Nuremberg Trial (Court TV, part 5)

[Music] coming up one night we were awakened by terrifying cries and we discovered on the following day from the men working in the Sonderkommando the gas commando that on the previous day the gas supply had run out and they had thrown the children into the furnaces alive a prisoner offers horrific testimony about life and death in the German concentration camps plus chairman Goering defense Hitler and his regime this German Revolution of freedom is the least bloody and the most disciplined of all revolutions known to history then the most equally anticipated examination of the tribe US prosecutor Robert Jackson questions Goering about the tools of Nazism concentration camps was one of the things you found immediately necessary upon coming to power [Music] [Music] welcome back to court TV I'm Fred Graham the real trial of the century began a half century ago in Nuremberg Germany when 22 of the highest-ranking surviving Nazi leaders were brought to trial this week court TV is presenting the trial for the first time in an extended forum on television on Monday and Tuesday we presented excerpts from the opening statements and from the prosecution's filmed evidence of concentration camp atrocities and Nazi Germany's war of aggression against its neighbors now this evening over the next three hours we'll see examples of some of the eyewitness testimony against the Nazis the story of atrocities witnessed by a prisoner in one of Hitler's concentration camps then we're going to move on to one of the dramatic and fascinating highlights of the trial the effort by Hermann Goering to turn his testimony into a monument to the Nazi Krieg will also show how the chief American prosecutor Associates Supreme Court Justice Robert Jackson faltered in his attempt to puncture Goering pronouncement through cross-examination as we approach the point in the trial when the Nazis were expected to state their defense the obvious question is how can there be a justification for the evil that they brought upon the World Court TVs Ricky Kleeman takes a look at the men who perpetrated that evil at times they look puzzled even confused as they sat in the left front area of the courtroom known as the doc with military police standing guard behind them and the bright lights for the film cameras shining into their eyes the Nuremberg defendants look too insignificant to have committed the crimes for which they were on trial yes they were some of Germany's top Nazi leaders but what were their jobs under Adolf Hitler national guard rises again on a strong foundation the national socialistic ideology some of the defendants like the rotund hermann goering and the intense rudolf hess were especially familiar to the public at large thanks to Hitler's propaganda machine and the International newsreels of the time hearing was the commander in chief of the Luftwaffe Germany's Air Force and chief of war economy until he changed his mind at the end of his reign Hitler proclaimed Goering as his successor as the deputy to Hitler for Nazi Party Mathers had been the third ranking Nazi in Germany one of a handful of old party fighters has flew to Scotland in 1941 with a secret handwritten peace proposal for the British when he learned of his his flight Hitler denounced his old friend as having a mental disorder has spent the war in a British jail another defendant the polished Albert Speer was viewed by some as Hitler's most trusted confidant the men shared a love of art and both viewed themselves as creative spirits Speer first served as the purest chief architect and then headed up German munitions production during the war to produce those weapons Speer needed workers to get them he turned to defendant fritz alkyl the Nazi responsible for slave labor during the war South Col often said he just rounded up the workers and was not responsible for their treatment the scar faced and menacing Ernst Kaltenbrunner was accused of implementing the Jewish death campaign as head of the Gestapo an overseer of the concentration camps Kaltenbrunner a lawyer was said to have bragged about his quota to kill a thousand Jews a day among Hitler's top military men indicted at Nuremberg Karl dönitz commander of the German Navy and successor to Hitler will hem keidel head of the German High Command who signed Germany's surrender in 1945 and Alfred Jodl operations chief of the jury armed forces not all of the defendants gave orders as speeches some were instrumental in raising money for the Hitler reign banker homer horace greeley shocked spent his youth in america with german immigrant parents after the family moved back to germany shocked became president of the rice bank Germany State Bank then Minister of the German economy shocked successor at the rush Bank Walther funk was also in the dock Frank was accused of knowing the source of Nazi loot including heaps of jewelry and gold teeth that had been recovered from the vaults of the rice bunk it was a horrifying treasure trove from the Jewish concentration camps that would hover over film and the rest of the men on trial at Nuremberg how much each man knew about the killings of millions of military and civilian prisoners would become the question that haunted the trial our guest commentator for this occasion is a particularly appropriate one and perhaps for reasons that you don't fully know he is renowned criminal defense attorney F lee Bailey most recently renowned for his role on the defense team in the OJ Simpson case but you may not know that Lee Bailey was an attorney in a sort of an American version perhaps of a war crime Lee you defended captain Ernest Medina US Army captain it was accused of a sort of a war crime growing out of the malai massacre back in 1967 you won that case yes now is there anything in your experience there you want if the jury was out six minutes jury reached a decision in six minutes and later reported they thought they should stay out fifty minutes or would look good all right now were there any lessons from your experience there that you think if the German defense attorneys at Nuremberg had had the benefit of might have helped not really because the defense that we used in Medina is the one that was used by the German lawyers in Nuremberg upon which some of them prevailed when the tribunal believed that one of the defendants didn't know what was going on with reference to one of the four counts they acquitted now captain Medina was somewhere near where the massacre took place involving his men you were able to show he didn't know now in the Nazi case those defense lawyers had a tougher Road a hoe didn't they because the prosecution is able to show evidence who will see some tonight of plans by the Germans and talk by the Germans about things they were going to do particularly with regard to elimination of the Jews and I think they were just able to show look if you didn't absolutely know this was going on you should have known oh they had a much tougher role to hold than I did because this was a single incident it was the product of an intelligence gaffe all these soldiers were told they're going to be shot at there wouldn't be any women and children and when they saw women and children they didn't see them I guess because they just started firing and it was butchery but at least it wasn't a situation where was happening day after day after day and you couldn't wear a uniform without Noah was going on now there's another particularly appropriate reason why your experience is going to be relevant here it has to do with your particular expertise in cross-examination which was not that evident in some of the cross-examination were going to see but that's a little later on for right now we won't let you know that we will be re airing our complete coverage of the Nuremberg trial during this weekend November the 18th and the 19th but as for now when we return from this commercial break the prosecution calls to the stand a victim of a Nazi concentration camp [Music] no good idea in my opinion us vixens what kind of justice should have done because they will always exaggerate that opinion by Otto Krantz Bueller a Nazi defense counsel at Nuremberg poses the classic objection to testimony by victims in criminal cases now the other side of the argument is that who more than a victim knows the evil that was done one such victim who knew the evils of the ostritz concentration camp was Madame valya cuckoo yay she'd been sent to Auschwitz for the crime of being a journalist who wrote anti-fascist articles she begins her testimony by telling why she was sent to ostrich and what she saw when she arrived there they are 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's situated in the middle of a great plane which was frozen in January during this part of the journey we had to drag our luggage as we pass through the door we knew only too well how slender the 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 our heads were shaved and our registration numbers were tattooed on the left forum 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 of this took place in the presence of SS men and women we were then given clothing that was soiled and torn a cotton dress and jacket of the same material as all of this had taken several hours we saw from the windows of the block where we were the men's camp and toward the evening an orchestra came in it was snowing and we wondered why they were playing music then we 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 or by blows with the butt end of a rifle for more than three months we did not change 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 roadside and then wash our under clothes 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 herb tea twice a day please describe in detail one of the roles at the beginning of February there was what is called a general roll call in the morning at 3:30 awakened and sent out of the plane whereas normally the roll call was at 3:30 inside the camp we remained out in front of the camp until 5:00 in the afternoon in the snow without any food when all the internees were back in the camp got a party to which I belong to was organized to go and pick up the bodies of the dead that were scattered over the plain as a battlefield we carried the dead and dying to the yard of block 25 without distinction and they remained there stacked up in a pile block 25 which was the anteroom of the gas chamber if one may express itself 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 there were stacks of courtesans 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 through them 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 devastating testimony on dolly but was it unduly prejudicial and could it be connected in a meaningful way in an illegal way to the defendants in this case now Lee Bailey could you keep this out of an American trial oh no I don't think so this is proof that a crime occurred the next step is to prove that the defendants actually and it supported it somehow were responsible now look at the insistence of Justice Jackson and to a certain extent the English prosecutors the Russians and the French adopted pretty much the anglo-american adversary system here but there were some signs that the German defense lawyers for the most part didn't know how to take advantage of that is it your impression that they that that Continental system really doesn't train them to do it that's true because they're not allowed to participate I've tried cases in Germany and in Switzerland in the French sector and the lawyers have a much more limited role the judge is the activist when it comes to examination and cross-examination they don't get any practice and I would assume that even if they had had a valid objection here based on let's see lack of foundation or whatever the objection might have been they might not have known exactly what to do about that well the rules at Nuremberg were kind of made up as they went along bear in mind the purpose of this was to punish the guilty but also to have a show and it was a very effective show to juxtapose the brutality of what the Nazis had done with the very ordered method in which they were punished for it so called due process and the witness that we're just seen here it may be that that's not all that germane to any of the 22 or propped it wasn't germane to clearly some of the 22 years but for there's this second purpose of making a point to the world pretty that it was and the tribunal as to many of the defendants was able to connect them up to this camp Auschwitz and others and show that they knew they approved they supported the idea of genocide was something that they thought was a good idea they didn't know these specifics at them they could have certainly assume that they would happen we're gonna take a break when we return this survivor of Auschwitz that we've just been hearing from tells how the Nazis made do when their gas chambers ran out of gas welcome back it was horrible enough that the Nazis planned and intended to kill certain types of people as part the Nazis beliefs but it came out at the Nuremberg trial that at Auschwitz terrible things were done to people including children they were not even part of the genocide plan we hear about it as Madame valiant couturier continues her testimony Vivi when we first arrived whenever a convoy of Jews came a selection was made first the old men and women then the mothers and children were put into trucks together with the sick or those whose health 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 1000 to 1500 seldom more than 250 and this figure really was the maximum actually reached the camp the rest were immediately sent to the gas stream at this election they also picked out women and good health between the ages of 20 and 30 who were sent to the experimental bloc 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 in the spring of 1944 there was also a special block for twins that was during the time when large convoys of Hungarian Jews arrived about 700,000 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 well you and I witness of the selections on the arrival of the convoys yes because when we worked at the sewing block in 1944 the block where we lived directly faced the place where the train stopped the system had been improved instead of making the selection at the place where they arrived a side line now tuck the trains practically right up to the gas chamber and the place where they stopped 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 and the soldiers letting men women and children out we then witnessed heart-rending scenes old couples forced apart 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 that awaited 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 and July of 44 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 gateun such as the merry widow the backer role from the tales of hoffmann and so on they were then informed that this was a labor camp one night we were awakened by terrifying cries and we discovered on the following day from the men working in the Sonderkommando the gas commando that on the previous day the gas supply had run out and they had thrown the children into the furnaces alive as the testimony continues we learned that there were differences between concentration camps in terms of their missions but not necessarily in their impact on the prisoners which was usually death in either event there were also executions in the camps the numbers were called at roll call in the morning and the victims then left for the commander and were never seen again a few days later the clothes were sent down to the effect incomer wear the clothes of the internees were kept after a certain time their cards would vanish from the filing cabinets in the camp the system of detention was the same as at Auschwitz no in Auschwitz obviously extermination was the sole aim and object nobody was at all interested in the work output we were beaten for no reason whatsoever it was sufficient to stand from morning till evening but whether we carried one brick or tent was of no importance at all possible - now after hearing this amount of detail today with the matter rather more generally and that there is some substantial difference between Reverend Brooke and I think there is a difference that 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 Robyn's Brooke they were interned in order to work and were weakened by work until they died of it the distinction between the two no doubt you will lead the witness I shall not fail to do so could you tell the tribunal in what condition the men's camp was found at the time of the liberation and how many survivals remained when the Germans went away they left two thousand six 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 were therefore able to go to the men's camp and there we found a perfectly indescribable sight they had been without water for five days there were eight hundred 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 before we proceed here we should explain something to you that may raise questions in your mind because you may see that this is being presented in sometimes in slightly different way than trials you see of Court TV this is the first time that the Nuremberg war crimes trial has ever been presented in the long form that we customarily used here on Court TV not soundbites however it was shot in film they didn't have videotape 50 years ago it was shot in sound bytes to be used in movie house newsreels that was the only way they showed such things in those days what court TV was able to do was to go back and find the portions that were on film and then pick up on the audio tape which has been preserved almost intact and when we reach the point of the audio tape we do something we normally don't do it court TV we just lay over that a