SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I think it was Schmalz at this time. Now, the Hermann Göring Division had been concerned in a number of three—I call them incidents; I would not say—what I mean by incidents is the sort of thing which I have been describing at Civitella. Let me remind you of one or two. Do you remember at Stia, on the 13th to the 18th of April, 137 civilians were killed, including 45 women and children; do you remember that incident? Civitella, that was on the 29th of June. And do you remember Buchini on the 7th and 9th of July; do you remember an incident at Buchini?
KESSELRING: It is possible, but I would have to study the details first.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Perhaps you will remember this. I will put it to you generally, Witness, because it is a perfectly general course of conduct, and there were a number of these incidents in which the Hermann Göring Division was engaged. Do you remember that?
KESSELRING: There were many incidents like that on both sides, and I would first have to study the exact details of the question.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Well, this is what I really want you to apply your mind to. Is it correct that the Hermann Göring Division was only under General Herr and General Von Vietinghoff for tactical purposes, and reported each day to Berlin to Reich Marshal Göring as to what they were doing?
KESSELRING: The Hermann Göring Division was under the General Command and the Army for tactical purposes, but I must assume that, in these questions, subordination to the General Command and the Army actually did exist. Whether there were any matters operating outside that, I do not know.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I will put the words exactly, and you can see where I have the words from the way I put them:
“The 1st Airborne Division and the Hermann Göring Division came under the army commanders only as regards tactics; for all other questions, on the other hand, directly under the Reich Marshal, to whom they had to send daily reports. They were not permitted to receive orders from the army commanders concerning criminal proceedings, nor to report the results of such proceedings. Thus they carried on the war against guerrillas according to principles which to some extent deviated from those of the Army.”
Is that a correct statement?
KESSELRING: That conception is correct, but the question is, perhaps, that the word “tactics” can, of course, be understood in a somewhat wider or narrower sense.