was present on two occasions when they took
hostages, on 21 August and 22 September. Among the hostages who were
taken away were the husbands of the women who were with me and who
left for Auschwitz. Most of them died there. These women, for the most
part, had been arrested only because of the activity of their
husbands. They themselves had done nothing.
M. DUBOST: When did you leave for Auschwitz?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I left for Auschwitz on 23 January 1943, and
arrived there on the 27th.
M. DUB OST: Were you with a convoy?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I was with a convoy of 230 French women;
among us were Danielle Casanova who died in Auschwitz, Mal Politzer
who died in Auschwitz, and Helene Solomon. There were some elderly
women...
M. DUBOST: What was their social position?
MME. VAIILLANT-COUTURIER: They were intellectuals, school teachers;
they came from all walks of life. Mal Politzer was a doctor, and the
wife of the philosopher Georges Politzer. Helene Solomon is the wife
of the physicist Solomon; she is the daughter of Professor Langevin.
Danielle Casanova was a dental surgeon and she was very active among
the women. It is she who organized a resistance movement among the
wives of prisoners.
M. DUBOST: How many of you came back out of 230?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Forty-nine. In the convoy there were some
elderly women. I remember one who was 67 and had been arrested because
she had in her kitchen the shotgun of her husband, which she kept as a
souvenir and had not declared because she did not want it to be taken
from her. She died after a fortnight at Auschwitz.
THE PRESIDENT: When, you said only 49 came back, did you mean only 49
arrived at Auschwitz.
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No, only 49 came back to France.
There were also cripples, among them a singer who had only one leg.
She was taken out and gassed at Auschwitz. There was also a young girl
of 16, a college girl, Claudine Guerin; she also died at Auschwitz.
There were also two women who had been acquitted by the German
military tribunal, Marie Alonzo and Marie Therese Fleuri; they died at
Auschwitz.
It was a terrible journey. We were 60 in a car and we were given no
food or drink during the journey. At the various stopping
205
28 Jan. 46
places we asked the Lorraine soldiers of the Wehrmacht who were
guarding us whether we would arrive soon; and they replied, "If you
knew where you are going you would not be in a hurry to get there."
We arrived at Auschwitz at dawn. The seals on our cars were broken,
and we were driven out by blows with the butt end of a rifle, and
taken to the Birkenau Camp, a section of the Auschwitz Camp. It is
situated in the middle of a great plain, which was frozen in the month
of January. During this part of the journey we had to drag our
luggage. As we passed through the door we knew only too well how
slender our chances were that we would come out again, for we had
already met columns of living skeletons going to work; and as we
entered we sang "The Marseillaise" to keep up our courage.
We were led to a large shed, then to the disinfecting station. There
our heads were shaved and our registration numbers were tattooed on
the left forearm. Then we were taken into a large room for a steam
bath and a cold shower. In spite of the fact that we were naked, all
this took place in the presence of SS men and women. We were then
given clothing which was soiled and torn, a cotton dress and jacket of
the same material.
As all this had taken several hours, we saw from the windows of the
block where we were, the camp of the men; and toward the evening an
orchestra came in. It was snowing and we wondered why they were
playing music. We then saw that the camp foremen were returning to the
camp. Each. foreman was followed by men who were carrying the dead. As
they could hardly drag themselves along, every time they stumbled they
were put on their feet again by being kicked or by blows with the butt
end of a rifle.
After that we were taken to the block where we were to live. There
were no beds but only bunks, measuring 2 by 2 meters, and there nine
of us had to sleep the first night without any mattress or blanket. We
remained in blocks of this kind for several months. We could not sleep
all night, because every time one of the nine moved-this happened
unceasingly because we were all ill-she disturbed the whole row.
At 3:30 in the morning the shouting of the guards woke us up, and with
cudgel blows we were driven from our bunks to go to roll call. Nothing
in the world could release us from going to the roll call; even those
who were dying had to be dragged there. We had to stand there in rows
of five until dawn, that is, 7 or 8 o'clock in the morning in winter;
and when there was a fog, sometimes until noon. Then the commandos
would start on their way to work.
M. DUBOST: Excuse me, can you describe the roll call?
206
28 Jan. 46
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: For roll call we were lined up in rows of
five; and we waited until daybreak, until the Aufseherinnen, the
German women guards in uniform, came to count us. They had cudgels and
they beat us more or less at random.
We had a comrade, Germaine Renaud, a school teacher from
Azay-le-Rideau in France, who had her skull broken before my eyes from
a blow with a cudgel during the roll can.
The work at Auschwitz consisted of clearing demolished houses, road
building, and especially the draining of marsh land. This was by far
the hardest work, for all day long we had our feet in the water and
there was the danger of being sucked down. It frequently happened that
we had to pull out a comrade who had sunk in up to the waist.
During the work the SS men and women who stood guard over us would
beat us with cudgels and set their dogs on us. Many of our friends had
their legs torn by the dogs. I even saw a woman torn to pieces and die
under my very eyes when Tauber, a member of the SS, encouraged his dog
to attack her and grinned at the sight.
The causes of death were extremely numerous. First of all, there was
the complete lack of washing facilities. When we arrived at Auschwitz,
for 12,000 internees there was only one tap of water, unfit for
drinking, and it was not always flowing. As this tap was in the German
wash house we could reach it only by passing through the guards, who
were German common-law women prisoners, and they beat us horribly as
we -went by. It was therefore almost impossible to wash ourselves or
our clothes. For more than 3 months we remained without changing our
clothes. When there was snow, we melted some to wash in. Later, in the
spring, when we went to work we would drink from a puddle by the
road-side and then wash our underclothes in it. We took turns washing
our hands in this dirty water. Our companions were dying of thirst,
because we got only half a cup of some herbal tea twice a day.
M. DUBOST: Please describe in detail one of the roll calls at the
beginning of February.
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: On 5 February there was what is called a
general roll call.
M. DUBOST: In what year was that?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: In 1943. At 3:30 the whole camp
M. DUBOST: In the morning at 3:30?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: In the morning at 3:30 the whole camp was
awakened and sent out on the plain, whereas normally the roll call was
at 3:30 but inside the camp. We remained
207
28 Jan. 46
out in front of the camp until 5 in the afternoon, in the snow,
without any food. Then when the signal was given we had to go through
the door one by one, and we were struck in the back with a cudgel,
each one of us, in order to make us run. Those who could not run,
either because they were too old or too ill were caught by a hook and
taken to Block 25, "waiting block" for the gas chamber. On that day 10
of the French women of our convoy were thus caught and taken to Block
25.
When all the internees were back in the camp, a party to which I
belonged was organized to go and pick up the bodies of the dead which
were scattered over the plain as on a battlefield. We carried to the
yard of Block 25 the dead and the dying without distinction, and they
remained there stacked up in a pile.
This Block 25, which was the anteroom of the gas chamber, if one may
express it so, is well known to me because at that time we had been
transferred to Block 26 and our windows 'Opened on the yard of Number
25. One saw stacks of corpses piled up in the courtyard, and from time
to time a hand or a head would stir among the bodies, trying to free
itself. It was a dying woman attempting to get free and live. The rate
of mortality in that block was even more terrible than elsewhere
because, having been condemned to death, they received food or drink
only if there was something left in the cans in the kitchen; which
means that very often they went for several days without a drop of
water.
One of our companions, Annette Epaux, a fine young woman of 30,
passing the block one day, was overcome with pity for those women who
moaned from morning till night in all languages, "Drink. Drink.
Water!" She came back to our block to get a little herbal tea, but as
she was passing it through the bars of the window she was seen by the
Aufseherin, who took her by the neck and threw her into Block 25. All
my life I will remember Annette Epaux. Two days later I saw her on the
truck which was taking the internees to the gas chamber. She had her
arms -around another French woman, old Line Porcher, and when the
truck started moving she cried, "Think of my little boy, if you ever
get back to France." Then they started singing "The Marseillaise."
In Block 25, in the courtyard, there were rats as big as cats running
about and gnawing the corpses and even attacking the dying who had not
enough strength left to chase them away.
Another cause of mortality and epidemics was the fact that we were
given food in large red mess tins, which were merely rinsed in cold
water after each meal. As all the women were ill and had not the
strength during the night to go to the trench which was used as a
lavatory, the access to which was beyond description, they used these
containers for a purpose for which they were not meant.
208
28 Jan. 46
The next day the mess tins were collected and taken to a refuse heap.
During the day another team would come and collect them, wash them in
cold water, and put them in use again.
Another cause of death was the problem of shoes. In the snow and mud
of Poland leather shoes were completely destroyed at the end. of a
week or two. Therefore our feet were frozen and covered with sores. We
had to sleep with our muddy shoes on, lest they be stolen, and when
the time came to get up for roll call cries of anguish could be heard:
"My shoes have been stolen." Then one had to wait until the whole
block had been emptied to look under the bunks for odd shoes.
Sometimes one found two shoes for the same foot, or one shoe and one
sabot. One could go to roll call like that but it was an additional
torture for work, because sores formed on our feet which quickly
became infected for lack of care. Many of our companions went to the
Revier for sores on their feet and legs and never came back.
M. DUBOST: What did they do to the internees who came to roll call
without shoes?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: The Jewish internees who came without shoes
were immediately taken to Block 25.
M. DUBOST: They were gassed then?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: They were gassed for any reason whatsoever.
Their conditions were moreover absolutely appalling. Although we were
crowded 800 in a block and could scarcely move, they were 1,500 to a
block of similar dimensions, so that many of them could not sleep or
even lie down during the whole night.
M. DUBOST: Can you talk about the Revier?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: To reach the Revier one had to go
first to the roll call. Whatever the state was...
M. DUBOST: Would you please explain what the Revier was in the camp?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: The Revier was the blocks where the sick were
put. This place could not be given the name of hospital, because it
did not correspond in any way to our idea of a' hospital.
To go there one had first to obtain authorization from the block chief
who seldom gave it. When it was finally granted we were led in columns
to the infirmary where, no matter what weather, whether it snowed or
rained, even if one had a temperature of 4011 (centigrade) one had to
wait for several hours standing in a queue to be admitted. It
frequently happened that patients died outside
209
28 Jan. 46
before the door of the infirmary, before they could get in. Moreover,
lining up in front of the infirmary was dangerous because if the queue
was too long the SS came along, picked up all the women who were
waiting, and took them straight to Block Number 25.
M. DUBOST: That is to say, to the gas chamber?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: That is to say to the gas chamber. That is
why very often the women preferred not to go to the Revier and they
died at their work or at roll call. Every day, after the evening roll
call in winter time, dead were picked up who had fallen into the
ditches.
The only advantage of the Revier was that as one was in bed, one did
not have to go to roll call; but one lay in appalling conditions, four
in a bed of less than 1 meter in width, each suffering from a
different disease, so that anyone who came for leg sores would catch
typhus or dysentery from neighbors. The straw mattresses were dirty
and they were changed only when absolutely rotten. The bedding was so
full of lice that one could see them swarming like ants. One of my
companions, Marguerite Corringer, told me that when she had typhus,
she could not sleep all night because of the lice. She spent the night
shaking her blanket over a piece of paper and emptying the lice into a
receptacle by the bed, and this went on for hours.
There were practically no medicines. Consequently the patients were
left in their beds without any attention, without hygiene, and
unwashed. The dead lay in bed with the sick for several hours; and
finally, when they were noticed, they were simply tipped out of the
bed and taken outside the block. There the women porters would come
and carry the dead away on small stretchers, with heads and legs
dangling over the sides. From morning till night the carriers of the
dead went from the Revier to the mortuary.
During the big epidemics, in the winters off 1943 and 1944, the
stretchers were replaced by carts, as* there were too many dead
bodies. During those periods of epidemics there were from 200 to 350
dead daily.
M. DUBOST: How many people died at that time?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: During the big epidemics of typhus in the
winters of 1943 and 1944, from 200 to 350; it depended on the days.
M. DUBOST: Was the Revier open to all the internees?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No. When we arrived Jewish women had not the
right to be admitted. They were taken straight to the gas chamber.
M. DUBOST: Would you please tell us about the disinfection of the
blocks?
210
28 Jan. 46
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: From time to time, owing to the filth which
caused the lice and gave rise to so many epidemics, they disinfected
the blocks with gas; but these disinfections were also the cause of
many deaths because, while the blocks were being disinfected with gas,
the prisoners were taken to the shower-baths. Their clothes were taken
away from them to be steamed. The internees were left naked outside,
waiting for their clothing to come back from the steaming, and then
they were given back to them an wet. Even those who were sick, who
could barely stand on their feet, were sent to the showers. It is
quite obvious that a great many of them died in the course of these
proceedings. Those who could not move were washed all in the same bath
during the disinfection.
M. DUBOST: How were you fed?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: We had 200 grams of bread, three-quarters or
half a liter-it varied-of soup made from swedes, .and a few grams of
margarine or a slice of sausage in the evening, this daily.
M. DUBOST: Regardless of the work that was exacted from the internees?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Regardless of the work that was exacted from
the internee. Some who had to work in the factory of the "Union," an
ammunition factory where they made grenades and shells, received what
was called a "Zulage," that is, a supplementary ration, when the
amount of their production was satisfactory. Those internees had to go
to roll can morning and night as we did, and they were at work 12
hours in the factory. They came back to the camp after the day's work,
making the journey both ways on foot.
M. DUBOST: What was this "Union" factory?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: It was an ammunition factory. I do not know
to what company it belonged. It was called the "Union."
M. DUBOST: Was it the only factory?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No, there was also a large Buna factory, but
as I did not work there I do not know what was made there. The
internees who were taken to the Buna plant never came back to our
camp.
M. DUBOST: Will you tell us about experiments, if you witnessed any?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: As to the experiments, I have seen in the
Revier, because I was employed at the Revier, the queue of young
Jewesses from Salonika who stood waiting in front of the
211
28 Jan. 46
X-ray room for sterilization. I also' know that they performed
castration operations in the men's camp. Concerning the experiments
performed on women I am well informed, because my friend, Doctor Hade
Hautval of Montbeliard, who has returned to France, worked for several
months in that block nursing the patients; but she always refused to
participate in those experiments. They sterilized women either by
injections or by operation or with rays. I saw and knew several women
who had been sterilized. There was a very high mortality rate among
those operated upon. Fourteen Jewesses from France who refused to be
sterilized were sent to a Strafarbeit kommando, that is, hard labor.
M. DUBOST: Did they come back from those kommandos?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Very seldom. Quite exceptionally.
M. DUBOST: What was the aim of the SS?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Sterilization-they did not conceal it. They
said that they were trying to find the best method for sterilizing so
as to replace the native population in the occupied countries by
Germans after one generation, once they had made use of the
inhabitants as slaves to work for them.
M. DUBOST: In the Revier did you see any pregnant women?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes. The Jewish women, when they arrived in
the first months of pregnancy, were subjected to abortion. When their
pregnancy was near the end, after confinement, the babies were drowned
in a bucket of water. I know that because I worked in the Revier and
the woman who was in charge of that task was a German midwife, who was
imprisoned for having performed illegal operations. After a while
another doctor arrived and for 2 months they did not kill the Jewish
babies. But one day an order came from Berlin saying that again they
had to be done away with. Then the mothers and their babies were
called to the infirmary. They were put in a lorry and taken away to
the gas chamber.
M. DUBOST: Why did you say that an order came from Berlin?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Because I knew the internees who worked in
the secretariat of the SS and in particular a Slovakian woman by the
name of Hertha Roth, who is now working with UNRRA at Bratislava.
M. DUBOST: Is it she who told you that?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes, and moreover, I also knew the men who
worked in the gas kommando.
M. DUBOST: You have told us about the Jewish mothers. Were there other
mothers in your camp?
212
28 Jan. 46
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes, in principle, non-Jewish women were
allowed to have their babies, and the babies were not taken away from
them; but conditions in the camp being so horrible, the babies rarely
lived for more than 4 or 5 weeks.
There was one block where the Polish and Russian mothers were. One day
the Russian mothers, having been accused of making too much noise, had
to stand for roll call all day long in front of the block, naked, with
their babies in their arms.
M. DUBOST: What was the disciplinary system of the camp? Who kept
order and discipline? What were the punishments?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Generally speaking, the SS economized on many
of their own personnel by employing internees for' watching the camp;
SS only supervised . These internees were chosen from German
common-law criminals and prostitutes, and sometimes those of other
nationalities, but most of them were Ger mans. By corruption,
accusation, and terror they succeeded in making veritable human beasts
of them; and the internees had as much cause to complain about them as
about the SS themselves. They beat us just as hard as the SS; and as
to the SS, the men behaved like the women and the women were as savage
as the men. There was no difference.
The system employed by the SS of degrading human beings to the utmost
by terrorizing them and causing them through fear to commit acts which
made them ashamed of themselves, resulted in their being no longer
human. This was what they wanted. It took a great deal of courage to
resist this atmosphere of terror and corruption.
