30 Nov. 45
Now, will you state to the Tribunal what your principal
activities were after being assigned to the Intelligence Division?
What information were you interested in and seeking to obtain?
LAHOUSEN: May I repeat--I don't know if I understood you
correctly--I was a member of the Austrian Intelligence Division, and
not of the German Abwehr.
COL. AMEN: After the Anschluss, what position did you assume?
LAHOUSEN: After the Anschluss I was automatically taken into the
High Command of the German Armed Forces, where I did the same work.
In that position I was then a member of the Abwehr and my chief was
Admiral Canaris.
COL.AMEN: And what was the position of Admiral Canaris?
LAHOUSEN: Canaris was at that time Chief of the German Abwehr,
the German Intelligence.
COL. AMEN: And will you explain briefly the responsibility of the
principal departments of the Abwehr under Admiral Canaris?
LAHOUSEN: When, after the Anschluss in 1938, I entered the Amt
Ausland-Abwehr there were three Abwehr divisions, and the division
called "Ausland," and together they formed the organization
known as "Ausland-Abwehr." That was the set-up of the
organization in my time. How it was composed before I became a member
of it, I cannot say exactly.
COL. AMEN: And what were your duties?
LAHOUSEN: First, I automatically came into Abwehr Division I.
That was the division concerned with collecting information. It was
also called the Secret Information Service. I worked under a
divisional chief, the then Colonel in the General Staff Pieckenbrock,
whom I knew already from my Austrian past. I also knew Canaris from
my time in Austria.
COL. AMEN: Admiral Canaris was your immediate superior?
LAHOUSEN: Admiral Canaris was my immediate superior.
COL.AMEN: From time to time did you act as his personal
representative?
LAHOUSEN: Yes, in all cases and on all occasions when his actual
deputy--namely, Colonel Pieckenbrock--was not present, or when
Canaris, for one reason or another, considered it necessary or
advisable to have me appear as his representative.
COL. AMEN: And in this capacity did you have any contact with
Field Marshal Keitel?
LAHOUSEN: Yes.
COL. AMEN: Did you also have contact with Jodl?
LAHOUSEN: Yes, occasionally, but to a much lesser extent.