Let's play a little game (Hi, Asuka!
).
One rule: Hitler is
off limits. He doesn't count.
There were 24 defendants in The Nuremberg Trial. They are the Nazi's you get to pick from.
What do I want from you, as far as participation goes?
Well, if you care to play this little game, I want you to choose your top 3 Nazi's out of the 24. And tell me
why.Your choices can be based on character, charisma, the level of the depravity of the crimes they oversaw/participated in, OR you can give me how you rank 3 of the Nazi's who were the most humane, and
least barbaric.
Will you play? Think of it like a twisted form of Fantasy Football. Perhaps this game will evolve into something
more in time.
I'll tell you
mine if you tell me
yours.
Get creative! Try and be original-- because anyone can pick the more well-known Nazi's, and forget the lesser-known (and perhaps more evil) ones.
Below are the 24 defendants in question:
MARTIN BORMANN
Successor to Hess as Nazi Party Secretary. Sentenced to death in absentia. Remains found in Berlin in 1972 and eventually dated to 2 May 1945 (per Artur Axmann's account); committed suicide or was killed while trying to flee Berlin in the last few days of the war.
Memorable quote:
"My darling girl, unfortunately, this earth is not a fairy-land, but a struggle for life, perfectly natural and therefore extremely harsh. All the same, or precisely for this reason, it is happiness and comfort for us men to have a precious sweetheart - and I have the most precious, the dearest and best of all!"Guilty of: Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death (in absentia)
HANS FRANK
Reich Law Leader 1933–45 and Governor-General of the General Government in occupied Poland 1939–45. Expressed repentance. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "This war would be only a partial success if the whole lot of Jewry survived it, while we shed our best blood to save Europe. My attitude toward the Jews will therefore be based solely on the expectation that they must disappear. They must be done away with. Gentlemen, I must ask you to rid yourself of all feeling of pity. We must annihilate the Jews wherever we find them and wherever it is possible."Guilty of: Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
WILHELM FRICK
Hitler's Minister of the Interior 1933–43 and Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia 1943–45. Co-authored the Nuremberg Race Laws. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "Hitler was undoubtedly a genius but he lacked self-control. He recognized no limits. Otherwise the thousand-year Reich would have lasted more than twelve years."Guilty of:Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
HERMANN GÖRING
Reichsmarschall, Commander of the Luftwaffe 1935–45, Chief of the 4-Year Plan 1936–45, and original head of the Gestapo before turning it over to the SS in April 1934. Originally the second-highest-ranked member of the Nazi Party and Hitler's designated successor, he fell out of favor with Hitler in April 1945. Highest ranking Nazi official to be tried at Nuremberg. Committed suicide the night before his scheduled execution.
Memorable quote: "I have no conscience, Adolf Hitler is my conscience."Guilty of:Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
ALFRED JODL
Wehrmacht Generaloberst, Keitel's subordinate and Chief of the OKW's Operations Division 1938–45. Signed orders for the summary execution of Allied commandos and Soviet commissars. Signed the instruments of surrender on 7 May 1945 in Reims as the representative of Karl Dönitz. Hanged 16 October 1946. Posthumously rehabilitated in 1953, which was later reversed.
Memorable quote: "Yes, I'm very normal, everything is okay, I won't become a psychiatric case."Guilty of:Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
ERNST KALTEBRUNNER
Highest-ranking SS leader to be tried at Nuremberg. Chief of RSHA 1943–45, the Nazi organ comprising the intelligence service (SD), Secret State Police (Gestapo) and Criminal Police (Kripo) and having overall command over the Einsatzgruppen. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "When I saw the newspaper headline 'Gas Chamber Expert Captured' and an American lieutenant explained it to me, I was pale in amazement. How can they say such things about me? I told you I was only in charge of the Intelligence Service from 1943 on. The British even admitted that they tried to assassinate me because of that, not because of having anything to do with atrocities, you can be sure of that."Guilty of: Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
WILHELM KEITEL
Head of Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW) and de facto defence minister 1938–45. Known for his unquestioning loyalty to Hitler. Signed numerous orders calling for soldiers and political prisoners to be executed. Expressed repentance. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "Death by hanging. That, at least, I thought I would be spared."Guilty of:Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
JOACHIM VON RIBBENTROP
Ambassador-Plenipotentiary 1935–36. Ambassador to the United Kingdom 1936–38. Minister of Foreign Affairs 1938–45. Expressed repentance. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "I rather liked Stalin and Molotov, got along fine with them."Guilty of:Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
ALFRED ROSENBERG
Racial theory ideologist. Later, Minister of the Eastern Occupied Territories 1941–45. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "I didn't say that the Jews are inferior. I didn't even maintain they are a race. I merely saw that the mixture of different cultures didn't work."Guilty of:Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
FRITZ SAUCKEL
Gauleiter of Thuringia 1927–45. Plenipotentiary of the Nazi slave labour program 1942–45. Hanged 16 October 1946. Defense attorney: Robert Servatius.