M. DUBOST: Who meted out punishments?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: The SS leaders, men and women.
M. DUBOST: What was the nature of the punishments?
NNE. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Bodily ill-treatment in particular. One of
the most usual punishments was 50 blows with a stick on the loins.
They were administered with a machine which I saw, a swinging
apparatus manipulated by an SS. There were also endless roll calls day
and night, or gymnastics; flat on the belly, get up, lie down, up,
down, for hours, and anyone who fell was beaten unmercifully and taken
to Block 25.
M. DUBOST: How did the SS behave towards the women? And the women SS?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At Auschwitz there was a brothel for the SS
and also one for the male internees of the staff, who were called
"Kapo." Moreover, when the SS needed servants,
213
28 Jan. 46
they came accompanied by the Oberaufseherin, that is, the woman
commandant of the camp, to make a choice during the process of
disinfection. They would point to a young girl, whom. the
Oberaufseherin would take out of the ranks. They would look her over
and make jokes about her physique; and if she was pretty and they
liked her, they would hire her as a maid with the consent of the
Oberaufseherin, who would tell her that she was to obey them
absolutely no matter what they asked of her.
M. DUBOST: Why did they go during disinfection?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Because during the disinfection the women
were naked.
M. DUBOST: This system of demoralization and corruption-was it
exceptional?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No, the system was identical in all the camps
where I have been, and I have spoken to internees coming from camps
where I myself had never been; it was the same thing everywhere. The
system was identical no matter what the camp was. There were, however,
certain variations. I believe that Auschwitz was one of the harshest;
but later I went to Ravensbruck, where there also was a house of ill
fame and where recruiting was also carried out among the internees.
M. DUBOST: Then, according to you, everything was done to degrade
those women in their own sight?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: What do you know about the convoy of Jews which arrived
from Romainville about the same time as yourself?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: When we left Romainville the Jewesses who
were there at the same time as ourselves were left behind. They were
sent to Drancy and subsequently arrived at Auschwitz, where we found
them again 3 weeks later, 3 weeks after our arrival. Of the original
1,200 only 125 actually came to the camp; the others were immediately
sent to the gas chambers. Of these 125 not one was left alive at the
end of 1 month.
The transports operated as follows:
When we first arrived, whenever a convoy of Jews came, a selection was
made; first the old men and women, then the mothers and the children
were put into trucks together with the sick or those whose
constitution appeared to be delicate. They took in only the young
women and girls as well as the young men who were sent to the men's
camp.
Generally speaking, of a convoy of about 1,000 to 1,500, seldom more
than 250-and this figure really was the maximum-actually
214
28 Jan. 46
reached the camp. The rest were immediately sent to the gas chamber.
At this selection also, they picked out women in good health between
the ages of 20 and 30, who were sent to the experimental block; and
young girls and slightly older women, or those who had not been
selected for that purpose, were sent to the camp where, like
ourselves, they were tattooed and shaved.
There was also, in the spring of 1944, a special block for twins. It
was during the time when large convoys of Hungarian Jews about
700,000-arrived. Dr. Mengele, who was carrying out the experiments,
kept back from each convoy twin children and twins in general,
regardless of their age, so long as both were present. So we had both
babies and adults on the floor at that block. Apart from blood tests
and measuring I do. not know what was done to them.
M. DUBOST: Were you an eye witness of the selections on the arrival of
the convoys?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes, because when we worked at the sewing
block in 1944, the block where we lived directly faced the stopping
place of the trains. The system had been improved. Instead of making
the selection at the place where they arrived, a side line now took.
the train practically right up to the gas chamber; and the stopping
place, about 100 meters from the gas chamber, was right opposite our
block though, of course, separated ,from us by two rows of barbed
wire. Consequently, we saw the unsealing of the cars and the soldiers
letting men, women, and children out of them. We then witnessed
heart-rending scenes; old couples forced to part from each other,
mothers made to abandon their young daughters, since the latter were
sent to the camp, whereas mothers and children were sent to the gas
chambers. All these people were unaware of the fate awaiting them.
They were merely upset at being separated, but they did not know that
they were going to their death. To render their welcome more pleasant
at this time-June-July 1944-an orchestra composed of internees, all
young and pretty girls dressed in little white blouses and navy blue
skirts, played during the selection, at the arrival of the trains, gay
tunes such as "The Merry Widow," the "Barcarolle" from "The Tales of
Hoffman," and so forth. They were then informed that this was a labor
camp and since they were not brought into the camp they saw only the
small platform surrounded by flowering plants. Naturally, they could
not realize what was in store for them. Those selected for the gas
chamber, that is, the old people, mothers, and children, were escorted
to a red-brick building.
M. DUBOST: These were not given an identification number?
MM. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No.
215
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: They were not tattooed?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No. They were not even counted.
M. DUBOST: You were tattooed?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes, look. [The witness showed her arm.] They
were taken to a red brick building, which bore the letters "Baden,"
that is to say "Baths." There, to begin with, they were made to
undress
and given a towel before they went into the' so-called shower room.
Later on, at the time of the large convoys from Hungary, they had no
more time left to play-act or to pretend; they were brutally
undressed, and I know these details as I knew a little Jewess from
France who lived with her family at the "Republique" district.
M. DUBOST: In Paris?
MIKE . VAILLANT-COUTURIER: In Paris. She was called "little Marie" and
she was the only one, the sole survivor of a family of nine. Her
mother and her seven brothers and sisters had been gassed on arrival.
When I met her she was employed to undress the babies before they were
taken into the gas chamber. Once the people were undressed they took
them into a room which was somewhat like a shower room, and gas
capsules were thrown through an opening in the ceiling. An SS man
would watch the effect produced through a porthole. At the end of 5 or
7 minutes, when the gas had completed its work, he gave the signal to
open the doors; and men with gas masks---they too were internees-went
into the room and removed the corpses. They told us that the internees
must have suffered before dying, because they were closely clinging to
one another and it was very difficult to separate them.
After that a special squad would come to pull out gold teeth and
dentures; and again, when the bodies had been reduced to ashes, they
would sift them in an attempt to recover the gold.
At Auschwitz there were eight crematories but, as from 1944, these
proved insufficient. The SS had large pits dug by the internees, where
they put branches, sprinkled with gasoline, which they set on fire.
Then they threw the corpses into the pits. From our block we could see
after about three-quarters of an' hour or an hour after the arrival of
a convoy, large flames coming from the crematory, and the sky was
lighted up by the burning pits.
One night we were awakened by terrifying cries. And we discovered, on
the following day, from the men working in the Sonderkommando-the "Gas
Kommando"-that on the preceding day, the gas supply having run out,
they had thrown the children into the furnaces alive.
216
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: Can you tell us about the selections that were made at the
beginning of winter?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Every year, towards the end of the autumn,
they proceeded to make selections on a large scale in the Revier. The
system appeared to work as follows-I say this because I noticed the
fact for myself during the time I spent in Auschwitz. Others, who had
stayed there even longer than I, had observed the same phenomenon.
In the spring, all through Europe, they rounded up men and women whom
they sent to Auschwitz. They kept only those who were strong enough to
work all through the summer. During that period naturally some died
every day; but the strongest, those who had succeeded in holding out
for 6 months, were so exhausted that they too had to go to the Revier.
It was then in autumn that the large scale selections were made, so as
not to feed too many useless mouths during the winter. All the women
who were too thin were sent to the gas chamber, as well as those who
had long, drawn-out illnesses; but the Jewesses were gassed for
practically no reason at all. For instance, they gassed everybody in
the "scabies block," whereas everybody knows that with a little care,
scabies can be cured in 3 days. I remember the typhus convalescent
block from which 450 out of 500 patients were sent to the gas chamber.
During Christmas 1944-no, 1943, Christmas 1943-when we were in
quarantine, we saw, since we lived opposite Block 25, women brought to
Block 25 stripped naked. Uncovered trucks were then driven up and on
them the naked women were piled, as many as the trucks could hold.
Each time a truck started, the infamous Hessler-he was one of the
criminals condemned to death at the Luneburg trials-ran after the
truck and with his bludgeon repeatedly struck the naked women going to
their death. They knew they were going to the gas chamber and tried to
escape. They were massacred. They attempted to jump from the truck and
we, from our own block, watched the trucks pass by and heard the
grievous wailing of all those women who knew they were going to be
gassed. Many of them could very well have lived on, since they were
suffering only from scabies and were, perhaps, a little too
undernourished.
M. DUBOST: You told us, Madame, a little while ago, that the
deportees, from the moment they stepped off the train and without even
being counted, were sent to the gas chamber. What happened to their
clothing and their luggage?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: The non-Jews had to carry their own luggage
and were billeted in separate blocks, but when the Jews arrived they
had to leave all their belongings on the platform. They were stripped
before entering the gas chamber and all their
217
28 Jan. 46
clothes, as well as all their belongings, were taken over to large
barracks and there sorted out by a Kommando named "Canada." Then
everything was shipped. to Germany: jewelry, fur coats, et cetera.
Since the Jewesses were sent to Auschwitz with their entire families
and since they had been told that this was a sort of ghetto and were
advised to bring all their goods and chattels along, they consequently
brought considerable riches with them. As for the Jewesses from
Salonika, I remember that on their arrival they were given picture
postcards, bearing the post office address of "Waldsee," a place which
did not exist; and a printed text to be sent to their families,
stating, "We are doing very well here; we have work and we are well
treated. We await your arrival." I myself saw the cards in question;
and the Schreiberinnen, that is, the secretaries of the block, were
instructed to distribute them among the internees in order to post
them to their families. I know that whole families arrived as a result
of these postcards.
I myself know that the following affair occurred in Greece. I do not
know whether it happened in any other country, but in any case it did
occur in Greece (as well as in Czechoslovakia) that whole families
went to the recruiting office at Salonika in order to rejoin their
families. I remember one professor of literature from Salonika, who,
to his horror, saw his own father arrive.
M. DUBOST: Will you tell us about the Gypsy camps?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Right next to our camp, on the other side of
the barbed wires, 3 meters apart, there were two camps; one for
Gypsies, which towards August 1944 was completely gassed. These
Gypsies came from all parts of Europe including Germany. Likewise on
the other side there was the so-called family camp. These were Jews
from the Ghetto of Theresienstadt, who had been brought there and,
unlike ourselves, they had been neither tattooed nor shaved. Their
clothes were not taken from them and they did not have to work. They
lived like this for 6 months and at the end of 6 months the entire
family camp, amounting to some 6,000 or 7,000 Jews, was gassed. A few
days later other large convoys again arrived from Theresienstadt with
their families and 6 months later they too were gassed, like the first
inmates of the family camp.
M. DUBOST: Would you, Madame, please give us some details as to what
you saw when you were about to leave the camp, and under what
circumstances you left it?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: We were in quarantine before leaving
Auschwitz.
M. DUBOST: When was that?
218
28 Jan. 46
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: We were in quarantine for 10 months, from the
15th of July 1943, yes, until May 1944. And after that we returned to
the camp-for 2 months. Then we went to Ravensbruck.
M. DUBOST: These were all Frenchwomen from your convoy, who had
survived?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes, all the surviving Frenchwomen of our
convoy. We had heard from Jewesses who had arrived from France, in
July 1944, that an intensive campaign had been carried out by the
British Broadcasting Corporation in London, in connection with our
convoy, mentioning Mal Politzer, Danielle Casanova, Helene
Solomon-Langevin, and myself. As a result of this broadcast we knew
that orders had been issued from Berlin to the effect that Frenchwomen
should be transported under better conditions.
So we were placed in quarantine. This was a block situated opposite
the camp and outside the barbed wire. I must say that it is to this
quarantine that the 49 survivors owed their lives, because at the end
of 4 months there were only 52 of us. Therefore it is certain that we
could not have survived 18 months of this regime had we not had these
10 months of quarantine.
This quarantine was imposed because exanthematic typhus was raging at
Auschwitz. One could leave the camp only to be freed or to be
transferred to another camp or to be summoned before the court after
spending 15 days in quarantine, these 15 days being the incubation
period for exanthematic typhus. Consequently, as soon as the papers
arrived announcing that the internee would probably be liberated, she
was placed in quarantine until the order for her liberation was
signed. This sometimes took several months and 15 days was the
minimum.
Now a policy existed for freeing German women common-law criminals and
asocial elements in order to employ them as workers in the German
factories. It is therefore impossible to imagine that the whole of
Germany was unaware of the existence of the concentration camps and of
what was going on there, since these women had been released from the
camps and it is difficult to believe that they never mentioned them.
Besides, in the factories where the former internees were employed,
the Vorarbeiterinnen (the forewomen) were German civilians in contact
with the internees and able to speak to them. The forewomen from
Auschwitz, who subsequently came to Siemens at Ravensbruck as
Aufseherinnen, had been former workers at Siemens in Berlin. They* met
forewomen they had known in Berlin, and, in our presence, they told
them what they had seen at Auschwitz. It is therefore incredible that
this was not known in Germany.
219
28 Jan. 46
We could not believe our eyes when we left Auschwitz and our hearts
were sore when we saw the small group of 49 women; all that was left
of the 230 who had entered the camp 18 months earlier. But to us it
seemed that we were leaving hell itself, and for the first time hopes
of survival, of seeing the world again, were vouchsafed to us.
M. DUBOST: Where were you sent then, Madame?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: On leaving Auschwitz we were sent to
Ravensbruck There we were escorted to the "NN" block meaning "Nacht
und Nebel", that is, "The Secret Block." With us in that block were
Polish women with the identification number "7,000." Some were called
"rabbits" because they had been used as experimental guinea pigs. They
selected from the convoys girls with very straight legs who were in
very good health, and they submitted them to various operations. Some
of the girls had parts of the bone removed from their legs, others
received injections; but what was injected, I do not know. The
mortality rate was very high among the women operated upon. So when
they came to fetch the others to operate on them they refused to go to
the Revier. They were forcibly dragged to the dark cells where the
professor, who had arrived from Berlin, operated in his uniform,
without taking any aseptic precautions, without wearing a surgical
gown, and without washing his hands. There are some survivors among
these "rabbits." They still endure much suffering. They suffer
periodically from suppurations; and since nobody knows to what
treatment they had been subjected, it is extremely difficult to cure
them.
M. DUBOST: Were these internees tattooed on their arrival?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No. People were not tattooed at Ravensbruck
but, on the other hand, we had to go, up for a gynecological
examination, and since no precautions were ever taken and the same
instruments were frequently used in all cases, infections spread,
partly because common-law prisoners and political internees were all
herded together.
In Block 32 where we were billeted there were also some Russian women
prisoners of war, who had refused to work voluntarily in the
ammunition factories. For that reason they had been sent to
Ravensbruck. Since they persisted in their refusal, they were
subjected to every form of petty indignity. They were, for instance,
forced to stand in front of the block a whole day long without any
food. Some of them were sent in convoys to Barth. Others were employed
to carry lavatory receptacles in the camp. The Strafblock
(penitentiary block) and the Bunker also housed internees who had
refused to work in the war factories.
220
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: Are you now speaking about the prisons in the camp?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: About the prisons in the camp. As a matter of
fact I have visited the camp prison. It was a civilian prison, a real
one.
M. DUBOST: How many French were there in that camp?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: From 8 to 10 thousand.
M. DUBOST: How many women all, told?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the time of liberation the identification
numbers amounted to 105,000 and possibly more.
There were also executions in the camps. The numbers were called at
roll call in the morning, and the victims then left for the
Kommandantur and were never seen again. A few days later the clothes
were sent down to the Effektenkanimer, where the clothes of the
internees were kept. After a certain time their cards would vanish
from the filing cabinets in the camp.
M. DUBOST: The system of detention was the same as at Auschwitz?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No. In Auschwitz, obviously, extermination
was the sole aim and object. Nobody was at all interested in the
output. We were beaten for no reason whatsoever. It was sufficient to
stand from morning till evening but whether we carried one brick or 10
was of no importance at all. We were quite aware that the human
element was employed as slave labor in order to kill us, that this was
the ultimate purpose, whereas at Ravensbruck. the output was of great
importance. It was a clearing camp. When the convoys arrived at
Ravensbruck, they were rapidly dispatched either to the munition or to
the powder factories, either to work at the air fields or, latterly,
to dig trenches.
The following procedure was adopted for going to the factories: The
manufacturers or their foremen or else their representatives were
coming themselves to choose their workers, accompanied by SS men; the
effect was that of a slave market. They felt the muscles, examined the
faces to see if the person looked healthy, and then made their choice.
Finally, they made them walk naked past the doctor and he eventually
decided if a woman was fit or not to leave for work in the factories.
Latterly, the doctor's visit became a mere formality as they ended by
employing anybody who came along. The work was exhausting, principally
because of lack of food and sleep, since in addition to 12 solid hours
of work one had to attend roll call in the morning and in the evening.
In Ravensbruck. there was the Siemens factory, where telephone
equipment was manufactured as well as wireless sets for aircraft. Then
there were
221
28 Jan. 46
workshops in the camp for camouflage material and uniforms and for
various utensils used by soldiers. One of these I know best...
