Sievers was, for all practical purposes, the acting head of the Ahnenerbe. In this capacity he was subordinated to Himmler and regularly reported to him on the affairs of this Society. The top secret correspondence of Himmler concerning the Ahnenerbe was sent to Sievers. The charter of the Ahnenerbe defines Sievers’ duties as follows:
“The Reich Business Manager handles the business affairs of the community; he is in charge of the business organization and administration. He is responsible for the drawing up of the budget and for the administration of the treasury.”
Sievers was responsible for the entire administrative problems of the secretary’s office, bookkeeping and treasury. Besides that he also had to manage the Ahnenerbe publishing house. In June 1943 Professor Dr. Mentzel, who among other things was Chief of the Business Managing Advisory Council of the Reich Research Council, appointed Sievers as his deputy. By this act Sievers did not become a member of the Reich Research Council but held only an honorary position.
In a letter to the defendant Rudolf Brandt, dated 28 January 1943, Sievers defines his position as Reich Business Manager of the Ahnenerbe as follows:
“My duty merely consists in smoothing the way for the research men and seeing that the tasks ordered by the Reichsfuehrer SS are carried out in the quickest possible way. On one thing I certainly can form an opinion; that is, on who is doing the quickest job.”
Sievers received orders directly from Himmler on matters of research assignments for the Ahnenerbe and he reported directly to Himmler on such experiments. Sievers devoted his efforts to obtaining the funds, materials, and equipment needed by the research workers. The materials obtained by Sievers included concentration camp inmates to be used as experimental subjects. When the experiments were under way, Sievers made certain that they were being performed in a satisfactory manner. In this connection, Sievers necessarily exercised his own independent judgment and had to familiarize himself with the details of such assignments.
HIGH-ALTITUDE EXPERIMENTS
The details of these experiments are discussed in other portions of this judgment. Sievers’ activities in the high-altitude experiments are revealed clearly by the evidence. Rascher, in a letter to Himmler dated 5 April 1942, states as follows:
“SS Obersturmbannfuehrer Sievers took a whole day off to watch some of the interesting standard experiments and may have given you a brief report * * * I am very much indebted to Obersturmbannfuehrer Sievers as he has shown a very active interest in my work in every respect.”
Sievers admitted that he reported to Himmler about his visit to Dachau. On the basis of the reports of Sievers and Rascher, Himmler authorized Rascher to continue the high-altitude experiments in Dachau, in the course of which the evidence shows that 180 to 200 inmates were experimented upon; that 70 to 80 of them died. Rascher became associated with the Ahnenerbe in March 1942, and during the entire time covered by the period of the high-altitude experiments, Rascher was attached to the Ahnenerbe and performed the high-altitude experiments with its assistance. On 20 July 1942, when the final report on high-altitude experiments was submitted to Himmler, Rascher’s name appeared on the letterhead of the Ahnenerbe Institute for Military Scientific Research as shown by the cover letter, and the inclosed report bore the statement that the experiments had been carried out in conjunction with the research and instruction association “Das Ahnenerbe”. Sievers had actual knowledge of the criminal aspects of the Rascher experiments. He was notified that Dachau inmates were to be used. He himself inspected the experiments. Sievers admitted that Rascher told him that several died as a result of the high-altitude experiments.