wide shot sometimes a static shot and that's why you'll see some unusual shots for court TV what you do hear there though is the the pauses for the interpretation in two different languages from a question from the bench and so forth I want to ask me Bailey who's tried cases in Germany what does that do to you in trying a case makes it very difficult because frequently the German witness will understand English then he waits for the translation and thinks up an answer so you lose the speed of cross-examination you you had a problem with an interpreter once a German we did all our witnesses were American soldiers in a military court-martial over three homicides with one defendant and suddenly a German witness can understand and began to say horrible things about my client who looked very good up to that point it turned out he wasn't saying those things at all the interpreter hated Americans and he was making up this story and passing it on fortunately my co-counsel spoke fluent German and he picked up the fact that the jury was not getting it exactly the way it was being said by the witness they weren't getting it at all until this fellow was caught my new interpreter brought it do you have get the impression that jurors in this case of course the judges have a more difficult job of telling credibility who's lying when a person is speaking in a language they don't fathom at all I think in the timing and the tenor of responses it's very disabling I can't listen to a German witness and make the same judgments I could make an American or English I can understand that when we return from this commercial break the Soviets present evidence of systematic murder by the Nazis Court TV asked former US war crimes prosecutor Drexel Spector why the Soviets devoted so much attention to the Nuremberg trial I think they had a great interest a very genuine interest in having exposed what happened because after all they had lost more people than anybody else had lost due to the Nazi invasion and due to the occupation practices after that so I think he had a very good reason to want a very full exposition [Music] I think that you that the younger generation probably can't have that experience that sudden knowledge of something absolutely evil and unimaginable that was suddenly forced upon us has been happening next door to us in our in time one important result of the Nuremberg trial of course was that evidence of the Nazis atrocities was forced upon the world the Soviet prosecutors contributed to that process by showing a film of the Maidan that concentration camp where more than a million people perished now you should be warned that some of the scenes of this film presented by the Russians is quite graphic and certainly disturbing however Court TV concluded that it was crucial to the evidence presented in the trial and was central to the evidence presented by the Soviet Union so we have included it here but you should know that discretion is advised the Hitler executioner's did everything to cover the traces of their most terrible crimes in 1942 they began to burn the corpses of those they had murdered in specially built ovens the ovens were burning constantly reaching temperatures of 1500 degrees to burn many corpses at a time the limbs were cut off for corpses were burned at the same time in one oven each burning lasted for 15 minutes thus within 24 hours 1920 corpses were burned by working all available ovens continuously the penetrating smell of burned human flesh lingered continuously above the death camp pictures of victims who were burned in the ovens among the six hundred eight thousand people who were burned in Maidan ik there were also the Polish professors mikhailovich and Camille of scheming savage a member of the highest polish Court and many other well-known representatives of the European intellectual elite about Jesus Washington authorial the regular company designed and built this large crematorium here you can see their company sign aside from using the ovens corpses were also continuously burned in huge pyres about 700,000 were burned in the camp as well as in the nearby Grimm pet ski forest altogether 1 million 380,000 corpses were burned to ashes at this site the ashes and the charred human bones were mixed with manure and used as fertilizer for the vegetable gardens of the Gestapo camp 1350 cubic meters of this fertilizer were found all men Kakashi this cabbage was grown from human ashes the gruesome murders committed by the Nazi criminals are also proven by other evidence entire store houses were found filled with the victims possessions 820 thousand pairs of shoes were counted in one single pile alone in the vicinity of the crematorium Indonesian estimate Oh another of the Gestapo storage houses for clothing was located at Chopin Strasse in Lublin all property of the murdered was confiscated by the Hitler State [Music] on this I conclude with nostalgia even children's toys and dolls were appropriated by the executioner's all things were carefully sorted and packed to be sent to Germany ss group leader Vogel explained to the Commission in 1944 within a short period of time I myself got 18 wagons of these stolen goods ready to be transported to Germany everything was sent to the prison barely in plotzensee these are the passports of people who were murdered poles Russians Dutch French Czechs Serbs Norwegians Danish Greek Fontenot Homer French agricultural worker 20 years old you know churn are a Italian preschool teacher Petrus Joseph II Anson Dutch electrical engineer 20 years old Constantin XANA Coppola and sister Greek arena Eleonora Peters polish from the city of rag on 32 years old three inmates of my donek who escaped death by mere chance the French De Luca frente the Dutch Denon the Czech Tama check report on the executions the tortures the torments and the inhuman terror the polish soviet special commission for the investigation of the Nazi Horrors in Lublin came to the conclusion that the chief offenders to be charged with those abominations are the Hitler regime the main executioner Himmler and his executioner's assistants from the Security office of the SS from the district of Lublin they have come to your attention right there that the artistic and the technical quality of the film there is simply excellent well there's a reason for that it turned out that there were two young Polish filmmakers who were traveling with the Russian forces who were going back into Poland to retake it these had been young left wingers they'd been frozen out of the artistic Society in Poland prior to the war and so they came in of course on the winning side they then became some of the towering a filmmaker of post-war of course communist polling but in any event you can see that it gave an opportunity for them to get a start and it presented a very effective piece of evidence for the prosecution we are told that these films and the film shown by the American side on earlier in the in the case were the first time that film documentaries had been used in a trial I want to ask every Bailey 50 years ago many ways you still see something a lot like that in some trials now where do you see it going from here normally you don't get a chance to film a crime you may go back to the scene later on but recreations particularly computerized recreations becoming ever more popular and I think that they are going to become the standard down the road in other words when all the witnesses testimonies put together then the jury is giving a moving picture what happened bother you at all it seems to me that that could be so subjective and certainly prejudicially the way it's presented the way it's presented is this is an expert's opinion and instead of just listening to his words you're going to see it depicted but it is what no more than you value his opinion so so far in civil cases it has not seemed to be disruptive or produce antithetical results court TV showed a couple of years ago what we believed to be the first time a computer recreation had been used in a criminal case it was down in Florida where there was an allegation that hit-and-run driver had swerved over in bad weather gone right up on the curb and and just wiped out some kids who were playing there and the impression was that somehow seeing that a computer particularly people have such awe of computers that's maybe I'm old-fashioned seem to me that that was too powerful for a criminal case it could be but very frequently there are two versions and they both depict it and then the jury gets a chance to pick and I for one am suspicious of a jury's ability to paint a picture from words I'd rather show them the picture after we take a break now we're going to see how the prosecution presented evidence about one of the most infamous concentration camps of all Ashford's welcome back Soviet troops liberated the concentration camp at Auschwitz where four million people were put to death they later