Transcripts For BBCNEWS HARDtalk 20170403

Hardtalk. Welcome to hardtalk with me, zeinab badawi, here in florida, where my guest is 98 year old ben ferencz. He is the last surviving prosecutor at the Nuremberg Nazi trials. He also helped liberate the death camps of europe while serving in the us army. So does he believe that the Nuremberg Trials have made genocide and other Crimes Against Humanity less likely to be committed in The World Today . Ben ferencz, welcome to hardtalk. You were born in 1920 in transylvania in central europe. You moved to the United States with your family when you were a little baby. You really epitomise the american dream, a kind of Rags To Riches story, because it was discovered that you were highly intelligent and you were put on a fast track to Harvard Law School. We arrived in america. My parents were young immigrants fleeing persecution and poverty. No money, no skills, no language. And lucky to have some friendly new yorker offer us, my father, who had been trained as a shoemaker, but they didnt need any boots made in new york, there were no cobblers. But the owner of a building offered us the opportunity to sleep in the cellar and my father would be the janitor. Thats where we began, and thats where my memory begins, in a high crime density area known for good reason as hells kitchen. There was a lot of crime there. Is that what excited your interest in law and pursuing a career in law . It excited my interest in not being on the criminal side, lets put it that way, there was crime all around. I had made up my mind early that i didnt want to be a cowboy and i didnt want to be a fireman and i didnt want to be a crook either, so that pretty much left me to go to law and ive focused on it ever since. After you graduated from Harvard Law School in i9a3, you joined the us military and joined a battalion preparing for the invasion of france. What are your key recollections of that time . I enlisted wherever i could get into the army, i was a private, the lowest rank you could get, assigned to be in the artillery battalion. And in that capacity we landed on the beaches of normandy. France was occupied by the germans. The only way to move the war forward and to get rid of the war was to defeat the germans. I sailed from lands end at the tip of england across to omaha beach, which was still. Had been cleared by the time i got there a bit. But there were many soldiers in american uniform still lying in the sea face down. There were many armoured vehicles still in the water and we had to push on from there into france and defeat them. There was heavy artillery all the way. Many battles all the way. And it was only when we got into the german occupied, and germany itself, that we began to encounter possible war crimes. As nazi atrocities were uncovered you were transferred to a newly created War Crimes Branch of the army to gather evidence of nazi brutality and apprehend the War Criminals. You entered the death camps, like buchenwald for instance, and you described how you saw scenes from hell. Describe to us what you saw. I can describe it vividly because the recollection is very strong in my mind but at the same time you cant understand what it is like because the rational human mind cant quite grasp it. Coming into buchenwald for example, dead bodies lying all on the ground, you cant tell if theyre dead or alive. Skeletons dressed in just rags which had at one time been part of their work uniform with a triangle indicating they were jews, homosexuals, communists or whatever. Everybody is running in different directions. The ss is trying to run out. A scene like a pile of rubbish the size of this room and in it inmates grovelling like rats for a bite of food and picking out garbage and sticking it into their mouths. The smell of foul flesh burning. Crematoria with stacks of human bodies looking like bones stacked one on top of the other while they are shovelled into a crematorium and turned into ash and the fat is used for making soap and their ashes are used as fertiliser. The ss is running out, occasionally getting caught and beaten to death by the inmates, that were still able to do anything about it. I wrote somewhere that i had peered into hell. I think hell would be paradise compared to what i saw. Are the memories of what you saw still very vivid for you . Yes, i dont like to talk about them much because i have difficulty controlling my own emotions. In i9a5 you left the us army, returned to new york and prepared to practise law, but shortly after that you were recruited for the nuremberg war crimes trials, the International Military tribunal prosecution against the likes of Hermann Goring and other leading nazis were already in progress. What was your reaction when you were asked to be part of that process . When the war was over, i came back, along with 10 million other soldiers, looking for a job. I graduated from the Harvard Law School and i passed the bar but i had no clients of any kind. I was pleased to get a telegram from the pentagon inviting me to come to the pentagon and they wanted to talk to me. I arrived there and they said dear sir, they had never called me sir before, they wanted me to go back to germany to help with war crimes trials. I had done that during the war days. The last several months in the war as we occupied portions of germany and france that