How would the Nuremberg trial have changed if Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels were captured?

How would the Nuremberg trial have changed if Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels were captured alive and didn’t commit suicide?

How would this have changed the arguments of the OTL defendants?

What would Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels say once put on the stand?
 
Not sure if Hitler can even survive from trial. At least they would need team of doctors if want Hitler survive to moment of hanging. And they need to guards who can stop Hitler commiting suicide. And Goebbels and Himmler too probably would try commit suicide before hanging.
 
How would the Nuremberg trial have changed if Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels were captured alive and didn’t commit suicide?

How would this have changed the arguments of the OTL defendants?

What would Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels say once put on the stand?
Himmler was apparently captured by the British in the original timeline, but killed himself anyway, whilst in British custody.
 
I don't think anything substantial would change in the existing dock. Hans Fritzche wouldn't be tried at all, and Kaltenbrunner would likely be relegated to a second-tier trial in the late 40s, though he'd still face the hangman. Probably everyone else, Goering included, would still be there.
 
I think it actually possible with those three you could see much stronger anti-suicide precautions, perhaps even something like straightjackets in the cell. Goering was a prestige candidate in the OTL ones, but here they've got the Big 3.

Hitler and Himmler would also almost certainly get the Streicher Treatment.
 
I think it would change allot

With there suicides Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels made themselves martyrs for National socialism and coming generation of Neo-nazi
but to see the three on trail, special Goebbels walking with his clubfoot, or Himmler try defense like Eichman and a sick tremulous Hitler rampages on.
that would be a hell of legacy for National socialism and not so much people would have interest in those losers...
 
I can see Hitler probably trying to claim that actions taken by the Allies during the war (bombing of civilians, unrestricted submarine warfare against Japan, etc.) were no less horrible than what Germany did and that the Allies' had no to put him on trial due to him being the legitimate head of the German state. Problem there is there's no way for anyone in Germany to remove him from power legally; about the only way he could be removed involves either a bullet or bomb. Concerning the Holocaust, while he may not have known exact details in order to create plausible deniability, he create the regime that allowed it to happen, and all other atrocities carried out by the Nazis happened under his watch. Finally, he was the one who started the war.

End result: Hitler and Himmler both go to the gallows while Goebbels MAYBE gets a lengthy prison sentence, but considering he was essentially Hitler's mouthpiece, it's more likely he's sentenced to hang as well.
 
What are the consequences for the rise of neo-nazi movements ? Would there be a sense of Hitler's martyrdom or something else ?
 
I think it would change allot

With there suicides Hitler, Himmler and Goebbels made themselves martyrs for National socialism and coming generation of Neo-nazi
but to see the three on trail, special Goebbels walking with his clubfoot, or Himmler try defense like Eichman and a sick tremulous Hitler rampages on.
that would be a hell of legacy for National socialism and not so much people would have interest in those losers...

Oh what I'd give to see some footage of that meth-addled buffoon showing his infirmity/insanity to the world in beautiful black and white....
 
Himmler was caught by the British Army. He was dressed as a common soldier and might have got away with it but got recognised and immediately took a cyanide capsule he had hidden in his mouth.
 
Himmler was caught by the British Army. He was dressed as a common soldier and might have got away with it but got recognised and immediately took a cyanide capsule he had hidden in his mouth.

He was originally captured when Brits liked Himmler's papers being too well organised. They noted his true identitet later. And then Himmler commited suicide.
 
Oh what I'd give to see some footage of that meth-addled buffoon showing his infirmity/insanity to the world in beautiful black and white....

Except you'd be giving a very public platform to a man recognized as one of the greatest orators of his day in the hopes that he'd screw it up. Maybe you'd win that gamble, with Hitler proving to be a broken half-senile old man, a mockery of the Fuhrer who once held Germany in thrall. . . and maybe Hitler would summon his demonic powers for one last series of harangues and you'd horribly lose your bet, allowing the man to control how he was immortalized in his final days.

You could be risking a great deal if you gave Hitler a final public platform to speak in his defense.
 
On the subject of thefiplomatic immunity of heads of states and other difficulties of removing Hitoer from power. These wouldn’t be a problem since the German state was declared a non entity at the end of the Second World War and replaced with a system of military governments. As such immunity would have been revoked.
 

Ramontxo

Donor
Except you'd be giving a very public platform to a man recognized as one of the greatest orators of his day in the hopes that he'd screw it up. Maybe you'd win that gamble, with Hitler proving to be a broken half-senile old man, a mockery of the Fuhrer who once held Germany in thrall. . . and maybe Hitler would summon his demonic powers for one last series of harangues and you'd horribly lose your bet, allowing the man to control how he was immortalized in his final days.

You could be risking a great deal if you gave Hitler a final public platform to speak in his defense.

And remember the Americans took Goering out of his drug habit what revived him enough for him to became quite a performer in Nuremberg. A Hitler medicated by real doctors and taken out of whatever Morell give him could use this last chance to win the historic tale...
 
I bei
The doctor would make a propaganda circus out of the trial.
I believe they managed to do that anyways when they let one of the Nazi heads (I think it was Goering) take the stand for like 30mins- an hour. Watched a history channel documentary on it. The let everyone say something on the stand...or something like that. It might have been Rudolf Hess. It was a while ago.
 
Except you'd be giving a very public platform to a man recognized as one of the greatest orators of his day in the hopes that he'd screw it up. Maybe you'd win that gamble, with Hitler proving to be a broken half-senile old man, a mockery of the Fuhrer who once held Germany in thrall. . . and maybe Hitler would summon his demonic powers for one last series of harangues and you'd horribly lose your bet, allowing the man to control how he was immortalized in his final days.

You could be risking a great deal if you gave Hitler a final public platform to speak in his defense.

And remember the Americans took Goering out of his drug habit what revived him enough for him to became quite a performer in Nuremberg. A Hitler medicated by real doctors and taken out of whatever Morell give him could use this last chance to win the historic tale...

Damn, you're both right. But, I'm morbid enough to still say I'd want to see it.

If the spirit of mankind is so fragile to give that man their ears with the smell of death still fresh on the wind, then that spirit was never worth fighting over to begin with.

Plus it'd just be good television.
 
You say that now. Have you seen man in the high Castle? I'd really rather not be in that situation...honestly I don't think it would have been as spectacular as you think. Hitler was probably too far gone, I don't really know much about the other's but I don't foresee it going on to be some testimony to either innocence or praises to the Nazi ideals...if I'm correct in my above statement it was Rudolf Hess who got the stand and gave a speech. He's lucky he made it back to his cell. I'm not sure the guards were all that happy that they had to keep them alive...one guard may have even helped one of the bigwigs commit suicide...I guess you'd have to watch the documentary. It was about 3hrs long...very interesting...lots of history book omissions. If I was writing the history books I probably would have done things a little more fairly. Eh, what's past is past. On to the alternate future discussions. We write our own history...and some of it is quite interesting I might add.
 
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