Do you know of any discussions with Schacht, of which you can remember anything, concerning the foregoing which might be useful to the Tribunal?
GISEVIUS: In all these preliminary discussions there were dozens of drafts of the communications Schacht wrote. They were discussed in friendly circles. To mention but one example, Schacht repeatedly discussed these drafts also with Goerdeler. It was always one question that was concerned: What could one say, so that such a letter should not be considered a provocation but would serve rather to draw the other non-Party ministers, and particularly the War Minister Blomberg, to Schacht’s side? That was just the difficulty, for how could such ministers as Blomberg, Neurath, or Schwerin-Krosigk, who were much more loyal to Hitler, be persuaded to join Schacht rather than to say that Schacht had once again provoked Hitler and Göring with his notoriously sharp tongue. All these letters can only be understood by their tactical reasons which, as I have said, had been discussed in detail with the leading men of the opposition.
DR. DIX: Now, after the Fritsch crisis, how did the political conspiracy between you and your friends and Schacht take form?
GISEVIUS: I want to deal with that word “conspiracy.” While up to that moment our activity could only be called more or less oppositional, now a conspiracy did indeed begin; and there appeared in the foreground a man who was later to play an important part as head of that conspiracy. The Chief of the General Staff at that time, Generaloberst Beck, believed that the time had come for a German general to give the alarm both inside and outside the country. I believe it is important for the Tribunal to know also the ultimate reason which prompted Beck to take that step.
The Chief of the General Staff was present when Hitler, in May 1938, made a speech to the generals at Jüterbog. That speech was intended to reinstate Fritsch. A few words were said about Fritsch, but more was said—and for the first time quite openly before a large group of German generals—about Hitler’s intention to engulf Czechoslovakia in a war. Beck heard that speech; and he was indignant that he, as Chief of the General Staff, should hear of such an intention for the first time in such an assembly without having been informed or consulted previously. During that same meeting, Beck sent a letter to Brauchitsch asking him for an immediate interview. Brauchitsch refused and deliberately kept Beck waiting for several weeks. Beck became impatient and wrote a comprehensive memorandum in which as Chief of the General Staff he protested against the fact that the German people were being drawn into war. At the end of that memorandum Beck announced his resignation, and here I believe is the opportunity to say a word about this Chief of the General Staff.
DR. DIX: One moment, Doctor. Will you tell us the source of your knowledge of what Beck thought, and the negotiations between Beck and Brauchitsch?
GISEVIUS: Beck confided in me, and during the latter years I worked in very close collaboration with him, and I was by his side until the last hour of his life on 20 July. I can testify here—and it is important for the Tribunal to know this—that Beck struggled again and again with the problem as to what a chief of the General Staff should do when he realized that events were driving toward a war. Therefore I owe to his memory, and to my oath here, not to conceal the fact that Beck took the consequences of being the only German general to relinquish his post voluntarily, in order to show that there is a limit beyond which even generals in leading positions may not go; but at the sacrifice of their position and their life, must resign and accept no further orders. Beck was of the opinion that the General Staff was not only an organization of war technicians; he saw in the German General Staff the conscience of the German Army, and he trained his staff accordingly. He suffered immensely during the later years of his life because men whom he had trained in that spirit did not follow the dictates of their conscience. I owe it to this man to say that he was a man of inflexible character.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Dix, I think we might get on to what Beck actually did.
DR. DIX: Yes, Your Honor, but...
THE PRESIDENT: Perhaps it would be a convenient time to break off. What I mean is, the witness said that Beck protested in a memorandum and offered to resign, and that was some minutes ago, and since then he was talking and had not told us what Beck actually did.