Q. However, in the sessions of the Jaegerstab they had discussed that point?

A. I cannot remember anything about it. Many things were discussed there every day, so that it is not quite possible to remember every detail that they discussed.

Q. During those conferences or meetings, the number of which you had mentioned, did you always participate in these conferences?

A. No. I was called out very often. I left on my own initiative sometimes in order to make certain arrangements in connection with my other fields of work; otherwise, I should not have been able to do any work whatsoever in my other spheres. At that time I had the whole set-up of General Foerster under my orders, and also the entire training of the Luftwaffe; on top of that were the questions of the Inspectorate General and his problems.

Q. Witness, I shall come now to your speech of 25 March 1944, which has been repeatedly mentioned here, Document NOKW-017, Prosecution Exhibit 54. It is your speech to the chief engineers of the Luftwaffe and the chief quartermasters. It says here at one point that for construction a few hundred thousand laborers were being used who had been withdrawn from other places. By that don’t you mean those 100,000 Jews we just mentioned?

A. No. Under no circumstances. At that time workers had been transferred for these purposes from many other constructions which were already under way.

Q. Witness—

A. May I add to that, this: I could not possibly imagine why Jews should be used as construction workers. Therefore, I am sure that it would have struck me if I had heard that, for Jews are not used as carpenters and bricklayers. They are mostly people who work in offices, and one could hardly expect construction work from them. I don’t believe that I myself, as a man who has never done that kind of work, would be of any use for it.

Q. Witness, explain to us now the purpose of this speech of yours, which uses rather strong language.

A. During the severe air raids we had lost many stocks of material, mainly of parts. The new output of these parts could not possibly keep pace with the destruction. There was only one way left, namely, to take these parts from troops’ stocks. The troops had large stocks over which the GL himself had no power of disposal whatsoever. He just gave the orders for the manufacture of them. The requests of the troops, in my opinion, were always too high—4.2 billion marks’ worth of parts were being ordered at that time, that is proof of it. If we wanted to have these planes, which were half ready, in time, it was possible only if the troops would give us some of their parts. Prior to this conference many attempts to that effect had been made, but the Quartermaster General, because of the veto of his chief quartermasters and chief engineers, had refused my wishes. I was very annoyed about that. Saur came to see me and stressed once more that the completion of the planes was impossible. He thought that in the army that would have been taken care of long ago, but in the Luftwaffe there did not seem to be any definite power to give orders, and he would take this matter up with the higher authorities. That, for the second time, made me very cross, and when this conference took place immediately after these things, I spoke in very strong terms in order that the Quartermaster General with his staff should give me the parts that were needed. That was the purpose and the aim of the whole thing, and contrary to what had happened before, when they had refused me those parts, the harsh military speech I made was crowned with success.