Albert Speer

“ For this reason, Speer believed that the extended theoretical preparation of German armaments had been mainly responsible for their low level of production until after 1942 when he had restored the principle of individual initiative by [Pg 236] putting war production back into the hands of private industry. Within a year he had completed an organization of completely new leading personalities to restore the autonomy of industry and preserve its unity even in the most trying times. ”

“ In mitigation it must be recognized that Speer’s establishment of blocked industries did keep many laborers in their homes and that in the closing stages of the war he was one of the few men who had the courage to tell Hitler that the war was lost and to take steps to prevent the senseless destruction of production facilities, both in occupied territories and in Germany. He carried out his opposition to Hitler’s scorched earth program in some of the Western countries and in Germany by deliberately sabotaging it at considerable personal risk. ”

“ Speer convinced Hitler that significant production could be obtained only if the concentration camp prisoners were employed in factories under the technical control of the Speer Ministry instead of the control in the camps. In fact, without Defendant Speer’s cooperation, we say it would have been most difficult to utilize the prisoners on any large scale for war production, since he would not allocate to Himmler the machine tools and other necessary equipment. Accordingly, it was agreed that the prisoners were to be exploited in factories under the Defendant Speer’s control. ”

“ I should further like to submit Document Number Speer-43 which is a memorandum from Speer to Hitler, dated 20 September 1944. Mr. President, this may be found on Page 6 of the English text, Page 3 of the French and Russian texts. From this document you can see that Speer was considered hostile to the Party (“parteifremd” and “parteifeindlich”) by Bormann and Goebbels because of his circle of collaborators. Speer writes in his memorandum, and I quote:
“The task which I have to fulfill is a nonpolitical one. ”

“ Up to then all the agencies in France had in general held the opinion: it has not been decided yet by any means, Sauckel’s figures are not correct, so we have to take it easy here. And that penetrated naturally down to the lower ranks of French authorities too.
Milch: That is just what I mean about the differences of opinion between you and Minister Speer. You say: The best thing for me is to approach the protected industries; Speer says: Leave those people alone, take 80 percent away from the others. ”

“ Report of the chief of the department on the conference on the 23d of March with Milch, Witzell, Leeb, in Minister Speer’s office. The Führer looks upon Speer as his principal mouthpiece, his trusted adviser in all economic spheres. Speer is the only one who has something to say today. He can interfere in any department. ”

“ There is no alternative.”
This opinion and project of Speer, namely, to exploit ruthlessly the labor reserve within Germany, was not realized until the summer of 1944. And this was a subject for argument between Speer on one side, and Sauckel and the Gauleiter on the other. The testimony of the witnesses in the questionnaires will deal with it. To assist the Tribunal I should like to state that with Schieber, it is the answer to Question 22; with Rohland, it is the answer to 1 and 4; with Kehrl, it is answer Number 9; and in the case of Schmelter it is Questions 13 and 16. ”

“ Only such prisoners who in the interest of investigation procedures are to remain absolutely in solitary confinement can be left there.
“Every single laborer counts!” (1063-D-PS)
Measures were also adopted to insure that extermination through work was practiced with maximum efficiency. Subsidiary concentration camps were established near important war plants. Speer has admitted that he personally toured Upper Austria and selected sites for concentration camps near various munitions factories in the area. ”

“ The fact was that Hitler tried to use this defeat for the extermination of the German people, as Speer has now horribly confirmed and as I was able to observe during the last phase of the conflict in Berlin when, through deceit by raising false hopes, boys of 15, 14, 13, and 12 years of age were equipped with small arms to fight against tanks and called into battle, boys who otherwise might have been the hope for future reconstruction. Hitler found escape in death, leaving behind him the order to keep on fighting. ”

“ A daily conference was held among the different offices where it was decided how many workers were needed for the individual industries. It did not occur that when a factory asked for a certain amount of men, it was like that: Speer said this factory has to be supplied with so and so many workers. ”

“ War Crimes and Crimes against Humanity
The evidence introduced against Speer under Counts Three and Pour relates entirely to his participation in the slave labor program. Speer himself had no direct administrative responsibility for this program. Although he had advocated the appointment of a General Plenipotentiary for the Utilization of Labor because he wanted one central authority with whom he could deal on labor matters, he did not obtain administrative control over Sauckel. ”

“ In practice it came to this that if a factory actually didn’t need any workers but Speer demanded them for that factory I had to supply these workers without being able to discuss or to tell him that it would be a waste of manpower ”

“ In my opinion the Messerschmitt, but I must be careful in what I say here, because in the last week before the collapse there were negotiations with the armament staff. I cannot remember what that situation was in Kaufering, but in Muehldorf there was constant talk of putting Buna in there. That changed continuously, dependent on the war situation. Once Speer wanted to set up a steel foundry in the fighter factory in the Rhineland, which was later changed. ”

“ Employees of these industries were immune from deportation to Germany as slave laborers and any worker who had been ordered to go to Germany could avoid deportation if he went to work for a blocked industry. This system, although somewhat less inhumane than deportation to Germany, was still illegal. The system of blocked industries played only a small part in the over-all slave labor program, although Speer urged its cooperation with the slave labor program, knowing the way in which it was actually being administered. ”