THE PRESIDENT: I think we had better break off now for 10 minutes.
[A recess was taken.]
M. DUBOST: Madame, did you see any SS chiefs and members of the
Wehrmacht visit the camps of Ravensbruck. and Auschwitz when you were
there?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
M. DUBOST: Do you know if any German Government officials came to
visit these camps?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I know it only as far as Himmler is
concerned. Apart from Himmler I do not know.
M. DUBOST: Who were the guards in these camps?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the beginning there were the SS guards,
exclusively.
M. DUBOST: Will you please speak more slowly so that the interpreters
can follow you?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the beginning there were only SS men, but
from the spring of 1944 the young SS men in many companies were
replaced by older men of the Wehrmacht both at Auschwitz and also at
Ravensbruck We were guarded by soldiers of the Wehrmacht as from 1944.
M. DUBOST: You can therefore testify that on the order of the German
General Staff the German Army was implicated in the atrocities which
you have described?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Obviously, since we were guarded by the
Wehrmacht as well, and this could not have occurred without orders.
M. DUBOST: Your testimony is final and involves both the SS and the
Army.
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Absolutely.
M. DUBOST: Will you tell us about the arrival at Ravensbruck. in the
winter of 1944, of Hungarian Jewesses who had been arrested en masse?
You were in Ravensbruck-this is a fact about which you can testify?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes, of course I was there. There was no
longer any room left in the blocks, and the prisoners already slept
four in a bed, so there was raised, in the middle of the
222
28 Jan. 46
camp, a large tent. Straw was spread in the tent, and the Hungarian
women were brought to this tent. Their condition was frightful. There
were a great many cases of frozen feet because they had been evacuated
from Budapest and had walked a good part of the way in the snow. A
great many of them had died en route. Those who arrived at Auschwitz
were led to this tent and there an enormous number of them died. Every
day a squad came to remove the corpses in the tent. One day, on
returning to my block, which was next to this tent, during the
cleaning up . . .
THE PRESIDENT: Madame, are you speaking of Ravensbruck or of
Auschwitz?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: [In English.] Now I am speaking of
Ravensbruck. [In French.] It was in the winter of 1944, about November
or December, I believe, though I cannot say for certain which month it
was. It is so difficult to give a precise date in the concentration
camps since one day of torture is followed by another day of similar
torment and the prevailing monotony makes it very hard to keep track
of time.
One day therefore, as I was saying, I passed the tent while it was
being cleaned, and I saw a pile of smoking manure in front of it. I
suddenly realized that this manure was human excrement since the
unfortunate women no longer had the strength to drag themselves to the
lavatories. They were therefore rotting in this filth.
M. DUBOST: What were the conditions in the workshops where the jackets
were manufactured?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the workshops where the uniforms were
manufactured...
M. DUBOST: Was it the camp workshop?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: It was the camp workshop, known as
"Schneiderei I." Two hundred jackets or pairs of trousers were
manufactured per day. There were two shifts; a day and a night shift,
both working 12 hours. The night shift, when starting work at
midnight, after the standard amount of work had been reached but only
then-received a thin slice of bread. Later on this practice was
discontinued. Work was carried on at a furious pace; the internees
could not even take time off to go the lavatories. Both day and night
they were terribly beaten, both by the SS women and men, if a needle
broke owing to the poor quality of the thread, if the machine stopped,
or if these "ladies" and "gentlemen!" did not like their looks.
Towards the end of the night one could see that the workers were so
exhausted that every movement was an effort to them. Beads of sweat
stood out on their foreheads. They could not see clearly. When the
standard amount of work was not reached the foreman, Binder, rushed up
and beat up, with all his might, one
223
28 Jan. 46
woman after another all along the line, with the result that the last
in the row waited their turn petrified with terror. If one wished to
go to the Revier one had to receive the authorization of the SS, who
granted it very rarely; and even then, if the doctor did give a woman
a permit authorizing her to stay away from work for a few days, the SS
guards would often come round and fetch her out of bed in order to put
her back at her machine. The atmosphere was frightful since, by reason
of the "black-out," one could not open the windows at night. Six
hundred women therefore worked for 12 hours without any ventilation.
All those who worked at the Schneiderei became like living skeletons
after a few months. They began to cough, their eyesight failed, they
developed a nervous twitching of the face for fear of beatings to
come.
I knew well the conditions of this workshop since my little friend,
Marie Rubiano, a little French girl who had just passed 3 years in the
prison of Kottbus, was sent, on her arrival at Ravensbruck, to the
Schneiderei; and every evening she would tell me about her martyrdom.
One day, when she was quite exhausted, she obtained permission to go
to the Revier; and as on that day the German Schwester (nursing
sister), Erica, was less evil- tempered than usual, she was X-rayed.
Both lungs were severely infected and she was sent to the horrible
Block 10, the block of the consumptives. This block was particularly
terrifying, since tubercular patients were not considered as
"recuperable material"; they received no treatment; and because of
shortage of staff, they were not even washed. We might even say that
there were no medical supplies at all.
Little Marie was placed in the ward housing patients with bacillary
infections, in other words, such patients as were considered
incurable. She spent some weeks there and had no courage left to put
up a fight for her life. I must say that the atmosphere of this room
was particularly depressing. There were many patients several to one
bed in three-tier bunks-in an overheated atmosphere, lying between
internees of various nationalities, so that they could not even speak
to one another. Then, too, the silence in this antechamber of death
was only broken by the yells of the German asocial personnel on duty
and, from time to time, by the muffled sobs of a little French girl
thinking of her mother and of her country which she would never see
again.
And yet, Marie Rubiano did not die fast enough to please the SS. So
one day Dr. Winkelmann, selection specialist at Ravensbruck, entered
her name in the black-list and on 9 February 1945, together with 72
other consumptive women, 6 of whom were French, she was shoved on the
truck for the gas chamber.
During this period, in all the Revieren, selections were made and all
patients considered unfit for work were sent to the gas chamber. The
Ravensbruck gas chamber was situated just behind the wall of
224
28 Jan. 46
the camp, next to the crematory. When the trucks came to fetch the
patients we heard the sound of the motor across the camp, and the
noise ceased right by the crematory whose chimney rose above the high
wall of the camp.
At the time of the liberation I returned to these places. I visited
the gas chamber which was a hermetically sealed building made of
boards, and inside it one could still smell the disagreeable odor of
gas. I know that at Auschwitz the gases were the same as those which
were used against the lice, and the only traces they left were small,
pale green crystals which were swept out when the windows were opened.
I know these details, since the men employed in delousing the blocks
were in contact with the personnel who gassed the victims and they
told them that one and the same gas was used in both cases.
M. DUBOST: Was this the only way used to exterminate the internees in
Ravensbruck?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: In Block 10 they also experimented with a
white powder. One day the German Schwester, Martha, arrived in the
block and distributed a powder to some 20 patients. The patients
subsequently -fell into a deep sleep. Four or five of them were seized
with violent fits of vomiting and this saved their lives. During the
night the snores gradually ceased and the patients died. This I know
because I went every day to visit the French women in the block. Two
of the nurses were French and Dr. Louise Le Porz, a native of Bordeaux
who came back, can likewise testify to this fact.
M. DUBOST: Was this a frequent occurrence?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: During my stay this was the
only case of its kind within the Revier but the system was also
applied at the Jugendlager, so called because it was a former reform
school for German juvenile delinquents.
Towards the beginning of 1945 Dr. Winkelmann, no longer satisfied with
selections in the Revier, proceeded to make his selections in the
blocks. All the prisoners had to answer roll call in their bare feet
and ex* pose their breasts and legs. All those who were sick, too old,
too thin, or whose legs were swollen with oedema, were set aside and
then sent to this Jugendlager, a quarter of an hour away from the camp
at Ravensbruck. I visited it at the liberation.
In the blocks an order had been circulated to the effect that the old
women and the patients who could no longer work should apply in
writing for admission to the Jugendlager, where they would be far
better off, where they would not have to work, and where there would
be no roll call. We learned about this later through some of the
people who worked at the Jugendlager-the chief of the camp was
225
28 Jan. 46
an Austrian woman, Betty Wenz, whom I knew from Auschwitz and from a
few of the survivors, one of whom is Irene Ottelard, a French woman
living in Drancy, 17 Rue de la Liberte, who was repatriated at the
same time as myself and whom I had nursed after the liberation.
Through her we discovered the details about the Jugendlager.
M. DUBOST: Can you tell us, Madame, if you can answer this question?
Were the SS doctors who made the selection acting on their own accord
or were they merely obeying orders?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: They were acting on orders received, since
one of them, Dr. Lukas, refused to participate in the selections and
was withdrawn from the camp, and Dr. Winkelmann was sent from Berlin
to replace him.
M. DUBOST: Did you personally witness these facts?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: It was he himself who told the Chief of the
Block 10 and Dr. Louise Le Porz, when he left.
M. DUBOST: Could you give us some information about the conditions in
which the men at the neighboring camp at Ravensbruck lived on the day
after the liberation, when you were able to see them?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I think it advisable to speak of the
Jugendlager first since, chronologically speaking, it comes first.
M. DUBOST: If you wish it.
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: At the Jugendlager the old women and the
patients who had left our camp were placed in blocks which had no
water and no conveniences; they lay on straw mattresses on the ground,
so closely pressed together that one was quite unable to pass between
them. At night one could not sleep because of the continuous coming
and going, and the internees trod on each other when passing. The
straw mattresses were rotten and teemed with lice; those who were able
to stand remained for hours on end for roll call until they collapsed.
In February their coats were taken away but they continued to stay out
for roll call and mortality was considerably increased.
By way of nourishment they received only one thin slice of bread and
half a quart of swede soup, and all the drink they got in 24 hours was
half a quart of herbal tea. They had no water to drink, none to wash
in, and none to wash their mess tins.
In the Jugendlager there was also a Revier for those who could no
longer stand. Periodically, during the roll calls, the Aufseherin
would choose some internees, who would be undressed and left in
nothing but their chemises. Their coats were then returned to them.
They were hoisted on to a truck and were driven off to the gas
226
28 Jan. 46
chamber. A few days later the coats were returned to the Kammer (the
clothing warehouse), and the labels were marked "Mittwerda." The
internees working on the labels told us that the word "Mittwerda" did
not exist and that it was a special term for the gases.
At the Revier white powder was periodically distributed, and the sick
were dying as in Block 10, which I mentioned a short time ago. They
made
THE PRESIDENT: The details of the witness' evidence as to Ravensbruck.
seem to be very much like, if not the same, as at Auschwitz. Would it
not be possible now, after hearing this amount of detail, to deal with
the matter more generally, unless there is some substantial difference
between Ravensbruck and Auschwitz.
M. DUBOST: I think there is a difference which the witness has pointed
out to us, namely, that in Auschwitz the prisoners were purely and
simply exterminated. It was merely an extermination camp, whereas at
Ravensbruck they were interned in order to work, and were weakened by
work until they died of it.
THE PRESIDENT: If there are any other distinctions between the two, no
doubt you will lead the witness, I mean ask the witness about those
other distinctions.
M. DUBOST: I shall not fail to do so.
[To the witness.] Could you tell the Tribunal in what condition the
men's camp was found at the time of the liberation and how many
survivors remained?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: When the Germans went away they left 2,000
sick women and a certain number of volunteers, myself included, to
take care of them. They left us without water and without light.
Fortunately the Russians arrived on the following day. We therefore
were able to go to the men's camp and there we found a perfectly
indescribable sight. They had been for 5 days without water. There
were 800 serious cases, and three doctors and seven nurses, who were
unable to separate the dead from the sick. Thanks to the Red Army, we
were able to take these sick persons over into clean blocks and to
give them food and care; but unfortunately I can give the figures only
for the French. There were 400 of them when we came to the camp and
only 150 were able to return to France; for the others it was too
late, in spite of all our care.
M. DUBOST: Were you present at any of the executions and do you know
how they were carried out in the camp?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I was not present at the executions. I only
know that the last one took place on 22 April, 8 days before the
arrival of the Red army. The prisoners were sent, as I
227
28 Jan. 46
said, to the Kommandantur; then their clothes were returned and their
cards were removed from the files.
M. DUBOST: Was the situation in this camp of an exceptional nature or
do you consider it was part of a system?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: It is difficult to convey an exact idea of
the concentration camps to anybody, unless one has been in the camp
oneself, since one can only quote examples of horror; but it is quite
impossible to convey any impression of that deadly monotony. If asked
what was the worst of all, it is impossible to answer, since
everything was atrocious. It is atrocious to die of hunger, to die of
thirst, to be ill, to see all one's companions dying around one and
being unable to help them. It is atrocious to think of one's children,
of one's country which one will never see again, and there were times
when we asked whether our life was not a living nightmare, so unreal
did this life appear in all its horror.
For months, for years we had one wish only: The wish that some of us
would escape alive, in order to tell the world what the Nazi convict
prisons were like everywhere, at Auschwitz as at Ravensbruck. And the
comrades from the other camps told the same tale; there was the
systematic and implacable urge to use human beings as slaves and to
kill them when they could work no more.
M. DUBOST: Have you a nothing further to relate?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No.
M. DUBOST: I thank you. If the Tribunal wishes to question the
witness, I have finished.
GEN. RUDENKO: I have no questions to ask.
DR. HANNS MARX (Acting for Dr. Babel, Counsel for the SS): Attorney
Babel was prevented from coming this morning as he has to attend a
conference with General Mitchell.
My Lords, I should like to take the liberty of asking the witness a
few questions to elucidate the matter.
[Turning to the witness.] Madame COUTURIER, you declared that you were
arrested by the French police?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Yes.
DR. MARX: For what, reason were you arrested?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Resistance. I belonged to a resistance
movement.
DR. MARX: Another question: Which position did you occupy? I mean what
kind of post did you ever hold? Have you ever held a post?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Where?
228
28 Jan. 49
DR. MARX: For example as a teacher?
MAO. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Before the war? I don't quite see what this
question has to do with the matter. I was a journalist.
DR. MARX: Yes. The fact of the matter is that you, in your statement,
showed great skill in style and expression; and I should like to know
whether you held any position such, for example, as teacher or
lecturer.
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: No. I was a newspaper photographer.
DR. MARX: How do you explain that you yourself came through these
experiences so well and are now in such a good state of health?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: First of all, I was liberated a year ago; and
in a year one has time to recover. Secondly, I was 10 months in
quarantine for typhus and I had the great luck not to die of
exanthematic typhus, although I had it and was in for 31/2 months.
Also, in the last months at Ravensbruck as I knew German, I worked on
the Revier roll call, which explains why I did not have to work quite
so hard or to suffer from the inclemencies of the weather. On the
other hand, out of 230 of us only 49 from my convoy returned alive;
and we were only 52 at the end of 4 months. I had the great fortune to
return.
DR. MARX: Yes. Does your statement contain what you yourself observed
or is it concerned with information from other sources as well?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Whenever such was the case I mentioned it in
my declaration. I have never quoted anything which has not previously
been verified at the sources and by several persons, but the major
part of my evidence is based on personal experience.
DR. MARX: How can you explain your very precise statistical knowledge,
for instance, that 700,000 Jews arrived from Hungary?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I told you that I have worked in the offices;
and where Auschwitz was concerned, I was a friend of the secretary
(the Oberaufseherin), whose name and address I gave to the Tribunal.
DR. MARX: It has been stated that only 350,000 Jews came from Hungary,
according to the testimony of the Chief of the Gestapo, Eichmann.
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I am not going. to argue with the Gestapo. I
have good reasons to know that what the Gestapo states is not always
true.
DR. MARX: How were you treated personally? Were you treated well?
229
28 Jan. 46
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: Like the others.
DR. MARX: Like the others? You said before that the German people must
have known of the happenings in Auschwitz. What are your grounds for
this statement?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I have already told you: To begin with there
was the fact that, when we left, the Lorraine soldiers of the
Wehrmacht who were taking us to Auschwitz said to us, "If you knew
where you were going, you would not be in such a hurry to get there."
Then there was the fact-that the German women who came out of
quarantine to go to work in German factories knew of these events, and
they all said that they would speak about them outside.
Further, the fact that in all the factories where the Haftlinge (the
internees) worked they were in contact with the German civilians, as
also were the Aufseherinnen, who were in touch with their friends and
families and often told them what they had seen.
DR. MARX: One more question. Up to 1942 you were able to observe the
behavior of the German soldiers in Paris. Did not these German
soldiers behave well throughout and did they not pay for what they
took?
MME. VAILLANT-COUTURIER: I have not the least idea whether they paid
or not for what they requisitioned. As for their good behavior, too
many of my friends were shot or massacred for me not to differ with
you.
DR. MARX: I have no further question to put to this witness.
[Dr. Marx started to leave the lectern and then returned.]
THE PRESIDENT: If you have no further question there is nothing more
to be said. [Laughter.] There is too much laughter in the court; I
have already spoken about that.
