NAZIS’ HIGH PRICE

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXIII, Issue 21946, 14 February 1946, Page 7

NAZIS’ HIGH PRICE

STALINGRAD PUSH HITLER BLAMED GERMAN MARSHAL’S STORY, NUREMBERG,' Feb. 12. Field Marshal von Paulus, formerly commander of the German Sixth Army, under a renewed barrage of questions at the trial of Nazi leaders at Nuremberg. admitted that if he contended he acted in good faith in carrying out his superiors’ orders, then the other members of the High Command could lay similar claims. He held fast to the statement, however, that Russia had not planned an attack against Germany. The German counter-intelligence, he claimed, would have known if such a move had been planned. Paulus expressed regret for the telegram which he sent to Hitler from Stalingrad expressing devotion to the Fuhrer. “I described the suffering of my soldiers as heroism, because I did not want to think that so many were dying in vain.” he declared. By the middle of January, he sent a message to Hitler protesting against the suffering, cold and hunger of his troops, which was beyond human endurance. “No Capitulation” Order Ten days before he capitulated, he sent a message to the High Command requesting permission to surrender. Hitler’s reply stated categorically: “Capitulation is impossible. You will do your duty to the last man.” The High Command, he- said, required the Sixth Army’s virtual suicide “while the lines of the Eastern Front were being straightened.” Paulus admitted that in the autumn of 1942 the Luftwaffe Chief of Staff told him that he was in line for promotion. He denied that he knew Hitler intended to appoint him as General Jodi’s successor if he were victorious at Stalingrad. All the Nazis in the dock leaned forward intently while Paulus, his face flushed with anger, defended his role in the Russian-sponsored “Free German Committee of Wehrmacht prisoners.” Paulus denied that he became a teacher in a military academy at Moscow and declared that he was imprisoned in the camp along with other German prisoners of war. Paulus agreed that he was a member of the German Freedom Committee in Russia which, he claimed, was a movement of German soldiers of all ranks who called on the German people “at the last moment before the abyss to end the Hitler Government which has brought so much misery to the German people.” In reply to a question about the Russion treatment of German prisoners, Paulus said: “There was an incredible amount of propaganda which led to the suicide of so many Stalingrad officers and others that I feel it my duty to say Lord Justice Lawrence, interrupting, said: “The treatment of war prisoners in the Soviet is not relevant. The tribunal will not hear it.” The German counsel dumbfounded the court by replying: “I only wanted to ascertain how German war prisoners fared under the Red Army, because so many families in Germany to-day are worried about their fathers and sons. I thought that by obtaining information in this way I could relieve their minds.” Further questioned, Paulus disclosed that he lost 20 infantry and armoured divisions at Stalingrad and also two Rumanian divisions. Paulus left the courtroom by the rear door, not passing the dock. The Soviet prosecutor, M. Zorya, dealing with Rumania, submitted _ a statement in which the ex-Rumanian dictator. General Aatonescu. was quoted as saying that Hitler’s offer_ to begin the war against the Soviet Union corresponded with his aggressive intentions and he announced that he agreed to participate in the attack. General Buschenhagen, ex-Chief of Staff of the German forces in Norway, gave evidence about the preparations for Germany's attack against Russia. He said that a supplv route was built up through Norway to Petsamo and other Finnish ports, and conversations were held with the Finnish General Staff. Keitel and Jodi attended the last conference at which the final details of German-Finnish co-operation were laid down.

Under cross-examination, General Buschenhagen said that both he and General Falkenhorst, the German commander m Norway, regarded an order to shoot down Soviet commissars as criminal. General Falkenhorst carried out the order because the commissars were always fighting to the last and, even if captured, their papers showing them to be commissars were destroyed.