“ There is nothing to be said against SS and Police taking drastic steps and putting those known as slackers into concentration camps. There is no alternative. Let it happen several times and the news will soon go round.” (R-124)
Speer is also guilty of compelling Allied nationals and prisoners of war to engage not only in the production of armaments and munitions, but also in direct military operations, against their own country and its actively resisting allies. ”

“ Speer proposed measures for the exploitation of the concentration camp labor in armament factories under his jurisdiction. At a meeting with Hitler Speer proposed and Hitler agreed that armament production should not be established within concentration camps but that concentration camp labor should be made available to established armament factories. ”

“ Witness, do you believe that this intention of the plotters of the 20th of July was due to the fact that the Defendant Speer, in view of his activities, was considered not only in these circles but even elsewhere merely as an expert and not as a politician?
OHLENDORF: The question is very hard to answer. It is very difficult not to be considered a politician if one has been so closely connected with those authorities of the Reich who made the final political decisions and has perhaps been an essential contributor to the suggestions and proposals from which the decisions evolved. ”

“ Speer had realized immediately what great fundamental errors had been committed and how small armament output had remained prior to his taking over. The Reichswehr had dealt with armament problems theoretically and industry generally had had no great inclination to participate in preparatory work. The government organizations had become so large that they had managed only to keep each other busy; they committed what might be called mental incest and paved the way for all the mistakes that had later kept armament production at a surprisingly low level. ”

“ The competent gentlemen from Speer’s Ministry also attended. Speer had a labor mobilization department where the requirements of industry were collected and confirmed.
4. Milch produced the figures for aviation. The same was done by Speer in his sphere of activity. Speer and Milch, however, also exerted influence on the allocation of workers. How far this came within their capacity as members of the Central Planning Board I cannot say; in any case they did this in their ministerial capacity. ”

“ DR. FLÄCHSNER: In this connection, I submit a memorandum which Hitler received from Speer on 11 December 1944, as Exhibit Speer-20. Mr. President, you will find an extract on Page 64 of the English document book, Page 61 of the German and French books. It states, and I quote:
“In view of the whole structure of the Reich economy, it is obvious that the loss of the Rhenish-Westphalian industrial area will in the long run spell ruin for the whole German economy and the further successful prosecution of the war. ”

“ Speer told me that it was urgent that I should assume...”
THE PRESIDENT: Could you move those papers away from the light; you cannot see the light which is constantly going on.
M. HERZOG: “...Speer told me that it was urgent that I should assume new functions in connection with the question of labor. A few days later he asked me to go with him to general headquarters, and I was introduced to the Führer who told me that I must accept this new appointment without fail.” ”

“ Please do not touch my 20 percent; there are enough among the 80 percent for your use. And now I say: Why do you not take the others? Is it so difficult to approach them?
Sauckel: No. I need the people as well. The fact is that Speer’s plants are filling up nowadays. For instance, I received the information the day before yesterday that the urge to work for the protected industries is especially strong in France just now and so the supply of skilled workers to Germany is practically cut off. ”

“ A man who, as the prosecution means, is keen on slave labor does not act in that way.
Finally, there is another point to be mentioned in this connection. The International Military Tribunal—which, by the way, states expressly in its verdict against Sauckel that there is no doubt of Sauckel having had the over-all responsibility for the slave labor program—that Tribunal stated in its verdict against Speer that it has to be considered as a mitigating circumstance in his favor, that by setting up protected factories Speer had kept many workers in their homelands. ”

“ On 4 January 1943, at 8 o’clock in the evening, Minister Speer telephoned from the general headquarters of the Führer giving the information that, by virtue of a decision of the Führer, it was no longer necessary, when recruiting skilled and unskilled labor in France, to have any particular regard for the French. ”

“ Again and again manpower for German economy was demanded of him. But, particularly after I had turned over the entire civil production to Speer and engaged in central planning, it was not only not to my advantage, from the point of view of my work, that manpower was brought to Germany from abroad, but it was indeed in my interest that the workers should remain in the occupied territories since the production of consumer goods had been transferred to a large degree to these territories ”

“ In the summer of 1937 when Schacht came to the Berghof...”
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: [Interposing.] Speer is present in the room. For one defendant to testify as to a conversation with another defendant is a very convenient way of getting testimony without access to cross-examination, but it seems to me that it is a highly objectionable method. I object to this on the ground that it has no probative value to testify to a conversation of this character when the Defendant Speer is in the courtroom and can be sworn and can give his testimony. He sits here and is available. ”

“ Speer, Mr. President, first took part in working out the program of forced labor and collaborated in its adoption. In the course of his interrogatory, he stated under oath: First, that he took part in the discussion at which the decision to use forced labor was made; second, that he collaborated in the execution of this plan; third, that the basis of this program was the removal to Germany by force of foreign workers on the authority of Sauckel, Plenipotentiary for Allocation of Labor under the Four Year Plan. ”

“ The number of Russians living within the Reich is small.
Rohland: In the mines one should exclusively use eastern people, not western ones.
Speer: The western men collapse!
Speer: In any case we ought to force the coal production with all our power. I now have here a statement on the distribution of the Soviet prisoners. There are 368,000 altogether. Of these are: 101,000 in agriculture; 94,000 in the mining industry—who are not available in any case; 15,000 in the building materials industry; 26,000 in iron and metal production where they cannot be extracted either ”