Krupp trial

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In the dock: Alfried Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach, Ewald Löser, Eduard Houdremont, Erich Müller, Friedrich Janssen, Karl Pfirsch, Karl Eberhardt and Heinrich Korschan (from left)

The Krupp Trial was the tenth of the twelve American follow-up trials against those responsible for the German Reich at the time of National Socialism before the Nuremberg National Military Tribunal. Alfried Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach and managers of the Krupp company were charged and convicted. The trial was one of the three Nuremberg economic trials ( Flick trial , IG Farben trial ), in which the involvement of leading large industrialists in the National Socialist crimes was prosecuted.

prehistory

During the Second World War, the allies USA and USSR had jointly regarded the economic imperialism of Nazi Germany as one of the reasons for the war. Large industrialists were assigned a key role in planning and carrying out this criminal war. The American point of view was influenced by the IG Farben report by the Kilgore Commission and the political scientist Franz Neumann's description of Germany as Behemoth , and the aim was to bring big industrialists to justice and to smash their cartels.

According to the Potsdam Agreement of August 1945, Germany was to be democratized , denazified , demilitarized and de-cartelized in order to fund the moral and economic reconstruction through a change of elite. In the Nuremberg trial of the main war criminals , important legal policy decisions were made on the use of forced labor (as a criminal “slave labor” program) and the SS as a criminal organization. But no industrialist had been convicted, as the only private industrialist accused was, due to a mistake, the seriously ill Gustav Krupp , who was unable to negotiate . A second major international war crimes trial focused on the economy was discarded for financial reasons and because the Soviets did not want to offer the Soviets an opportunity for a tribunal against the capitalist system. By turning to the reintegration of Germany as a bulwark against communism within the framework of the Marshall Plan , the funds for the industrial trials were reduced and only the trials against members of Flick , IG Farben and Krupp before a National Military Tribunal (NMT) of the Americans and in the case of the Röchling Group before a French tribunal.

Chief Prosecutor Telford Taylor opened the Krupp trial

The charges

The Nuremberg chief prosecutor Robert H. Jackson viewed Krupp as a central case of crimes committed by industrialists in association with National Socialism:

“Four generations of the Krupp family have owned and operated the great armament and munitions plants which have been the chief source of Germany's war supplies. For over 130 years this family has been the focus, the symbol, and the beneficiary of the most sinister forces engaged in menacing the peace of Europe. "

The far-reaching perspective was based, among other things, on the critical presentation of the company's history by Bernhard Menne , which shortly after its publication in Switzerland also received international attention. The Krupp case was prepared as the third industrialist trial by 1947.

The indictment of July 1, 1947 against those responsible for the company from the levels of owner, top manager, plant and department manager and executive employee comprised the four charges of preparing and waging a war of aggression (I), looting (II), forced labor (III) and conspiracy (IV ). The first three counts roughly correspond to today in international criminal law established the crime of aggression by a war of aggression , of war crimes by plunder and robbery in the occupied territories and the crimes against humanity by abduction, exploitation and abuse of slave labor ( forced labor ) and unlawful use of Prisoners of war for arms production. The fourth count of the conspiracy to commit the other three crimes is not codified in international criminal law today. Nonetheless, the main interest of the prosecution in the Krupp trial was on the "double issue of war of aggression - conspiracy", so that the prosecution's statements went back well into the 19th century.

The judge

process

The opening address was delivered by Prosecutor Telford Taylor on December 8, 1947. The defense staff consisted of 35 attorneys and doubled the prosecution. The defense spoke of victorious justice , even claimed that the defense was discriminated against, as in Soviet and National Socialist show trials, and generally tried to protect the German private sector and even the entire German population from being charged with collective guilt .

In April 1948, after a short trial period, the court announced the acquittal of the charges of aggression and conspiracy (Counts I and IV), the reasoning of which seemed untenable by the prosecutors. This was preceded by criticism from American arms companies and protests from American congressmen who spoke of “Communist-inspired show trials”, which ultimately led the War Department to recommend that these charges be dropped.

