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a decentralized firm, in which each of its members could survey only
his own and related spheres. This applies particularly to Dr. Oster, who had no
IG department, but only managed an independent firm which had IG participation.
If every individual member of the Vorstand in such an undertaking is to be
charged with the duty of checking the entire activity of the company, the
Vorstand would consist of persons who know a little about many things, but
nothing entirely.
The responsibility incumbent upon a member of the
Vorstand is, moreover, one of corporation law, i. e., of civil law, and has
nothing to do with responsibility under criminal law, which can only be a
personal one. If the prosecution wishes to establish a corporate responsibility
of all the members of the Vorstand, this would imply an attempt to characterize
the Vorstand of the IG as a criminal organization within the meaning of the
Charter. The prosecution has purposely refrained from doing this, because it
would have called up a reference to the judgment of the IMP, which in such
cases also required the individual proof of personal guilt. To go any further
into this point would merely be a repetition of what has already been said by
my colleagues. If the prosecution wished to establish the responsibility of all
the members of the Vorstand, it would have had to prove the knowledge, by every
individual, of all the business matters, which it has not done.
The
facts described by me also show that under the circumstances there can be no
question of a mutual scheme for the planning, preparation, and waging of wars
of aggression. So far as I have been able to see up to the present, the
prosecution has submitted no evidence whatever of the existence of any facts in
respect to Dr. Oster which permit of the conclusion that there existed a common
plan to commit the alleged crimes. The fact that several persons in a firm have
worked in a leading position, and that this firm has developed a business
activity which could to some extent be of importance in a war, does not prove
that all those participating in its efforts purposely and in unanimous
agreement aimed at a war, let alone a war of aggression.
In addition,
it appears to me that the prosecution rather simplified matters for itself when
branding all members of the I.G. Farben Vorstand as accomplices in a common
plan or plot. Usually, the objects aimed at by the Vorstand of a commercial
enterprise are different from those of participants in a common plan to prepare
a war of aggression. It seems unbelievable that all Vorstand members should be
at the same time members of a conspiracy, the objectives of which are of a
different nature than those of a commercial enterprise. I would ask you to take
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