presented a film of Auschwitz as explicit evidence that the Nazis had committed war crimes now again you should be warned that some of this is very graphic and will be upsetting to you but it was a crucial point of the truck evidence in the trial and very important to the Russian prosecution in the case so discretion is advised [Music] I've been all over Europe people return to their homelands to their families and their personal fates to their private lives to their homes the Red Army has freed millions of people who were doomed to die and brought them back to the realm of the living what remained Buchenwald Belsen Dachau Maidana Corps Treblinka for more than five years Europe was one huge concentration camp the most terrible of all was outfits outfits is located near Krakow in Poland it was here that fascism created an experimental laboratory a death factory equipped with refined tools used on an enormous scale an entire industry of mass destruction created according to Hitler's ideas and his cannibalistic system the notions and inventions developed by Nazi science and technology became gruesome reality in precisely executed projects in this Nazi death camp here is the camp's floor plan between ten and twelve thousand corpses were cremated daily in six ovens German factories produce the equipment for the destruction of human beings four million people were murdered in Auschwitz the camp completely met its quota the fascist architects built stables where human beings waited to die the floor plan of a barracks here a barracks that was built according to plan and how the fighters of the Red Army found it this is how people had to live as long as they could bear that kind of life above the camp gate the sneering word of command work makes you free mean blasphemy how liberating it was could be seen in the double row of barbed wire said under the camps high voltage fences the electric current was regulated through a switchboard 180 of the 2819 people liberated by the Red Army here were children fifty-two were under 8 years old how did they manage survive this hell these children were kept for special experiments all others were killed like mice or rabbits these children were used for medical experiments fascist executioner's with medical diplomas the camp doctors dr. Schmid and dr. Mengele each had devised his own experiment the only survivors seen here are twins they don't know their names they don't know their families only numbers are burned into children's arms now they find their way back to life the camp is empty but the inextinguishable traces of Hitler's brutish crimes remain traces that are evidence of crime here is an oven where human beings were cremated before retreating the Gestapo tried to destroy everything that might serve as proof of mass murder but the Hitler executioner's were in too much of a hurry traces of murders remained after all here is the kitchen of these cannibals the death machine that operated here did not produce garbage before they were killed women's hair was cut off mounds of women's hair stored in bales 28 kilograms 22 kilograms human hair was used by the German textile industry as raw material 7,000 kilograms of hair all that remains of 140,000 murdered women human hair was sold to mills and to mattress factories ground human bones were sold to the Strand company this fertilizer the sale of human corpses was big business but that was not all of this gruesome trade dentists removed the corpses teeth so they could save the gold fillings the corpses belongings were stored in 35 warehouses piles of eyeglasses how many died if only one in ten wore glasses official bagel storage rooms filled with laundry and clothes mounds of laundry 514 thousand eight hundred forty three pieces of children's women's and men's clothing shoes forty three thousand five hundred twenty six pairs even used toothbrushes and clothes brushes were saved shaving brushes two suitcases with labels from around the world Poland Hungary France Czechoslovakia Holland Greece Belgium the Germans blew up burned and destroyed much here but in Auschwitz every handful of Earth accuses them the dead as well as the living of Auschwitz demand accountability for 4 million murdered the victims of fascism are paid their final respects [Music] obviously powerful evidence for any kind of a trial certainly a war crimes trial now it may seem a bit like a technicality but it might have occurred to you as it might to some others and experiment a medical experiment by medical doctors we heard the names of two medical doctors that go far beyond what would normally be considered acceptable medical practice I want to ask Lee Bailey what crime is this the crime would be called maiming which is deforming the human body in some brutal way and it's a crime in almost every civilization it's well recognized and when you start operating on people without their consent in order to see whether or not half a brain is as good as a whole brain you're guilty of maiming and particularly when you have children and the curse the selecting twins you can tell that they were doing some things to one or the other one to see what difference it would make I guess in the impact on Caroline Hitler was trying to create the master race and that was the basis for all this experimentation he was trying to create a strain of Aryans that would be far superior to everybody else in the world and therefore be able to govern it forever it's interesting the way terrible human activities such as this can manifest themselves in litigation that happened in this regard didn't it yes it did it's the subject of a very famous book by Leon URIs who got sued by a doctor who was at Treblinka conducting experiments and sued for libel in England the case was tried in London the doctor won but the verdict was so small one Happiny that had destroyed him and URIs both wrote the book qb7 about Queen's Bench 7 when the case was tried well if there was a judgement and a ha'penny under British law did doesn't mean that that basically it was true I mean what it was he was true in saying he didn't do these things or know what the jury said was this that URIs had said something about the doctor that wasn't proven the doctors reputation was so bad that he wasn't entitled any money in any event it's it's fascinating these self-destructive traits of some people who despite what they may have done will feel that that they should be vindicated for their lives we're going to take a break now when we return US prosecutor Robert Jackson takes center stage some Americans thought Jackson had done an unwise thing by taking leave of his post as the Supreme Court justice to prosecute the case at Nuremberg Herbert Wetzler the chief legal advisor to the US judge at Nuremberg told Court TV that that raised the stakes in Jackson's mind and justice Jackson was very who was the primary enthusiast for this enterprise really gave his whole reputation to it and his talent to developing it really thought that this would be a great precedent in the law [Music] still ahead but we wanted to carry out the task to which we considered ourselves called Hermann Goering one of the chief architects of the Nazi regime proudly defends Hitler's Germany and will see lawyers from three world powers cross-examine him coming up on the Nuremberg trial [Music] I think there was a necessity to have a trial but trial under the right law was in fact not with a fabric at law and concentrating that was a real crime the atrocities most of all the extermination of use that whole business was aggressive war was fabricated never followed up now that remarked the auto cons Beeler who was a defense lawyer at the Nuremberg trials underscores one of the major failures of the prosecution that was the failure to achieve any tangible legal purpose by in dieting the Nazi organizations in addition to the individual defendants for war crimes at the conclusion of the prosecution's case against the 22 individual defendants Robert Jackson chief US prosecutor for the United States addressed the court on the topic of the six indicted Nazi organizations the United States lawyers had come up with this idea of trying the organizations including the SS and the Gestapo the Nazi secret police and the SA the street thugs known as brown church Jackson believed that by convicting the Nazi organizations by having the Nuremberg court declare them criminal this would permit the prosecutors to later convict lower level Nazi simply by proving that they had belonged to the criminal organizations this was a controversial strategy and as we're going to see didn't work but Jackson had high hopes as he explained to the court the importance he thought of convicting these six indicted Nazi organizations I am to review the evidence against each particular organization which we take it should be reserved for summation after the evidence is all presented but it is timely to say that the selection of the six