DR. KAUFFMANN: You have just mentioned ghettos. Did you know that these mass deportations were, in effect, a preliminary step to mass extermination?
MILCH: No, we were never told.
DR. KAUFFMANN: May I ask you further if, in this connection, you had any idea about the existence of the Auschwitz extermination camp?
MILCH: No. I first heard of the name much later. I read it in the press after I was captured.
DR. KAUFFMANN: So-called Einsatzkommandos were employed in the East, where they carried out large-scale exterminations, also of Jews. Did you know that these Einsatzkommandos had been created by order of Adolf Hitler?
MILCH: No. The first I heard of these Einsatzkommandos was here in prison in Nuremberg.
DR. KAUFFMANN: Did you know that a special campaign was launched for the extermination of Jewish citizens in the southeastern provinces of the Reich, which, according to the statement of the leader concerned, named Eichmann, caused the death of from 4 to 5 million Jews?
MILCH: No, I know nothing at all about it. This is the first time I have heard the name Eichmann mentioned.
DR. KAUFFMANN: Am I correct in stating that in Germany, under the regime of an absolute leader, any opposition to a supreme order would most probably have meant death?
MILCH: That has been proved in many hundreds of cases.