GEN. RUDENKO: Should we not conclude, after all that has been said here, that you were a Hitler-General, not because duty called you but on account of your own convictions?
KEITEL: I have stated here that I was a loyal and obedient soldier of my Führer. And I do not think that there are generals in Russia who do not give Marshal Stalin implicit obedience.
GEN. RUDENKO: I have exhausted all my questions.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Defendant, do you remember on the 2d of October 1945 writing a letter to Colonel Amen, explaining your position? It was after your interrogations, and in your own time you wrote a letter explaining your point of view. Do you remember that?
KEITEL: Yes, I think I did write a letter; but I no longer remember the contents. It referred to the interrogations, however.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Yes.
KEITEL: And I think it contained a request that I be given a further opportunity of thinking things over, as the questions put to me took me by surprise and I was often unable to remember the answers.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I want to remind you of one passage and ask you whether it correctly expresses your view:
“In carrying out these thankless and difficult tasks, I had to fulfill my duty under the hardest exigencies of war, often acting against the inner voice of my conscience and against my own convictions. The fulfillment of urgent tasks assigned by Hitler, to whom I was directly responsible, demanded complete self-abnegation.”
Do you remember that?