organizations name the indictment was not a matter of chance the chief reasons they were chosen are these collectively they were the ultimate repositories of all power in the Nazi regime they were not only the most powerful but the most vicious organizations in the regime and they were organizations in which membership was generally voluntary the Nazi leadership Corps consisted of the directors and principle executors of the Nazi Party and the Nazi Party was the force lying behind and dominating the whole German state the Reich's cabinet was the facade through which the Nazi Party translated its will into legislative administrative and executive acts the two pillars on which the security of the regime rested were the Armed Forces directed and controlled but the general staff of the High Command and the police forces the Gestapo the SA the SD and the SAS these organizations exemplify all of the evil forces of the Nazi regime these organizations were also selected because while representative they were not so large or extensive as to make it probable that innocent passive or indifferent Germans might be caught up in the same net with the guilty state official de miz represented but not all the administrative officials or department heads or civil servants only the Reich's cabinet the very heart of Nazi Dome within the government is named the armed forces are accused but not the average soldier or officer no matter how high-ranking only the top policymakers the General Staff and the high command are named the police forces are accused but not every policeman not the ordinary police which performed only the normal police functions only the most terroristic and repressive police elements the Gestapo land the SD are named the Nazi Party is accused but not every Nazi voter not even every member only the leaders and not even every party official or worker is included only the bearers of sovereignty in the metaphysical jargon of the party who are the actual commanding officers and their staff officers on the highest levels in administering preventive justice with a view to for stalling repetition of these crimes against peace crimes against humanity and war crimes it would be a greater catastrophe to acquit these organizations than it would be to equip the entire 22 individual defendants in the Box these defendants power for harm is past their discredited men that of these organizations goes on these organizations are exonerated here the German people will infer that they did no wrong and they will easily be regimented in reconstituted organizations under new names behind the same program in administering retributive justice it would be possible to exonerate these organizations only by concluding that no crimes have been committed by the Nazi regime for these organizations sponsorship of every Nazi purpose and their Confederation to execute every measure to attain these ends is beyond denial a failure to condemn these organizations under the terms of the Charter can only mean that such Nazi ends and means cannot be considered criminal and that the charter of the tribunal declaring them sole is a nullity some of the the odd camera changes that you're seeing here are the changing of lenses there it's the way it was done back in those days fifty years ago that we should say here that three of the six organizations were found guilty it sounds odd just to say that three of the organizations were acquitted those convicted were the SS the Gestapo and the Nazi hierarchy none of that's very much of a surprise but in a sense what you were seen there in the line of thinking that was presented by Robert Jackson who after all was a member of the United States Supreme Court and went back to that job later is an idea that was to bring grief to some in the United States in the cold war era following these trials particularly with the rise of McCarthyism lee Bailey that gave lawyers a lot of problems this idea of guilt by association being a member of the Communist Party people like Harry bridges many people associated with Hollywood were hounded and put out of business and nowadays of course being a member of the Cosa Nostra is tantamount to being a crime in and of itself because the organization has been labeled as criminal now you're not implying are you that by just being a member of let's say like Cosa Nostra mafia that you can be indicted convicted and punished for that you bet you bet because that is racketeering and being a member is assumed to be in the rackets so to speak now normally it takes a predicate act you have to do something wrong be a member in order to be convicted but the racketeering statute was pointed straight at organized crime and organized crime has been typify duh at least in this country I think Cosa Nostra now going back to the the Smith Act which basically said that if you were a communist that's a crime that has been struck down by the United States Supreme Court so at least to that extent and and in other cases involved in other radical groups and so forth the jurisprudence in the United States has abandoned sort of the bald assertion that you belong to a radical group and that can be a crime but the Supreme Court has said is that carrying a card in and of itself is not enough you have to do something but then when you do something the fact that you're a member of the organization is admissible against you and can enhance your punishment you know there's a logic apparently which transcends the boundaries of countries and their different jurisprudence because after the finding that these three groups were guilty of being criminal organizations apparently it really never paid out into anything they never if they were going to prosecute someone later on some of the smaller fish they found it easier just to indict them for what they done and not to try and follow this line of belong to the organization that's true but there were many trials after Nuremberg where the Germans were prosecuted in various countries for various crimes including within Germany and their party affiliations were certainly used against them as evidence of guilt so it's an idea that's not totally been discredited coming up next the defendants begin their case and as we go to break United States prosecutor drets Drexel sprecher recalls how Robert Jackson fell victim to a common lawyers weakness that is believing that the court was being too lenient on the other side he began to get worried after the defense case began that the Tribunal was allowing the defense too much leeway and that they weren't paying attention to relevancy or accumulation so at one point he gets into quite a struggle with the tribunal which was most unfortunate he lost his temper [Music] more than three months after the allies convened the Nuremberg Court for the first time the prosecutors wrapped up their case and it was time for the defense although the Germans sneered at the proceedings and call them Victor's justice the rules gave the defendants the basic protections of anglo-american law the defendants were entitled to counsel of their choice but often these German lawyers fail that such American techniques as cross-examination suppression of evidence and presentation of effective defense witnesses other than the defendants and nearly all of the men charged at Nuremberg decided to take the stand in their own defense but the rules did not permit them to raise the defense known as to Koch way meaning so did you this meant that they could not offer evidence that the Allies had for instance themselves bombed civilian areas and it was also not a defense that they were simply carrying out orders all of the defendants tried before the International Military Tribunal had pleaded not guilty to four counts conspiring to wage aggressive war waging aggressive war war crimes and crimes against humanity Hermann Goering the number-two man to Hitler was the first defendant testified he tried throughout the trial to set an example for the other defendants by remaining firm in his position the flamboyant Hermann Goering was that off Hitler's anti-semitic Co architect in the building of the Nazi machine before becoming head of the German air force Goering was the creator of the Gestapo Germany's secret state police he was the first Nazi to establish places to confine political enemies places that came to be known as concentration camps Hitler elevated Goering to rice marks for the highest military rank in Germany and had the war economy physicians that fed greens quest for power the pure has brought into one the parties of the classes property and religions he has given us back our arms because he loves his people and the security of Germany is close to his heart the rotund Nazi also had an appetite for high living at the time of his arrest he carried 264 pounds on his five foot six inch frame his finger and toenails were polished flaming red and he was addicted to the painkiller para codeine his