22 Nov. 45
"Himmler, in June of 1934, was
able to convince Hitler that Röhm wanted to start a Putsch. The
Führer ordered Himmler to suppress the Putsch which was supposed
to take place at the Tegernsee, where all of the SA leaders were
coming together. For northern Germany, the Führer gave the order
to suppress the Putsch to Göring."
Frick goes on to say:
"
Pursuant to this order, a great many people were
arrested and something like a hundred, and possibly more, were even
put to death, accused of high treason; all this was done without
judicial process." They were just killed on the spot. Many
people were killed--I don't know how many--who actually did not have
anything to do with the Putsch. People who just weren't liked very
well as, for instance, Schleicher, the former Reich Chancellor, were
killed. Schleicher's wife was also killed. Also Gregor Strasser, who
had been the Reich Organization Leader and second man in the Party
after Hitler. Strasser, at the time he was murdered, was not active
in political affairs any more; he had however separated himself from
the Führer in November or December of 1932".
Frick goes on to say:
"The SS was used by Himmler for
the execution of these orders to suppress the Putsch."
During this period the conspirators created, by a
series of decrees of the Reich Cabinet, a number of new political
crimes. Any act or statement contrary to the Nazi Party was deemed to
be treason and punished accordingly. The formations of the Party, the
SA, SS, as well as the SD and the Gestapo, were the vicious tools
used in the extermination of all opposition, real or potential. As
the Defendant Göring said on July 24th, 1933--I refer to
Document Number 2494-PS, which will be introduced in evidence:
"Whoever in the future raises a
hand against a representative of the National Socialist movement or
of the State, must know that he will lose his life in a very short
while. Furthermore, it will be entirely sufficient, if he is proven
to have intended the act, or, if the act results not in a death, but
only in an injury."
The Defendant Frank stated, in a magazine of the
Academy for German Law, 1936, which will be introduced as Document
Number 2533-PS, as follows:
"By the world we are blamed
again and again because of the concentration camps. We are asked,
'Why do you arrest without a warrant of arrest?' I say, 'Put yourself
into the position of our nation.' Don't forget that the very great
and still un-