VON SCHIRACH: No, I had no definite plan in mind. I thought that one ought to choose an objective corresponding to the sites hit by British bombers in Germany.
MR. DODD: As long as it was a cultural city. Were you thinking of what happened in Germany or of what happened to Heydrich?
VON SCHIRACH: I was thinking of the cultural buildings in Germany which had been attacked, and I wanted to suggest this as an opportunity to make clear unmistakably that the murder of Heydrich had not been committed by the Czech population but by the Czech emigrants in London with British support. This retaliation in the third year of the war was to be a reply both to the attempt against Heydrich and to the attacks on German cultural monuments.
MR. DODD: You did not make any reference in this telegram to any so-called or alleged bombings of cultural objects in Germany, did you?
VON SCHIRACH: The Wehrmacht communiqués had already announced them, and they were generally known.
MR. DODD: That is not what I asked you. I asked if it is not a fact that in this teletype you made no reference at all to the alleged bombing of cultural objects in Germany, nor did you relate your suggestion for the bombing of a cultural town in England to any alleged cultural bombing in Germany, but rather, you made it perfectly clear that you wanted to strike at a cultural town in England because of what had happened to Heydrich. That is so, is it not?
VON SCHIRACH: It was not at all necessary for me to point to the bombing of German cultural sites. It was a fact known to the entire German population from the daily attacks of British bombers.
MR. DODD: I suppose by this time you knew very well the general reputation of Heydrich, did you not?
VON SCHIRACH: No, that is not correct. I considered Heydrich in this particular case as the representative of the Reich in Bohemia and Moravia and not as the Chief of the Gestapo.
MR. DODD: Did you know his general reputation in Germany at least at that time?