Memorable quote: "I never burned down synagogues. It was a revolution, and Russians burned churches during their revolution. If there are many different nationalities in a country, the leadership should be divided among people by percentages. In finance, press, radio - the Jews had taken over positions. That feeling existed before Hitler."Guilty of:Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
ARTHUR SEYSS-INQUART
Instrumental in the Anschluss and briefly Austrian Chancellor 1938. Deputy to Frank in Poland 1939–40. Later, Reichskommissar of the occupied Netherlands 1940–45. Expressed repentance. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "The Jews are the enemy of National Socialism. From the time of their emancipation their methods were directed to the annihilation of the folkish and moral worth of the German people and to replace a national and responsible ideology with international nihilism. It was really they who stabbed the Army in the back which broke the resistance of the Germans in the First World War. The Jews are the enemy with whom no armistice or peace can be made. We will smite the Jews where we meet them and whoever goes along with them must take the consequences."Guilty of:Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
JULIUS STREICHER
Gauleiter of Franconia 1922–40, when he was relieved of authority but allowed by Hitler to keep his official title. Publisher of the anti-Semitic weekly newspaper Der Stürmer. Hanged 16 October 1946.
Memorable quote: "Who are the moneylenders? They are those who were driven out of the Temple by Christ Himself 2000 years ago. They are those who never work but live on fraud."Guilty of:Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Death
WALTHER FUNK
Hitler's Minister of Economics; succeeded Schacht as head of the Reichsbank. Released because of ill health on 16 May 1957. Died 31 May 1960.
Memorable quote: "I am guilty of one thing - that I should have cleared out and not had anything to do with these criminals in the first place. Later it was too late. I was in up to my neck. But as for the atrocities, I had not a thing to do with them, did not know about them. And as for conspiring against peace, that is false, too. And that is my plain line of defense."Guilty of:Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: Life imprisonment
RUDOLF HESS
Hitler's Deputy Führer until he flew to Scotland in 1941 in an attempt to broker peace with the United Kingdom. Had been imprisoned since then. After trial, incarcerated at Spandau Prison, where he committed suicide in 1987.
Memorable quote: "The party is Hitler, Hitler is Germany, and Germany is Hitler! Sieg heil!"Guilty of:Penalty: Life imprisonment
ERICH RAEDER
Commander In Chief of the Kriegsmarine from 1928 until his retirement in 1943, succeeded by Dönitz. Released (ill health) 26 September 1955. Died 6 November 1960.
Memorable quote: "The Fuehrer has shown his people that in the National Socialist racial community lies the greatest and invincible sources of strength, whose dynamic power ensures not only peace at home, but also enables to make use of all the Nation's creative powers."Guilty of:Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Penalty: Life imprisonment
BALDUR VON SCHIRACH
Head of the Hitlerjugend from 1933–40, Gauleiter of Vienna 1940–45. Expressed repentance. Released 30 September 1966. Died 8 August 1974.
Memorable quote: "We simply believed."Guilty of:Crimes against humanity
Penalty: 20 years
ALBERT SPEER
Hitler's friend, favourite architect, and Minister of Armaments from 1942 until the end of the war. In this capacity, he was ultimately responsible for the use of slave labourers from the occupied territories in armaments production. Expressed repentance. Released 1 October 1966. Died 1 September 1981.
