The Nuremberg Interviews (13 page)

“My father was completely apolitical. Whereas all his brothers and brothers-in-law entered the Postal Ministry, he chose not to play politics and stayed in the field. He was director of the post offices, at various times, in Halle, Breslau, and Leipzig.” In general Fritzsche’s father was rather stern and strict, but rarely used physical means of punishment toward the children. The relationship between father and son seems to have been a respectful but aloof one.

“My mother died in 1938 of arteriosclerotic heart disease. She was about five years younger than my father. I wrote about her in the short autobiography but I would much rather tell you in my own words. She did not have as much schooling as Father. She had what is termed in Germany the ‘education of the eldest daughter,’ that is, she spoke a little French, played the piano to a limited extent, and so forth. Mentally, however, she was much more alert than my father and had a shining personality.

“I had always been on exceptionally close terms with my mother. She was born a Catholic, but because the family was Lutheran and because there was no Catholic church in Linz, and since she believed that God would accept prayers in any form that they were offered, she became a
Protestant at the age of over sixty. A year later she became president of the Lutheran Women’s Welfare of all Pomerania. Although she had little formal education, no ability to make speeches, and wore only the simplest of clothes, she actually had a very forceful personality.”

I asked him what his feelings had been concerning his mother during the last few months. He replied that he often thought of her, particularly in dreams. “My mother was always my greatest sympathizer, and when I grew up, even as a man, I liked to put my head in her lap. That was a gesture which was so strong, that especially now I can visualize it again and again.

“My mother could be very sad about little things, but in a time of any great difficulty or crisis she was always brave. She always had a kind word in case of trouble. For example, when my brothers and sisters died, I shall always remember what she said. It was a religious sentence which I don’t want to mention. I dream of those things often.”

It seemed obvious that he wanted me to ask him about this religious sentence which he did not want to profane by mentioning. I did ask him why he was reluctant to mention something that was obviously good. “I hesitate because I consider the words so sacred because they were said by my beloved mother. But you are right, there is no harm in saying a good thing. The religious words my mother said were ‘The soul is saved.’

“In my home there was little talk of religion but everything was based on it. I have a repeated dream in which my head is resting in my mother’s lap and there is that gesture of hers, and that saying ‘Now what is happening?’ ”

I asked Fritzsche what he felt was meant by that dream. He said he did not believe in the significance of dreams particularly, but that he supposed it had something to do with his innate innocence. “If I were a psychiatrist I should guess that that dream meant an unconscious feeling of innocence. Because when I’m awake there are two forces acting on me. One force demands to know, Why did you serve in this system — you saw things in 1932 and 1938 — why did you let yourself be talked into this system?

“The other force within me is a voice which always says, But how
could
you know of these atrocities, because you are innocent!

“Moreover, there is this completely false trial. I would participate wholeheartedly in a trial if it were to determine the guilt for 5 million murdered people
¹
and the guilt for the atrocities. But I see in this trial endless other things brought out and I have the feeling that in the shadow of the guilt of these murders the German people shall be considered guilty of everything, and in the shadow of this guilt the Americans,
English, French, and especially the Russians will want to get rid of their own dirty linen.

“I’m of the opinion that one must differentiate two things: First, the will of the German people to live and to wage a clean fight for its existence — a fight which was conducted. Second, and on the other side, the guilt for the murders and the atrocities. These are two completely different things.”

I remarked that it seemed hard to differentiate where one began and the other ended. “If we had a German judge he would sentence us more severely than any Allied judge, but he would draw a clean line between the two things I just mentioned. I cannot forgo the feeling that the German people had during the last war and during this one, namely, that they were on the right side. Now, for the first time, the German nation was abused of this right by Hitler through his ambition for war, which appeared to us as a war for defense, but which was sought after by Hitler as an aggressive war, and through mass murder and atrocities.

“That is the tragedy which I feel.”

