Rostock has dealt with this question in detail during direct examination. The Tribunal will certainly still have a recollection of his statement. Rostock actually had no supervisory authority over research work of the branches of the Wehrmacht and the SS.
Brandt’s, and thus also Rostock’s, commission did not comprise all medical affairs but only special tasks as was testified quite clearly here by the witness Lammers on 7 February 1947. (Tr. p. 2667.) And the assignment given Rostock did not include supervision of practical research. (Tr. p. 2449.) On 23 April 1947 Professor Rose quite correctly described the situation in Germany (Tr. p. 6300) when he said that the central planning of medical research in Germany is a phantom born 1½ years after the end of the war. True, attempts were made to correct the impossible situation created by the lack of a central direction of science in Germany. Attempts were made but the leading German politicians recognized the importance of science too late.
Germany did not have an institution with the competency and the financial means of the American “Office of Scientific Research and Development” under Dr. Vannevar Bush which, under the direction of the same man, was taken over into the United States’ peace organization under the name of “Joint Research and Development Board.” The relationship of Rostock’s agency to the SS must be discussed briefly, for all experiments which play a part in these proceedings were, after all, carried out in concentration camps which came under the jurisdiction of the SS. Rostock himself was never a member of the SS. Apart from that, he had no other relations of any kind with the SS. When the agency of the Commissioner General for the Medical and Health System was created, Hitler, in the presence of Himmler, made it quite clear to Karl Brandt that in his (Karl Brandt’s) capacity of Commissioner General the SS was not his affair. (Tr. p. 2324.) The practical execution of this directive has been expressly confirmed by Genzken. (Tr. p. 3780.) Furthermore, the decree of 25 August 1944 (NO-082, Pros. Ex. 7), which lists the agencies to which the Reich Commissioner for the Medical and Health System could give directives, does not mention the SS. Genzken also testified that no direct connections existed between Genzken’s and Brandt’s offices. According to the numerous affidavits submitted by Genzken (Genzken 1, Genzken Ex. 3; Genzken 9, Genzken Ex. 9; Genzken 6, Genzken Ex. 10; Genzken 8, Genzken Ex. 11; Genzken 3, Genzken Ex. 12; Genzken 5, Genzken Ex. 13; Genzken 16, Genzken Ex. 14; Genzken 17, Genzken Ex. 15; Genzken 15, Genzken Ex. 16) only Grawitz was competent for scientific research within the SS. Genzken also testified that Rostock never gave instructions in research affairs to the SS. (Tr. p. 3780.)
Gebhardt testified on 4 March that Grawitz was never subordinate to Karl Brandt and that Brandt never even had the right to give directives to Grawitz. (Tr. p. 3977.) He testified further that Himmler wanted to create a “science exclusively for the SS” and that the university people had resisted that attempt. However, Rostock must quite definitely be considered an exponent of university scientists. The proof for the correctness of Himmler’s intention of a “science exclusively for the SS” is contained in a letter, dated 22 September 1942, from SS Gruppenfuehrer Berger to the Reich Leader SS. (Karl Brandt 120, Karl Brandt Ex. 35.)
When in the instruction of 15 May 1944 (NO-919, Pros. Ex. 460) Himmler fixed the formalities for the carrying out of experiments on prisoners, it was natural that the names of Rostock or Karl Brandt were not mentioned in it. This instruction was not sent to Karl Brandt even for information purposes as is revealed by the document itself. This should be sufficient proof that Rostock had no influence on research activities within the SS or the concentration camps. During discussion of the individual experiments it has already been pointed out that he did not even know of them.
In regard to research commissions given to the medical chiefs of the Luftwaffe, Schroeder had claimed (NO-449, Pros. Ex. 130)—and during cross-examination he was again reproached for this document (Tr. p. 3695)—that all research assignments had to go through Rostock’s office. In his affidavit Schroeder testified that this was an erroneous description. (Rostock 11, Rostock Ex. 10.) In another interrogation on 27 February 1947 by Dr. Krauss (Tr. p. 3695) Schroeder expressly confirmed the correctness of this affidavit. For it had only been agreed that a carbon copy of the research commission given out would be sent to Rostock. His approval of the assignment of commissions was not required. The witness Wuerfler, too, confirmed this during his cross-examination by Dr. Krauss on 19 February 1947. (Tr. p. 3142.) And in his affidavit, Becker-Freyseng testified that the Luftwaffe did not commission Rostock’s office to carry out research by way of experiments on human beings. (Rostock 10, Rostock Ex. 9.)
During the hearing of evidence on 2 June 1947 in the case of Becker-Freyseng, it was discussed in detail how research commissions happened to come about, how reports were made on them and that the means by which results were obtained were not prescribed; and that a real control by the agency giving out the commissions was neither exercised nor possible. I refer to the transcript which contains significant testimony in this connection. (Tr. pp. 8317, 8320, 8321, 8324-8326.)
And now I would like to turn to the problems connected with the Reich Research Council. Here the prosecution has charged Rostock with responsibility because from the beginning of 1944 on he was Brandt’s deputy in his capacity as a member of the presiding council of this body. The fact itself is not, but the responsibility, especially in the sense of penal law or morals, must be denied. I deny the prosecution’s assertion, leading up to Mr. McHaney’s statement of 10 December 1946 (Tr. pp. 96 and 144), that Rostock exercised a “supervisory control” over the Reich Research Council or—on the occasion of submitting a letter from Rascher about freezing experiments (NO-432, Pros. Ex. 119)—that the “Reich Research Council as a whole is implicated in a criminal manner.”
The question of the Reich Research Council has been cleared up sufficiently during the examinations of Karl Brandt, Rostock, Blome, Sievers, as well as by the affidavits of the Chief of the Managing Committee of the Reich Research Council, Mentzel. (Rostock 13, Rostock Ex. 12; Sievers 42, Sievers Ex. 43.) As the crux emerges in this connection the fact that those responsible for the assignment of research commissions were, exclusively, the managers of the special sections and their authorized agents and plenipotentiaries who in turn were directly responsible to Hermann Goering.[[147]] Rostock was not among them. The members of the presiding board had no supervisory duty over and no right to issue directives to the managers of the special sections.
The members of the presiding board were informed about research carried out through the printed reports, the so-called “Red Booklets.” It can be assumed “that the prosecution is in possession of these booklets. The entire files of the Reich Research Council were handed over to the American authorities by Professor Osenberg and some documents from these files have been submitted during this trial.”