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as the statement of the five generals. You signed this document
together with Field Marshal von Brauchitsch Field Marshal von Manstein, General
Halder, and General Westphal. How did this document originate?
DEFENDANT WARLIMONT: I came to the Nuernberg jail for the first time on
8 October 1945. A few days later I was taken into an interrogation room and
there I was received by Brigadier General Donovan who was at that time
Associate Chief of Counsel. I knew General Donovan from before the war. He
greeted me as an officer and a comrade. He asked me about various events which
even today form the subject of this trial, and at the conclusion of this first
conversation he asked me to be prepared to testify before the IMT about the
relationship of the Wehrmacht to the Third Reich. He described to me what the
importance of such a statement by me could have; I then asked for a certain
time to think it over. On one of the following days I told him that I
personally was not in a position to make such a statement alone because, first
of all, I was not able to survey all the most important events of the war, and,
in addition, according to my previous official positions and also from the
point of view of the respect which I enjoyed in the Wehrmacht, I did not feel
myself called upon to testify in the name of the Wehrmacht before this
Tribunal. As a result I suggested to him this statement should be set down as a
written statement and should be compiled by those high-ranking officers who had
also arrived in Nuernberg jail in the meantime, and I would then act as an
assistant to these generals and would do everything possible to help carry out
their wishes. I gave him the names of the officers set down here, principally
Brauchitsch and Halder, and then, Manstein. General Donovan agreed with this.
Then we were given the possibility to work in a room in this building for about
two weeks in order to compile this statement.
Q. And what was supposed
to be the main subject of this statement?
A. The main subject was to be
the relationship of the Wehrmacht to the Third Reich. |
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| * * *
* * * *
* * * |
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4. TESTIMONY OF DEFENDANTS AND
DEFENSE
WITNESSES |
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EXTRACTS FROM THE TESTIMONY OF DEFENSE
WITNESS FRANZ
HALDER* |
| —————————— |
* Complete testimony is recorded in
mimeographed transcript, 12-16 April 1948, pp. 1817-1864, 1867-2125.
532 |
. 
