DR. NELTE: The document contains, if I may indicate it briefly, the following: The developments, and the ever increasing influence of organizations alien to the Wehrmacht on the course of the war. It is the proof that the Wehrmacht, during this war, which must be called a degenerate war, tried, as far as possible, to keep within the limits of international law and that when the...
THE PRESIDENT: I only want to know what your question is, that is all.
DR. NELTE: My question to Field Marshal Keitel was to tell me about the speech on the 14th of June 1941, and what Hitler ordered the generals to do and what the effect on them was. With that, I intended to conclude the preparations for the Russian campaign.
THE PRESIDENT: He can tell what the effect was upon himself, but I don’t see how he can tell what the effect was upon the other generals.
DR. NELTE: He can only assume of course, but he can say whether the others reacted in one way or another. One can talk and one can take an opposing stand. I merely wanted to know whether this happened or not.
THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps you had better ask him what happened that day at the conference; if you want to know what happened at the conference, why don’t you ask him?
DR. NELTE: Please, tell us about it.
KEITEL: After short reports regarding the operational orders to the individual commanders, there followed a recapitulation, which I must describe as a purely political speech. The main theme was that this was the decisive battle between two ideologies, and that this fact made it impossible—that the leadership in this war, the practices which we knew as soldiers, and which we considered to be the only correct ones under international law, had to be measured by completely different standards. The war could not be carried on by these means. This was an entirely new kind of war, based on completely different arguments and principles.
With these explanations, the various orders were then given to do away with the legal system in territories which were not pacified, to combat resistance with brutal means, to consider every local resistance movement as the expression of the deep rift between the two ideologies. These were decidedly quite new and very impressive ideas, but also thoughts which affected us deeply.
DR. NELTE: Did you, or did any other generals raise objections to or oppose these explanations, directives, and orders?