[To Dr. Marx.] I thought you had said you had no further question.
DR. MARX: Yes. Please excuse me. I only want to make a proviso for
Attorney Babel that he might cross-examine the witness himself at a
later date, if that is possible.
THE PRESIDENT: Babel, did you say?
DR. MARX: Yes.
THE PRESIDENT: I beg your pardon; yes, certainly. When will Dr. Babel
be back in his place?
DR. MARX: I presume that he will be back in the afternoon. He is in
the building. However, he must first read the minutes.
THE PRESIDENT: We will consider the question. If Dr. Babel is here
this afternoon we will consider the matter, if Dr. Babel makes a
further application.
230
28 Jan. 46
Does any other of the defendants' counsel wish to ask any questions of
the witness?
[There was no response.]
M. Dubost, have you any questions you wish to ask on reexamination?
M. DUBOST: I have no further questions to ask.
THE PRESIDENT: Then the witness may retire.
[The witness left the stand.]
M. DUBOST: If the Tribunal will kindly allow it, we shall now hear
another witness, M. Veith.
THE PRESIDENT: Are you calling this witness on the treatment of
prisoners in concentration camps?
M. DUBOST: Yes, Mr. President, and also because this witness can give
us particulars of the ill-treatment to which certain prisoners of war
had been exposed in the camps of internees. This is no longer a
question of concentration camps and of ill-treatment inflicted upon
civilians in those camps, but of soldiers who had been brought to the
concentration camps and subjected to the same cruelty as the civilian
prisoners.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, you won't lose sight of the fact that there has
been practically no cross-examination of the witnesses you have
already called about the treatment in concentration camps? The
Tribunal, I think, feels that you could deal with the treatment in
concentration camps somewhat more generally than the last witness. Do
you hear what I say?
M. DUBOST: Yes, Your Honor.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal thinks that you could deal with the
question of treatment in concentration camps rather more generally
now, since we have heard the details from the witnesses whom you have
already called.
[The witness, Veith, took the stand.]
M. DUBOST: Is the Tribunal willing to hear this witness?
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
[To the witness.] What is your name?
M. JEAN-FREDERIC VEITH (Witness): Jean-Frederic Veith.
THE PRESIDENT: Will you repeat this oath: I swear that I will speak
without hate or fear, that I will tell the truth, all the truth,
nothing but the truth.
[The witness repeated the oath in French.]
THE PRESIDENT: Raise your right hand and say, "I swear."
VEITH: I swear it.
231
28 Jan. 46
THE PRESIDENT: Would you like to sit down and spell your name and
surname?
M. DUBOST: Will you please spell your name and surname?
VEITH: J-e-a-n F-r-e-d-e-r-i-c V-e-i-t-h. I was born on 28 April 1903
in Moscow.
M. DUBOST: You are of French nationality?
VEITH: I am of French nationality, born of French parents.
M. DUBOST: In which camp were you interned?
VEITH: At Mauthausen; from 22 April 1943 until 22 April 1945.
M. DUBOST: You knew about the work carried out in the factories
supplying material to the Luftwaffe. Who controlled these factories?
VEITH: I was in the Arbeitseinsatz at Mauthausen from June 1943, and I
was therefore well acquainted with all questions dealing with the
work.
M. DUBOST: Who controlled the factories working for the Luftwaffe?
VEITH: There were outside camps at Mauthausen where workers were
employed by Heinkel, Messerschmidt, Alfa-Vienne, and the Saurer-Werke,
and there was, moreover, the construction work on the Leibl Pass
tunnel by the Alpine Montan.
M. DUBOST: Who controlled this work, supervisors or engineers?
VEITH: There was only SS supervision. The work itself was controlled
by the engineers and the firms themselves.
M. DUBOST: Did these engineers belong to the Luftwaffe?
VEITH: On certain days I saw Luftwaffe officers who came to visit the
Messerschmidt workshops in the quarry.
M. DUBOST: Were they able to see for themselves the conditions under
which the prisoners lived?
VEITH: Yes, certainly.
M. DUBOST: Did you see any high-ranking Nazi officials visiting the
camp?
VEITH: I saw a great many high-ranking officials, among them Himmler,
Kaltenbrunner, Pohl, Maurer, the Chief of the Labor Office, Amt D II,
of the Reich, and many other visitors whose names I do not know.
M. DUBOST: Who told you that Kaltenbrunner had come?
VEITH: Well, our offices faced the parade ground overlooking the
Kommandantur; we therefore saw the high-ranking officials
232
28 Jan. 46
arriving, and the SS men themselves would tell us, "There goes so and
so."
M. DUBOST: Could the civilian population know, and did it know of the
plight of the internees?
VEITH: Yes, the population could know, since at Mauthausen there was a
road near the quarry and those who passed by that road could see all
that was happening. Moreover, the internees worked in the factories.
They were separated from the other workers, but they had certain
contacts with them and it was quite easy for the other workers to
realize their plight.
M. DUBOST: Can you tell us what you know about a journey, to an
unknown castle, of a bus carrying prisoners who were never seen again?
VEITH: At one time a method for the elimination of sick persons by
injections was adopted at Mauthausen. It was particularly used by Dr.
Krebsbach, nick-named "Dr. Spritzbach" by the prisoners since it was
he who had inaugurated the system of injections. There came a time
when the injections were discontinued, and then persons who were too
sick or too weak were sent to a castle which, we learned later, was
called Hartheim, but was officially known as a Genesungslager
(convalescent camp). Of all of those who went there, none ever
returned. We received the death certificates directly from the
political section of the camp; these certificates were secret.
Everybody who went to Hartheim died. The number of dead amounted to
about -5,000.
M. DUBOST: Did you see prisoners of war arrive at Mauthausen Camp?
VEITH: Certainly I saw prisoners of war. Their arrival at Mauthausen
Camp took place, first of all, in front of the political section.
Since I was working at the Hollerith I could watch the arrivals, for
the offices faced the parade ground in front of the political section
where the convoys arrived. The convoys were immediately sorted out.
One part was sent to the camp for registration, and very often some of
the uniformed prisoners were set aside; these had already been
subjected to special violence in the political section and were handed
straight over to the prison guards. They were then sent to the prisons
and never heard of again. They were not registered in the camp. The
only registration was made in the political section by Muller who was
in charge of these prisoners.
M. DUBOST: They were prisoners of war?
VEITH: They were prisoners of war. They were very often in uniform.
233
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: Of what nationality?
VEITH: Mostly Russians and Poles.
M. DUBOST: They were brought to your camp to be killed there?
VEITH: They were brought to our camp for "Action K."
M. DUBOST: What do you know about Action K and how do you know it?
VEITH: My knowledge of Action K is due to the fact that I was head of
the Hollerith service in Mauthausen, and consequently received all the
transfer forms from the various camps. And when prisoners were
erroneously transferred to us as ordinary prisoners, we would put it
on the transfer form which we had to send to the central office in
Berlin; or rather, we would not put any number at all, as we were
unable to give one. The "Politische" gave us no indications at all and
even destroyed the list of names if, by chance, it ever reached us.
In conversations with my comrades of the "Politische" I discovered
that this Action K was originally applied to prisoners of war who had
been captured while attempting to escape. Later this action was
extended further still, but always to soldiers and especially to
officers who had succeeded in escaping but who had been recaptured in
countries under German control.
Moreover, any person engaged in activities which might be interpreted
as not corresponding to the wishes of the fascist chiefs could also be
subjected to Action K. These prisoners arrived at Mauthausen and
disappeared, that is, they were taken to the prison where one part
would be executed on the spot and another sent to the annex of the
prison, which by this time had become too small to hold them, to the
famous Block 20 of Mauthausen.
M. DUBOST: You definitely state that these were prisoners of -war?
VEITH: Yes, they were prisoners of war, most of them.
M. DUBOST: Do you know of an execution of officers, prisoners of war,
who had been brought to the camp at Mauthausen?
VEITH: I cannot give you any names, but there were some.
M. DUBOST: Did you witness the execution of Allied officers who were
murdered within 48 hours of their arrival in camp?
VEITH: I saw the arrival of the convoy of 6 September. I believe that
is the one you are thinking of; I saw the arrival of this convoy and
in the very same afternoon these 47 went down to the quarry dressed in
nothing but their shirts and drawers. Shortly
234
28 Jan. 46
after we heard the sound of machine gun fire. I then left the office
and passed at the back, pretending I was carrying documents to another
office, and with my own eyes I saw these unfortunate people shot down;
19 were executed on the very same afternoon and the remainder on the
following morning. Later on, all the death certificates were marked,
"Killed while attempting to escape."
M. DUBOST: Do you have the names?
VEITH: Yes, I have a copy of the names of these prisoners.
[The Tribunal recessed until 1400 hours.]
235
28 Jan. 46
Afternoon Session
MARSHAL: If the Court please, it is desired to announce that the
Defendant Kaltenbrunner will be absent from this afternoon's session
on account of illness.
THE PRESIDENT: You may go on, M. Dubost.
M. DUBOST: We are going to complete the hearing of the witness Veith,
to whom, however, I have only one more question to put.
THE PRESIDENT: Have him brought in.
[The witness, Veith, took the stand.]
'M. DUBOST: You continue to testify under the oath that you already
made this morning.
Will you give some additional information concerning the execution of
the 47 Allied officers whom you saw shot in 48 hours at Camp
Mauthausen where they had been brought?
VEITH: Those officers, those parachutists, were shot in accordance
with the usual systems used whenever prisoners had to be done away
with. That is to say, they were forced to work to excess, to carry
heavy stones. Then they were beaten until they took heavier ones; and
so on and so forth until, finally driven to extremity, they turned
towards the barbed wire. If they did not do it of their own accord,
they were pushed there; and they were beaten until they did so; and
the moment they approached it and were perhaps about one meter away
from it, they were mown down by machine guns fired by the SS guards in
the watchtowers. This was the usual system for the "killing for
attempted escape" as they afterwards called it.
Those 47 men were killed on the afternoon of the 6th and morning of
the 7th of September.
M. DUBOST: How did you know their names?
VEITH: Their names came to me with the official list, because they had
all been entered in the camp registers and I had to report to Berlin
all the changes in the actual strength of the Hollerith Section. I saw
all the rosters of the dead and of the new arrivals
M. DUBOST: Did you communicate this list to an official authority?
VEITH: This list was taken by the American official authorities when I
was at Mauthausen. I immediately went back to Mauthausen after my
liberation, because I knew where the documents were; and
236
28 Jan. 46
the American authorities then had all the lists which we were able to
find.
M. DUBOST: Mr. President, I have no further questions to ask the
witness.
THE PRESIDENT: Does the British Prosecutor want to ask any questions?
BRITISH PROSECUTOR: No.
THE PRESIDENT: Does the United States Prosecutor?
UNITED STATES PROSECUTOR: No.
THE PRESIDENT: Do any members of the Defense Counsel wish to ask any
questions?
HERR BABEL: I am the defense counsel for the SS and SD. Mr. President,
I was in the Dachau Camp on Saturday and at the Augsburg-Goggingen
Camp yesterday. I found out various things there which now enable me
to question individual witnesses. I could not do this before, as I was
not acquainted with local conditions. I should like to put one
question. I was unable to attend here this morning on account of a
conference to which I was called by General Mitchell. Consequently I
did not have the cross-examination of the witness this morning. I have
only one question to put to the witness now. I should like to ask
whether I may cross-examine the witness further later, or if it is
better to withdraw the question?
THE PRESIDENT: You can cross-examine this witness now, but the
Tribunal is informed that you left General Mitchell at 15 minutes past
10.
HERR BABEL: Yes, but as a consequence of the conference I had to send
a telegram and dispatch some other pressing business so that it was
impossible for me to attend the session.
THE PRESIDENT: You can certainly cross-examine the witness now.
HERR BABEL: I have only one more question, namely: The witness stated
that the officers in question were driven toward the wire fence. By
whom were they so driven?
VEITH: They were driven to the barbed wire by the SS guards who
accompanied them, and the entire Mauthausen staff was present. They
were also beaten by the SS and by one or two "green" prisoners, who
were with them and who were the "Kapo." In the camps these "green"
prisoners were often worse than the SS themselves.
237
28 Jan. 46
HERR BABEL: Thus, in the Dachau Camp, inside the camp itself, within
the wire enclosure, there were almost no SS guards, and that was
probably also the case in Mauthausen? However...
VEITH: Inside the camp there was only a limited number of SS, but they
changed, and none of those who belonged to the troops guarding the
camp could fail to be aware of what went on in it; even if they did
not enter the camp, they watched it from the watchtowers and from
outside, and they saw precisely everything.
HERR BABEL: Were the guards who shot at the prisoners inside or
outside the wire enclosure?
VEITH: They were in the watchtowers in the same line as the barbed
wire.
HERR BABEL: Could they see from there that the officers were -driven
to the barbed wire by anyone by means of blows? Could they observe
that they were driven there and beaten?
VEITH: They could see it so well that once or twice some of the guards
refused to shoot, saying that it was not an attempt to escape and they
would not shoot. They were immediately relieved from their posts, and
disappeared.
HERR BABEL: Did you see that yourself?
VEITH: I did not see it myself, but I heard about it; it was told by
my Kommandofuehrer among others, who said to me, "There's a watchguard
who refused to shoot."
HERR BABEL: Who was this Kommandofuehrer? The chief of the group?
VEITH: The Kommandofuehrer was Wielemann. I do not remember his rank.
He was not Unterscharfuehrer, but the rank immediately below
Unterscharfuehrer, and he was in charge of the Hollerith section in
Mauthausen.
HERR BABEL: I thank you.
I have no more questions to ask just now. I shall, however, make
application to call the witness again, and I shall then take the
opportunity to ask the rest, to put such further questions to him as
'I consider necessary. I request you to retain him for this purpose,
here in Nuremberg. I am not in a position to cross-examine the witness
this afternoon, as I did not hear his statements this morning, and I
would request that the witness ...
THE PRESIDENT: You ought to have been here. If you were released from
an interview with General Mitchell at 1015, there seems to the
Tribunal, to, me at any rate, to be no reason why you should not have
been here while this witness was being examined.
238
28 Jan. 46
HERR BABEL: Mr. President, this morning I discussed with General
Mitchell some questions with which I have-been occupied for a long
time. General Mitchell agreed in, the course- of our, conversation
that my duties and activities are so extensive that-it will now be
necessary to appoint a second defense counsel for the SS; my presence
at the sessions claims so much of my working time and has become so
exhausting and so burdensome that I am often compelled to be absent
from the Court. I am sorry, but in the prevailing circumstances, I
cannot help it.
Further, I would like to say this: So far, over 40,000 members of the
SS have made applications to the Tribunal; and although many of these
are collective and not individual applications, you can imagine how
wide the field is.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, no doubt your work is extensive, but this morning,
as I have already told you, General Mitchell has informed the Tribunal
that his interview with you finished at 10:15; and it appears to the
Tribunal that you must have known that the witnesses who were giving
evidence this morning were giving evidence about concentration camps.
In addition to that, you had obtained the assistance of another
counsel, I think, Dr. Marx, to appear on your behalf, and he did
appear on your behalf; and he will have an opportunity of
cross-examining this witness if he wishes to do so now. The Tribunal
considers that you must conclude your cross-examination of this
witness now. I mean to say, you may ask any further questions of the
witness that you wish.
HERR BABEL: It all amounts to whether I can put a question, and this I
cannot do at the moment; therefore, I must renounce the
cross-examination of the witness.
THE PRESIDENT: Are there any other questions to put, M. Dubost? There
may be some other German counsel who wish to cross- examine this
witness.
M. Dubost, do you wish to address the Tribunal?
M. DUBOST: Your Honor, I would like to state to the Tribunal that we
have no reason whatsoever to fear a cross-examination of our witness
or of this morning's witness, at any time; and we are ready to ask our
witnesses to stay in Nuremberg as long as may be necessary to reply to
any questions from the Defense.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Babel, in view of the offer of the French
Prosecutor to keep the witness in Nuremberg, the Tribunal will allow
you to put any questions you wish to put to him in the course of the
next 2 days. Do you understand?
HERR BABEL: Yes.
239
28 Jan. 46
DR. KURT KAUFFMANN (Counsel for Defendant Kaltenbrunner): Before I
question the witness, I allow myself to raise one point which, I
believe, will have an important influence on the good progress of the
proceedings. The point I wish to raise is the following, and I speak
in the name of my colleagues as well: Would it not be well to come to
an agreement that both the Prosecution and the Defense be informed the
day before a witness is brought in, which -witness is to be heard? The
material has now become so considerable that circumstances make it
impossible to ask pertinent questions, questions which are urgently
necessary in the interest of all parties.
As far as the Defense is concerned, we are ready to inform the
Tribunal and the Prosecution of the witnesses we intend to ask for
examination, at least one day before they are to be heard.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal has already expressed its wish that they
should be informed beforehand of the witnesses who are to be called
and upon what subject. I hope that Counsel for the Prosecution will
take note of this wish.