I asked him whether his mother had ever expressed any opinions about National Socialism. “She never did. She was completely unpolitical. Of course, she was very happy and very proud that I had become well known, but she had no conception of the party or of my actual function in it. For that matter I was left cold by the big party meetings and rallies, too.

“Mother had a great dislike for Goebbels. She met him only once, when she visited me at the office. I don’t know why she disliked him so, because he was nice and polite to her, but she told me after meeting him that I should get away from Goebbels. She said that he was a
small
man and I was a
big
man, and that Goebbels wanted to misuse me.”

Fritzsche has been married for twenty years. His wife is six months older than he is. They have one child, born after twelve years of marriage, a girl of eight.

Much happiness from your child? “Very.” Intelligent? “Very, and mature in her feelings. For instance, when my wife wrote a letter, she shed tears and the girl said, ‘Don’t cry, Mother. Tears won’t help. I lost my pencil sharpener in school and tears won’t bring it back.’ ”

Does she know where you are or why you are here? “She knows
where
I am, but
why
I am here, I think she will, for the time being … she will find out when older.”

He met Hitler for the first time in the Rhineland in 1924 or 1925, in the house of a daughter of old Werner Siemens. “I heard Hitler speak. He had just come from prison and he spoke of a radical fight against Communism. That conversation ended with a remark by Hitler that he was not a politician but a propagandist. I was not impressed, did not join the party, because the propaganda Hitler introduced was too brutal and forcible.” Did you converse with Hitler then? “Yes.” Your impression? “An enthused dreamer. Something mystic about him. The only question was, how, out of a mix-up of thirty-six parties, could unity of the German people be found? That and the problem of Communism.” Did he mention anti-Semitism? “Not in the speech. He spoke with the old lady, and I listened.” Was she a friend of yours? “She was the aunt of a friend. I was invited there by chance.”

Brief Survey of Fritzsche’s Activities in Propaganda Ministry:
Radio news reporter for the first five years. “No musical accompaniments, no speeches.” In charge of German newspapers three and a half to four years. The last four years until the end, charged with everything on the radio. Were you the number two man in the Propaganda Ministry? “No, it’s hard to say that. But I was charged with everything in radio and I was well known. But I formerly had many superiors between me and Goebbels. In the end there was only one superior between me and Goebbels. I was one of the twelve section chiefs. But I can say that I was the most independent person in the Propaganda Ministry. I commanded great respect. My official sphere of activity was not great, but my human influence was great.”

For instance? “If I protected a man nobody did anything to him. There was an inspector for the party radio supposed to control me. In October 1944, I prohibited this party inspector entry into all radio stations in Germany.” Why? “He behaved badly.” What did he do? “He talked about me behind my back. Nobody but Fritzsche could do anything like that.

“Another example: The Gestapo sent agents into my department on three occasions. Each time I would fire them. Nobody but me would have dared to do that.”

“Mother’s family came from the region around Münster. Her people were mostly tulip growers and gardeners. It must have been a peace-loving family. I never knew my grandparents, unfortunately.

“Being the youngest child, I was probably a little spoiled by Mother. I was always considered the most gifted of the children, and in a way that set me somewhat apart from the rest.”

He virtually did not live with his wife after 1944. He had a younger woman as a lover and lived with her. Legally he remained married, but his intention was to obtain a divorce and wed the younger woman who had become his mistress. He heard from his young woman “indirectly” since his imprisonment, and still felt he would like to marry her, but because he heard regularly and devotedly from his wife, he was torn between emotions of “loyalty and devotion on the one side, and passion and love on the other.

“My wife is depressed but brave at present. She is prohibited from practicing dentistry, although she was Dr. Villiger’s assistant, an excellent dental surgeon in her own right. When I was in the Propaganda Ministry we lived on my small income. Dr. Goebbels would not approve my wife’s practicing, but I ignored his disapproval and she always practiced. Now she lives from hand to mouth in Hamburg, suffers because she is my wife — no doubt that is why the authorities won’t let her practice — and she must earn a mark a day doing knitting.”