American captors put him on a diet and a drug detox program the highest-ranking Nazi on trial didn't think much of the court proceedings he was two-faced when delivered a copy of the indictment against him Goering wrote on it boldly the victor will always be the judge and the vanquished be accused the attorney for hemming Goering was a post amuri former member of the Nazi Party who put a series of witnesses on the stand to testify that Goering was not a criminal here we see the testimony of Goering 'he's military assistant Karl Bowden shots Marshal Goering 1918 what capacity did you get to know and I came to know him when he was the commander of as a Richtofen squadron I was at that time the adjutant of it my stirfry hair found Richthofen and i just been killed in action in 1933 I reported to Hermann Goering in Berlin at that time Goering was right commissioner of the Luftwaffe and I became his military adjutant and what position did you have during the war Regas reservoir I was liaison officer between the commander in chief of the Luftwaffe and the Fury's headquarters did Marshall Goering have any previous knowledge of the incidents against the Jews which took place during the night of November 9th through 10th 1938 Goering had no previous knowledge of these incidents I inferred that from his demeanor and he acted towards manifests the guard to these incidents he acted in the following manner then he heard of these happenings he was dismayed and condemned him a few days later he went with proof to the Fuhrer and complained about the people who had instigated these incidents where the concentration camps broken off at the Fuhrer's headquarters during discussions with the Fuhrer or in any other occasion in the Fuhrer's headquarters I never heard the Fuhrer speak about the concentration camps we never discuss them in our circle was the question of the annihilation of the Jews discussed their night no it was not not at his discussions with me at any rate not even in discussions on the war situation night no I cannot remember him ever discussing the annihilation of the Jews in my presence during discussions on the war situation did anyone else they are mentioned anything he never discussed the subject of assembly I have only heard since being in prison that Himmler's reply to people who spoke to him on this matter was what you have heard is not true it is incorrect I personally did not discuss this question this Himmler did you know how many concentration camps there where everyone knew that the camps existed but I was not aware that so many existed it was only after the war that I learned the names of Mauthausen and Buchenwald from the newspaper I only knew of the camp of Dachau because I happen to come from Bavaria did you ever hear the atrocities either no I never heard of the atrocities it's a very first time I heard of us last year when I reported to the rice mushroom to be exact it was the middle of March 1945 when I reported my departure on sick leave the reichsmarschall told me during lunch that the very many chews must have perished there and that we should have to pay dearly for it that's why it's the first time that I heard of crimes against the Jews I have no further questions I can now turn the witness over to the other defense counsel and to the prosecution now we have a veteran defense counsel here how for Swasey visit well on the surface the fellow looks credible on the other hand how one could live in Germany and be a high-ranking member of the party but so many millions being butchered and never have heard of it is not credible in a way there was something kind of productive going on here because Goering produced several witnesses like this who were able to say well I never heard any discussion in his presence of the kinds of crimes that you're hearing about in this Tribunal but then Goering himself was to take the stand and knew he was going to take the stand and take a very aggressive posture toward what the Nazis had done and say that it was okay as a matter of fact the judgment convicting Hermann Goering said that he convicted himself out of his own mouth his testimony alone and his admissions were sufficient to make him guilty of all four counts in the indictment well maybe he knew something and I suspect that he did that you remarked to me a moment ago and you were talking about justice Jackson who had not been a trial lawyer for many many years before this experience and got bent out of shape when the judges started ruling consistently in favor of the defendants your observation was what when you see that happening you generally feel that the defendants are going to take it that the judges are creating a clean record showing the public how fair they can be as a consequence of which when the convictions come down everybody will say that was fair they'll be upheld on appeal if there is one of course in this case that never were any appeals so justice Jackson might have been well advised when he saw that to happen to kind of cool it and kick back and let nature take its cool that's not the case in the Supreme Court but it's the case in lower courts and he might have been too far removed interesting thing about justice Jackson there really came out to my knowledge in any of this justice Jackson had throughout his life opposed capital punishment yes he had and of course the result of this was just bound to be in the case of many of these defendants the death penalty 12 or executed yes indeed well 12 was said I think Goering killed himself yeah and and it may be that you know he pushed throughout the case really to enlarge the procedural rights and the the fairness toward the defendants and maybe that was somewhere in the back of his mind level that plane it might be but you know from I think and I would almost include myself here I've long been against capital punishment because they don't think it does any good I think it demeans us but I think I would have made an exception in the Nuremberg trials there's several perhaps I think Walter Cronkite who we interviewed about this and said something pretty close to that now when we return Herman Goering himself takes the stand and as we go to break Walter Cronkite recalls Goering strange magnetism here was one of the architects and certainly one of the principal of attendance of Hitler's and getting and carrying out the precepts of of Nazism and yet somehow whether he had charisma [Music] nearly seems impossible that some people didn't know you mentioned growing cotton porn I should say but it's just kissing there has been has been no proof Otto Crohn's Bueller the lawyer for one of Hitler's top military men in that trial today echoes the testimony of the Nuremberg defendants who said they just didn't know one of those defendants the unrepentant Hermann Goering was the first defendant to take the stand in his own defense this top Nazi once designated as Hitler's successor was apparently quite pleased at the opportunity to take center stage once again on direct examination by his defense attorney Otto stommer Goering describes the early days of Nazi power and he unabashedly praises Hitler his Fuhrer his leader it was a matter of course for us said once we had come into power and were determined to keep their power under all circumstances we did not want power and government authority for power sake but we needed power and government authority in order to make Germany free and great we did not want to leave this any longer to chance to election and parliamentary majorities but we wanted to carry out the task to which we considered ourselves called for the purpose of consolidation of power which seemed very important not only to me but all of us because that was two forms a basic condition for our further work a still stronger influence came into the rice cabinet new National Socialists received positions as ministers new ministries were created in addition came a number of new basic laws it was indeed clear to everyone who had concerned himself with German conditions either abroad or especially in Germany that we would put an end to the Communist Party as quickly as possible it was an absolutely necessary consequence said it should be prohibited we were convinced that if the Communist Party which was the strongest next to us had succeeded in coming to power it would certainly not have taken any National Socialists into its cabinet or tolerated them elsewhere we were aware that we would have been eliminated in an entirely different manner and vipera an additional strengthening which occurred only after the deaths of rice president von Hindenburg in 1934 was the confirmation of the head of state and the Reich Chancellor in one person to this I should like to add that on this occasion I had a long conversation with the Fuhrer right from the beginning we had discussed whether Hitler would and should take over as a position of head of the state and as I should take over the chancellorship