DR. KAUFMANN: Yes, I thank you.
A point of special significance emerges from the statements of the
witness we heard this morning, as well as from the statements of this
witness; and this point concerns something which may be of decisive
importance for the Trial as a whole. The Prosecution ...
THE PRESIDENT: You are not here to make a speech at the moment. You
are to ask the witness questions.
DR. KAUFFMANN: Yes. It is the question of the responsibility of the
German people. The witness has stated that the civilian population was
in a position to know what was going on. I shall now try to ascertain
the truth by means of a series of questions.
Did civilians look on when executions took place? Would you answer
this?
VEITH: They could see the corpses scattered along the roads when the
prisoners were shot while returning in convoys, and corpses were even
thrown from the trains. And they could always take note of the
emaciated condition of these prisoners who worked outside, because
they saw them.
DR. KAUFFMANN: Do you know that it was forbidden on pain of death to
say anything outside the camp about the atrocities, anything in the
way of cruelties, torture, et cetera, that took place inside?
VEITH: As I spent 2 years in the camp I saw them. Some of them I saw
myself, and the rest were described to me by eyewitnesses.
240
28 Jan. 46
DR. KAUFFMANN: Could you please repeat -that again? Did you see the
secrecy order? What did you see?
VEITH: Not the order, I saw the execution and that is worse.
DR. KAUFFMANN: My question was this: Do you know that the strictest
orders were given to the SS personnel, to the executioners, et cetera,
not to speak even inside the camp, much less outside of it, of the
atrocities that went on and that eyewitnesses who spoke of them
rendered themselves liable to the most rigorous penalties, including
the death penalty? Do you know anything about that, about such a
practice inside the camps? Perhaps you will tell me whether you
yourself were allowed to talk about any observations of the kind.
VEITH: I know that liberated prisoners had to sign a statement saying
that they would never reveal what had happened in the camp and that
they had to forget what had happened; but those who were in contact
with the population, and there were many of them, did not fail to talk
about it. Furthermore, Mauthausen was situated on a hill. There was a
crematorium, which emitted flames 3 feet high. When you see flames 3
feet high coming out of a chimney every night, you are bound to wonder
what it is; and everyone must have known that it was a crematorium.
DR. KAUFFMANN: I have no further question. Thank you.
THE PRESIDENT: Does any other counsel for the defendants wish to ask
any questions? Did you tell us who the "green prisoners" were? You
mentioned "green prisoners."
VEITH: Yes, these "green prisoners" were prisoners convicted under the
common law. They were used by the SS to police the camps. As I have
already said, they were often more bestial than the SS themselves and
acted as their executioners. They did the work with which the SS did
not wish to soil their hands; they were doing all the dirty work, but
always by order of the Kommandofuehrer
This contact with the "green" Germans was terrible for the internees,
particularly for the political internees. They could not bear the
sight of them, because they realized that we were not their sort, and
they persecuted us for that alone. It was the same in all the camps.
In all the camps we were bullied by the German criminals serving with
the SS.
THE PRESIDENT: M. Dubost, do you wish to ask any other question?
M. DUBOST: Your Honor, I have no more questions to ask.
241
28 Jan. 46
THE PRESIDENT: Then the witness can retire.
[The witness left the stand.]
M. DUBOST: I shall request the Tribunal to authorize us to hear the
French witness, Dr. Dupont.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes. Very well.
[The witness, Dupont, took the stand.]
THE PRESIDENT: Is your name Dr. Dupont?
DR. VICTOR DUPONT (Witness): Dupont, Victor.
THE PRESIDENT: Will you repeat this oath after me? I swear that I will
speak without hate or fear, that I will tell the truth, all the truth,
nothing but the truth.
[The witness repeated the oath in French.]
THE PRESIDENT: Raise your right hand and say, "I swear."
DUPONT: I swear.
THE PRESIDENT: You may sit down.
M. DUBOST: Your name is Victor Dupont?
DUPONT: Yes, I am called Victor Dupont.
M. DUBOST: You were born on 12 December 1909?
DUPONT: That is correct.
M. DUBOST: At Charmes in the Vosges?
DUPONT: That is correct.
M. DUBOST: You are of French nationality, born of French parents?
DUPONT: That is correct.
M. DUBOST: You have won honorable distinctions. What are they?
DUPONT: I have the Legion of Honor, I am a Chevalier of the Legion of
Honor. I have 2 Army citations, and I have the Resistance Medal.
M. DUBOST: Were you deported to Buchenwald?
DUPONT: I was deported to Buchenwald on 24 January 1944.
M. DUBOST: You stayed there?
DUPONT: I stayed there 15 months.
M. DUBOST: Until 20 May 1945?
DUPONT: No, until 20 April 1945.
M. DUBOST: Will you make your 'statement on the regime in the
concentration camp where you were interned and the aim of those who
prescribed this regime?
242
28 Jan. 46
DUPONT: When I arrived at Buchenwald I soon became aware of the
difficult living conditions. The regime imposed upon the prisoners was
not based on any principle of justice. The principle ,which formed the
basis of this regime was the principle of the purge. I will explain.
We-I am speaking of the French-were grouped together at Buchenwald
almost all of us, without having been tried by any Tribunal. In 1942,
1943, 1944, and 1945, it was quite unusual to pass any formal judgment
on the prisoners. Many of us were interrogated and then deported;
others were cleared by the interrogation and deported all the same.
Others again were not interrogated at all. I shall give you three
examples.
On 11 November 1943 elements estimated at several hundred persons were
arrested at Grenoble during a demonstration commemorating the
Armistice. They were brought to Buchenwald, where the greater part
died. The same thing happened in the village of Verchenie (Drome) in
October 1943. 1 saw them at Buchenwald too. It happened again in April
1944 at St. Claude, and I saw these people brought in in August 1944.
In this way, various elements were assembled at Buchenwald subject to
martial law. But there were also all kinds of people, including some
who were obviously innocent, who had either been cleared by
interrogation or not even interrogated at all. Finally, there were
some political prisoners. They had been deported because they were
members of parties which were to be suppressed.
That does not mean that the interrogations were not to be taken
seriously. The interrogations which I underwent and which I saw others
undergo were particularly inhuman. I shall enumerate a few of the
methods:
Every imaginable kind of beating, immersion in bathtubs, squeezing of
testicles, hanging, crushing of the head in iron bands, and the
torturing of entire families in each others' sight. I have, in
particular, seen a wife tortured before her husband; and children were
tortured before their mothers. For the sake of precision, I will quote
one name: Francis Goret of the Rue de Bourgogne in Paris was tortured
before his mother. Once in the camp, conditions were the same for
everyone.
M. DUBOST: You spoke of racial purging as a social policy. What was
the criterion?
DUPONT: At Buchenwald various elements described as "political,"
"national"-mainly Jews and Gypsies-and "asocial"-especially
criminals--were herded together under the same regime. There were
criminals of every nation: Germans, Czechs, Frenchmen, et cetera, all
living together under the same regime. A purge does
243
28 Jan. 46
not necessarily imply extermination, but this purge was achieved by
means of the extermination already mentioned. It began for us in
certain cases; the decision was taken quite suddenly. I shall give one
example. In 1944 a convoy of several hundred Gypsy children arrived at
Buchenwald, by what administrative mystery we never knew. They were
assembled during the winter of 1944 and were to be sent on to
Auschwitz to be gassed. One of the most tragic memories of my
deportation is the way in which these children, knowing perfectly well
what was in store for them, were driven into the vans, screaming and
crying. They went on to Auschwitz the same day.
In other cases the extermination was carried out by progressive
stages. It had already begun when the convoy arrived. For instance, in
the French convoy which left Compiegne on 24 January 1944 and arrived
on 26 January, I saw one van containing 100 persons, of which 12 were
dead and 8 insane. During the period of my deportation I saw numerous
transports come in. The same thing happened every time; only the
numbers varied. In this way the elimination of a certain proportion
had already been achieved when the convoy arrived. Then they were put
in quarantine and exposed to cold for several hours, while roll call
was taken. The weaker died. Then came extermination through work. Some
of them were picked out and sent to Kommandos such as Dora, S III, and
Laura. I noticed that after those departures, which took place every
month, when the contingent was brought up to strength again,
truck-loads of dead were brought back to Buchenwald. I even attended
the post-mortems on them, and I can tell you the results. The lesions
were those of a very advanced stage of cachexy. Those who had stood up
to conditions for one, two, or three months very often exhibited the
lesions characteristic of acute tuberculosis, mostly of the granular
type. In Buchenwald itself prisoners had to work; and there, as
everywhere else, the only hope of survival lay in work. Extermination
in Buchenwald was carried out in accordance with a principle of
selection laid down by the medical officer in charge, Dr. Shiedlauski.
These selections ...
M. DUBOST: Excuse me for interrupting. What is the nationality of this
medical officer in charge?
DUPONT: He was a German SS doctor.
M. DUBOST: Are you sure of that?
DUPONT: Yes, I am quite sure.
M. DUBOST: Are you testifying as an eyewitness?
DUPONT: I am testifying as an eyewitness.
M. DUBOST: Go on, please.
244
28 Jan. 46
DUPONT: Shiedlauski carried out the selection and picked out the sick
and invalids. Prior to January 1945 they were sent to Auschwitz; later
on they went to Bergen-Belsen. None of them ever returned.
Another case which I witnessed concerns a Jewish labor squad which was
sent to Auschwitz and stayed there several months. When they came
back, they were unfit for even the lighter work. A similar fate
overtook them. They also were sent to Auschwitz again. I myself
personally witnessed these things. I was present at the selection and
I witnessed their departure.
Later on, the executions in Buchenwald took place in the camp itself.
To my own knowledge they began in September 1944 -in room 7, a little
room in the Revier. The men were done away with by means of
inter-cardiac injections. The output was not great; it did not exceed
a few score a day, at the most.
Later on more and more convoys came in, and the number of cachexy
cases increased. The executions had to be speeded up. At first they
were carried out as soon as the transports arrived; but from January
1945 onwards they were taken care of in a special block, Block 61. At
that date all those nicknamed "Mussulmans" on account of their
appearance were collected in this block. We never saw them without
their blankets over their -shoulders. They were unfit for even the
lightest work. They all had to go through Block 61. The death toll
varied daily from a minimum of 10 to about 200 in Block 61. The
execution was performed by injecting phenol into the heart in the most
brutal manner. The bodies were then carted to the crematorium mostly
during roll calls or at night. Finally, extermination was also always
assured at the end by convoys. The convoys which left Buchenwald while
the Allies were advancing were used to assure extermination.
To give an example: At the end of March 1945 elements withdrawn from
the S III detachment arrived at Buchenwald. They were in a state of
complete exhaustion when they arrived and quite unfit for any kind of
exertion. They were the first to be re-expedited, two days after their
arrival. It was only about half a mile from their starting-point in
the small camp, that is, at the bark of the Buchenwald Camp, to their
point of assembly for roll call; and to give you an idea of the state
of weakness in which these people were, I need only say that between
this starting point and their assembly point, that is, over a distance
of half a mile, we saw 60 of them collapse and die. They could not go
on further. Most of them died very soon, in a few hours or in the
course of the next day. So much for the systematic extermination which
I witnessed in Buchenwald, including ...
245
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: What about those who were left?
DUPONT: Those who were left when the last convoy went out? That is a
complicated story. We were deeply grieved about them. About the 1st of
April, though I cannot guarantee the exact date, the commander of the
camp, Pister, assembled a large number of prisoners and addressed them
as follows:
"The Allied advance has already reached the immediate neighborhood of
Buchenwald. I wish to hand over to the Allies the keys of the camp. I
do not want any atrocities. I wish the camp as a whole to be handed
over."
As a, matter of actual fact, the Allied advance was held up, more than
we wanted at least, and evacuation was begun. A delegation of
prisoners went to see the commander, reminding him of his word, for he
had given his word emphasizing that it was his "word of honor as a
soldier." He seemed acutely embarrassed and explained that Sauckel,
the Governor of Thuringia, had given orders that no prisoner should
remain in Buchenwald, for that constituted a danger to the province.
Furthermore, we knew that all who knew the secrets of the
administration of Buchenwald Camp would be put out of the way.
A few days before we were liberated 43 of our comrades belonging to
different nationalities were called out to be done away with, and an
unusual phenomenon occurred. The camp revolted; the men were hidden
and never given up. We also knew that under no circumstances would
anyone who had been employed, either in the experimental block or in
the infirmary, be allowed to leave the camp. That is all I have to say
about the last few days.
M. DUBOST: This officer in command of the camp, whom you have just
said gave his word of honor as a soldier, was he a soldier?
DUPONT: His attitude towards the prisoners was ruthless; but he had
his orders. Frankly, he was a particular type of soldier; but he was
not acting on his own initiative in treating the prisoners in this
way.
M. DUBOST: To what branch of the service did he belong?
DUPONT: He belonged to the SS Totenkopf Division.
M. DUBOST: Was he an SS man?
DUPONT: Yes, he was an SS man.
M. DUBOST: He was acting on orders, you say?
DUPONT: He was certainly acting on orders.
M. DUBOST: For what purposes were the prisoners used?
DUPONT: The prisoners were used in such a way that no attention
was paid to the fact that they were human beings. They were
246
28 Jan. 46
used for experimental purposes. At Buchenwald the experiments were
made in Block 46. The men who were to be employed there were always
selected by means of a medical examination. On those occasions when I
was present it was performed by Dr. Shiedlauski, of whom I have
already spoken.
M. DUBOST: Was he a doctor?
DUPONT: Yes, he was a doctor. The internees were used for the hardest
labor; in the Laura mines, working in the salt mines as, for instance,
in the Mansleben-am-See Kommando, clearing up bomb debris. It must be
remembered that the more difficult the labor conditions were, the
harsher was the supervision by the guards.
The internees were used in Buchenwald for any kind of labor; in earth
works, in quarries, and in factories. To cite a particular case: There
were two factories attached to Buchenwald, the Gustloff works and the
Muhlbach works. They were munition factories under technical and
non-military management. In this particular case there was some sort
of rivalry between the SS and the technical management of the factory.
The technical management, concerned with its output, took the part of
the prisoners to the extent of occasionally obtaining supplementary
rations for them. Internee labor had certain advantages. The cost was
negligible, and from a security point of view the maximum of secrecy
was ensured; as the internees had no contact with the outside world
and therefore no leakage was possible.
M. DUBOST: You mean leakage of military information?
DUPONT: I mean leakage of military information.
M. DUBOST: Could outsiders see that the internees were illtreated and
wretched?
DUPONT: That is another question, certainly.
M. DUBOST: Will you answer it later?
DUPONT: I shall answer it later. I have omitted one detail. The
internees were also used to a certain extent after death. The ashes
resulting from the cremations were thrown into the excrement pit and
served to fertilize the fields around Buchenwald. I add this detail
because it struck me vividly at the time.
Finally, as I said, work, whatever it might be, was the internees'
only chance of survival. As soon as they were no longer of any
possible use, they were done for.
M. DUBOST: Were not internees used as "blood donors," involuntary of
course?
247
28 Jan. 46
DUPONT: I forgot that point. Prisoners assigned to light work, whose
output was poor, were used as blood donors. Members of the Wehrmacht
came several times. I saw them twice at Buchenwald, taking blood from
these men. The blood was taken in a ward known as CP-2, that is,
Operation Ward 2.
M. DUBOST: This was done on orders from higher quarters?
DUPONT: I do not see how it could have been done otherwise.
M. DUBOST: On their own initiative?
DUPONT: Not on the initiative of anyone in the camp. These elements
had nothing to do with the camp administration or the guards. I must
make it clear that those whom I saw belonged to the Wehrmacht, whereas
we were guarded by SS, all of them from the Totenkopf Division.
Towards the end, a special use was made of them.
In the early months of 1945, members of the Gestapo came to Buchenwald
and took away all the papers of those who had died, in order to
A-establish their identity and to make out forged papers. One Jew was
specially employed to touch up photographs and to adapt the papers
which had belonged to the dead for the use of persons whom, of course,
we did not know. The Jew disappeared, and I do not know what became of
him. We never saw him again.
But this utilization of identification papers was not confined to the
dead. Several hundred French internees were summoned to the
"Fliegerverwaltung" and there subjected to a very precise
interrogation on their person, their connections, their convictions,
and their background. They were then told that they would on no
account be allowed to receive any correspondence, or even parcels
those of them who ever received any. From an administrative point of
view all traces of them were effaced and contact with the outside
world was rendered even more impossible for them than it had been
under ordinary circumstances. We were deeply concerned about the fate
of these comrades. We were liberated very soon after that, and I can
only say that prisoners were used in this way, that their
identification papers were used for manufacturing forged documents.
M. DUBOST: What was the effect of this kind of life?
DUPONT: The effect of this kind of life on the human organism?
