Davies [the American Ambassadors William C. Bullitt and Jo-
seph Davies] in support of Roosevelt threat of aggression against
Germany.”
Cynical and realistic alike, Göring declared to Gilbert that
the victors would always be the judges. “He constantly drums
into the others the idea that Germany was a sovereign state,
Hitler a sovereign ruler, and the court has no jurisdiction.”
Commenting on the charge of waging “aggressive war,” Göring
maintained that Britain, America, and Russia had all done the
same. “But when Germany does it, it becomes a crime because
we lost!” Aware of Churchill’s own plans to invade neutral Nor-
way and Sweden, which the Germans had learned about from
documents captured in , defense counsel for Keitel, Jodl,
and Göring all challenged the British government to produce
the relevant telegrams. Their request caused acute embarrass-
ment to the new, left-wing foreign secretary, Ernest Bevin, in
London. Sir Norman Brooke, the British Cabinet’s secretary,
agreed that the defense’s allegation about Churchill was true but
warned against allowing the production of isolated documents at
Nuremberg “especially when we do not know precisely what
captured [British] documents the other side may have.”
In this unequal battle the Reichsmarschall’s only support-
ers were Rosenberg and Ribbentrop. Former Nazi youth leader
Baldur von Schirach was wavering, reported Dr. Gilbert, and
Field Marshal Keitel was “afraid to talk up.” The psychiatrist ad-
vised Jackson to concentrate on winning over banker Hjalmar
Schacht and Hitler’s young arms minister Albert Speer, using
two chinks in the Reichsmarschall’s armor the Nazi atrocities,
and his acquisition of art treasures. “They spoil his pose as a
hero-patriot and model officer.”
The damning evidence of the concentration-camp atroci-
ties flabbergasted Göring. “I still can’t grasp all those things,” he