Goebbels at Nuremberg

[kittiesRcool]

There's lots of "WI Hitler survived" threads, but not as many dealing with Goebbels. Would the master of propaganda significantly change the dynamics at the Nuremberg Trials?

[Jokerang]

Originally Posted by kittiesRcool

There's lots of "WI Hitler survived" threads, but not as many dealing with Goebbels. Would the master of propaganda significantly change the dynamics at the Nuremberg Trials?

why would he let himself be captured anyway?

[kittiesRcool]

Maybe he tries to escape to South America but gets caught.

[informationfan]

Originally Posted by kittiesRcool

Maybe he tries to escape to South America but gets caught.

but then he will not be in nürnberg... the plot cannot work

if he escapes he will do nothing. the world will try to catch him, but like mengele he will escape

thats it... goebbels without the nazi party and power to put his mouthshit in the world is nothing, a handicaped idiot

[kittiesRcool]

No, he gets caught before he leaves Germany.

[xxmagex]

The problem is that Goebbels would have had the chance to testify. Goering did testify and by all accounts ran circles around the American Prosecutor Robert Jackson during cross-examination.
http://mnbar.org/benchandbar/2002/oct02/cross-exam.htm
http://www.adl.org/education/dimensi...n2/goering.asp


Goebbels probably could have done better than Goering during his testimony. It would have been a PR problem for the Allies. Perhaps the presence of Goebbels would cause the selection of a prosecutor who actually knew how to conduct a cross-examination.

[informationfan]

Originally Posted by kittiesRcool

No, he gets caught before he leaves Germany.

oh, sorry i misread your post

well - if he get caught, he will kill himself.
So no goebbels at nuernberg

sorry, that is near asb

[LOTLOF]

No matter how entertaining Goebbles might be on the stand there was no chance at all of his being spared. As with Goering there was a mountain of evidence against him. He would swing on the gallows, but at least his wife and children would get to live in this scenario.

[informationfan]

Originally Posted by LOTLOF

No matter how entertaining Goebbles might be on the stand there was no chance at all of his being spared. As with Goering there was a mountain of evidence against him. He would swing on the gallows, but at least his wife and children would get to live in this scenario.

nope,. magda was the real nazi...she made the decision to kill the kids, he was against it.

the bock vom Babelsberg was a dwarf with his wife, the true evil nazi woman.

so no hanging, only self murder...

[Shawn Endresen]

Goebbels can't save himself, but he can eviscerate the case against some of his "lessers", and probably would do so. He panics under pressure, but even his second-best work would do the trick. Von Schirach and von Neurath walk; Doenitz might walk.

Doenitz is clean enough that he might have a postwar career in Germany, with the Allies' blessing. I wonder what von Schirach would do with their freedom.

[Derek Jackson]

I have heard the view that Doenitz was fully aware of the Nazi Genocide campaign and accepted it.

By the way he obviously was involved in planning aggressive war.

By the way how much was Goebles in the loop about plans to start wars and murder whole peoples?

[Shawn Endresen]

Fully aware? Probably. Able to do anything about it except resign or commit suicide in protest? Nope.

He was acquitted of planning aggressive war in OTL; too junior, participated in violating Versailles but that wasn't held as criminal in itself at Nuremburg. The only thing he was convicted of was War Crimes, the sinking of civilian vessels - and you get a sharp divide on the court on that one. Allied military officers conceded that his targets were legitimate; civilians generally did not.

The balance is close enough on Doenitz that one more powerful argument could tip it; Goebbels says that he declared the targets legitimate, f'r'ex...

[torque7844]

Originally Posted by Derek Jackson

I have heard the view that Doenitz was fully aware of the Nazi Genocide campaign and accepted it.

By the way he obviously was involved in planning aggressive war.

By the way how much was Goebles in the loop about plans to start wars and murder whole peoples?

I'm pretty sure he was at least in the loop on the plans to divert food from a conquered Russia to Germany leaving millions of Russians to starve. I don't have my Shirer handy where I'm sitting at the moment but I'm pretty sure there was a reference to it there.

[xxmagex]

Originally Posted by LOTLOF

No matter how entertaining Goebbles might be on the stand there was no chance at all of his being spared. As with Goering there was a mountain of evidence against him. He would swing on the gallows, but at least his wife and children would get to live in this scenario.

A conviction isn't the issue, the legit standing of the verdict and the discrediting of Naziism in general in the eyes of the world is the important thing. That's why Georing's performance against Robert Jackson was so damaging. It raised the spectre of Nazis arguing that they had not been completely discredited.

If Georing, and Goebbels in this ATL, can claim even a moral victory it leaves a kernel of the possiblity of the Nazis rising from the ashes of post-war Germany at some point. That's why the British prosecutor David Maxwell-Fyfe demolishing of Georing in his cross-examination was so important after Jackson had his head handed to him.

BTW, there was someone from the Propaganda Ministry being tried at Nuremberg
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans_Fritzsche
The belief was that he was there as a stand-in for Goebbels.

[Cook]

Originally Posted by Derek Jackson

By the way how much was Goebles in the loop about plans to start wars and murder whole peoples?

Fully.

Goebbels planned Kristallnacht and was the member of Hitler’s inner circle most keep to invade Czechoslovakia in 1938 and Poland in ’39.

What would have been entertaining would be watching Goering and Goebbels tearing strips off each other and each blaming the other for cause and/or the loss of the war. The pair hated each other with a passion; it probably would have come to blows!

[mowque]

It would probably be a forgotten side note.

[Trotsky]

If Goebbels stood before the IMT, then even fewer people would have heard of Hans Fritzsche.

[Nietzsche]

Originally Posted by torque7844

I'm pretty sure he was at least in the loop on the plans to divert food from a conquered Russia to Germany leaving millions of Russians to starve. I don't have my Shirer handy where I'm sitting at the moment but I'm pretty sure there was a reference to it there.

...as bad and horrible as we may see it now, it was mostly common practice during the era to starve the locals, so I don't see that being any more against him than it was Goering.

[torque7844]

Originally Posted by Nietzsche

...as bad and horrible as we may see it now, it was mostly common practice during the era to starve the locals, so I don't see that being any more against him than it was Goering.

Agreed. I was just responding to Derek's question about whether Goebbels actually knew about Nazi plans to start wars and conduct mass murder.

[Joke Insurance]

Originally Posted by informationfan

but then he will not be in nürnberg... the plot cannot work

He could be extradited.