M. DUBOST: On the human organism.
DUPONT: As to the human organism, there was only one effect: the
degradation of the human being. The living conditions which I- have
just described were enough in themselves to produce such degradation.
It was done systematically. An unrelenting will seemed
248
28 Jan. 46
to be at work to reduce those men to the same level, the lowest
possible level of human degradation.
To begin with, the first degrading factor was the way in which they
were mixed. It was permissible, to mix nationalities, but not to mix
indiscriminately every possible type of prisoner: political,
military-for the members of the French resistance movement were
soldiers-racial elements, and common-law criminals.
Criminals of all nationalities were herded together with their
compatriots, and every nationality lived side by side, so conditions
of living were distressing. In addition, there was overcrowding,
unsanitary conditions, and compulsory labor. I shall give a few
examples to show that prisoners were mixed quite indiscriminately.
In March 1944, 1 saw the French General Duval die. He had been working
on the "terrasse" with me all day. When we came back, he was covered
with mud and completely exhausted. He died a few hours later.
The French General Vernaud died on a straw mattress, filthy with
excrement, in room Number 6, where those on the verge of death were
taken, surrounded by dying men.
I saw M. De Tessan die ...
M. DUBOST: Will you explain to the Tribunal who M. De Tessan was?
DUPONT: M. De Tessan was a former French minister, married to an
American. He also died on a straw mattress, covered with pus, from a
disease known as septicopyohemia.
I also witnessed the death of Count de Lipkowski, who had done
brilliant military service in this war. He had been granted the honors
of war by the German Army and had, for one thing, been invited to
Paris by Rommel, who desired to show the admiration he felt for his
military brilliance. He died miserably in the winter of 1944.
One further instance: The Belgian Minister Janson was in the camp
living under the conditions which I have already described, and of
which you must have already heard very often. He died miserably, a
physical and mental wreck. His intellect had gone and he had partially
lost his reason.
I cite only extreme cases and especially those of generals, as they
were said to be granted special conditions. I saw no sign of that.
The last stage in this process of the degradation of human beings was
the setting of internee against internee.
M. DUBOST: Before dealing with this point, will you describe the
conditions in which you found your former professor, Leon Kindberg,
professor of medicine?
249
28 Jan. 46
DUPONT: I studied medicine under Professor Maurice Leon Kindberg at
the Beaujon Hospital.
M. DUBOST: In Paris?
DUPONT: Yes, in Paris. A very highly cultured and brilliantly
intelligent man. In January 1945 1 learned that he had just arrived
from Monovitz. I found him in Block 58, a block which in n
ormal circumstances would hold 300 men, and into which 1,200 had been
crowded-Hungarians, Poles, Russians, Czechs, with a large proportion
of Jews in an extraordinary state of misery. I did not recognize Leon
Kindberg because there was nothing to distinguish him from the usual
type to be found in these blocks. There was no longer any sign of
intellect in him and it was hard to find anything of the man that I
had formerly known. We managed to get him out of that block but his
health was unfortunately too much impaired and he died shortly after
his liberation.
M. DUBOST: Can you tell the Tribunal, as far as you know, the "crimes"
committed by this man?
DUPONT: After the armistice Leon Kindberg settled in Toulouse to
practice the treatment of pulmonary consumption. I know from an
absolutely reliable source that he had taken no part whatsoever in
activities directed against the German occupation authorities in
France. They found out that he was a Jew and as such he was arrested
and deported. He drifted into Buchenwald by way of Auschwitz and
Monovitz.
M. DUBOST: What crime had General Duval committed that he should be
imprisoned along with pimps, moral degenerates, and murderers? What
had General Vernaud done?
DUPONT: I know nothing about the activities of General Duval and
General Vernaud during the occupation. All I can say is that they were
certainly not asocial.
M. DUBOST: What about Count de Lipkowski and M. De Tessan?
DUPONT: Nor has the Count de Lipkowski or M. De Tessan committed any
of the faults usually attributed to asocial elements or common-law
criminals.
M. DUBOST: You may proceed.
DUPONT: The means used to achieve the final degradation of the
internees -as a whole was the torture of them by their fellow
prisoners. Let me give a particularly brutal instance. In Kommando A.
S. 6, which was situated at Mansleben-am-See, 70 kilometers from
Buchenwald, there were prisoners of every nationality, including a
large portion of Frenchmen., I had two friends there: Antoine
d'Aimery, a son of General d'Aimery, and Thibaut, who was studying to
become a missionary.
250
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: Catholic?
DUPONT: Catholic. At Mansleben-am-See hangings took place in public in
the hall of a factory connected with the salt mine. The SS were
present at these hangings in full dress uniform, wearing their
decorations.
The prisoners were forced to be present at these hangings under
threats of the most cruel beatings. When they hanged the poor
wretches, the prisoners had to give the Hitler salute. Worse still,
one prisoner was chosen to pull away the stool on which the victim
stood. He could not evade the order, as the consequences to himself
would have been too grave. When the execution had been carried out,
the prisoners had to file off in front of the victim between two SS
men. They were made to touch the body and, gruesome detail, look the
dead man in the eyes. I believe that men who had been forced to go
through such rites must inevitably lose the sense of their dignity, as
human beings.
In Buchenwald itself all the executive work was entrusted to the
internees, that is, the hangings were carried out by a German prisoner
assisted by other prisoners. The camp was policed by prisoners. When
someone in the camp was- sentenced to death, it was their duty to find
him and take him to the place of execution.
Selection for the labor squads, with which we were well acquainted,
especially for Dora, Laura, and S III-extermination detachments-was
carried out by prisoners, who decided which of us were to go there. In
this way the internees were forced down to the worst possible level of
degradation, inasmuch as every man was forced to become the
executioner of his fellow.
I have already referred to Block 61, where the extermination of the
physically unfit and those otherwise unsuited for labor was carried
out. These executions were also carried out by prisoners under SS
supervision and control. From the point of view of humanity in
general, this was perhaps the worst crime of all, for these men who
were constrained to torture their fellow-beings have now been restored
to life, but profoundly changed. What is to become of them? What are
they going to do?
M. DUBOST: Who was responsible for these crimes as far as your
personal knowledge goes?
DUPONT: One thing which strikes me as being particularly significant
is that the methods which I observed in Buchenwald now appear to have
been the same, or almost the same, as those prevailing in all the
other camps. The degree of uniformity in the way in which the camps
were run is clear evidence of orders from higher quarters. In the case
of Buchenwald, in particular, the personnel, no matter how rough it
might be, would not have done such things
251
28 Jan. 46
on their own initiative. Moreover, the camp chief and the SS doctor,
himself, always pleaded superior orders, often in a vague manner. The
name most frequently invoked was that of Himmler. Other names also
were given. The chief medical officer for all the camps, Lolling, was
mentioned on numerous occasions in connection with the extermination
block, especially by an SS doctor in the camp, named Bender. In regard
to the selection of invalids or Jews to be sent to Auschwitz or
Bergen-Belsen to be gassed, I heard the name of Pohl mentioned.
M. DUBOST: What were the functions of Pohl?
DUPONT: He was chief of the SS administration in Berlin, Division D 2.
M. DUBOST: Could the German people as a whole have been in ignorance
of these atrocities, or were they bound to know of them?
DUPONT: As these camps had been in existence for years, it is
impossible for them not to have known. Our transport stopped at Treves
on its way in. The prisoners in some vans were completely naked while
in others they were clothed. There was a crowd of people around the
station and they all saw the transport. Some of them excited the SS
men patrolling the platform,, But there were other channels through
which information could reach the population. To begin with, there
were squads working outside the camps. Labor squads went out from
Buchenwald to Weimar, Erfurt, and Jena. They left in the morning and
came back at night, and during the day they were among the civilian
population. In the factories, too, the technical crew were not members
of the armed forces. The "Meister" were not SS men. They went home
every night after supervising the work of the prisoners all day.
Certain factories even employed civilian labor-the Gustloff works in
Weimar, for instance. During the work, the internees and civilians
were together.
The civil authorities were responsible for victualling the camps and
were allowed to enter them, and I have seen civilian trucks coming
into the camp.
The railway authorities were necessarily informed on those matters.
Numerous trains carried prisoners daily from one camp to another; or
from France to Germany; and these trains were driven by railway men.
Moreover, there was a regular daily train to Buchenwald as a terminal
station. The railway administrative authorities must, therefore, have
been well informed.
Orders were also given in the factories, and industrialists could not
fail to be informed regarding the personnel they employed in their
factories. I may add that visits took place; the German prisoners were
sometimes visited. I knew certain German internees, and I know that on
the occasion of those visits they talked to their
252
28 Jan. 46
relatives, which they could hardly do without informing their home
circle of what was going on. It would appear that it is impossible to
deny that the German people knew of the camps.
M. DUBOST: The Army?
DUPONT: The Army knew of the camps. At least, this is what I could
observe. Every week so-called commissions came to Buchenwald, a group
of officers who came to visit the camp. There were SS among these
officers; but I very often saw members of the Wehrmacht, the
Luftwaffe, who came on those visits. Sometimes we were able to
identify the personalities who visited the camp, rarely so far as I
was concerned. On 22 March 1945 General Mrugowski came to visit the
camp. In particular, he spent a long time in Block 61. He was
accompanied on this visit by an SS general and the chief medical
officer of the camp, Dr. Shiedlauski.
Another point, during the last few months, -the Buchenwald guard, plus
SS-men...
M. DUBOST: Excuse me for interrupting you. Could you tell us about
Block 61?
DUPONT: Block 61' was the extermination block for those suffering from
cachexy-in other words, those arrived in such a state of exhaustion
that they were totally unfit for work.
M. DUBOST: Is it direct testimony you are giving about this visit to
Block 61?
DUPONT: This is from my own personal observation.
M. DUBOST: Whom does it concern?
DUPONT: General Mrugowski.
M. DUBOST: In the Army?
DUPONT: A doctor and an SS general whom I cannot identify.
M. DUBOST: Were university circles unaware of the work done in the
camps?
DUPONT: At the Pathological Institute in Buchenwald, pathological
preparations were made; and naturally some of them were out of the
ordinary, since-and I am speaking as a doctor-we encountered cases
that can no longer be observed, cases such as have been described in
the books of the last century. Some excellent pieces of work were
prepared and sent to universities, especially the University of Jena.
On the other hand there were also some exhibits which could not
properly be described as anatomical.
Some prepared tattoo marks were sent to universities.
M. DUBOST: Did you personally see that?
DUPONT: I saw these tattoo marks prepared.
253
28 Jan.. 46
I M. DUBOST: Then how did they obtain the anatomic exhibits, how did
they get these tattoo marks? They waited for a natural death, of
course.
DUPONT: The cases I observed were natural deaths or executions. Before
our arrival-and I can name witnesses who can testify to this-they
killed a man to get these tattoo marks. It happened, I must emphasize,
when I was not at Buchenwald. I am repeating what was told me by
witnesses whose names I will give. During the period when the camp was
commanded by Koch, people who had particularly artistic tattoo marks
were killed. The witness I can refer to is a Luxembourger called
Nicolas Simon who lives in Luxembourg. He spent 6 years in Buchenwald
in exceptional conditions where he had unprecedented opportunities of
observation.
M. DUBOST: But I am told that Koch was sentenced to death and executed
because of these excesses.
DUPONT: As far as I know, Koch was mixed up with some sort of
swindling affair. He quarrelled with the SS administration. He was
undoubtedly arrested and imprisoned.
THE PRESIDENT: We had better have an adjournment now.
[A recess was taken.]
M. DUBOST: We stopped at the end of the Koch story and the witness was
telling the Tribunal that Koch had been executed not for the crimes
that he had committed with regard to the internees in his charge, but
because of the numerous dishonest acts of which he had been guilty
during his period of service.
Did I understand the witness' explanation correctly?
DUPONT: I said explicitly that he had been accused of dishonesty. I
cannot give precise details of all the charges. I cannot say that he
was accused exclusively of dishonest acts by his administration; I
know that such charges were made against him, but I have no further
information.
M. DUBOST: Have you nothing to add?
DUPONT: I can say that this information came from Dr. Owen, who had
been arrested at the same time and released again and who returned to
Buchenwald towards the end, that is, early in 1945.
M. DUBOST: What was the nationality of this doctor?
DUPONT: German. He was in detention. He was an SS man and Koch and he
were arrested at the same time. Owen was released and came back to
Buchenwald restored to his rank and his functions at the beginning of
1945. He was quite willing to talk to the prisoners and the
information that I have given comes from him.
254
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: I have no further questions to ask the witness, Mr.
President.
THE PRESIDENT: Does any member of the Defense Counsel wish to ask any
questions?
DR. MERKEL: I am the Defense Counsel for the Gestapo.
Witness, you previously stated that the methods of treatment in
Buchenwald were not peculiar to the Buchenwald Camp but must be
ascribed to a general order. The reasons you gave for 'this statement
were that you had seen those customs and methods in all the other
camps too. How am I to understand this expression "in all the other
camps"?
DUPONT: I am speaking of concentration camps; to be precise, a certain
number of them, Mauthausen, Dachau, Sachsenhausen; labor squads such
as Dora, Laura, S III, Mansleben, Ebensee, to mention these only.
DR. MERKEL: Were you yourself in those camps?
DUPONT: I myself went to Buchenwald. I collected exact testimony about
the other camps from friends who were !here. In any case, the number
of friends of mine who died is a sufficiently eloquent proof that
extermination was carried out in the same way in all the camps.
HERR BABEL: I should like to know to what block you belonged. Perhaps
you can tell the Tribunal-you have already mentioned the point-how the
prisoners were distributed? Did they not also bear certain external
markings, red patches on the clothing of some and green on that of
others?
DUPONT: There were in fact a number of badges, all of which were found
in the same Kommandos. To give an example, where I was-in the
"terrasse-kommando" known as "Entwasserung" (drainage)-I worked along
side of German "common-laws" wearing the green badge. Regarding the
nationalities in this Kommando, there were Russians, Czechs, Belgians,
and French. Our badges were different; our treatment was identical,
and in this particular case we were even commanded by "common-laws."
HERR BABEL: I did not quite hear the beginning of your answer. I asked
whether the internees were divided into specific categories
identifiable externally by means of stars or some kind of
distinguishing mark: green, blue, et cetera?
DUPONT: I said that there were various badges in the camp, triangular
badges which applied in principle to different categories, but all the
men were mixed up together, and subjected to the same treatment.
255
28 Jan. 46
HERR BABEL: I did not ask you about their treatment, but about the
distinctive badges.
DUPONT: For the French it was a badge in the form of a shield.
HERR BABEL: For all the prisoners, not only the French.
DUPONT: I am answering you. In the case of the French, who were those
I knew best, the red, political badge was given to everyone without
discrimination, including the prisoners brought over from Fort
Barraut, who were common-law criminals. I saw the same thing among the
Czechs and the Russians. It is true that the use of different badges
had been intended, but that was never put into practice in any
reasonable way.
To come back to what I have already stated, even if there were
different badges, the people were all mixed up together, nevertheless,
and subjected exactly to the same treatment and the same conditions.
HERR BABEL: We have already heard several times that prisoners of
various nationalities were mixed up together. That is not what I asked
you. You were in the camp for a sufficiently long period to be able to
answer my question. How were these prisoners divided? As far as I
know, they were divided into criminal, political, and other groups,
and each group distinguished by a special sign worn on the
clothing-green, blue, red, or some other color.
DUPONT: The use of different badges for different categories had been
planned. These categories were mixed up together. "Criminals" were
side by side with prisoners classed as "political." There were,
however, blocks in which one or another of those elements
predominated; but they were not divided up into specific groups
distinguished by the particular badge they wore.
HERR BABEL: I have been told, for instance, that political prisoners
wore blue badges and the criminals wore red ones. We have already had
a witness who confirmed this to a certain extent by stating that
criminals wore a green badge and asocial offenders a different badge
and that the category to which they belonged could be seen at a
glance.
DUPONT: It is true that different badges existed. It is true that the
use of these badges for different categories was foreseen; but it I am
to confine myself to the truth, I must emphasize the fact that the
full use was not made of these badges. For the French, in particular,
there were only political badges; and this increased the confusion
still more since notorious criminals from the ordinary 'civil prisons
were regarded everywhere as political prisoners. The badges were
intended to identify the different existing categories, but they were
not employed systematically. They were not employed at all for the
French prisoners.
256
28 Jan. 46
HERR BABEL: If I understand you correctly, you say that all French
prisoners were classified as political prisoners?
DUPONT: That is correct.
HERR BABEL: Now, among these French prisoners, as you said yourself,
is it not true to say that there were not only political prisoners but
also a large proportion of criminals?
DUPONT: There were some among...
HERR BABEL: At least, I took your previous statement to mean that. You
said that quite definitely.
DUPONT: I did say so. I said that there were criminals from special
prisons who were not -given the green badge with an F, which they
should have received, but the political badge.
HERR BABEL: What was your employment in the camp? You are a doctor,
are you not?
