GISEVIUS: Did you say Hitler? No, Keitel.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: Whether Keitel could control Hitler or not he did control and command the entire OKW underneath him?
GISEVIUS: Yes.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: In other words, whatever Hitler’s own inclinations may have been, these men in this dock formed a ring around him which kept out information from your group as to what was going on unless they wanted Hitler to hear it, isn’t that a fact?
GISEVIUS: Yes. I believe that I should cite two more examples which I consider especially significant. First of all, every means was tried to persuade Keitel to warn Hitler, before the invasion of Belgium and Holland, and to tell him, that is Hitler, that the information which had been submitted by Keitel regarding the alleged violation of neutrality by the Dutch and Belgians was wrong. The counterintelligence was to produce these reports which would incriminate the Dutch and Belgians. Admiral Canaris at that time refused to sign these reports. I ask that this be verified. He told Keitel repeatedly that these reports, which were supposedly produced by the OKW, were wrong. That is one example when Keitel did not transmit to Hitler what he should have transmitted. The second was that Keitel was asked by Canaris and Thomas to submit to Hitler the details of the murders in Poland and Russia. Admiral Canaris and his friends were anxious to prevent even the beginning of these mass murders and to inform Keitel while the first preparations by the Gestapo were being made for these infamous actions. We received the documents, through Nebe and others. Keitel was informed as to this in detail, and here again he did not resist at the beginning; and he who did not stop the Gestapo at the beginning can not be surprised if in the end a millionfold injustice was the upshot.
THE PRESIDENT: Mr. Justice Jackson, I think you put your question, “Did not these men in the dock form a ring which prevented you getting to Hitler,” and the question was answered rather as though it applied only to Keitel. If you intended to put it with reference to all defendants, I think it ought to be cleared up.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: I think that is true.
[Turning to the witness.] Each of the defendants who held ministerial positions of any kind controlled the reports which should go to Hitler from that particular ministry, did he not?
GISEVIUS: As far as this general question is concerned, I must reply cautiously, for, first of all, it was a close clan which put a cordon of silence around Hitler. A man like Von Papen or Von Neurath cannot be included in this group, for it was obvious that Von Papen and Von Neurath, and perhaps one or the other of the defendants, did not have the possibility, or much later no longer had the possibility, of having regular access to Hitler, for besides Von Neurath, Hitler already had his Ribbentrop for a long time. Thus I can only say that a certain group, which is surely well known, composed the close circle of which I am speaking.
MR. JUSTICE JACKSON: I should like you to identify those of the defendants who had access to Hitler and those who were able to prevent access to Hitler by their subordinates. That would apply, would it not, to Göring, Ribbentrop, Keitel, Kaltenbrunner, Frick, and to Schacht—during the period until he broke with them, as you have testified—and to Dönitz, Raeder, Sauckel, and Speer?