The IHR, an independent, public interest history research and publishing center, seeks to promote peace and freedom through greater awareness of the past.
Zyklon B, Auschwitz, and Bruno Tesch Skip to main content INSTITUTE FOR HISTORICAL REVIEW You are hereHome Zyklon B, Auschwitz, and Bruno Tesch by William B. Lindsey We still have judgment here, that we but teach Bloody instructions, which being taught return To plague th' inventor. This even handed justice Commends th'ingredience of our poison'd chalice To our own lips. -- Shakespeare, Macbeth The Prelude to "Justice" Toward the end of World War II, the designated legal representatives of the United Nations, [1] meeting in London with Lord Wright, Chairman of the United Nations War Crimes Commission, established the London Agreements to implement earlier agreements by the United Nations at Yalta and other war conferences, and to finally concretize numerous threats and warnings made by the United Nations to the Axis nations during the course of the war. Their intention was to impeach, prosecute, and punish the vanquished Germans and Japanese for crimes newly defined and delineated by the victors themselves, and to do this with tribunals created by them for that single purpose. The most atrocious crime of which the Germans were accused by the victors was that they had planned to kill all of the Jews of Europe; of the six million they allegedly succeeded in killing, four million were allegedly killed in gas chambers constructed for that purpose at Auschwitz-Birkenau. To place these United Nations tribunals in their proper perspective, it is necessary to appreciate the attitude and temper of the United Nations allies toward Germany before and during these trials. Beginning at least as early as 1940, Germany's enemies -- who later, on 2 January 1942, were to take the collective name of the "United Nations" -- subjected their citizenry to an incessant bombardment of dire, doleful predictions and frightful allegations of the most horrible atrocities allegedly committed or about to be committed by Germany. But a few of the many separate sources of these allegations were: Dr. Nahum Goldman, the Polish Government-in-exile, Rabbi Stephen S. Wise, Rabbi J. H. Herz, U.S. Under-Secretary of State Sumner Welles, former Soviet Foreign Minister Maxim Litvinoff, the British Broadcasting Corporation, Mr. H. Wickham Steed (A British journalist who was active in anti-German propaganda during World War I and prior to World War II), and the U.S. War Refugee Board, organized and fully supported by President Franklin D. Roosevelt. Although presenting no concrete evidence and identifying no "eyewitnesses" (allegedly for reasons of wartime security), these charges were, as were the similar charges in World War I, generally accepted by Germany's enemies as valid -- with the largely implied pledge that the ultimate proof of these allegations would be presented at the end of the war. As the end of the war approached, almost every news release seemed to support these early accusations. With the discoveries made near the end of the war by the advancing United Nations armies of the heaps of corpses at Bergen-Belsen, Dachau, Buchenwald, Nordhausen, etc. -- corpses, incidentally, predominantly Gentile, [2] and caused by disease, hunger, etc. -- the self-righteous indignation of Germany's conquerors mounted to rage. The German government itself, now headed by Grand Admiral Dönitz, was equally appalled and vowed to see justice done. Dönitz's Flensburg regime was aghast that after the fiasco of Allied accusations against Germany in World War I and the necessity of their subsequent refutation and withdrawal under fire after the war, charges of a similar type would again be brought seriously and again believed by the same enemies only thirty years later, this time as before without thorough prior investigation. Viewing themselves quite early in the war, however, as avenging angels and anointed crusaders, expurgating and exterminating murderers and blasphemers, the United Nations conquerors thereupon reconsecrated themselves, as they had already sworn they would do, to fast and merciless punishment for anyone they deemed associated even remotely with these apparent crimes. Many United Nations protagonists, the older ones perhaps still smarting from their rebuff and rejection as a result of their false World War I charges, were certain in their own minds that this time Germany was obviously guilty of all allegations as charged -- certain without even bothering to wait for the promised proof of these allegations. In their haste, the only questions they were concerned with were when and how far the victors should go in meting out the "new" justice. The London Agreements obviously had not solved all the problems. Stalin was suggesting, as he had been for some time, the summary killing of 50,000 German "war criminals," and the Americans were to learn later that Roosevelt had, at the 1943 Teheran conference, failed to take any umbrage whatever at this