DUPONT: I arrived in January. For 3 months I was assigned first to the
quarry and then to the "terrasse." After that I was assigned to the
Revier, that is to say the camp infirmary.
HERR BABEL: What were your duties there?
DUPONT: I was assigned to the ambulance service for internal diseases.
HERR BABEL: Were you able to act on your own initiative? What sort of
instructions did you receive regarding the treatment of patients?
DUPONT: We acted under the control of an SS doctor. We had a certain
number of beds for certain patients, in the proportion of one bed to
20 patients. We had practically no medical supplies. I worked in the
infirmary up to the liberation.
HERR BABEL: Did you receive instructions regarding the treatment of
patients? Were you told to look after them properly or were you given
instructions to administer treatment which would cause death?
DUPONT: As regards that, I was ordered to select the incurables for
extermination. I never carried out this order.
HERR BABEL: Were you told to select them for extermination? I did not
quite hear your reply. Will you please repeat it?
DUPONT: I was ordered to select those who were dangerously ill so that
they might be sent to Block 61 where they were to be exterminated.
That was the only order I received concerning the patients.
HERR BABEL: "Where were they to be exterminated?" I asked if you were
told that they were to be selected for extermination.
257
28 Jan. 46
Were you told-"They will be sent to Block 61?" Were you also told what
was to happen to them in Block 61?
DUPONT: Block 61 was in charge of a noncommissioned officer called
Wilhelm, who personally supervised the executions; and it was he who
ordered what patients should be selected to be sent to that block. I
think the situation is sufficiently clear.
HERR BABEL: I beg your pardon. You were given no specific details?
DUPONT: The order to send the incurables.. .
HERR BABEL: Witness, it strikes me that you are not giving a
straightforward answer of "yes" or "no," but that you persist in
evading the question.
DUPONT: It was said that these patients were to be sent to Block 61.
Nothing more was added but every patient sent to Block 61 was
executed.
HERR BABEL: That is not first-hand observation. You found out or you
heard that those who were sent there did not come back.
DUPONT: That is not correct. I could see for myself, for I was the
only doctor who could enter Block 61, which was under the command of
an internee called Louis Cunish (or Remisch). I was able to get a few
of the patients out; the others died.
HERR BABEL: If such a thing was said to you, why did you not say that
you would not do it?
DUPONT: If I understand the question correctly, I am being asked why,
when I was told to send the most serious cases...
HERR BABEL: When you received instructions to select patients for
Block 61 why did you not say, "I know what will happen to those
people, and therefore I will not do it."
DUPONT: Because it would have meant death.
HERR BABEL: And what would it have meant if Germans had refused to
carry out such an order?
DUPONT: What Germans are you talking about? German internees?
HERR BABEL: A German doctor, if you like, or anyone else employed in
the hospital. What would have happened to him if he had received such
an order and refused to carry it out?
DUPONT: If an internee refused point-blank to execute such an order,
it meant death. In point of fact, we sometimes could evade such
orders. I emphasize the fact that I never sent anyone to- Block 61.
HERR BABEL: I have one more general question to ask about conditions
in the camp. For those who have never seen a camp it is difficult to
imagine what conditions were actually like. Perhaps
258
28 Jan. 46
you could give the Tribunal a short description of how the camp was
arranged.
DUPONT: I think I have already spoken at sufficient length on the
organization of the camp. I should like to ask the President whether
it will serve any useful purpose to return to this subject.
THE PRESIDENT: I believe it is not necessary. [To Herr Babel] If you
want to put any particular cross-examination to him to show he is not
telling the truth, you can, but not to ask him for a general
description.
HERR BABEL: The camp consists of an inner site surrounded and secured
by barbed wire. The barracks in which the prisoners were housed were
inside this camp. How was this inner camp guarded?
THE PRESIDENT: Will you kindly put one question at a time? The
question you just put involves three or four different matters.
HERR BABEL: How was the part of -the camp in which the living quarters
are situated, separated from the rest? What security, measures were
taken?
DUPONT: The camp was a unified whole, cut off from the rest of the
world by an electrified barbed wire network.
HERR BABEL: Where were the guards?
DUPONT: The guards of the camp were in towers situated all around the
camp; they were stationed at the gate and they patrolled inside the
camp itself.
HERR BABEL: Inside the camp? Inside the barbed wire enclosure?
DUPONT: Obviously, inside the camp and inside the barracks, of course.
They had the right to go everywhere.
HERR BABEL: I have been informed that each separate barrack was under
the supervision of only one man, a German SS man or a member of some
other organization, that there were no other guards, that these guards
were not intended to act as guards but only to keep order, and that
the so-called Kapos, who were chosen from the ranks of the prisoners,
had the same authority as the guards and performed the duties of the
guards. It may have been different in Buchenwald. My information comes
from Dachau.
DUPONT: I have already answered all these questions in my statement by
saying that the camps were run by the SS in a manner which is common
knowledge and that in addition the SS employed the internees as
intermediaries in many instances. This was the case in Buchenwald and,
I suppose, in all the other concentration camps.
259
28 Jan. 46
HERR BABEL: The answer to the question has again been highly evasive.
I shall not, however, pursue the matter any further, as in any case I
shall not receive a definite answer.
But I should like to put one further question: You stated in
connection with the facts you described that a professor, whose name I
could not understand through the earphones and who was, I believe, a
professor of your own, was housed in Block 53. You stated in
connection with the question of degradation that at first 300 people,
I think, were housed there and later on 1,200. Is that correct?
DUPONT: There were 1,200 men in Block 58 when I found Dr. Kindberg
there.
HERR BABEL: Yes. And if I understood you correctly, you
said that in this block there were not only Frenchmen, but also
Russians, Poles, Czechs, and Jews and that a state of degradation was
caused not only through the herding together of 1,200 people but also
through the intermingling of so many different nationalities.
DUPONT: I want to make it clear that the intermingling of elements
speaking a different language, men who are unable to understand each
other, is not a crime; but it was a pre-disposing factor which
furthered all the other measures employed to bring about a state of
human degradation among the prisoners.
HERR BABEL: So you consider that the intermingling of Frenchmen,
Russians, Poles, Czechs, and Jews is a degradation?
DUPONT: I do not see the point of this question. The fact of
intermingling ...
HERR BABEL: There is no need for you to see the point; I know why I am
asking the question.
DUPONT: The fact of putting men who speak different languages together
is not degrading. I did not either think or say such a thing; but the
herding together of elements which differ from each other in every
respect and especially in that of language, in itself made living
conditions more difficult, and paved the way for the application of
other measures which I have already described at length and whose
final aim was the degradation of the human being.
HERR BABEL: I cannot understand why the necessity of associating with
people whose language one does not understand should be degrading.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Babel, he has given his answer, that he considers
it tended to degradation. It does not matter whether you understand it
or not.
HERR BABEL: Mr. President, the transmission through the earphones is
sometimes so imperfect that I, at least, often cannot
260
28 Jan. 46
hear exactly what the witness says and for that reason I have
unfortunately been compelled to have an answer repeated from time to
time.
M. DUBOST: I should not Eke the Tribunal to mistake this interpolation
for an interruption of the cross-examination; but I think I must say
that some confusion was undoubtedly created in the mind of the Defense
Counsel just now in consequence of an interpreter's error which has
been brought to my notice.
He asked my witness an insidious question, namely, whether the French
deportees were criminals for the most part, and the question was
interpreted as follows: whether the French deportees were criminals.
The witness answered the question as translated into French and not as
asked in German. I therefore request that the question be put once
more by the Defense Counsel and correctly translated.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you understand what Mr. Dubost said, Dr. Babel?
HERR BABEL: I think I understand the substance. I think I understand
that there was a mistake in the translation. I am not in a position to
judge; I cannot follow both the French and German text.
THE PRESIDENT: I think the best course is to continue your
cross-examination, if you have any more questions to ask, and Mr.
Dubost can clear up the difficulty in re-examination.
HERR BABEL: Mr. President, the Defense Counsel for Kaltenbrunner has
already explained today that it is very difficult for the Defense to
cross-examine a witness without being informed at least one day before
as to the subjects on which the witness is to be heard. The testimony
given by today's witnesses was so voluminous that it is impossible for
me to follow it without previous preparation and to prepare and
conduct from brief notes the extensive cross-examinations which are
necessary.
To my knowledge, the President has already informed Defense Counsel
for the organizations that we shall have an opportunity of
re-examining the witnesses later or of calling them on our own behalf.
THE PRESIDENT: I have already said what I have to say on behalf of the
Tribunal on that point, but as Counsel for the Defense must have
anticipated that witnesses would be called as to the conditions in the
concentration camps, I should have thought they could have prepared
their cross-examination during the 40 or more days during which the
Trial has taken place.
HERR BABEL: Mr. President, I do not think that this is the proper time
for me to argue the matter with the Tribunal, but I
261
28 Jan. 46
may perhaps be given the opportunity of doing so later in a closed
session. I consider this necessary in the interests of the rapid and
unhampered progress of the Trial.
I have no desire whatsoever to delay the proceedings. I have the
greatest interest in expediting them as far as possible, but I am
anxious not to do so at the cost of prejudicing, the defense of the
organizations.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Babel, I have already pointed out to you that you
must have anticipated that the witnesses might be called to state the
conditions in concentration camps. You must therefore have had full
opportunity during the days the Trial has taken place for making up
your mind on what points you would cross- examine, and I see no reason
to discuss the matter with you.
HERR BABEL: Thank you for this information. But naturally I cannot
know in advance exactly what the witness is going to say, and I cannot
cross-examine him until I have heard him. I know, of course, that a
witness is going to make a statement about concentration camps but I
cannot know in advance which particular points he will discuss.
M. DUBOST: I would ask the Tribunal to note that in questioning the
French witness the Defense used certain words the literal translation
of which is "for the most part." This applied to the character of the
French deportees. The question was, "Were they criminals for the most
part?" The witness understood it to be as I did: "Did you say that
they were criminals?" and not "that the convoys were for the most part
composed of criminals." His reply was the natural one. The Tribunal
will allow me to ask the witness to give details. What was the
proportion of common-law criminals and patriots respectively among the
deportees? Was he himself a common-law criminal or a patriot? Were the
generals and other personalities whose names he has given us
common-law criminals or patriots, speaking generally?
DUPONT: The proportion of French common-law criminals was very small.
The common-law criminals came from Fort Barraut in a convoy. I cannot
give the exact figures, but there were only a few hundred out of all
the internees. In other incoming convoys the proportion of common-law
criminals included was only 2 or 3 per thousand.
M. DUBOST: Thank you.
THE PRESIDENT: The witness can retire.
[The witness left the stand.]
THE PRESIDENT: M. Dubost, are you proposing or asking to call other
witnesses upon concentration camps? Because, as I have already pointed
out to you, the evidence, with the exception of
262
28 Jan. 46
Dr. Babel's recent cross-examination, has practically not been
cross-examine; and it is supported by other film evidence. We are
instructed by Article 18 of the Charter to conduct the Trial in as
expeditious a way as possible; and I will point out to you, as ordered
under 24e of the Charter, you have the opportunity of calling
rebutting evidence, if it were necessary and, therefore, if the
evidence which has been so fully gone into as to the condition in
concentration camps...
M. DUBOST: The witness whom I propose to ask the Tribunal to hear will
elucidate a point which has been pending for several weeks. The
Tribunal will remember that when my American colleagues were
presenting their e vidence, the question of ascertaining whether
Kaltenbrunner had been in Mauthausen arose. In evidence of this, I am
going to call M. Boix, who win prove to the Tribunal that
Kaltenbrunner had been in Mauthausen. He has photographs of that visit
and the Tribunal will see them, as the witness brought them with him.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
[The witness, Boix, took the stand.]
THE PRESIDENT: What is your name?
M. FRANCOIS BOIX (Witness): Francois Boix.
THE PRESIDENT: Are you French?
BOIX: I am a Spanish refugee.
THE PRESIDENT: Will you repeat this oath after me. I swear to speak
without hate or fear, to say the truth, all the truth, only the truth.
[The witness repeated the oath in French.]
THE PRESIDENT: Raise your right hand and say, "I swear."
BOIX: I swear.
THE PRESIDENT: You may sit down.
M. Dubost, will you spell the name.
M. DUBOST: B-O-I-X. [Turning -to the witness.] You were born on 14
August 1920 in Barcelona?
BOIX: Yes.
M. DUBOST: You are a news photographer, and you were interned in the
camp of Mauthausen, since...
BOIX: Since 27 January 1941.
M. DUBOST: You handed over to the commission of *inquiry a certain
number of photographs?
BOIX: Yes.
263
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: They are going to be projected on the screen and you will
state under oath under what circumstances and where these pictures
were taken?
BOIX: Yes.
M. DUBOST: How did you obtain these pictures?
BOIX: Owing to my professional knowledge, I was sent to Mauthausen to
work in the identification branch of the camp. There was a
photographic branch, and pictures of everything happening in the camp
could be taken and sent to the High Command in Berlin.
[Pictures were then projected on the screen.]
M. DUBOST: This is the general view of the quarry. Is this where the
internees worked?
BOIX: Most of them.
M. DUBOST: Where is the stairway?
BOIX: In the rear.
M. DUBOST: How many steps were there?
BOIX: 160 steps at first; later on there were 186.
M. DUBOST: We can proceed to the next picture.
BOIX: This was -taken in the quarry during a visit from ReichsFuehrer
Himmler, Kaltenbrunner, the Governor of Linz, and some other leaders
whose names I do not know. What you see below is the dead body of a
man who had fallen from the top of the quarry (70 meters), as happened
every day.
M. DUBOST: We can proceed to the next picture.
BOIX: This was taken in April 1941. My Spanish comrades who had sought
refuge in France are pulling a wagon loaded with earth. That was the
work we had to do.
M. DUBOST: By whom was this picture taken?
BOIX: At that time by Paul Bicken a professor from Essen.
M. DUBOST: We may proceed to the next one.
BOIX: This staged the scene of an Austrian who had escaped. He was a
carpenter in the garage and he managed to make a box, a box in which
he could hide and so get out of the camp. But after a while he was
recaptured. They put him on the wheelbarrow in which corpses were
carried to the crematorium. There were some placards saying in German,
"Alle Vogel sind schon da," meaning "All the birds are back again." He
was sentenced and then paraded in front of 10,000 deportees to the
music of a gypsy band playing a song "J'attendrai." When he was
hanged, his body swung to and fro in the wind while they played the
very well known song, "Bill Black Polka."
264
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: The next one.
BOIX: This is the scene; in this picture we see on the right and left
all the deportees in a row; on the left are the Spaniards, they are
smaller. The man in the front with the beret, is a criminal from
Berlin by the name of Schultz, who was employed on these occasions. In
the background you can see the man who is about to be hanged.
M. DUBOST: Next one. Who took these pictures?
BOIX: By the SS OberscharFuehrer Fritz Kornatz. He was killed by
American troops in Holland in 1944. This man, a Russian prisoner of
war, got a bullet in the head. They hanged him to make us think he was
a suicide and had tried to hurl himself against the barbed wire.
The other picture shows some Dutch Jews. That was taken at Barracks C,
the so-called quarantine barracks. The Jews were driven to hurl
themselves against the barbed wire on the very day of their arrival
because they realized that there was no hope to escape for them.
M. DUBOST: By whom were these pictures taken?
BOIX: At this time by the SS OberscharFuehrer Paul Ricken, a professor
from Essen.
M. DUBOST: Next one.
BOIX: These are 2 Dutch Jews. You can see, the red star they wore.
That was an alleged attempt to escape (Fluchtversuch).
M. DUBOST: What, was it in reality?
BOIX: The SS sent them to pick up stones near the barbed wires, and
the SS guards at the second barbed wire fence fired on them, because
they received a reward for every man they shot down.
The other picture shows a Jew in 1941 during the construction of the
so-called Russian camp, which later became the sanitary camp, hanged
with the cord which he used to keep up his trousers.
M. DUBOST: Was it suicide?
BOIX: It was alleged to be. It was a man who no longer had any hope of
escape. He was driven to desperation by forced labor and torture.
M. DUBOST: What is this picture?
BOIX: A Jew whose nationality I do not know. He was put in a barrel of
water until he could not stand it any longer. He was beaten to the
point of death and then given 10 minutes in which to hang himself. He
used his own belt to do it, for he knew what would happen to him
otherwise.
265
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: Who took that picture?
BOIX: The SS OberscharFuehrer Paul Ricken.
M. DUBOST: And what is this picture?
BOIX: Here you see the Viennese police visiting the quarry. This was
in June or July 1941. The two deportees whom you see here are two of
my Spanish comrades.
M. DUBOST: What are they doing?
BOIX: They are showing the police how they had to raise the stones,
because there were no other appliances for doing so.
M. DUBOST: Did you know any of the policemen who came?
BOIX: No, because they came only once. We had just time to have a look
at them.
