THE PRESIDENT: What is this in answer to? What is the question it is in answer to?
DR. KAUFFMANN: You ought to come to the point a little more quickly. The question was what you did to bring the war to the quickest possible end?
KALTENBRUNNER: I could quote a lot of factors in this connection. My first effort was in the spring of 1943; I think it was even in February 1943, when I favored a considerable alteration of the church politics in order to win the Vatican for the first peace mediations. That was my first effort in that direction.
DR. KAUFFMANN: I now mention the name Dulles. Did you have direct or indirect contact with him and what was the purpose of your taking up those connections?
KALTENBRUNNER: Yes, I was in contact with him, namely, through Höttl. Since May 1943, I won over step by step, Höttl and other Austrians who were politically in the opposition, and learned of their peace feelers directed to foreign countries. Through these channels I heard of Roosevelt’s representative for central Europe. I think he was his economics expert, a Mr. Dulles, who was reported as being in Switzerland.
DR. KAUFFMANN: I want to interpose a question in that connection. What would have happened if Hitler or Himmler had heard of that attitude of yours?
KALTENBRUNNER: My order to Höttl and my knowledge of his activity was, if you interpret it strictly, high treason since the Führer’s views were known to me at the time. They were that there should be no contact regarding peace and no discussions about peace. Hitler changed his opinion only on 15 April 1945 in a discussion with me in the presence of a certain Wolf.
DR. KAUFFMANN: In the course of this so-called peace policy which you have described, did a representative make journeys to Switzerland so as to make contact with the so-called Mr. Dulles?
KALTENBRUNNER: Yes, there was a large number of journeys, and indeed not only by Höttl but by several other persons. For instance, I point out a discussion which I had with a Count Potocki, whom I asked to get in touch with such circles and forward the same information to Anglo-American circles in Switzerland.
DR. KAUFFMANN: I think we can leave this subject. In my opinion you have related the essential parts.