GÖRING: The air force at Leningrad was very weak. The most northern sector of our position had the poorest air protection, so that the air force there had to carry out very many tasks simultaneously. At no time was there a concentrated attack by the Air Force on Leningrad, such as we have made on other cities or as have been carried out on German cities on the largest scale. The Führer not once but repeatedly, in the presence of other gentlemen at briefing sessions, reproachfully said that apparently the German Luftwaffe dared not venture into Leningrad. I replied:
“As long as my Air Force is ready to fly into the hell of London it will be equally prepared to attack the much less defended city of Leningrad. However I lack the necessary forces, and besides you must not give me so many tasks for my Air Force north of the front, such as preventing reinforcements from coming over Lake Ladoga and other tasks.”
Attacks were therefore made only on Kronstadt and on the fleet which was left in the outer bay of Leningrad, and other targets such as heavy batteries.
I was interested to hear from the sworn testimony of the Russian professor for museums, that he was under the impression that the German Air Force was mainly out to destroy museums, and then from the testimony—not sworn to—by I believe he called himself a metropolitan, who had the impression that my Air Force had mainly chosen his cathedrals as targets. I would like to call your attention to this contradiction—perhaps understandable for people who are not experts. St. Petersburg was in fact at the very front of the fighting, and it was not necessary to attack by air, for medium and heavy artillery was sufficient to reach the center of the city.
DR. STAHMER: Was confiscation by the occupying power in Russia limited to state property?
GÖRING: In connection with the last question I forgot to mention something briefly.
There has been a great deal of talk here about the great destruction in Russia. Pictures and films were shown, impressive in themselves, but not so impressive to a German, for they showed only a modest proportion of the destruction which we personally experienced in our own cities. But I would like to point out that much of this destruction took place in the course of battle, in other words, that destruction was not intended, by the Air Force or by the artillery, but that cities, historical cities or art monuments were very frequently destroyed by battle action.
Also, in Germany men of the rank of the musician and composer Tschaikovsky, and the poets Tolstoy and Pushkin are too highly revered for deliberate destruction of the graves of these great and creative men of culture to have been intended.
Now to the question whether only state property was confiscated; as far as I know, yes. Private property, as has been mentioned here from state documents—I can easily imagine that in the cold winter of 1941-42 German soldiers took fur shoes, felt boots, and sheep furs here and there from the population—that is possible; but by and large there was no private property, therefore it could not be confiscated. I personally can speak only of a small section, namely of the surroundings of the city of Vinnitza and the city of Vinnitza itself. When I stopped there with my special train as headquarters, I repeatedly visited the peasant huts, the villages, and the town of Vinnitza, because life there interested me.
I saw such abject poverty there that I cannot possibly imagine what one could have taken. As an insignificant but informative example I would like to mention that for empty marmalade jars, tin cans, or even empty cigar boxes or cigarette boxes, the people would offer remarkable quantities of eggs and butter because they considered these primitive articles very desirable.