Стенограмма Нюрнбергского процесса. Том X.
NINETY-FIRST DAY
Tuesday, 26 March 1946
DR. HORN: Who determined the basic lines of the foreign policy?
VON STEENGRACHT: The foreign policy, not only on its basic lines, but also usually down to the most minute details, was determined by Hitler himself. Ribbentrop frequently stated that the Führer needed no Foreign Minister, he simply wanted a foreign political secretary. Ribbentrop, in my opinion, would have been satisfied with such a position because then at least, backed by Hitler's authority, he could have eliminated partly the destructive and indirect foreign political influences and their sway on Hitler. Perhaps he might then have had a chance of influencing Hitler's speeches, which the latter was accustomed to formulate without Ribbentrop, even in the foreign political field.
DR. HORN: Were there other offices or personalities, in addition to the Foreign Office, that concerned themselves with foreign policy?
VON STEENGRACHT: Yes, there was practically no office in the Party or its organizations that, after 1933, had no foreign political ambitions. Every one of these offices had a sort of foreign bureau through which it took up connections with foreign countries in the attempt to gain its own foreign political channels.
I should judge the number of these to be approximately thirty. For example, the Hitler Jugend, the SA, the German Labor Front, the SS, the Rosenberg office with its Foreign Political office, the Propaganda Ministry, the office Waldeck, the Ribbentrop office, the Nordic Society; further, the VDA, the German Academy, the Reich Railways (Reichsbahn) and others. Besides these offices, the immediate entourage of Hitler and personalities like Himmler, Goebbels, and Bormann had an influence in the shaping of foreign Policy. Göring, too, as I see it, had perhaps a certain influence, but only until 1938 - at any rate, in matters of foreign politics, scarcely later than that.
...In general the changed position of the Foreign Office during the war is best characterized by Hitler's statement: "The Foreign Office shall, as far as possible, disappear from the picture until the end of the war." Hitler wanted to limit the Foreign Office to about 20 to 40 people, and it was even, partially forbidden to form or to maintain any connection with the Foreign Office.
The Foreign Office, as such, and its officials were detested by Hitler. He considered them objective jurists, defeatists, and cosmopolitans, to whom a matter can be given only if it is not to be carried out.
DR. HORN: Was there any foreign policy, in a traditional sense, in Germany?
VON STEENGRACHT: No; at least, I never noticed anything of it, for Hitler had in effect made the statement: "Diplomacy is defrauding the people. Treaties are childish; they are respected only as long as they seem useful to the respective partners." That was Hitler's opinion of all diplomats in the world.
DR. HORN: Did the Foreign Office have any influence in the Eastern territories and the territories that were under civilian administration?
VON STEENGRACHT: I have already touched on this question. I have already said that in the territories in which there was a military government or a civilian administration, a representative of the Foreign Office - if he was tolerated at all - was tolerated only as an observation post, at any rate had no functions; that was the rule.
I think I would be going too far if I went through the condition in every country. The situations varied.