feeling abandoned. The disorder of his prison chamber seemed to mirror his mental disorganization, and he often peppered Kelley with such questions as, “Doctor, what shall I do? What shall I do?” Kelley noted, “He walks up and down his cell muttering to himself.He is like a little boy whose parents are taken away from him, and he is suddenly told to shift for himself. He doesn’t know what to do.”
Ernst Kaltenbrunner, the top-ranking Gestapo leader in captivity, was a former lawyer. He was the tallest of the prisoners, and the many scars on his face lent him a sinister appearance. His unfortunate victims had often guessed that the terror chief’s web of scar tissue came from dueling, but it actually resulted from his being propelled through an automobile window during a traffic accident. Kelley pegged him as a cowardly man despite his intimidating appearance, “a typical bully, tough and arrogant when in power, a cheap craven in defeat, unable to even stand the pressures of prison life.”
As Kelley deepened his knowledge of the prisoners, the International Military Tribunal in which the top Nazis would face judgment haltingly moved forward. Enormous quantities of official Nazi documents were making their way to Allied investigators and prosecutors. Representativesof the United States, Great Britain, France, and the USSR, after rejecting the possibility of quick executions without trial, negotiated how a war crimes tribunal could be conducted and who would first face judgment. Such an international court had never before come together. Although the Soviets made plain their wish that any trial would automatically end in death-penalty verdicts, and the British more quietly agreed,the arrival in Nuremberg of more than a hundred American legal staff members signified that the United States would lead the other countries in organizing the proceedings and setting the standards of justice. The Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the American wartime intelligence agency, was officially handling the investigation of the suspects. Its former head, William “Wild Bill” Donovan, collaborated with chief prosecutor Robert Jackson to assemble evidence against the Nazis. Damning evidence was found of SS death vans that murdered Jews, the gas chambers of Auschwitz, and other horrors of the Holocaust, in addition to proof of war crimes and violations of international law.
Kelley began to see more clearly the social and political hierarchy of his charges.They reminded him of the directors of a business, all under the leadership of the late CEO, Adolf Hitler. One clique—which included Göring and Rosenberg—he called the “brain group,” the men who had shaped Nazi ideology and policy. There were also salesmen—Baldur von Schirach, Franz von Papen, Konstantin von Neurath, and Ribbentrop—who sold Hitler’s ideas to the world. Military and domestic enforcers, including Kaltenbrunner, Wilhelm Keitel, Alfred Jodl, Erich Raeder, and Karl Dönitz, mobilized armies and weapons to enforce transactions. Finally, Third Reich, Inc., employed lawyers and bureaucrats who “tagged along.” Altogether the captive Nazi leaders constituted a “board of directors” of their defeated regime, a ruling group that had run a nation but frequently had little contact with one another.
Yet unlike any corporate board of directors, this one had unleashed six years of war upon the world, cynically disregarded treaties and international agreements, wiped out countless communities of innocent people, enslaved millions, concentrated additional millions in camps designed tomurder them efficiently, and legalized racism and terror. What made these men criminals? Did they grasp at opportunities that could tempt many of us? Were they born with evil tendencies? Did they share psychiatric disorders—a type of “Nazi mind”—that could account for their behavior? Kelley understood that his access to this collection of many of the century’s most
Ernst Kaltenbrunner, the top-ranking Gestapo leader in captivity, was a former lawyer. He was the tallest of the prisoners, and the many scars on his face lent him a sinister appearance. His unfortunate victims had often guessed that the terror chief’s web of scar tissue came from dueling, but it actually resulted from his being propelled through an automobile window during a traffic accident. Kelley pegged him as a cowardly man despite his intimidating appearance, “a typical bully, tough and arrogant when in power, a cheap craven in defeat, unable to even stand the pressures of prison life.”
As Kelley deepened his knowledge of the prisoners, the International Military Tribunal in which the top Nazis would face judgment haltingly moved forward. Enormous quantities of official Nazi documents were making their way to Allied investigators and prosecutors. Representativesof the United States, Great Britain, France, and the USSR, after rejecting the possibility of quick executions without trial, negotiated how a war crimes tribunal could be conducted and who would first face judgment. Such an international court had never before come together. Although the Soviets made plain their wish that any trial would automatically end in death-penalty verdicts, and the British more quietly agreed,the arrival in Nuremberg of more than a hundred American legal staff members signified that the United States would lead the other countries in organizing the proceedings and setting the standards of justice. The Office of Strategic Services (OSS), the American wartime intelligence agency, was officially handling the investigation of the suspects. Its former head, William “Wild Bill” Donovan, collaborated with chief prosecutor Robert Jackson to assemble evidence against the Nazis. Damning evidence was found of SS death vans that murdered Jews, the gas chambers of Auschwitz, and other horrors of the Holocaust, in addition to proof of war crimes and violations of international law.
Kelley began to see more clearly the social and political hierarchy of his charges.They reminded him of the directors of a business, all under the leadership of the late CEO, Adolf Hitler. One clique—which included Göring and Rosenberg—he called the “brain group,” the men who had shaped Nazi ideology and policy. There were also salesmen—Baldur von Schirach, Franz von Papen, Konstantin von Neurath, and Ribbentrop—who sold Hitler’s ideas to the world. Military and domestic enforcers, including Kaltenbrunner, Wilhelm Keitel, Alfred Jodl, Erich Raeder, and Karl Dönitz, mobilized armies and weapons to enforce transactions. Finally, Third Reich, Inc., employed lawyers and bureaucrats who “tagged along.” Altogether the captive Nazi leaders constituted a “board of directors” of their defeated regime, a ruling group that had run a nation but frequently had little contact with one another.
Yet unlike any corporate board of directors, this one had unleashed six years of war upon the world, cynically disregarded treaties and international agreements, wiped out countless communities of innocent people, enslaved millions, concentrated additional millions in camps designed tomurder them efficiently, and legalized racism and terror. What made these men criminals? Did they grasp at opportunities that could tempt many of us? Were they born with evil tendencies? Did they share psychiatric disorders—a type of “Nazi mind”—that could account for their behavior? Kelley understood that his access to this collection of many of the century’s most
Similar Books
