But in the course of this trial it has become clearer to me day by day just how criminal the Hitler system was, to which I sacrificed in good faith many years of my life, and I am so deeply moved inside me that I must confess to myself: For years I held a responsible position in a system which today I must curse just as much as I curse all those who forced upon the German people such a tyranny of crime and debasement of man.
It was my mistake that I stayed in the post where fate had placed me and in which I had hoped to be able to do good for our people and my profession. It would often have been simpler to give up this post when I began to realize, step by step, the depravity of the Third Reich. If I did not do so, but stayed at my post until the bitter end, I did this because I considered it my duty, especially in the hard times of total war, and because again and again I succeeded either in protecting the medical profession from harm or in preventing crimes against humanity. Even today I would have to consider it cowardice if I had left my post in 1941 or 1942 only to bring myself to safety or to evade threatened responsibility.
I feel myself free of the guilt of ever having committed or furthered crimes against humanity.
H. Final Statement of Defendant Mrugowsky[[40]]
My attorney and I made every effort during my examination on the witness stand and by means of the considerable evidence which we submitted to refute the charges which have been raised against me, just as much as we tried to assist in ascertaining the truth.
The outcome of the trial and the evidence against me is in the hands of the Tribunal and the closing brief, and in the reply to comprehensive documentation of the prosecution. I am firmly confident on the basis of this trial that this high Tribunal will examine the evidence objectively and carefully. Thus in my final speech I merely would like to draw your attention to the fact that my life in its entirety was solely devoted to my profession and my science. It was my aim, not by any means to represent some political ideology, but to go to the university and to reach the position of a free and independent doctor and scientist.
The prosecution has charged us, the defendants, with destructive tendencies which were supposed to have been the causes of our actions. I know that I am free of such tendencies. They never occurred to my collaborators and myself at any time. In the Waffen SS too, the troops of which were among the bravest divisions of the German Armed Forces, such tendencies never played a part.
As far as my own concepts of the ethical duties of the doctor are concerned, they are contained in my book regarding medical ethics, and I believe always to have acted according to the principles of that book and lived according to them. My life, my actions, and my aims were clean. That is why now that at the end of this trial I can declare myself free of personal guilt.
I. Final Statement of Rudolf Brandt[[41]]
Now, after this trial has reached its final stage, my conscience is confronted with the question of whether I consider myself guilty or innocent. My responsibility, in my opinion, is to be tested by a threefold question: