M. DEBENEST: I am going to read to you a passage from a report by the Defendant Seyss-Inquart, a report drafted on 19 July 1940. You shall tell me whether you still maintain the reply that you have just given me. This is what Seyss-Inquart wrote:
“The civil administration”—he means the civil administration in the Netherlands—“at present finds itself in a sufficient and otherwise progressive way under the direction and control of the German authorities.”
Is the answer which you have just made in agreement with what Seyss-Inquart wrote?
WIMMER: If mention is made in Dr. Seyss-Inquart’s reply that the control was in German hands, that can only mean that the supervision was in the hands of German authorities, for it is naturally to be taken for granted that the German occupation authorities reserved for themselves a certain control and supervision over Dutch legislation, as well as over all important acts of administration and government; and if everything went as it should, important decrees could not be issued without the approval of the occupying power.
M. DEBENEST: That is enough. The Tribunal will judge your answer with regard to this document.
Will you explain why a civilian government was established in the Netherlands, whereas no such government was set up in other countries, such as Belgium, for instance?
WIMMER: I do not know the real reason for that, but from what I have heard and could find out myself the main reason was that Germany attached the greatest value to establishing a good relationship with the Netherlands, and the leaders in the Reich probably thought that this could be more easily done through men of the civilian administration than through the Armed Forces.
M. DEBENEST: More exactly, were they not pursuing a political goal in this, the goal of placing the country in the hands of the National Socialists, in order to bring about some sort of Germanic federation of Germanic states?
WIMMER: Whenever I spoke with the Reich Commissioner about such things, the Reich Commissioner expressed the point of view that the Dutch people had all the characteristics of a distinct and independent people and therefore should remain independent and sovereign as a state. It goes without saying that during the occupation period the Reich Commissioner and the German administration maintained fairly close contact with these parties and groups which were pro-German, and I do not have to give any reasons for that. But that the Netherlands, especially during a period of occupation, were not going to accept completely the political ideology of the occupying power was quite clear to the Reich Commissioner, as indeed to anyone who was able to judge the conditions at all reasonably.
M. DEBENEST: You said a few moments ago, if I understood correctly, that the Reich Commissioner did not want to force the secretaries general of the Netherlands to make decisions which might be contrary to their conscience, and if they felt uneasy about it, they could ask for their dismissal. Is that what you stated?