. NMT05-T0282
Volume V · Page 282
| Operational Main Office, but also for the
action spheres of the other main offices of the SS, therefore also for the
sphere of the WVHA. He had to attend to the installation and staffing of dental
clinics as well as to the supply of the necessary materials and medical
supplies, and besides he had to attend to the professional supervision of
dentists and dentists' personnel. Owing to the expansion of the dental service of the Waffen SS during the war it became necessary to create the position of leading dental surgeons. This was an intermediate instance which in the case of larger units, such as divisions supervised the dentists employed, in order to relieve the central instance, office XIV. After the Inspectorate of the Concentration Camps was incorporated to the WVHA as Office Group D, it became necessary to create also in office D III (medical service of the concentration camps) the position of a leading dental surgeon as intermediate instance for the supervision of the camp dentists and as professional adviser to the superintending physician and chief of office Dr. Lolling. The defendant Hermann Pook held this position since the end of 1943, being professionally subordinate to office XIV (dental service of the Waffen SS) as every other leading dental surgeon, and receiving therefrom his orders and instructions concerning the dental professional field. It is not merely to dispute words if, contrary to the statement of the prosecution, it is emphasized that defendant Hermann Pook was not chief dental surgeon of the WVHA. There was no chief dental surgeon in the whole of the Waffen SS. A chief dental surgeon, i.e., a dentist with independent authority to direct subordinated dentists was not necessary and would have been in contradiction to the idea of a centralized organization of the dental service of the Waffen SS. Details will show that Hermann Pook, as leading dentist of Lolling, had no real authority to act independently, especially that he could not give any independent orders to camp dentists, nor did he ever do so. It would be foolish on my part if I would expect to be able to exculpate by this evidence alone defendant Hermann Pook for ill-treatments or other atrocities which the camp dentists are alleged to have committed on prisoners, because after all it was Pook's duty as leading dental surgeon to exercise adequate professional supervision over the dentists. However, there is a marked difference whether responsibility arises from the position of chief, who acts independently and is generally responsible for his subordinates, or merely from the position of a supervising officer in the professional-technical field. Furthermore the accusation against Hermann Pook does obviously not stress particularly dental ill-treatment committed on living prisoners, but |