The "looting" and "slave labor" convictions were announced on July 31, 1948. In the grounds of the judgment, the defense's objection that the provisions of the Hague Agreement could no longer be applied to “ total war ” was “rejected most emphatically” by the court.

Judgments

The twelve defendants in the trial "United States vs. Alfried Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach et al. ", And their judgments of July 31, 1948 were as follows:

Overview of the defendants
image Name and position defender Charges Sentence Discharge
I. II III IV
Friedrich von Bülow
* 1889; † 1984
department director dealing with forced labor		 Wolfgang Pohle,
Fritz Streese,
Joseph S. Robinson,
Hermann Maschke,
von Schlippenbach 		U U S. U 12 years imprisonment February 2, 1951
Karl Eberhardt
* 1894; † unknown
Department director involved in forced labor		 Kurt Gollnick,
Walter Siemers,
Gerhart Weiz,
Rüdiger Weiz 		U S. S. U 9 years imprisonment February 2, 1951
Eduard Houdremont
* 1896; † 1958
Board member involved in forced labor		 Walter Siemers,
Aenne Kurowski-Schmitz ,
Kurt Peschke 		U S. S. U 10 years imprisonment February 2, 1951
Max Ihn
* 1890; † 1983
deputy Board member involved in forced labor		 Otto Kranzbühler ,
Walter Ballas ,
Fritz Wecker 		U U S. U 9 years imprisonment February 2, 1951
Friedrich Janssen
* 1887; † 1956
management positions at subsidiaries		 Alfred Schilf,
Viktor von der Lippe 		U S. S. U 10 years imprisonment February 2, 1951
Heinrich Korschan
* 1895; † 1973
deputy Board member involved in forced labor		 Erich Wandschneider ,
Erhard Heinke,
Rudolf Kühn 		U U S. U 6 years imprisonment February 2, 1951
Alfried Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach Krupp processes.jpg Alfried Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach
* 1907; † 1967
Company owner engaged in forced labor		 Otto Kranzbühler ,
Walter Ballas,
Fritz Wecker 		U S. S. U 12 years imprisonment,
deprivation of property		 February 2, 1951,
property refund
Hans Kupke
* 1885; † unknown
Oberlagerführer for forced laborers		 Alfred Behringer,
Oskar Stübinger,
Erich Mayer 		U - S. U 2 years
10 months
19 days imprisonment		 after process
Heinrich Lehmann
* 1904; † unknown
assistant and deputy of Max Ihn		 Gerhard Weise,
Franz Wolf,
Erwin Haack 		U - S. U 6 years imprisonment August 25, 1950
Ewald Löser
* 1888; † 1970
board member		 Kurt Behling ,
Günther Wendland 		U S. S. U 7 years imprisonment Discharge early due to illness
Erich Müller
* 1892; † 1963
member of the board		 Heinrich Link,
Otto Reitzenstein 		U S. S. U 12 years imprisonment February 2, 1951
Karl Pfirsch
* 1877; † 1967
deputy Board member		 Bernd Vorwerk,
Johannes Schmidt 		U U U U acquittal

S - guilty verdict;  U - Innocent as charged

The Krupp company had enriched itself or tried to enrich itself in the occupied territories by exploiting industrial resources (cases: Austin in Liancourt, ELMAG in Mühlhausen, ALSTOM in Belfort and machines from Holland). Six of the defendants were found guilty of having participated in the robbery and looting of someone else's property (Count II).

All but the defendant Karl Pfirsch were convicted of participating in the forced labor program with tens of thousands of Eastern workers (Count III). The Krupp Group employed 69,989 foreign civilian workers and 4,978 concentration camp prisoners throughout Germany ; 23,076 prisoners of war were employed in the Krupp works . No protection against air attacks was offered for the prisoners of war in Essen, so that contrary to the Hague Convention, the prisoners were left defenseless. The malnourished Russian prisoners of war deployed were forced to do heavy labor despite their state of health and treated so badly at Krupp that factory management and the responsible Wehrmacht officers complained about it. In Auschwitz, the Berthawerke in Breslau and in other Krupp factories, concentration camp prisoners were systematically deployed. In the Buschmannshof children's barracks in Voerde, the babies and toddlers of the Eastern workers employed by Krupp were systematically undersupplied and large numbers of them died.

