I invite the attention of the Tribunal to the organization chart entitled, “The Position of Kaltenbrunner and the Gestapo and SD in the German Police System,” Exhibit Number USA-493. As Chief of the Security Police and SD, Kaltenbrunner was the head of the Gestapo, the Kripo and the SD, and of the RSHA which was a department of the SS, and the Reich Ministry of the Interior. He was in charge of the regional offices of the Gestapo, the SD, and the Kripo within Germany, and of the Einsatz groups and Einsatzkommandos in the occupied territories.
Directly under Kaltenbrunner were the chiefs of the main offices of the RSHA including Amt III (the SD within Germany), Amt IV (the Gestapo), Amt V (the Kripo), and Amt VI (foreign intelligence).
I offer Document 2939-PS as exhibit next in order, Exhibit Number USA-513. This is the affidavit of Walter Schellenberg, who was chief of Amt VI of the RSHA from the autumn of 1941 to the end of the war. I am going to read a very small portion of this affidavit, beginning with the sixth sentence of the first paragraph:
“On or about 25 January 1943, I went together with Kaltenbrunner to Himmler’s headquarters at Lötzen in East Prussia. All of the Amt chiefs of the RSHA were present at this meeting, and Himmler informed us that Kaltenbrunner was to be appointed Chief of the Security Police and SD (RSHA) as successor to Heydrich. His appointment was effective 30 January 1943. I know of no limitation placed on Kaltenbrunner’s authority as Chief of the Security Police and SD (RSHA). He promptly entered upon the duties of the office and assumed direct charge of the office and control over the Amt. All important matters of all Ämter had to clear through Kaltenbrunner.”
During Kaltenbrunner’s term in office as Chief of the Security Police and SD, many crimes were committed by the Security Police and SD pursuant to policy established by the RSHA or upon orders issued out of the RSHA, for all of which Kaltenbrunner was responsible by virtue of his office. Each of these crimes has been discussed in detail in the case against the Gestapo and SD, and reference is here made to that presentation. Evidence how will be offered only to show that these crimes continued after Kaltenbrunner became Chief of the Security Police and SD on 30 January 1943.
The first crime for which Kaltenbrunner is responsible as Chief of the Security Police and SD is the murder and mistreatment of civilians of occupied countries by the Einsatz groups. There were at least five Einsatz groups operating in the East during Kaltenbrunner’s term in office.
The Befehlsblatt of the Security Police and SD—and this is contained in our Document 2890-PS, of which I ask the Tribunal to take judicial notice—contains reference to Einsatz Groups A, B, D, G, and Croatia during the period of August 1943 to January 1945.
I shall not read from that document which contains those excerpts, but the Tribunal will note those references to the name “Einsatz groups,” indicating that they were operating during the time that Kaltenbrunner was Chief of the Security Police and SD. The Tribunal will recall Document 1104-PS, which has heretofore been received as Exhibit Number USA-483. I will only refer in passing to this document, which contained a lengthy and critical report on the conduct of the Security Police in exterminating the Jewish population of Sluzk, White Ruthenia. That report was submitted to Heydrich on 21 November 1941. Yet the same conditions of horror and cruelty continued to characterize the operations of Einsatzkommandos in the East while Kaltenbrunner was Chief of the Security Police and SD. I refer to Document R-135, which, has heretofore been received as Exhibit Number USA-289; and I will not read anything from that but simply refresh the recollection of the Tribunal to the report of Günther, the prison warden at Minsk, under date of 31 May 1943, to the General Commissioner for White Ruthenia, in which he pointed out that after 13 April 1943 the SD had pursued a policy of removing all gold teeth, bridgework, and fillings of Jews, an hour or two before they were murdered.
The Tribunal will also recall in this exhibit the report of 18 June 1943 to the Reich Minister for the Occupied Territories describing the practice of the police battalions of locking men, women, and children into barns which were then set on fire.
The second crime for which Kaltenbrunner is responsible as Chief of the Security Police and SD, is the execution of racial and political undesirables.