MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: May it please the Tribunal, I should not care to object to this upon the ground that it is written, because I think there are occasions when the writing out of the testimony of a witness might be more expeditious than their examination.
I object to it on the ground that it does not get us anywhere when you include it. It starts off: “Keitel gives the impression of a military man, an officer of the old school.” That is not testimony that gets us anywhere. I admit that statement; he always impressed me that way. His philosophy is dominated in the main by militaristic ideas and concepts.
Let Keitel give us a description of himself, if we must have one. I think an examination of this affidavit will show that it consists of matter that has been covered, or of matter on which another witness never ought to be interrogated. I object to it upon the ground that it has no probative value.
THE PRESIDENT: As you are aware, Dr. Nelte, any decision which the Tribunal made about documents was expressly made provisionally and with the condition that the decision about the relevancy of the document should be made when the document was produced. If the document had been produced before the Tribunal, they would have been able to look at it. They have not seen the document.
The document appears, as Mr. Justice Jackson says, to be not a document which has any evidential value at all, and as the defendant is at present giving evidence under oath, the Tribunal will not look at the document.
DR. NELTE: Mr. President, as the Tribunal have examined this document and found that it is irrelevant, I accept that decision. But it seems to me that the Tribunal . . .
THE PRESIDENT: We are not preventing you from asking any questions of the witness which may be relevant, but we do not desire to read another document from the same person who is giving testimony.
DR. NELTE: I shall omit this affidavit.
DR. THOMA: Rosenberg was chief of the Office of Foreign Affairs of the NSDAP until 1940. Did he in this capacity, or otherwise personally, have an influence on Hitler’s decisions concerning foreign policy?
GÖRING: I believe that the Party’s Central Department for Foreign Policy after the seizure of power was never once consulted by the Führer on questions of foreign policy. It was established earlier only so that certain questions on foreign policy which arose within the Party could be dealt with centrally. I am not informed in detail about the methods of that office. As far as I know Rosenberg was certainly not consulted on questions of foreign policy after the accession to power.