In contrast to the Flick and IG Farben Trials, the court did not want to recognize the accused in the Krupp Trial as having a state of emergency to mitigate the punishment . On the one hand, it was doubtful that the Krupp management did not want to employ forced labor and, on the other hand, the allegedly threatened consequences of a refusal to employ forced laborers (dismissal, impeachment, expropriation or arrest of the manager) would have been disproportionate to the damage suffered by the defendants inflicted on the people entrusted to them.

Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach was sentenced to twelve years in prison and confiscated all of his property for crimes against humanity and violations of martial law. The reasons for the verdict referred to the crimes against the slave laborers, to the preparation for war and to his active role in the plundering and deindustrialization of the countries occupied by Germany.

Pardon and reception

Almost all convicts were released early in the years 1951–52 by the US High Commissioner John Jay McCloy.

The confiscation of Alfried Krupp von Bohlen and Halbach's property was not implemented in the western occupation zones. In the Soviet zone of occupation, however, the expropriation of some Krupp factories, which in fact had already taken place, was subsequently legally legitimized. Alfried Krupp von Bohlen und Halbach served a small part of his sentence in the military prison in Landsberg am Lech until he was given amnesty on January 31, 1951 and released early from prison. The part of the judgment that ordered the confiscation of Krupp's property was also overturned.

This was not least the result of a PR offensive with which chambers of commerce, business associations, conservative media and even the defenders of the Krupp trial tried to exonerate Krupp and German industry as a whole from all allegations and to restore the company's own version of the company's history and the role of the to whitewash German industry under National Socialism. As early as 1950, the text “Why was Krupp condemned?” Barely went beyond the content of the defense speeches, but also practiced anti-Allied rhetoric by using bombing raids, the Nuremberg trials and the economic unbundling policy of the occupying powers to “war of annihilation” against the German economy declared. These apologetic writings include today:

  • Tilo von Wilmowsky : Why was Krupp convicted? Legend and miscarriage of justice. Vorwerk, Stuttgart 1950.
  • Hermann M. Maschke: The Krupp judgment and the problem of "looting" . Herbert Kraus (Ed.), Göttingen Contributions to Contemporary Issues. No. 7, Musterschmidt, Göttingen 1951.
  • Gert von Klass : The three rings. Life story of an industrial company . Wunderlich, Tübingen 1953, on the Krupp trial especially pp. 441–464.
  • Device from Klass: rubble and ashes. Croup after five generations . Tubingen 1961.
  • Tilo von Wilmowsky: Looking back, I would like to say ... On the threshold of Krupp's 150th anniversary . Oldenburg / Hamburg 1961.

The didactic effect of the process, desired by the Allies, was questioned, at least in West Germany, because these whitewashing writings were not opposed to any extensive, German-language process documentation comparable to the IMT and the German public, with their lack of need for clarification, provided a useful account of the past in the Krupp managers' victim narratives found.

literature

  • Grietje Baars: Capitalism's Victor's Justice? The Hidden Stories Behind the Prosecution of Industrialists Post-WWII . In: The Hidden Histories of War Crime Trials . Ed .: Kevin Jon Heller and Gerry Simpson , Oxford University Press 2013, ISBN 978-0-19-967114-4 , pp. 163-192.
  • Werner Abelshauser : Armamentsmiths of the Nation? The Krupp concern in the Third Reich and in the post-war period 1933 to 1951. In: Lothar Gall (Hrsg.): Krupp in the 20th century. The history of the company from the First World War to the establishment of the foundation. Siedler, Berlin 2002, ISBN 3-88680-742-8 , pp. 464-472.
  • Kevin Jon Heller : The Nuremberg Military Tribunals and the Origins of International Criminal Law. Oxford University Press, 2011, ISBN 978-0-19-955431-7 .
  • Uwe Kessler: On the history of management at Krupp. From the beginning of the company to the dissolution of Fried. Krupp AG (1811-1943) . Franz Steiner Verlag, Stuttgart 1995, ISBN 3-515-06486-9 (supplements to the journal for corporate history ; vol. 87).
  • Kim Christian Priemel : The special way in court. Applied history in the Nuremberg Krupp trial . In: Historische Zeitschrift 294, 2012, No. 2, pp. 391–426.
  • Kim Christian Priemel: Tradition and Emergency. Lines of interpretation and confrontation in the Krupp case . In: NMT - The Nuremberg Military Tribunals between History, Justice and Righteousness . Ed .: Priemel and Stiller, Hamburger Edition 2013, ISBN 978-3-86854-577-7 , p. 434 ff.
  • Annette Weinke : The Nuremberg Trials . Beck, Munich 2006, ISBN 3-406-53604-2 ( Beck'sche Reihe Wissen 2404).

