III. Knowledge of the defendant Poppendick
The Tribunal imputed to the defendant Poppendick, who was Oberfuehrer of the Waffen SS and Obersturmbannfuehrer of the General SS: (1) knowledge of freezing experiments; (2) sulfanilamide experiments; (3) sterilization experiments; (4) incendiary bomb experiments; (5) phlegmon experiments, without, however, being criminally involved in them.
(1) Knowledge of freezing experiments is imputed to the defendant Poppendick because he was subsequently invited to participate in a conference between Grawitz and Dr. Rascher in January 1943. As Rascher was at that time an officer in the Luftwaffe and all his collaborators were not members of the SS, this series of experiments (at least in January 1943) cannot be interpreted as a series of experiments within the SS and consequently as crimes of the SS. There is no proof of knowledge of such experiments after January 1943.
(2) The defendant Poppendick knew as much about Professor Gebhardt’s sulfanilamide experiments as Professor Rostock who was acquitted by the same Tribunal, i.e., that prisoners sentenced to death were used for these experiments.
(3) Knowledge of sterilization experiments is imputed to the defendant Poppendick by means of a simple assumption, although the Tribunal pointed out in several passages of the judgment that a mere assumption of guilt, in our case of knowledge, is insufficient. Poppendick only worked in the Race and Settlement Office as a doctor dealing with hereditary questions for members of the SS and their families; as medical superintendent he had to supervise this activity and the social welfare doctors. These matters were purely internal SS affairs. If the Race and Settlement Office occasionally dealt, amongst other measures, with one of racial policy through its field offices, the doctors were not involved in any case, and there is not the least indication that Poppendick knew or ought to have known about such measures. Even the judgment itself reveals to what extent the real sterilization experiments were kept secret.
(4) On page 112 (German), the Tribunal points out, that in conferences concerning sterilization experiments (Poppendick never took part in such conferences) each participant had to undertake to maintain absolute secrecy. Neither the defendant Poppendick’s statement nor the evidence submitted reveal that Poppendick had any knowledge of sterilization experiments, let alone of extermination measures.
(5) In the case of the phlegmon experiments it has not been proved that Poppendick had any knowledge of them. Here, too, the assertion that he had such knowledge is based on a mere assumption.
It has, however, nowhere been proved that defendant Helmut Poppendick knew about the experiments in such a way as to necessitate his realizing that non-Germans were being used for such experiments. In its verdict the Tribunal has consistently followed the principle that it must be proved that crimes were committed on non-German nationals (see pp. 50, 51, 70, 91, 103, 131, 160, German text). In contrast to this the Tribunal left open the question as to how far the state is entitled to carry out experiments on its own citizens; it stated when dealing with the question of guilt: “* * * whatever right a state may have concerning its own citizens” (see pp. 114, 195, German). The Tribunal, therefore, in all essentials confined itself to the question of to what extent crimes were committed on non-Germans. No conclusive evidence has been brought against defendant Helmut Poppendick in each single case to prove his knowledge of experiments carried out on non-Germans. In reality, nothing is more suitable to explain under whatever point of view we have to look at defendant Poppendick’s knowledge of experiments, than his words at the end of the trial: “As to medical experiments on prisoners, human experiments were nothing striking and nothing new to me. I knew that experiments were being conducted in hospitals. I knew that the triumphs of modern medicine had not been achieved without sacrifices. I admit I cannot remember that in experiments in hospitals, the voluntary participation of the experimental subjects had to be such an indispensable and obvious prerequisite, as it appears to be according to the argumentation heard in this trial. Furthermore, I know that some scientific questions can only be solved by serial experiments in an unchanging environment, and that, therefore, in all countries, experiments are often conducted, particularly on soldiers in camps. Under these circumstances I was not at all surprised that during the war serial examinations and experiments were also carried out by scientists in concentration camps. I had not the slightest reason to assume that these scientists in the camps went beyond what was usual everywhere else in the world of science. As far as I was concerned, what I knew about medical experiments in the SS had just as little to do with criminal acts as the experiments about which I knew from my internship before 1933.”
IV. Consequences for future jurisdiction arising from the
penalties imposed by the sentence on Poppendick
The sentence imposed on Helmut Poppendick for his membership in the SS is altogether the first sentence in the American Zone against an SS member of this kind. Therefore, it has to be regarded as a precedent for all military tribunals and possibly, later on, for German courts, whose task it will be to punish members of criminal organizations. To sum up its consequences, the sentence creates a precedent, that—
1. Every SS leader with a rank higher than Poppendick’s, who knew of SS crimes committed on Germans and non-Germans, can, on principle, only be sentenced to the maximum penalty.
2. Every member of the SS involved in crimes can be sentenced up to this maximum penalty again only on account of his SS membership. What penalty can, for example, be inflicted on an SS Obergruppenfuehrer who saw how the gas chambers were run at Auschwitz, without, however, being otherwise involved in the extermination of the Jews; a man thus having, so to speak, the highest degree of knowledge derived from SS membership? It is obvious that such a sentence as the one passed on Poppendick deprives future tribunals of all latitude of discretion, transforms the maximum penalty into the average penalty, and in this way renders the recommendation of the IMT absurd.