DR. JAHRREISS: Did I understand you correctly as mentioning 60,000 teleprint messages in a year?
SCHRAMM: Yes, 60,000. I remember the exact figure. And I remember it exactly, because my clerk calculated that 120 volumes of files passed through the War Diary office, and that they were so [demonstrating] thick. Therefore, about 12 yards of material passed constantly through my office. That represents 10,000 sheets of paper, if not 100,000.
DR. JAHRREISS: Perhaps you may be able to help us with a question which has been repeatedly touched upon here, but to which no precise answer has ever been given. Do you know anything about an order from Hitler saying that generals must not resign?
SCHRAMM: Yes, I remember that very exactly from an order which appeared in the middle of 1944, repeating with great strictness an order already issued before my time—that must have been during 1940 or 1941. That order was about 1½ typewritten pages in length and most forcefully worded. Its contents are still clear in my mind, because I discussed it afterwards with several of my comrades. The order stated that every commanding officer—and the departments under him correspondingly—was entitled to mention any objections he might have to the measures of the Supreme Command, but that he would then have to obey unconditionally the order once it was given him by higher quarters—that is to say, he would have to do something which meant acting contrary to his intentions. It added that it was impossible for a commander to resign in consequence of this. The reason stated was that the sergeants in the trench could not tell their company commander that they wanted to resign when they were not in agreement with his orders.
I repeat, it was so emphatically worded that we talked about it a great deal. From that time on, the commanders had even less chance of evading an order from the Supreme Command.
DR. JAHRREISS: Professor Schramm, might I ask you to speak just a little more slowly?
This order—the contents of which you have just described to us, and by means of which you have established the date of the final and most stringent formulation—did this order also apply to a man like General Jodl?
SCHRAMM: If it applied to the commanders, it naturally applied all the more to General Jodl.
DR. JAHRREISS: I now turn to another question.
General Jodl has been described as a political general. You are a civilian and a professor; and I assume, therefore, that you possess the detachment required to enable you to make up your mind on the matter and to supply the Tribunal with facts which will permit it to form its decision. Can you give us facts which would of necessity form a basis for judgment for or against?