proposal. Missouri Representative Marion T. Bennett, in Europe with other US Congressmen at General Eisenhower's special invitation, probably expressed the general, although not unanimous, feeling by saying: "I left Buchenwald convinced that every German must be killed." Joseph Pulitzer of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch advocated killing 1,500,000 "Nazis." Equally ominous for those Germans left alive (out of a nation originally comprising 80 million) was the announcement that four to six million of them faced trial by the United Nations as "war criminals" -- presumably under the newly decreed ex post facto fiats of the United Nations London Agreements. On 14 May 1945, the last legitimate German government was completely dismantled by Germany's new masters and its members arrested pending trial and execution or imprisonment. The last possible source of even a whimper of protest against any abuse of Germans was thus adroitly silenced forever. The Allies had been cheated of their German "hanging bee" in 1918, but now as the "United Nations" they were determined to be neither cheated nor thwarted. Thus was the stage craftily set in Germany for a series of trials by unique military or "international" tribunals, artfully conceived, contrived and convened by the victors for the sole purpose of trying and punishing only the vanquished Germans, at the victors' pleasure, for "Crimes Against Humanity" and such other "crimes" recently enunciated or to be later unilaterally enunciated by the rationalizing, legalizing apologists of the victorious United Nations. Dr. Bruno Tesch and his business manager-proxy ("Prokurist") Karl Weinbacher, who had never been members of the German government or the German armed forces, were two of the first unfortunate Germans to become enmeshed in this newly-woven web of United Nations "new international justice."[3] It was their lot to be accused by the United Nations Occupation Authorities of having recommended the use of, and knowingly supplied, the poisonous Zyklon B for the purpose of killing the 4-4 1/2 million Jews allegedly gassed at Auschwitz-Birkenau. This paper will discuss the official transcript of the British Military Tribunal which tried them and condemned them to death by hanging. Of the numerous tribunals established by the United Nations for their multifaceted motives, the first Nuremberg Tribunal -- the International Military Tribunal or IMT (also known as the Trial of Major War Criminals or TMWC), which was constituted to try the famous "first string" National Socialists -- occupied center stage as intended, often eclipsing the events of other tribunals sitting at the same time. As a result of this, one fails often to realize that these less-publicized "side" tribunals usually provided the Nuremberg Tribunals (both the IMT and the series of American-run Nuremberg Military Tribunals, or NMT) with much of the basic material used to formulate the concepts and support the arguments advanced by Robert H. Jackson, Telford Taylor and other United Nations prosecutors in their assignments at Nuremberg. In time, these concepts and arguments have, with some modifications necessitated already then by early revisionist research, congealed into what has become the monolithic corpus of the "Holocaust" gospel. Pre-eminent in these side tribunals was the British Lueneburg Tribunal which undertook the trial of the Birkenau SS staff, whom the British Army had captured at the Bergen-Belsen Jewish transit camp. (See note 2.) This tribunal sat from 17 September 1945 to 17 November 1945, and at times its sensational headlines jeopardized the intended place of the Nuremberg IMT show on the front pages of the world's newspapers. It was at this British Military Tribunal that much of the "Holocaust" dogma and wartime tales of German bestiality were chiseled into the United Nations "Behistan Rock" to justify forever the United Nations acts vis-a-vis Germany. This was done by parading before the Tribunal a nondescript chorus of Yiddish voices, each chorus member seeking to gain for himself, for varied reasons, the prestigious role of a latter-day Judith or Esther, a Samson or Mordecai, and each seeking to outdo his predecessor on the witness stand with a horror tale of abuse and privation -- naturally all unsubstantiated. It was here that the first United Nations prosecutor sought to establish legal credence and respectability for the earlier rumors of German bestiality and particularly the unsubstantiated allegations that 4,000,000 Jews had been killed at Auschwitz-Birkenau. It was here that physicians Ada Bimko and Charles Bendel made their bows on the front pages of the world's newspapers before figuring in the tribunal trying Dr. Tesch and Herr Weinbacher -- and after that disappearing, but leaving behind a legacy of falsehood and confusion which became, nevertheless, a part of the unquestioned, unchallengeable litany of the "Holocaust" credo. A British officer serving the Defense at Lueneburg described these many witnesses as