era in view of the fears temperament and attitude it was unthinkable that the Fuhrer sitting on a throne above the political cloud so to speak should appear only as head of the state he was definitely a political leader and hence a leader of the government also the thought of putting in some other person as a puppet head of the state we considered unworthy of the situation Feuer told me then that the simplest thing to do would be to take as examples the United States of America where the head of the state is at the same time also the head of the government thus following the example of the United States we combine the position of the head of the state with the head of the government and he called himself fewer of the German people and the Reich Chancellor of the German Reich that he thereby automatically became also the commander-in-chief of the German armed forces followed as a matter of course according to the Constitution and also according to the previous Constitution just as in the case in other countries also that was the position broadly speaking apart from a number of other developments which probably would have to be mentioned later in my testimony as for instance the establishment of police power the basic element of the consolidation of power and so on in conclusion I wish to say one it is correct that I and only I can speak for myself have done everything which was at all within my personal power to strengthen the National Socialist Movement to increase it and have worked unceasingly to bring it to power under all circumstances and as is the one and only authority to I have done everything to secure for the Fuhrer the place as rush Chancellor which rightfully belong to him 3 but I look back I believe I have not failed to do anything to consolidate our power to such an extent that it would not have to yield to the chances of a political game or to violent actions but would rather in the further course of reconstruction becomes the only factor of power which would lead the Reich and lead it as we hoped to a great development now this is obviously not the usual kind of testimony that you hear in a case this is a criminal cases eventually I want to ask Effie Bailey we didn't you that be admissible and any sort of American trial at all yes it would assume for instance that we have a company on trial for criminal enterprise and the president the company's explaining why he did what he did how he built his organization and so forth generally that would be allowed to show his state of mind as he committed various acts charged as crimes and that that pretty much tracks out what Goering was doing there and he was doing something else that I think you see in American trials particularly when he was talking about how they were going to crack down on the communist immediately when they got power well he was smart enough to see that the Americans and the Soviets were just starting to drift apart into what quickly became the Cold War and I think there might have been a little and division sewing going on there oh I think he was attempting to drive a wedge in there and get a disagreement that might in your to his benefit indeed three of the defendants were acquitted the Soviet judge objected to each one now one of the things that he did do also was spoke quite admiring Lee of the American political system and constitutional arrangement for command commander in chief who was also the head of state well he did in the one hand the other hand he said we don't want any parliamentary procedures and we don't want any elections and that's hardly the American Way now he is doing what you said he he is stating the broader case as might be done in the kind of case that you mentioned there involving a corporation in the United States but the thrust of what he is saying ideologically is anathema to these judges it is I really wonder whether he cared I think Goering was so impressed with himself in his role and this great but failed enterprise that he was perfectly happy to stand up and boast about it which he clearly is doing and continued to do when he could on cross-examination well you don't know if he believed in that but he had said publicly and he had said to his fellow defendants there he had said look this trial is an opportunity for us he had said we will have an opportunity to make a statement and he said many many years from now when people learn that we were right but we just lost the war this will stand as a glowing statement of our Creed people will admire sport well that was the the fourth reich they thought a lot about it indeed there's an old chestnut that said when Hitler was discovered in South America years later he was forming the fourth reich and somebody said what are you gonna do different this time he said no more mr. nice guy one other thing that of course Goering knew and I guess no one else knew they may have suspected was that he had hidden some cyanide pills and so he knew that look this was going to result in his death either way it went oh I think that he knew right from the outset that he was the head shed the lead man and there was no way in the world that he was going to get acquitted of anything okay no more mr. nice guy we're gonna be back with more of the direct testimony of Nazi Hermann Goering after this once Adolf Hitler took over the German government in 1933 Hermann Goering moves swiftly to set up prisons originally for political dissidents and they soon came to be known as concentration camps on continued direct examination by his own counsel Goering discusses his perception of these camps the concentration camps at noon no panic I detected when the need became evident for creating order first of all and removing the most dangerous element of disorder directed against us I decided to have some communist functionaries and leaders arrested all at once only one possibility was available here that of protective custody that is whether or not one could prove that these people were involved in a traitorous act or an act hostile to the state whether or not one could expect such an act from them such an act must be prevented and the possibility eliminated by means of protective custody of course in the beginning there were excesses of course the innocent were also here are their of course there were beatings here and there an axle brutality were committed but compared to all that has happened in the past and to the greatness of the events this German Revolution of freedom is the least bloody and the most disciplined of all revolutions known to history did you supervise the treatment of the prisoners I naturally gave instructions that such things should not happen that they did happen then happened everywhere to smaller a greater extent I have just stated I always pointed out that these things ought not to happen because it was important to me to win over some of these people for our side and to re-educate them did you do anything about the abuses you heard about I took a personal interest in the concentration camps up to the spring of 1934 at that time there were two or three camps in Prussia witnessed corner has already mentioned the case of karma I would like to speak about it briefly because it was the most striking case as Talman was the leader of the Communist Party I could not say today who it was who hinted to me is that Hartmann had been beaten I had him called to me in my room directly without informing the higher authorities and questioned him very closely he told me that he had been beaten during and especially at the beginning of the interrogations thereupon as the witness who was present has said already I told Salman that I regretted that at the same time I told him via Tallman if you had come to power I probably would not have been beaten but you would have chopped my head off immediately and he agreed then I told him that in the future he must feel free to let me know if anything of this sort should happen to him or to others I could not always be there but it was not my wish that any act of brutality should be committed against Anna next Goering continues to describe his role in supervising the German concentration camps and an organization that he took over during the early days of the Third Reich an organization whose name would become synonymous with fear the Gestapo did you after a consolidation of power had taken place ever free inmates to any great extent and at what time did you do so at Christmas of 1933 I gave waters for the release of the lighter cases that is the less dangerous cases and those cases of which one had the impression that the people had resigned themselves to the situation that was about 5,000 people I repeated that once more in November 1934 for 2,000 inmates I stress again that that refers only to Prussia at that time as far as I remember I cannot say exactly one camp was dissolved or at least closed temporarily that was at a time when nobody thought that it would