GEN. RUDENKO: Please look at the date of the document—12 May 1941, Führer’s Headquarters.
GÖRING: Yes.
GEN. RUDENKO: Look at Paragraph 3 of the document.
“Political leaders among the troops are not to be considered prisoners of war and must be exterminated at the latest in the transit camps. They must never be transported to the rear.”
Did you know about this directive?
GÖRING: May I point out that this is in no way a directive, but that it bears the heading, “Memorandum,” and is signed Warlimont. Also the distribution chart does not show any other department than the Home Defense Department, which I have mentioned. In other words, this is a memorandum.
GEN. RUDENKO: You mean to say then that you did not know about this document?
GÖRING: I say once more, this is a memorandum from the Operations Staff of the OKW; and it is not an order or a directive, but a memorandum.
THE PRESIDENT: That is not an answer to the question. You are telling us what it was, not whether you knew of it.
GÖRING: No; I did not. It had been put before me as an order, and I wanted to point out that it is not an order.