23 Nov. 45
the Reich Defense Council would immediately undertake to prepare
for war emergency He stressed the urgency of the task of organizing a
war economy, and announced that the Council stood ready to brush
aside all of their obstacles. Fully aware of the fact that their
action was in flagrant violation of the Treaty of Versailles, the
Defendant Keitel emphasized the extreme importance of absolute
secrecy when he said, and I quote from the document bearing the
number EC-177, on Page 5 of that document. Colonel Keitel is
speaking, and he said:
"No document ought to be lost,
since otherwise it may fall into the hands of the enemies'
intelligence service. Orally transmitted matters are not provable;
they can be denied by us in Geneva."
The singleness of purpose with which the Nazi
conspirators geared the German economy to the forging of a war
machine is even further shown by the secret minutes of the sixth
meeting of the working committee of the so-called Reich Defense
Council, held on the 7th of February 1934, as shown in the document
bearing the number EC-404, marked "Secret Command Matter",
and dated the 7th of February 1934. At this meeting, Lieutenant
General Beck pointed out that: "The actual state of preparation
is the purpose of this session."
Parenthetically, I might say that on the first page of that
document it appears that besides Lieutenant General Beck, the
Defendant Jodl was present, then Lieutenant Colonel Jodl. There was a
Captain Schmundt; and there was a Colonel Guderian there; and there
was a Major General Von Reichenau; there was a Major Warlimont; and
these are names that Your Honors will hear more of in the course of
the presentation of this case.
Detailed measures of financing a future war were discussed and it
was pointed out that the financial aspects of the war economy would
be regulated by the Reich Finance Ministry and the Reichsbank, which
was headed by the Defendant Schacht.
On May 31st of 1935--as stated earlier in this morning's
discussion--the Defendant Schacht was secretly appointed
plenipotentiary-general of the war economy, and he had the express
function of placing all economic forces of the nation in the services
of the Nazi war machine.
By the secret defense law of May 21, 1935, under which Schacht
received this secret appointment, he was in effect, given charge of
the entire war economy. In case of war, he was to be virtual economic
dictator of Germany. His task was to place all economic forces into
the service for the conduct of the war and to secure economically the
life of the German people. The Ministers of