Memorable quote: "So long as Hitler had temperamental outbursts of hate, there was yet hope for a change towards more moderate directions. Therefore, it was the resoluteness and coldness which made his outbreaks against the Jews so convincing. In other areas when he announced horrifying decisions in a cold and quiet voice, those around him, and I myself knew that things had now become serious. And with just this cold superiority he declared also, when we occasionally had lunch together, that he was set to destroy the Jews in Europe."Guilty of:Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: 20 years
BARON KONSTANTIN VON NEURATH
Minister of Foreign Affairs 1932–38, succeeded by Ribbentrop. Later, Reich Protector of Bohemia and Moravia 1939–43. On furlough since 1941, he resigned in 1943 because of a dispute with Hitler. Released (ill health) 6 November 1954 after suffering a heart attack. Died 14 August 1956
Memorable quote: "I was educated as a Christian, and at all times I have considered the Christian Church and Christian morality the foundation of the State. Therefore I tried again and again to persuade Hitler not to allow the anticlerical attitude of certain groups in the Party to become effective. In the case of excesses committed by Party organizations and individuals against the Church and the monasteries and so on I have always intervened, insofar as I was able."Guilty of:Participation in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of a crime against peace
Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Crimes against humanity
Penalty: 15 years
KARL DÖNITZ
Leader of the Kriegsmarine from 1943, succeeded Raeder. Initiator of the U-boat campaign. Briefly became President of Germany following Hitler's death. Convicted of carrying out unrestricted submarine warfare in breach of the 1936 Second London Naval Treaty, but was not punished for that charge because the United States committed the same breach. Released 1 October 1956. Died 24 December 1980. Defense attorney: Otto Kranzbühler
Memorable quote: "I would rather be reduced to having to eat earth than my grandchildren being educated and poisoned in the spirit and dirt of the Jews."Guilty of:Planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace
Participating in war crimes
Penalty: 10 years
GUSTAV KRUPP VON BOHLEN UND HALBACH
Major industrialist. C.E.O. of Friedrich Krupp AG 1912–45. Medically unfit for trial; he had been partially paralyzed since 1941. Due to an error, Gustav, instead of his son Alfried (who ran Krupp for his father during most of the war), was selected for indictment. The prosecutors attempted to substitute his son in the indictment, but the judges rejected this due to proximity to trial. However, the charges against him remained on record in the event he should recover (he died in February 1950). Alfried was tried in a separate Nuremberg trial (the Krupp Trial) for the use of slave labor, thereby escaping worse charges and possible execution.
Memorable quote: "I could only speak in the smallest, most intimate circles about the real reasons which made me undertake the changeover of the plants for certain lines of production for I had to expect that many people would not understand me."Found innocent on 3 counts
Penalty: No decision
ROBERT LEY
Head of DAF, German Labour Front. Committed suicide on 25 October 1945, before the trial began. Indicted but neither acquitted nor found guilty as trial did not proceed.
Memorable quote: "We believe on this earth in Adolf Hitler alone! We believe in National Socialism as the creed which is the sole source of grace! We believe that Almighty God has sent us Adolf Hitler so that he may rid Germany of the hypocrites and Pharisees."Found innocent on 3 counts
Penalty: No decision
HANZ FRITZSCHE
Popular radio commentator; head of the news division of the Nazi Propaganda Ministry. Released early in 1950. Fritzsche had made himself a career within German radio, because his voice was similar to Goebbels'. Died 27 September 1953.
Memorable quote: "I do not by any means want to deny that I and my fellow workers selected news and quotations following a certain tendency. It is the curse of propaganda during war that one works only with black and white. But to my knowledge it is a mistake to believe that in the Propaganda Ministry thousands of little lies were hatched out. If we had lied on a thousand small things, the enemy would have been able to deal with us more easily than was the case."Found innocent on 3 counts
Acquitted
FRANZ VON PAPEN
Chancellor of Germany in 1932 and Vice-Chancellor under Hitler in 1933–34. Ambassador to Austria 1934–38 and ambassador to Turkey 1939–44. Not charged as a war criminal at Nuremberg, von Papen was classified as one in 1947 by a German de-Nazification court, and sentenced to eight years' hard labor. He was acquitted following appeal after serving two.
Memorable quote: "Hitler didn't strive for the annihilation of the Jews - he stressed that fact in public life and in the newspapers. Hitler merely said at the beginning that Jewish influence was too great, that of all the lawyers in Berlin, eighty percent were Jewish. Hitler thought that a small percentage of the people, the Jews, should not be allowed to control the theater, cinema, radio, et cetera."Found innocent on 2 counts
Acquitted
DR. HJALMAR SCHACHT
Prominent banker and economist. Pre-war president of the Reichsbank 1923–30 & 1933–38 and Economics Minister 1934–37. Admitted to violating the Treaty of Versailles. Many at Nuremberg alleged that the British had brought about Schacht's acquittal to safeguard German industrialists and financiers; Francis Biddle revealed Geoffrey Lawrence had argued that Schacht, being a "man of character", was nothing like the other "ruffians" on trial. By 1944, he had been imprisoned in a concentration camp by the Nazis, and he was outraged to be put on trial as a major war criminal.
Memorable quote: "The Jews must realize that their influence in Germany has disappeared for all time. We wish to keep our people and our culture pure and distinctive, just as the Jews have always demanded this of themselves."Found innocent on 2 counts
Acquitted
