DR. FRITZ: Fritzsche asserts that he did not hear of Dr. Goebbels’ instigation of the anti-Semitic excesses in November 1938 until much later, a remark made by Dr. Goebbels himself. That does not sound very credible, because, after all, Defendant Fritzsche was a close associate of Dr. Goebbels. Can you give us an explanation?
VON SCHIRMEISTER: In 1938 certainly none of us in the Ministry realized that Dr. Goebbels was the instigator. During the night in question Dr. Goebbels was not in Berlin. As far as I remember, just before that he had been to see the Führer and he was still in southern Germany. The conversation which you have just mentioned did not take place until the middle of the war. It took place at Lanke, where the Minister had a house and it was on an occasion when Herr Fritzsche had also been invited. Someone put the direct question to the Minister as to the cause of these excesses of November 1938. Thereupon Dr. Goebbels said that the National Socialist economic leadership had come to the conclusion that the elimination of Jewry from Germany’s economy could not be carried out further...
DR. FRITZ: Witness, excuse me, that is enough. We have heard about it already today. Did Fritzsche later on—I believe it is supposed to have been in June 1944—talk to you about his general attitude toward the Jewish problem?
VON SCHIRMEISTER: In May or June 1944 I talked to Fritzsche in his apartment about the fact that on the day of these outrages he had said to me, “Schirmeister, can one participate in this sort of thing and still be a decent human being?” And then Herr Fritzsche said to me, “You know, I have really always been an anti-Semitic, but only in the sense that some of the Jews themselves also were.” And he mentioned a Jewish newspaper, I believe the C. V. Zeitung...
DR. FRITZ: That is enough, Witness. Then how do you explain Fritzsche’s anti-Semitic statements in various of his radio speeches?
VON SCHIRMEISTER: They had been ordered by the Minister. We had seen from the British press that a certain anti-Semitic current in Britain was growing, but a law in England stopped this from appearing in the British press. Now the Minister tried to find a common factor against which our propaganda abroad could be directed. This common factor was the Jew.
To give support to the foreign propaganda by the Reich, Herr Fritzsche received orders that in Germany, too, he should touch upon this subject in some of his broadcasts.
THE PRESIDENT: How long do you think you will be in concluding the case of the Defendant Fritzsche?
DR. FRITZ: I think three-quarters of an hour at the most, Mr. President.
THE PRESIDENT: Well then, after that the Tribunal will continue the case of the Defendant Bormann until 1 o’clock tomorrow.