. NMT06-T0149
Volume VI · Page 149
| [subma…] rine commanders in the First World War, and as knight of the order Pour-le-Mérite. On his fiftieth birthday Steinbrinck received from Himmler the rank of Brigadefuehrer. He never saw any duty in the SS. Only when in 1933, the National Socialist government convened in Godesberg with the top generals of the armed forces, Steinbrinck was asked to attend for purely representative reasons. On this occasion Steinbrinck was a member of Himmler's entourage. This did not imply any special functions, it was a purely representative affair. The assertion of the prosecution to the effect that Steinbrinck had particularly close relations with Himmler will be rectified in the course of the argumentation. Steinbrinck's membership in the SS was of a purely formal nature and it is to be examined whether the bestowal of an honorary position falls at all under the regulations of the Control Council Law pertaining to membership in criminal organizations. Even if this should be part of the indictment, the prosecution will not be able to charge the defendant Steinbrinck with this membership. Details will result from the personal examination of the defendant and from further presentation of evidence. |
| D. Opening Statement for Defendant Burkart* |
| DR. KRANZBUEHLER: Honorable Judges!
As part of the over-all defense I have undertaken to deal with the question of foreign workers. The prosecution combines both the procurement of foreign workers and their employment in Germany under the term "Slave Labor Program" and describes all defendants as chief perpetrators responsible for this program. The legal reply to his charge shall be reserved for a later part of the proceedings. At this point I only want to point out two facts, which have to be taken into account in any just estimation. Only he who sees not only the foreground but discerns also the background can form a correct judgment of the contents of a picture. But the background of this indictment and of all its charges is total war with all its undreamed of effects of an economic and ideological kind. Evidence will show over and over again that the defendants became involved in these events as a fact, which they had not caused and which they could not alter. The second fact of a general nature is that since the First World War conceptions have changed, whether the state is justified to force individuals to do certain work against their will. I shall prove this change of conceptions from the laws of |
* Transcript pages 3937-3943, 18 July 1947.
