. NMT02-T0774
Volume II · Page 774
In approaching a judicial solution of the questions involved in this phase of the case, it may be well to set down seriatim the controlling legal questions to be answered by an analysis of the proof.
(1) Were low-pressure and freezing experiments carried on at Dachau?
(2) Were they of a character to inflict torture and death on the subjects? (The answer to these two questions may be said to involve the establishment of the corpus delicti. )
(3) Did the defendant personally participate in them?
(4) Were they conducted under his direction or command?
(5) Were they conducted with prior knowledge on his part that they might be excessive or inhuman?
(6) Did he have the power of opportunity to prevent or stop them?
(7) If so, did he fail to act, thereby becoming particeps criminis and accessory to them?
The periods during which these experiments were conducted become extremely significant in determining the responsibility of the defendant. The evidence is uncontradicted that the low-pressure experiments were inaugurated in March 1942, and were concluded by the end of June 1942. The cold water experiments extended from August to October 1942, and the freezing experiments from February to April 1943. During all of these periods the defendant was Under State Secretary of the Reich Air Ministry, Inspector General and Second in Command under Goering of the Luftwaffe, to which post he was appointed 19 November 1941. In these various capacities, certain military duties devolved upon him, especially as Inspector General. For example, he was ordered by Hitler to take an air squadron to Norway on a purely military expedition, and during the siege of Stalingrad, early in 1943, he was ordered by Hitler to attempt to transport into Stalingrad by air food and supplies for the beleaguered German Army. His high military standing is indicated by the fact that he was one of the twelve field marshals of the German armed forces. The major part of his duties, however, revolved around the production of aircraft for the Luftwaffe. He was primarily a production man, charged with the duty of keeping military airplanes supplied in sufficient quantity to the air arm of Germany's military machine. This naturally involved the procurement in large quantities of the two essential ingredients of production — labor and raw material
