DIRECT EXAMINATION
Dr. Fleming: Will you please draw the necessary conclusions from what we have discovered about Ding’s diary?
Defendant Mrugowsky: The various erroneous entries in this document and the facts which the handwriting experts have discovered prove that this document is not a diary in which entries were made from time to time. Rather there are long periods of time that are missing, sometimes periods of more than one year before the entries were made. Pages 1 to 3, I believe, were all written at the same time, and also the subsequent pages. The document has 27 pages, which were written down on only a few occasions. That is testified to by the handwriting expert. This explains the various discrepancies between the entries and the actual facts; for instance, calling the Robert Koch Institute a Reich Institute, when it wasn’t, etc. The testimony of a prosecution witness, Balachowsky, corroborates this affidavit.
Q. This affidavit is Document NO-484, Prosecution Exhibit 291. Balachowsky said, under number 29: “The file notes which were copied into the diary shortly before the collapse, give the precise number of the pages and the number of the experiments.” Now please continue.
A. In these words Balachowsky corroborates the fact that this diary, namely, this diary of Block 46, was drawn up shortly before the collapse, apparently on several days, consequently the difference in the typewriters used. Now, as to why he did this I can only conjecture—I do not know. That there was some reason for making the entries in this form would appear to be obvious.
Q. For the explanation of why Ding wrote this diary on Block 46 let me remind you of Kogon’s testimony, namely, that after 1943 Ding was sure that the war would be lost.
A. Yes. That is true. During his testimony Kogon often stated that from the beginning of 1943 on, Ding made efforts to cover himself. He also said that from that moment on, the oral assignments that he received were not sufficient, but that he must insist on receiving written orders. All the more remarkable is it then that the so-called diary, this NO-265, says only very infrequently who initiated the various lines of experimentation. And, if I recall correctly, he does not once say who ordered them.
Q. Then do the contents of this diary meet the normal requirements of a scientist’s diary?
A. The diary of a scientist has the purpose of setting down the precise course of the work undertaken. Consequently, all efforts regarding the initiation and course of experiments should be set down. That is a perfectly comprehensible custom in all institutes because subsequently the evaluation of the experiments is based on entries in the scientific institute’s diary. In this Document NO-265, however, which is allegedly such a diary of Block 46, there is not one entry regarding the actual course of the experiments; not even the results of the experiments are set down there. That is really the least that you could ask of such a diary. Dr. Kogon thought that the number of fatalities which are set down with clear precision were a result, to be sure, an unhappy result, of these experiments. That these events are found lamentable can hardly be disputed, but it is a false point of view if one orients oneself on the basis of this result toward something, the purpose of which was entirely different. The real experimental result can be seen in the following: as a consequence of the protective vaccination, what happens during a subsequent case of infection is that firstly, the period of incubation is prolonged, namely, that period of time which lapses between the actual infection and the first appearance of the disease. Secondly, the period of fever is shortened, whereas usually the period of fever in typhus is 17 days. This protective vaccination reduces it to 12, 10, and even 6 days, depending on the strength of the protective vaccine. At the same time, the height of the temperature is reduced. In other words, the symptoms that are associated with fever, which effect the blood circulation and the heart, as well as those which effect the central nervous system, are less pronounced or altogether absent after the protective vaccine. There are various other small clinical indications which a doctor readily recognizes as a result of the protective vaccine, and it must be said that as the result of less serious clinical manifestations, the number of fatalities from typhus is smaller. That is not a direct but an indirect consequence of vaccination. Therefore, when Ding asserts in this block diary of Block 46 that the most important result of the experiments was the number of fatalities, then every doctor will recognize this as such an erroneous and distorted statement that even if it is made by a doctor so reliable as Ding, it is completely unworthy of credence.