KALTENBRUNNER: I was just coming to that. The quarries belonged to the city of Vienna. The city of Vienna had a vital interest not to be excluded from the deliveries of granite which they used for paving the streets of Vienna. Now, according to a Reich law, as I learned later, this large quarry was expropriated from the city of Vienna by the WVHA—Pohl—and the city of Vienna was excluded from the supply of granite for quite some time. Now, the city turned to me to approach Himmler on this. It happened that Himmler was visiting and inspecting southern Germany and decided to visit Austria and Mauthausen and asked me to see him there. In that way, it came about that I was with Himmler at this quarry. Whether or not I was photographed at that time, I do not know. I have not seen the picture and I cannot say whether I am in it.
I might add something. Neither at this time nor at any other time did Himmler ever take me into a concentration camp or suggest that he do so; as I learned later, he had certain reasons for not doing so. I would not have attended such an inspection for I knew very well that as far as I was concerned, he would, as he did with others whom he had invited on such visits, show me “Potemkin villages” and not conditions as they actually were; and, except for a handful of men in the WVHA, no one else was allowed to see how things really were in concentration camps.
DR. KAUFFMANN: Now, may I ask you—you are speaking about a handful of men—you did not belong to this group?
KALTENBRUNNER: No, I did not. This handful of men were Himmler, Pohl, Müller, and Glücks, and the camp commanders.
DR. KAUFFMANN: As far as Camp Mauthausen is concerned, there is a document on which we would like to have your views. The Document Number 1650-PS, which has already been submitted, dated 4 March 1944, is the so-called Bullet Decree. It deals with Camp III:
“Measures against recaptured prisoners of war, officers and nonworking, noncommissioned officers, with the exception of British and American prisoners of war.”
This document is known to the Tribunal in its contents. I do not believe that I need read it. The Defendant Kaltenbrunner is to make a statement, whether these facts became known to him.
THE PRESIDENT: I did not hear the reference to it, the number.
DR. KAUFFMANN: Document 1650-PS, Exhibit Number USA-246.
THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps that would be a good time to break off for 10 minutes.