Web links

Commons : Krupp process  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Grietje Baars: Capitalism's Victor's Justice? The Hidden Stories Behind the Prosecution of Industrialists Post-WWII . In: The Hidden Histories of War Crime Trials . Ed .: Heller and Simpson, Oxford University Press 2013, ISBN 978-0-19-967114-4 , pp. 163, 169 f.
  2. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: Flick - A corporate history from the German Empire to the Federal Republic . Wallstein 2007. ISBN 978-3-8353-0219-8 , p. 616 ff.
  3. ↑ Answer for the United States to the Motion Filed in Behalf of Krupp von Bohlen, November 12, 1945 . In: Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression . Vol. 1. Washington 1946, pp. 86-91; quoted from Kim Christian Priemel: The special way in court. Applied history in the Nuremberg Krupp trial . In: Historische Zeitschrift 294, 2012, No. 2, pp. 391–426, here p. 403.
  4. ^ Bernhard Menne: Krupp. Germany's cannon kings . Zurich 1937.
  5. ↑ US-American edition: Bernhard Menne: Blood and Steel. The Rise of the House of Krupp . New York 1938.
  6. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: The special way in court. Applied history in the Nuremberg Krupp trial . In: Historische Zeitschrift 294, 2012, No. 2, p. 408.
  7. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: The special way in court. Applied history in the Nuremberg Krupp trial . In: Historische Zeitschrift 294, 2012, No. 2, p. 414.
  8. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: Tradition and Emergency. Lines of interpretation and confrontation in the Krupp case . P. 450 ff.
  9. ↑ Weinke, 2006, p. 89.
  10. ↑ Abelshauser, 2002, p. 468.
  11. ↑ 12 years in prison for Alfried Krupp - guilty of looting in occupied territories , WELT am SONNTAG, West edition of August 1, 1948, p. 1
  12. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: Tradition and Emergency. Lines of interpretation and confrontation in the Krupp case. P. 449.
  13. ^ Trials of War Criminals Before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals Under Control Council Law No. 10. Nuernberg October 1946-April 1949, Volume IX: The Krupp Case . P. 1373.
  14. ↑ 12 years in prison for Alfried Krupp - guilty of looting in occupied territories , WELT am SONNTAG, West edition of August 1, 1948, p. 1
  15. ↑ Kevin Jon Heller: The Nuremberg Military Tribunals and the Origins of International Criminal Law . Oxford University Press, 2011, ISBN 978-0-19-955431-7 , p. 213
  16. ↑ Kevin Jon Heller: The Nuremberg Military Tribunals and the Origins of International Criminal Law . P. 221
  17. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: Tradition and Emergency. Lines of interpretation and confrontation in the Krupp case. P. 449.
  18. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: Tradition and Emergency. Lines of interpretation and confrontation in the Krupp case . P. 460.
  19. ^ Thomas A. Schwartz: The pardon of German war criminals. John J. McCloy and the Landsberg inmates . In: VfZ 38 (1990), pp. 375-414.
  20. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: The special way in court. Applied history in the Nuremberg Krupp trial . In: Historische Zeitschrift 294, 2012, No. 2, p. 422.
  21. ↑ Cf. Kim Christian Priemel: The special way in front of the court. Applied history in the Nuremberg Krupp trial . In: Historische Zeitschrift 294, 2012, No. 2, pp. 422f.
  22. ↑ Kim Christian Priemel: Tradition and Emergency. Lines of interpretation and confrontation in the Krupp case . P. 463.