ever be the subject of an investigation before an international tribunal how long were you in charge of the Gestapo and the concentration camps and until what date actually I was in charge until the beginning of 1934 that is at the beginning of 1934 deals was the head and he gave me frequent reports about the Gestapo and about the concentration camps meanwhile outside Prussia a regrouping of police had taken place with the result that Himmler was in charge of the police in all the provinces of Germany with the exception of Prussia only probably following the example of my measures he had installed a secret state police there because the police at that time was still a matter of the states there was a police of Bavaria württemberg baden has a saxony etc he had become the leader of all these police forces and of course he now sought to get the leadership of the police in prussia as well I was very satisfied with deals at that time and from my point of view I saw no reason for letting any change take place now this is the sort of argument that has been repeated since and not in the great distant future that is that police departments have tough jobs that you can set up a police department with the expectation that it will be law-abiding but it doesn't always prove to be that way valid defense yes I would say in view of recent history that claim is certainly very much in the forefront now he also said that this revolution that is the Nazi takeover of Germany followed by which which was preceded by some pretty rough political activities but not a war he says it was really less brutal than the other revolutions in human history there might be some history behind that women I think in all probability number one his claim is true in terms of actual bloodshed and that is because they simply rounded up the enemy and put them behind barbed wire before they could gain any arms and retaliate or start a guerrilla action and I guess in again was fairly subtle but I guess in a way he was sort of winking Lee saying look one of the four prosecutorial forces here are the Soviets their revolution in 1917 was followed by a bloodbath that was equals this one we got his point in he said if you imprison me I'd lose my head it wouldn't just be a meeting so you're much worse than I am he attempted early on to insist as if he had a legal right that he should be put to death by a firing squad he said I'm a military man the kind of allegations here flow from me performing my role as a military man I should not be hanged I have a right to firing squad didn't get very far is there any sort of law at all yes general Noriega insisted that he be brought into court in uniform and he was as a result of the international codes during problem was he wasn't tried in you talkers there you got your choice hanging or a firing squad all right coming up next chief United States prosecute Robert Jackson begins his much-anticipated cross-examination of the very combative Hermann Goering the cross-examination of Hermann Goering the top Nazi to take the stand of Nuremberg was shared by the chief lawyers from each of the four prosecuting nations first the chief prosecutor for the United States Robert Jackson tackle Goering whose wily intelligence was clearly evident so was the fact that Jackson who was a Supreme Court justice on leave had not crossed examine to witness for many years it was a battle of words with Goering grabbing the opportunity to speak his piece about the glories of the Hitler regime historians say Goering got the best of Jackson do the chief prosecutors wish to cross-examine you are perhaps aware that you are the only living man who can expound to us the true purposes of the Nazi Party and the inner workings of its leadership I'm perfectly well aware of that you from the very beginning together with those who were associated with you intended to overthrow and later did overthrow defy my Republic the smile survived that was as far as I am concerned my firm intention and upon coming to power you immediately abolished parliamentary government in Germany she banished me an orphan we found it to be no longer necessary also I should like to emphasize the fact that we were moreover the strongest parliamentary party and had the majority but you are correct when you say that parliamentary procedure was done away with because the various parties were disbanded and forbidden the principles of the authoritarian government which you set up required as I understand you that there be tolerated no opposition political parties which might defeat or obstruct the policy of the Nazi Party aslam Jewish Irish disgustin you have understood this quite correctly by that time and we had lived long enough with opposition and we had had enough of it through opposition we had been completely ruined it was now time to have done with it and to start building up after you came to power hearing regarded as necessary in order to maintain power let you suppress all opposition parties that is courage we found it necessary not to permit any more opposition yes and you also held it necessary that you should suppress all individual opposition lest it should develop into a party of opposition survive you offers it shown in Fiorentina form insofar as opposition seriously hampered our work of building up this opposition of individual persons was it was not tolerated you are explaining as the higher authority of this system to men who don't understand it very well and I want to get what's necessary to run the kind of a system that you set up in Germany and concentration camps was one of the things you found immediately necessary upon coming to power is it not was it not and you set them up as a matter of necessity as you saw it that was falsely translated it went too fast I believe I have understood the sense of your remarks you asked me if I considered it necessary to establish concentration camps immediately in order to eliminate opposition is that correct that is your answer is yes I think Yeow yes our guest commentator f lee Bailey is widely considered to be one of the foremost cross-examiners in American law now we haven't seen much of this yet we're gonna see more of it so far what's going wrong well I don't think a whole lot I think Jackson got bad rap here because he's pinning Goering down and some very anti-democratic practices but I must say the questions are too long too convoluted and leave too much room for a speech in short of instead of a nice short answer as we will see when the British take over now he almost did it there he almost phrased that he said now did you consider it necessary to set up concentration camps and he almost said yes or no or is that true but then he'd wandered around a bit more and let him answer but he got the answer he got the answer yes ultimately despite during's protestations that the translation was faulty in too quick he then repeated the question almost verbatim and answered it yes now how would you have pinned on Goering some of the horrendous things we've seen here that were done by the Nazis I would have spent more time asking him from what you have seen in the film clips do you tell the tribunal you were learning about this for the first time now that's a very effective question particularly for one was at the top of the leadership pile and I guess you could also blame him the fact that he did in the early stages run the Gestapo and created the concentration camps he was sort of in there on the ground floor of some of the worst things that happened well I think in his direct examination he undercut his own possibility to withstand cross because he espoused all these things that are inimical to us get rid of democracy throw your opponents in prison and take over and don't let anyone disagree with you in the press or elsewhere now we're going to return to this cross-examination but one thing I want to sort of notice to our viewers and listeners here you will notice some some just quiet periods some lags some breaks in the conversation there and what that is is the IBM corporation had been asked by the tribunal to create what was then the world's first simultaneous translation system in which the four language languages were being simultaneously translated and then put into the earphones of the person who understood that language IBM did it and did a masterful job and it's one of the things that got them started on such a fantastic track after World War Two but it was slow at times and you'll see that when we come back we are going to take a break and when we do return Robert Jackson continues that cross examination of Goering you

Channel: RobertHJacksonCenter

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Keywords: Hermann goering, F. Lee Bailey, Marie Claude Vaillant-Couturier, Herb Wechsler, Drexel Sprecher, Russina concentration camp films, Robert H. Jackson Center

Id: 1crP-l0Ky_w

Length: 123min 23sec (7403 seconds)

Published: Sun Feb 11 2018