the dregs of eastern European ghettos; for this he was forced by the Tribunal to apologize. The British Tribunal at Lueneburg was described by Dr. Eberhard Kolb [4] in his book Bergen-Belsen as having carried out its work with "vorbildicher" (typical or exemplary) "Fairness" (fairness) -- an opinion typical of a "new" or "reconstructed" German acceptable to the United Nations conquerors. What really concerned the British Tribunal and nearly everyone else at the time was not "Fairness," not facts, not justice but: "How will you kill Kremer?" [5] The real trials had long since been completed in the newspapers, in the information bureaus and in the numerous conferences of the United Nations. Among the United Nations, there was the almost universal desire to see as many Germans as possible put to ignominious death, and these United Nations Tribunals appeared to be useful vehicles for achieving this extirpation. Others openly favored summary execution of large numbers of Germans with no trial whatever. The Bergen-Belsen Tribunal at Lueneburg and the trial of Dr. Tesch and Herr Weinbacher are to some extent unique, since they represent some of the first and last vain attempts of the accused to tell the truth and thereby clear up the multitude of preposterous wartime charges disseminated by the United Nations for obvious propaganda objectives. After the trials began, however, it soon became apparent that telling the truth was a fatal strategic error for the accused. To deny that Jews had been maliciously killed en masse by Germany in a tribunal whose very existence was based upon the intent to establish without doubt that Jews had been killed was as fatal to the defendant in 1946 as it would have been to an accused medieval heretic who before his inquisitors guaranteed his condemnation on whatever charge by throwing in for the hell of it a denial of the existence of the Trinity and the Divinity of Jesus. From the standpoint of survival, it was necessary for a witness to testify that Jews were certainly gassed, while attempting to save himself by protesting that his presence at that location or in that position entailed no responsibility and only incidental or accidental knowledge of the killings which, if observed, he was powerless to prevent. [6] Such were the deplorable circumstances on 1 March 1946, when Dr. Tesch and Herr Weinbacher were indicted and brought before the British Military Tribunal at Curiohaus, Hamburg. Tesch und Stabenow Dr. Tesch's association with Zyklon B, the product whose sale was to result in his and Herr Weinbacher's execution, began long before the war. As a gifted graduate in chemistry, physics and mathematics at the University of Berlin, he had attained the position of assistant at the world-venerated Kaiser Wilhelm Institut. Here, he became interested in hydrogen cyanide as a fumigating agent. It was effective, but quite hazardous to use because it was a liquid and was chemically unstable. In addition, it was a deadly poison for humans. But it was this very deadliness to all animals which made it a nearly ideal fumigant. It killed not only warm-blooded vermin quickly but also any eggs, larvae, pupa or adult insects which might be on the vermin or in the area being fumigated. [7] With the support of the IG Farbenindustrie, Dr. Tesch, in conjunction with Dr. Gerhard Peters, initiated research which to a great extent, circumvented the problems which previously had long prevented the widespread use of hydrogen cyanide as a fumigating agent. These problems were solved as follows: An irritant tear gas was mixed with the liquid hydrogen cyanide so as to "warn" anyone of the poison's presence.[8] After adding a chemical stabilizer, one part of this liquid was soaked into two parts of a porous, highly absorbent material so that the resulting mixture was not a liquid but solid, free-flowing granules. This product was named "Zyklon B,"[9] and the deadly fumes which evaporated slowly from the granules were called "Zyklon B gas." Chemically, this fumigating gas was nearly pure hydrogen cyanide diluted with air. Zyklon B held such promise that it was patented by the IG Farbenindustrie and the patent assigned to the DEGESCH, the DEutsche GEsellschaft fuer SCHaedlingsbekaempfung (German Society for Pest Control), and it was they who were designated by the German Government to set the safety rules and standards for its use, necessarily stringent, because of the product's extreme lethal character. The DEGESCH also authorized shipment of the product to the user from the factory only after the government regulations had been met. These regulations for using hydrogen cyanide for fumigation were relaxed only in specific instances deemed essential to the German government. For purposes of fumigation, the German military forces in both world wars were granted such a relaxation in regulations.