had been occupied, we ran into examples of crimes of all kinds, the most obvious ones, what we called the allied flyer cases, very little is known about that. Flyers were being shot down in german held territory were almost invariably beaten to death by the german mob. It was part of our first War Crimes Cases so i had that kind of experience with me when i left the army. I took that back to germany when i agreed with some hesitation to go back to germany and help with trials which would follow the International Military tribunal. Why did you hesitate . Was it because you didnt want to. . Its a horrible experience for anyone. Germany was associated in my mind with atrocity and terrible crimes, i didnt want to go back to germany. This is horror glorified. Nothing heroic about it at all. It shows how human beings can be debased in times of war. So you did go back to germany and you scoured nazi offices and archives and trying to find evidence of the nazi atrocities by german doctors, officers, lawyers, judges and generals. It was quite all pervasive, wasnt it, the people that were involved in the atrocities. The United States in particularfelt the International Military tribunal trial against Hermann Goring was just a camera shot of a small sampling, and in order to really understand how a civilised country like germany could commit and tolerate the kind of atrocities that were committed, you should understand the position that doctors who perform medical experiments, the lawyers and judges that perverted the law, the ss murderers of course that did the killings, the industrialists that were working people to death. All of these were specific groups. So the United States said let us take a sampling from each of these groups to help us understand it. So i went to berlin with a team of about 50 people, scoured through all of the archives, miles of nazi documents, to gather the evidence to cover the Broad Spectrum of german society, which basically was responsible for the crimes. In previous interviews you described how in gathering Witness Testimonies you did resort to duress, for instance lining up villagers and threatening to shoot them if they lied. I mean, such methods now would amount to witness harassment of the most extreme order. Perhaps it would. But its only because the people that make the allegations dont understand what war is about. If i bring a room of 20 people, and this is an actual case, and line them up, and say i want you to all write out exactly what happened, what your role was, what others did, anybody who lies will be shot. Oh, how can you do a thing like youre threatening them with torture what am i going to tell them . Anybody who lies wont get his patty cake tonight . What do you want me to tell them . Please be honest, please confess that youre a murderer, please do that. I dont want to have to threaten you with anything. What are you talking about . Theres a war going on. Theyd kill you if you could, they were killing some of your buddies before, thats why theyre standing there. So what am i going to do . I didnt shoot them, but i threatened to, and thats the only weapon i had. And if that be torture then call me a torturer. So you became the Chief Prosecutor for the United States at one case in nuremberg, the einsatzgruppen case. Described by the Associated Press news agency as the biggest murder trial in history. 22 nazi War Criminals who were part of these death squads, Shooting More Thani million people, most of them civilians. It was quite a responsibility for a young man, you were only 27, to take. And in fact, just before you talk to me about that, i just want to show you, this is you at the Nuremberg Trials. The leading judge, michael musmanno, pre recorded in pennsylvania. These are the defendants. 22 defendants. Each one charged with mass murder. All of them pleaded not guilty. No one ever showed any sign of remorse whatsoever. I remember very well what i said. May it please your honours, it is with sorrow and with hope that we here disclose the murder of over a million innocent and defenceless men, women and children. File vengeance is not our goal. Nor do we seek merely just retribution. We ask this court to affirm, by International Penal action, mans right to live in peace and dignity, regardless of his race or creed. The case we present is a plea of humanity to law. That these men who wrote the darkest page in human history, people were murdered because they didnt share the race and colour and the ideology of their executioners. I thought it was horrible then, i think it is horrible now. And i appealed for the rule of law, which would in future protect people from that type of atrocity. When you look at that picture of you, though i mean, 27 years of age, Chief Prosecutor in the nuremberg process. That was an accident, that i was the Chief Prosecutor. One of my researchers, i had about 50 of them in berlin, came across the daily reports from the front of the special extermination squads, whose job it was to kill, without pity or remorse, every single jewish man, woman and child they could lay their hands on, including the same for gypsies, and any other perceived or suspected opponent of the reich. No such process had been planned. I flew down to nuremberg to talk to the general who was in charge and he said we cant put on this trial now, because of all the lawyers