The date of this picture is September 1943, on the birthday of
ObersturmbannFuehrer Franz Ziereis. He is surrounded by the whole
staff of Mauthausen Camp. I can give you the names of all the people
in the picture.
M. DUBOST: Pass the next photo.
BOIX: This is a picture taken on the same day as ObersturmbanniFuehrer
Franz Ziereis's birthday. The other man was his adjutant. I forgot his
name. It must be remembered that this adjutant was a member of the
Wehrmacht and put on an SS uniform as soon as he came to the camp.
M. DUBOST: Who is that?
BOIX: That is the same visit to Mauthausen by police officials in June
or July 1941. This is the kitchen door. The prisoners standing there
had been sent to the disciplinary company. They used that little
appliance on their backs for carrying stones up to a weight of 80
kilos, until they were exhausted. Very few men ever came back from the
disciplinary company.
This picture shows Himmler's visit to the Fuehrerheim. at Camp
Mauthausen in April 1941. It shows Himmler with the Governor of Linz
in the background and OBERSTURMBANNFuehrer Ziereis, the commanding
officer of Camp Mauthausen, on his left.
This picture was taken in the quarry. In the rear, to the left, you
see a group of deportees at work. In the foreground are Franz Ziereis,
Himmler, and ObergruppenFuehrer Kaltenbrunner. He is wearing the gold
Party emblem.
M. DUBOST: This picture was taken in the quarry? By whom?
BOIX: By the SS OberscharFuehrer Paul Ricken. This was between April
and May 1941. This gentleman frequently visited the camp at that
period to see how similar camps could be organized throughout Germany
and in the occupied countries.
266
28 Jan. 46
M. DUBOST: I have finished. You give us your assurance that it is
really Kaltenbrunner.
BOIX: I give you my assurance.
M. DUBOST: And that this picture was taken in the camp?
BOIX: I give you my assurance.
M. DUBOST: Were you taken to Mauthausen as a prisoner of war or as a
political prisoner?
BOIX: As a prisoner of war.
M. DUBOST: You had fought as a volunteer in the French Army?
BOIX: Either in infantry battalions or in the Foreign Legion, or in
the pioneer regiments attached to the Army to which I belonged. I was
in the Vosges with the 5th Army. We were taken prisoners. We retreated
as far as Belfort where I was taken prisoner in the night of 20-21
June 1940. 1 was put with some fellow Spaniards and transferred to
Mulhouse. Knowing us to be former Spanish Republicans and
anti-fascists, they put us in among the Jews as members of a lower
order of humanity (Untermensch). We were prisoners of war for 6 months
and then we learned that the Minister for Foreign Affairs had had an
interview with Hitler to discuss the question of foreigners and other
matters. We knew that our status had been among the questions raised.
We heard that the Germans had asked what was to be done with Spanish
prisoners of war who had served in the French Army, those of them who
were Republicans and ex-members of the Republican Army. The answer...
M. DUBOST: Never mind that. So although you were a prisoner of war you
were sent to a camp not under Army control?
BOIX: Exactly. We were prisoners of war. We were told that we were
being transferred to a subordinate Kommando, like all the other
Frenchmen. Then we were transferred to Mauthausen where, for the first
time, we saw that there were no Wehrmacht soldiers and we realized
that we were in an extermination camp.
M. DUBOST: How many of you arrived there?
BOIX: At the end we were 1,500; altogether 8,000 Spaniards at the time
of our arrival.
M. DUBOST: How many of you were liberated?
BOIX: Approximately 1,600.
M. DUBOST: I have no more questions to ask.
THE PRESIDENT: Do you want to ask any questions?
GEN. RUDENKO: I shall have some questions. If the President will
permit me I shall present them in tomorrow's session.
THE PRESIDENT: We will adjourn now.
[The Tribunal adjourned until 29 January 1946 at 1000 hours.]
267 Nuremberg Trials Vol. 6
An Electronic Publication of the Avalon Project - Copyright 1999 The
Avalon Project
'
'
Tom
"Koos Nolst Trenite" <Ambassador...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:1181400394.5...@p47g2000hsd.googlegroups.com...
How Do You Face Evil?
"Dire creatures from the Netherhells shoud always be faced directly, unless
it is possible to face them some other way, say from behind a bush, in
perfect safety." -- The Teachings of Ebenezum (Craig Gardner Shaw)
Robin
with this small 5 yr old in the situation you suggest, I would not try
to make sense out of the senseless.
I would merely take her in my arms and give her comfort, maybe express
my empathy by kooing gently in her ear, words of love and perhaps a
cool story to help her escape for a few moments into her child's
imagination.
Just because I know the metaphysical meaning of a situation, that does
not mean it is appropriate or even helpful to spout it.
You can't take a situation of extreme suffering and try to teach, tell
or even defend and hope to be anything more than a part of the
problem.
Robin
Koos Nolst Trenite
this?
'One night we were awakened by terrifying cries. And we discovered, on
the following day, from the men working in the Sonderkommando - the
"Gas Kommando" - that on the preceding day, the gas supply having run
out, they had thrown the children into the furnaces alive.'
(Excerpt of 29 Jan 1946 morning testimony,
Nuremberg)
Robin
the meaninglessness of what you are describing and at the same time
the great need for compassionate action towards the apparent victims
on BOTH sides.
However what you describe cannot happen to a realized Christ...
Robin
On Jun 9, 4:51 pm, Koos Nolst Trenite
> > Robin- Hide quoted text -
>
> - Show quoted text -
Leonardo Been
5 February 2003
{HRI 20030205-V2.3.3}
(Version 2.3.3
on 13 May 2007)
'
The definition of Insane:
Assigning the wrong causes to things.
'
And from this - from assigning the wrong causes to things - irrational
behavior results,
which we experience as being Insane, and we experience that
usually regarding some activity, or on some subject, or in and
regarding certain circumstances.
And indeed, if you find the right causes, and act on
those,
then it stops being Insane,
the activity or subject or reaction to circumstances
stops being Insane,
and happiness returns, on all faces
- on all faces that want fast and lasting remedies
and progress for all.
'
'
The definition covers the whole scale,
from mildly Insane on a few subjects - as also the wisest
amongst us are -
to crippling-ly Insane on one subject, or maybe on many
subjects,
and very much further down,
down to THE INTENTION AND PRACTICE OF WANTING TO MAKE AND TO KEEP
OTHERS INSANE ON AS MANY SUBJECTS AS POSSIBLE,
by assigning wrong causes, and further down to a level where
inflicting insanity is done
by ENFORCING THE INABILITY TO PERCEIVE OR DETERMINE THE RIGHT CAUSES
which - ultimately and very simply and very
practically - means:
Destroying your ability to perceive the soul of
another, or even
denying its (a person's) existence altogether.
'
They are destroying that natural ability
- the most vital of all abilities to have on
Earth, no doubt, *(4)
a natural ability that all normal, loving
people still can exert to a greater or
lesser extent -
to feel others, because WITHOUT that ability, you can not
anymore detect or FEEL, at all,
whether someone is a friend or foe - or - has turned
into being a foe temporarily. *(1)(2)
'
Instead of feeling and perceiving what IS going on - and
thus getting an idea of what IS true -
you can then be manipulated by others who give you
censored or manipulated data
(as any dominating or dictatorial person tries to do
to you and to everyone)
and you can then be manipulated even to such
an extent, that you REFUSE to believe what is
actually going on,
because now you can not FEEL that anymore, what
does exist,
and then you can not FEEL anymore, what is
really intended, and what is hidden
about things, about people, about their
intentions and activities - about life
itself -
that you have the normal, natural and VITAL ability
to feel quite something of. *(3)
It is the main ability of any
manager, or of any leader,
towards his group and its
activity.
'
You FEEL what is going on in other people, and you are appreciated
as a senior or leader, to the extent that you can do so and are
also doing so
- which is ENTIRELY AND ONLY a matter of feeling the soul of
others.
'
But your children are taught in school, that "souls do not
exist," that "people are their brain"
- so (suppose children believe and act upon that
very false "data" provided to them, and suppose
they accept that belief, in the data demanded by
Criminal Minds at examinations) suppose they
believe such ""scientific"" lies -
then they can not recognize those who intend to harm,
let alone could they recognize it, when they are
being targeted by sadists, rapists or even potential
murderers, by serial killers, by drug pushers and
the like,
who go at it expertly and with the preparation and
deception required to succeed, not being recognized
until AFTER such deeds have been initiated or even
completed with irreversible effects - on your children.
'
Apart from the fact, that you considerably do diminish a
person's ability to enjoy life when you get him or her to
believe such lies "about himself or herself,"
those dangers are the - I would say rather telling -
"side-effects" of demanding of children to DENY, that
people ARE souls that you CAN and DO feel.
How do you think they recognize you from a distance?
From your answer, you can judge how Insane you
yourself have been made, and have agreed to be, on
this subject.
'
OF COURSE Criminal Minds do not want that you look
at their soul:
In fact, it is a common tool of police people, that
they use, to select suspects:
Who avoids having his soul (his personality, his
intentions) looked at - is suspect. *(a)
Now, do you still want to give me a big mouth about
your medical ""sciences""? *(3)
(see References)
'
'
'
The definition of Humor is related to the definition of Insane.
To put it all in one, 'academic' sentence:
'According to the intention with which others recognize
such Insanities - or fail to recognize these - there is
humor and the various types and flavors of humor.'
'
But of course, coming from Criminal Minds, you have also
Insane and ugly "humor"
- Criminal Minds have everything in reverse,
remember? -
"humor" from those individuals who try to make "fun" of
the correct assignment of causes
who do so in order to have these correct assignments
of the cause
(of, for instance themselves being detected as
the cause)
not accepted as true and correct, but rejected:
They try to have (their) Ugliness accepted as
"Beautiful," or as "Art," and
they want to have (your) true Beauty - your
desire (and hard work, that you do) to enjoy
people and to make life happy for others -
they want THAT seen as "pretense," as "your
making others small by you being big," and as
"done by you just to attract admiration"
- they are describing in fact THEIR OWN,
THEIR hidden intentions toward people,
and they "project," what is wrong with
themselves, onto others, onto you.
Indeed, Criminal Minds have everything in
reverse.
THEY give to charity, for example,
in order to hide their own evil,
in order to be regarded - if only
by themselves - as "being good."
So if YOU help people, then "you
are like them," then "you ALSO do
that merely 'for yourself' and
ALSO 'to hide own evil'."
They can not feel the joy of
people helping each other,
nor people's joy of being
Beautiful for each other -
well, they can feel
it, but as a "threat,"
as something that
"must be destroyed,"
stopped, or "made to
be seen as 'sinful'."
'
'
I will talk a little bit more about the connection to Humor:
It is hilarious to assign very obviously the wrong causes to
things - and to go about it very seriously, as if you really do
not know better at all.
It is so popular with people, because it matches reality - it
matches the world we live in,
immersed as we are, in all kind of Insanities,
immersed in the continuous assignment of wrong causes to
the things that are happening to us or that are happening
to others in the world.
'
'
All comedies and funny acts, all comedians, all clowns, are about this
- assigning the wrong causes, or acting with very wrong
importances which result from assigning wrong causes -
and when you 'play as if those wrong causes "are right
and important"'
- while your public knows, or suspects, or will
find out it isn't at all -
and if you are being very serious about it,
then you have people roaring with laughter in no time!
Actually, you are making them saner. *(b)
'
Koos Nolst Trenite "Cause Trinity"
human rights philosopher and poet
'God gave Solomon wisdom
and very great insight,
and a breadth of understanding
as measureless as the sand on the seashore.'
1 Kings 4:29
________
Textnote:
(a) That applies to the smaller Criminals - the really big ones can
and do hide their soul so well, that you can not actually see its
horrible condition very easily, or not at all,
and they do not look away from your gaze, but instead, they try
(and succeed by means of the mask they create for others to feel
or "see," and with the various other intentions they project,
they manage) to make you and to keep you blind spiritually
- as you know for instance about medical "doctor" Mengele,
about "father" Stalin, about "people-lover" Castro,
about "the great leader" Mao Zedong, or "leader" Pol
Pot, about "socialist" Chavez and the like,
who make it impossible for people near them, to see
their soul
(ask their secretaries or those who "love" them).
'
(b) You might even get well-paid, and highly appreciated, and famous,
by doing so.
'
_________
Footnotes:
(1) 'The Nature of War'
{HRI 20051027-V1.8.1}
(27 Oct 2005 - Version 1.8.1 on 4 May 2007)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.military/msg/71ca92e9e9d5e495
(2) 'Defining 'Destructive Coward' (Definition)'
{HRI 20050610-V3.1.0.1}
(10 June 2005 - Version 3.1 on 29 Jan 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.politics/msg/bbdbbae16d5d9073
(3)' "Insane" "Defined" By Criminal Minds As 'Ability To Perceive
Them' '
{HRI 20040422-V2.7.1}
(22 April 2004 - Version 2.7 on 22 July 2006 -> V 2.7.1)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.religion/msg/54232e64adb8ca83
(4) 'Definition Of Sanity'
{HRI 20040410-V2.0}
(10 April 2004 - Version 2.0 on 11 May 2007)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.military/msg/9aebbf1c46bc4382
'
__________
References:
[Check for newer and for update HRI's]
'Definition Of Schizophrenic
{HRI 20021125-V1.1}
(25 November 2002 - Version 1.1 on 19 July 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.mexican/msg/fb76c88f565e0a7d
'Criminal Minds prevent you from knowing The Nature of War'
- Quote from {HRI 20051027-V1.6} 'The Nature Of War'
(7 April 2006 quote of 7 November 2005 version)
http://groups.google.com/group/misc.education/msg/8a17c8d2fd51ee58
'Detecting Criminal Minds By Their Intentional Omission Of Vital
Truth' {HRI 20020819-V2.2.3}
(19 August 2002 - Version 2.2.3 on 12 May 2005)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.russian/msg/907447eab9a5f099
'The First International Law'
{HRI 20021124-V2.0}
(24 November 2002 - Version 2.0 on 23 Sept 2003)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.europe/msg/e6fd1197b1678b70
'
'Issue Note V3.0 on 'The Hippocrates Syndrome - Current State of
Mental Health Care And Understanding - Consequences For
Decision Makers, Caretakers And Caregivers' '
(27 September 2005)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/7e28b77daa515f63
'Are ALL Licensed Medical Doctors Criminal? No!'
(13 February 2006) (Quote from HRI 20021209-V3.1)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.anthropology/msg/ec75ccee2e34a304
'Medical Doctors Can Seriously Damage Your Health'
(15 February 2006) (Quote from HRI 20021209-V3.1)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.anthropology/msg/c88214dabda6d7fe
'Stay Away From Medical Doctors ...UNLESS You Know About Them'
(16 February 2006) (Quote from HRI 20021209-V3.1)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.anthropology/msg/3f49b295e2c0f50f
'The Licensed Medical Doctors ARE The Dangerous Quacks,
and Charlatans All'
(17 February 2006) (Quote from HRI 20021209-V3.1)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.anthropology/msg/019140cb8089d6c2
'A Bottomless Money Drain: The Licensed Medical Trade - Medical
Research, Charities, Foundations, Universities And Hospitals
CONTEMPT Of Your Suffering And Of Mankind'
(13 February 2006 - Version 1.0.1 on 20 Feb 2006)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.anthropology/msg/25fb3378ca8ce9dc
'Current State of Mental Health Care And Understanding
- Consequences For Decision Makers, Caretakers And Caregivers'
{HRI 20021209-V3.1} - (9 Dec 2002 - Version 3.1 on 27 Sept 2005)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/98b407408d4daf50
(full text:)
http://groups.google.com/group/sci.med/msg/98b407408d4daf50?dmode=source
'
'If You Want Peace, Then Do Understand And Face Evil
- A Short Course In Human Rights Philosophy' {HRI 20041225-
V1.02}
(25 December 2004 - Christmas Day)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.rights.human/msg/34578c4c3a9f0b22
'Defining Love And Hate - A Law Of Life'
(29 July 2002 - Version 2.0i on 7 January 2003)
http://groups.google.com/group/Koos-Nolst-Trenite/msg/40d2a6d4cadc84b1
'Living In The Present - Definition' {HRI 20030102} (2 Jan 2003)
http://groups.google.com/group/alt.philosophy/msg/79b86c004f4c16ad
'Tolerance Defined In Holland (The Netherlands)' (25 Dec 2002)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.rights.human/msg/17a80804e05335e0
'The Mafia Code Against Mankind' {HRI 20021018-V2.0}
(18 October 2002 - V2.0 on 10 October 2003)
http://groups.google.com/group/soc.culture.europe/msg/4ff16a259b5da25a
'Your Spark Of Life Into The Darkness' (on Christmas Day 2002)
http://groups.google.com/group/rec.arts.fine/msg/bd59513e0a51c569
'
____________
Verification:
http://www.angelfire.com/space/platoworld
Copyright 2003-2007 by Koos Nolst Trenite - human rights philosopher