DR. DIX: I will make the question more precise.
How, Dr. Schacht, through your exchange of thoughts with foreigners, was your personal attitude influenced? How was your attitude and your activity influenced through the attitude of these foreigners?
[Turning to the Tribunal.] That is something which Dr. Schacht can testify to alone, because it is of an intimate nature and personal to Schacht. Your Lordship, I want quite openly to state the point to be proved which seems very relevant to the Defense and on which this question is based. I do not wish to conceal anything.
I, the Defense, maintain that this oppositional group—about which Gisevius has already spoken, and of which Schacht was a prominent member—that this group not only received no support from abroad, but that foreigners rendered the opposition more difficult. That is not a criticism that is leveled towards foreign governments.
There is no doubt that the representatives of these countries took that attitude in good faith and with a sense of duty in the service of their countries. But it was of decisive value for the attitude of these men of this oppositional group what position the foreign countries took to this regime; whether they respected or whether they supported it by precedence given its representatives, socially, as far as possible, or, through caution and reserve, showed their disinclination to it, thereby strengthening this oppositional group.
This evidence is of the utmost importance to me in the carrying on of the defense. I have stated it quite openly, and, as much as I can, I will fight for this piece of evidence.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Dix, the Tribunal has considered the argument which you have presented to it and they think that the investigation of these facts is a waste of time and is irrelevant. They will, therefore, ask you to go on with the further examination of the defendant.
DR. DIX: Dr. Schacht, you supported the rearmament through financing by the Reichsbank. Why did you do that?
SCHACHT: I considered that Germany absolutely had to have political equality with other nations, and I am of the same opinion today; and in order to reach this state, it was necessary that either the general disarmament which had been promised by the Allied powers would come into effect, or that if equal rights were to be obtained Germany would have to rearm on a corresponding scale.
DR. DIX: Was this financial help by the Reichsbank your work alone or was that decreed through the Directorate of the Reichsbank?