8 Jan. 46
Afternoon Session
MR. ALBRECHT: May it please the Tribunal, two important
conferences which have already been adverted to by the Prosecution show
clearly how the Defendant Göring inspired and directed the
preparation of the German economy for aggressive war. On the 8th of July
1938 he addressed a number of the leading German aircraft manufacturers
and laid the groundwork for a vast increase in aircraft production. He
stated that war with Czechoslovakia was imminent and boasted that the
German Air Force was already superior-in quality and quantity to the
English. He said that:
" ... if Germany wins the war. Then
she will be the greatest power in the world, dominating the world
market, and Germany will be a rich nation. For this goal, risks must
be taken ... "
That
quotation, may it please the Court, is taken from Document R-140,
Exhibit Number USA-160.
A few weeks after the Munich Agreement, on the 14th of October 1938, at
another conference held in Göring's office, he made the statement
that Hitler had instructed him to organize a gigantic armament program
which would make insignificant all previous achievements. He indicated
that he had been ordered to build as rapidly as possible an air force
five times as large, to increase the speed of army and navy rearmament,
and to concentrate on offensive weapons, principally heavy artillery and
-heavy tanks; and at that meeting he proposed a specific program
designed to accomplish those ends. That is a short summary of facts
which appear from Exhibit Number USA-123 already in evidence, our
Document 1301-PS.
In his dual role as Reich Air Minister and Commander-in-Chief of the
German Air Force it was Göring's function to develop the Luftwaffe
to practical war strength. As early as the 10th of March .1935, in an
interview with the correspondent of the London Daily Mail, the
mask of hypocrisy was removed and Göring frankly announced to the
world that he was in the 'process of building a true military air force.
Two months later, in a speech to 1,000 Air Force officers, Göring
spoke in a still bolder vein. I offer in evidence from Exhibit Number
USA-437, our Document 3441-PS — which is Göring's Reden
und Aufsätze — another excerpt that has not yet been read
in evidence, from Page 242. Göring said:
"I repeat: I intend to create a
Luftwaffe which, if the hour should strike, shall burst upon the foe
like a chorus of revenge. The enemy must have the feeling of being
lost already before having fought."