This holds true both for the state and for the relationship between nations. Who should determine in this order what is right and what is wrong? The criterion for this might be, according to the traditional conception, only a constitutional, that is, a national one. The drawing closer of the nations by world traffic and general civilization resulted in the various national concepts becoming adjusted to each other in spite of many differences. It must be admitted that this process of adjustment suffered a harmful set-back through certain National Socialist doctrines and their methods. Nevertheless, the principle remains inviolable that the criterion of right or wrong must be a national one, if order is not to be dissolved. The only thing worth striving for is the adjustment of nations and national fundamental concepts to each other as is now being attempted through world organization.
Although the national criterion, that is, the national judgment of good and bad, right and wrong, had been well established in any case up to now, the concepts never have been deprived of their relativity, especially when national differences existed for other reasons. A convincing example of this is the opinion expressed about the resistance movement.
All countries extol what is considered to be the highest form of patriotism: When someone risks his life for his country under the utmost danger. However, according to the Hague Rules of Land Warfare such resistance movement is forbidden. We have here a clear example of the contrast between ethical and legal evaluation. This proves that there are no absolute concepts of good and bad or right and wrong and that beyond all written laws there are unwritten laws which acquit the culprit when he obeys those higher laws. Those higher laws, however, also depend on subjective and national, that is, collectively subjective considerations. If anybody believes something to be good or right, such faith may come into existence out of an actually higher law, a truly higher idea; but it may also grow out of misled faith, out of a false idea. Who would or who could judge whether a faith or an idea was or was not right? History teaches that usually the successful idea is recognized as right, to a certain extent because it is a divine judgment. I do not wish to decide whether that is always true. The question here, however, is whether the people whose guilt is to be judged acted in good faith, in accordance with such an idea and such a faith. If the ordeal has demonstrated this faith to be wrong, the question remains open whether the people could believe the idea to be good for comprehensible or explainable reasons.
This question constitutes the problem which concerns not only Defendant Keitel but also the entire German nation. According to the speech of the French Prosecution not only the defendants in this Trial are the really guilty ones, but the entire German nation. The extent and importance of this thesis are tremendous. Should the Tribunal—if only on the grounds for its decision—come to the conclusion that the entire German nation is guilty, every German for incalculable time will bear the brand of Cain which finally must lead to the destruction of this people and its dissolution.
It has been stated most authoritatively that there is no intention here of accusing the entire German people. Through unconditional surrender we are left entirely to the mercy of the victorious powers for better or worse. It was said, however, that the verdict of this Tribunal is to be just. Here in this Court it is not clemency or inclemency which are to be the guiding principle but justice. Justice does not mean mildness. A verdict, however, will only be just if it takes into consideration all the circumstances which underlie the actions and conduct of the defendants. There is no excuse for what has happened and for what forms the subject of this Indictment. I can only try to give an analysis.
The misery, the misfortune that has fallen on the entire human race is so great that words do not suffice to express it. The German people, especially after having learned the catastrophe that has befallen the nations in the West and East and the Jews, is shaken by horror and pity for the victims. The German nation knows what this misfortune means; for it is stricken as hardly any other nation is, not only in the military field but through the sinister consequences of air attacks, through the loss of millions of its youth in the field, through evacuations and escapes in ice and snow. We know, therefore, what it means to be in misery and to have to suffer. But while other nations are able to look upon all this misery and all this misfortune as a chapter of the past, and in the protection of constitutional order have the comforting hope of returning to an orderly existence and a happy future, there still rests upon this nation the gloom of despair. By affirming the guilt of the entire nation the verdict of this Tribunal would perpetuate this despair. The German people does not expect to be acquitted. It does not expect the cloak of Christian charity and oblivion to be spread over all that has happened. The German nation is ready to the last to take the consequences upon itself. It is willing to accept it as its fate and do everything to participate in removing the consequences. It hopes, however, that the soul and hearts of the rest of mankind will not be so hardened that the existing tension, in fact the existing hatred, between this nation and the rest of mankind will remain.
Your task, Your Honors, is a terribly hard one. We not only speak different languages, each of us feels with the soul of his own country. Much of what has happened in this country will seem incomprehensible to you. The feelings of the German people in its different categories are not your feelings. One of the most essential points, especially in the case of the soldier, seems to me the way of judging what freedom is felt to be. In this country, too, the ideal of freedom was proclaimed. All of us know that the most extreme form of freedom is anarchy. No state desires anarchy, because it means surrender of its own existence. If therefore, all countries agree that the absolute concept of freedom is never worth striving for and can never be sanctioned, there results, perforce, relativity of the concept of freedom. No concept has been so misused as the concept of freedom, and yet every political system proclaims freedom as the greatest of all blessings.
By that, I by no means wish to say that the concept of freedom as proclaimed by National Socialism was the right solution. What I do wish to say, however, is that National Socialism also knew the concept of freedom and made it clear to the people through propaganda that its conception of freedom was the right one. National Socialism was aided in this by the fact that under the effects of the Treaty of Versailles Germany could indeed make no claim to be really free. The limitations of its sovereignty were so pronounced and so evident that it was easy for National Socialism to proclaim the fight for the freedom of the fatherland.
As long as the fatherland is recognized in the world as the highest worldly possession, endeavors to keep this possession must be understood and will not be disapproved of even when it is an adversary who makes them. One may be of a different opinion as to the method which should be used for the realization of these endeavors and as to how freedom is to be attained. This, however, is not decided by the individual but by that person or those persons who hold the power in a state.
Every human being wants something to hold on to in life; he must have it if he is not to sink into anarchy. Public order at the side of moral order is a firm support and the foundation of his existence, and this gives him a feeling of security in his life and professional activities. It is the deep longing of all civilized men for order which finds its highest fulfillment in the institutions of the state. On the other hand, the citizen must have confidence that the state, that is, its official agencies, will safeguard law and order. In this respect it should not matter which party provides the guardians of its inviolable principles. That is just where the confidence of a nation as a whole expresses itself, namely, by leaving leadership to the prevailing majority. National Socialism undoubtedly aimed at and succeeded in rousing the belief in wide circles of the German people that its endeavors were supported by the majority of the people. It thereby procured for itself the alibi of legality.