Today being Sunday, he was working in midafternoon on his typewriter upon questions for his own defense. “I don’t think I will have a difficult time. My defense is that it was all pure idealism on my part. I can defend everything point by point. But I won’t try to do that, because everything I did, I did before the world public.

“On the other side of the picture is the fact that on the basis of my work, 5 million people were murdered and untold atrocities took place. It is purely a question of judgment as to whether a connection can be established clearly between these two things.

“If it were merely my person that were involved, I could defend myself in one sentence — ‘I did it as a German patriot’ — because if all of the German people were betrayed, I was also betrayed; but it is a complex matter. It is not my person alone that is involved, but the whole German people, whom I for the biggest part informed.”

Fritzsche smiled pensively and rolled a cigarette. His face suddenly clouded over with seriousness and he said: “Then because of the murder of 5 million people — and I am not excusing or minimizing such
barbarity — it becomes now the question of the right for existence of 50 million German people who are pressed together in a space in which they cannot exist and on which they will probably starve.”

There has been no indication from Allied policy that the intention is to starve 50 million Germans. “It is happening. By accident I received a letter from a Jewish landowner whom I once helped escape from a concentration camp. He writes that his family was arrested in Berlin after six months of flight from the East. This man describes dramatically the plight of millions of people, hundreds of thousands killed and starved to death.”

Where? “In East Prussia and in Silesia. That is a tragedy.”

From the foregoing it would almost seem as if you are implying that the present plight of the German people is the fault of the 5 million dead Jews. “No, no, no, a thousand times, the German people must now bear the accusation of these murders and rightfully. Everyone cries, ‘Punishment! Punishment! Punishment!’ The Russians say that they will take a tiny piece of East Prussia, but actually they moved Poland three or four kilometers to the west. And the Poles are deporting all Germans from that territory. It is the same in Yugoslavia and Bohemia.
²

“Besides, I get a description of my daughter and wife starving or almost starving in Hamburg. She was given notice to give up her flat, which in itself was just shingles over one’s head; and now she doesn’t know where to move. I wrote to my wife, but what advice can I give? She is a brave woman and writes brave letters. She says that physically she is unable to move. She is probably very worn out and nervous. She has no permission to live in southern Germany.

“The worst thing is their taking away her permission to practice dentistry.” Why? “I can understand, but really I don’t understand. It is being investigated through Colonel Andrus and he says that she should be permitted to practice. Dr. Gilbert thinks so, too. Do you see any reason for such an order against her practicing?” None, as you have told the story. None. “She writes she had offers from twenty to thirty places in various dentists’ offices in Hamburg, but it is forbidden.”

Was your wife a member of the party? “No.” I guess it is a matter of time and that eventually she will be permitted to practice. “Yes, time — but people have to live. I hope this man from Pomerania to whom I have just referred, and who wrote me the letter thanking me for helping him to escape from the concentration camp, will help her a bit.” What is the
story of your helping this Jewish man from Pomerania? “One day a woman came to my offices and waited in the foreroom. Her name was Karneka, and she was from Pomerania. She cried bitterly and I took her into my office and asked her what the trouble might be. She told me that her husband had been arrested and was in prison at Köslin. She said that both she and her husband had been declared Jews, but she didn’t know upon whose orders the arrest took place. After that, I put in phone calls to the prison at Köslin and I requested to know who issued the orders for her husband’s arrest. They answered that it was done on orders of the Gestapo.

“Then I called the Reich Security Main Office [RSHA] in Berlin, which replied that they knew nothing at all about the case and would investigate it. I called Köslin again and told them that I was investigating the case and that I was interested in it. The prison director told me then and there that the woman could come to the prison and visit her husband, who until then had been held incommunicado. This was followed by a fight of three or four months’ duration. I will make it short. I involved the food minister, Herbert Backe; the party district administrator of Pomerania, Franz Schwede-Coburg; and also a man whose name I didn’t know at that time — Adolf Eichmann of the Gestapo.”
³
At this point, Fritzsche laughs rather sardonically and somewhat anxiously.