. NMT05-T1170
Volume V · Page 1170
| reached in the original judgment does not
preclude the Tribunal from reaching a different judicial conclusion, if, after
further deliberation, with or without briefs, such conclusion appears just and
appropriate. Judicial judgments are not immutable. If the original court or an
appellate court in the interest of justice sees fit to modify them, the power
and authority to do so, even on its own motion, is undoubted, with the possible
limitation that no penalty fixed by the original judgment could be increased.
Defense counsel have taken the strange position of objecting to a supplemental
proceeding which could not be prejudicial and could be beneficial to their
clients. There is a constant strain prevalent in the defense in all of these cases. Throughout the entire organization of WVHA, there is a disclaimer of any authority to do anything which might be interpreted as culpable. To illustrate, the Tribunal sets out to examine operation Z which seems to have certain elements of criminality. From the table of organization, it appears that this operation pertains to office A. Upon further inquiry, the head of office A protests that he had no authority to conduct operation Z, and that if he signed or received any documents connected with it, he was merely a conduit between two other offices. Upon inquiry, those other offices also claim that while operation Z seems to come within their sphere of competence, actually such operation started in office B, and terminated in office C. A composite picture of these defenses would lead the Tribunal to the conclusion that no one in the entire organization had any real responsibility or authority, except for the most perfunctory and casual tasks. Somewhere within this complex and elaborate organization, there must have been sources of authority for launching and implementing important functions. Organizations of such size and importance are not inert. They are set up to get things done and to get them done quickly and efficiently, and in order to accomplish that end, definite broad authority must be delegated. But according to the contention of the defendants, no one in the organization had any authority to do anything important. Even Pohl, the chief of the WVHA, depreciates his own power almost to the vanishing point. He denies any control of Maurer and Gluecks and the Inspectorate of Concentration Camps, and takes the position that in most important respects, especially if they involve suspected criminality, he was merely a mouthpiece for Himmler. If this was the German conception of a chain of command, the whole chain was composed of fragile links, only strong enough to carry a very light load. The testimony of the defendants and the briefs of their counsel are replete with statements such as these: |