[10] With Herr Paul Stabenow, Dr. Tesch established the company in 1923 which later became fully his: Tesch und Stabenow. Dr. Peters accepted a leading position in the DEGESCH. Tesch und Stabenow was a pest-control company much like those in this country or in England. It sold primarily its pest-exterminating services and know-how. It did not manufacture Zyklon B nor the other chemicals it used in its fumigation service, but purchased them from the factories which produced them in volume. [11] Prior to the war, Dr. Tesch's business grew rapidly, because with Zyklon B it was possible to fumigate entire ships, buildings, dwellings, mess halls, barracks, flour mills, grain elevators, railroad cars, etc.[12] successfully without damaging their contents. So long as these contents remained dry, Zyklon B gas did not harm them, and so long as the fumigated area was properly aired out after fumigation and the safety practices were followed faithfully, Zyklon B could be used satisfactorily and without danger to humans. At the same time, similar operations were being carried out in the United States by domestic companies.[13] As Tesch und Stabenow prospered, at least six other similar firms sprang up in Germany. Of all pest-control firms, Tesch und Stabenow was an international leader, if not in fact the international leader. This was a result of Dr. Tesch's careful personal training of his employees in fumigation techniques and his uncompromising refusal to relax safety regulations. In war, fumigation was even more important to Germany than in peace. Besides the many pressing needs of the Wehrmacht, the Luftwaffe, and the Navy, there were additional civilian needs. Any dwelling or building which was vacated for any reason might require fumigation before new tenants could occupy it. In addition, the camps established for the huge numbers of foreign workers and repatriated Germans from the east -- all under the care of the SS -- required frequent fumigation. The importance of these fumigation operations can further be gaged by the fact that men employed as fumigators were exempt from military draft. Of the 50 or so employees of Tesch und Stabenow at the start of the war, thirty-five were involved with fumigation operations. Herr Weinbacher himself had begun work at the company as a fumigator and had, through hard work, become Dr. Tesch's assistant. Although the fumigation/pest-control business was profitable, in war it was not without headaches. Besides the shortages of personnel, materials, equipment, etc., Tesch und Stabenow, because of the acute German manpower shortages, was assigned the additional task of assisting the DEGESCH in processing orders from those seeking to use Zyklon B. The German government made this arbitrary assignment because Tesch und Stabenow already placed regular, large orders for Zyklon B through the DEGESCH, and this simplified the government's role in policing compliance with existing government regulations and reduced the work load on the DEGESCH. As a condition of continuing as a licensed fumigator, Dr. Tesch was legally obligated to receive and process all Zyklon B orders from users east of the Elbe River. This unwelcome additional task represented a division of the paper work associated with ordering rather than of manufacturing or supplying. In a similar arrangement, areas west of the Elbe River had their orders initially processed by Hirt und Linkler before they were submitted to the DEGESCH. After checking the orders to see if potential buyers were authorized users of Zyklon B, the orders were forwarded by Tesch und Stabenow to the DEGESCH [14] where the buyer's government authorization and compliance with regulations were rechecked. Then, they were allocated whatever percentage of their order Dr. Peters [15] and his allocation committee at the DEGESCH decided upon, and the order was finally placed with the factory. Allocation was necessary because Zyklon B, like all other chemicals, was always in short supply.[16] Military orders were always given preference over civilian usage, and these orders were filled from wherever supplies might be available at the time -- east or west of the Elbe River. In performing this order-processing function, Dr. Tesch was required to pay cash immediately when an order processed by him was placed at the factory, and he received his money back plus a small commission three to four months later when the Zyklon B was delivered. For German government orders, Tesch und Stabenow received initially a fee of 10% of the gross amount of the order. This fee was set by the government. After May 1943, this fee was cut to 2 1/2%, and after 1943, the service of Tesch und Stabenow was dispensed with entirely by virtue of the Government's assignment solely to the Wehrmacht Hauptsanitaetspark (Wehrmacht Main Sanitary Depot), Berlin, the function of supplying Zyklon B to all government users. Interrogation and charge Dr. Tesch first became aware of his impending ordeal with the United Nations Occupation Authorities when a British Captain, Anton W. Freud,[17] visited him in his office with Emil Sehm, one of his former bookkeepers, and interrogated him in … truncated (90,472 more characters in archive)