are already assigned. The trial is in progress, the pentagon hasnt approved it, i doubt if they will approve it, and i have in my Hand Evidence of mass murder on a scale never before seen in human history. You cant let these guys go. You said you wanted to prosecute the officers. You werent as interested in the foot soldiers, you wanted to get the educated officers among them. Its very hard for the public today to understand. The special extermination squad, einsatzgruppen, the german word means action groups. They were 3,000 men. I selected at least 3,000, all of whom were complicit in mass murder, i selected those based on severalfactors. First of all, we had to have them in captivity. If youve got the evidence and you havent got the prisoner, youve got nothing. I want a list of everybody who was an einsatzgruppen member, from all of our intelligence services, sent down immediately to nuremberg. I went over the list, i picked those of the highest rank, and then checked out their background, from the nazi party records, which we captured in berlin. Those who had doctor degrees, and had or generals, they got priorities. I picked out 22, not 21 or 28, because we only had 22 seats in the dock. Is that absurd . Of course its absurd. There were only 22 seats in the dock for the Hermann Goering trial, so we have a selection. Thats all it is. Of the 22 who you tried in the einsatzgruppen case, about a dozen were given death sentences, four were actually executed. The others remained in prison, but only for a few years, until an agreement, a deal, was made between the american and german governments, and they were released. So it wasnt. It wasnt that formalistic. The political atmosphere had changed. General george patton, who was my commander, Made A Speech In London to a womans group before the war was over, in which he said we have fought the wrong enemy. We should not have been fighting the germans, we should have been fighting the russians. While the war was on, an American General americans were still being killed in battle, and the russians were being slaughtered indicated the change of political scene in the United States. A conservative group was saying, why we are getting involved in this, this crime against the germans . We need the germans. The british were particular keen about not executing some of the german generals that the british army wanted. So the political pressure was such, together with some feeling of amnesty, for humanitarian considerations. They stopped the trials, they released the people who were there, and then began to rehire people like wernher von braun, who knew about rockets, and some of his deputies came to the United States, as they had the new rocket science. So when the trial that you presided over at nuremberg was hailed as a success, as some did at the time, it cant really be described as that. Some of those who were found guilty were subsequently released. I was of course disappointed, but i never anticipated or tried to do justice, in the broad sense of holding every criminal accountable. It would have been a practical impossibility. So i was careful in the selection of having the men in custody, having high rank, having good education, having absolute proof, beyond any doubt, of his guilt. I had his report, top secret, to his commanders, saying how many people executed. They were not quite accurate. They exaggerated the body count. So more how many more they killed. Then they said it was against our will, superior orders. Baloney. Was it baloney . They were ordered to kill all the jews, but they wanted to brag. They said how many they killed. You said the lessons, if we do not devote ourselves to developing effective world law, the same inhumanity which made the holocaust possible might one day destroy the entire human race. So today, so many years later, here you are in your 98th year. As you look around you at the world, the conflicts that have happened in recent times, what is your assessment . Have we made progress . We have made progress. We have not learned the lesson of nuremberg. We have made progress, i will come back to it. But first let me emphasise the fact, i learnt that war makes murderers, mass murderers, out of otherwise decent people. And it applies to all wars and all nationalities, and i have seen it. In all the wars, these are not wild animals, or out for blood. These are patriots, who are trying to do their duty, to protect either their religion or their nationality or the economic security. These are the three major causes. We have not learned that you cant kill an ideology with a gun. We still go at it with the same stupid approach, of spending all of your assets on building weapons and more weapons, to kill more people, and depriving people of the things they need to eliminate the fears which they have in their life. The man who is desperate, who has nojob, who has no money, if the money spent on weapons could be spent on eliminating the cause of his discontent, is not going to risk his life and go out and kill people the way they do today. So you were very instrumental in the setting up of the International Criminal court, which was established by the rome statute in 1998. Do you think that has really helped prevent Crimes Against Humanity, war crimes . Do you think it has stopped these crimes being committed with impunity . It has helped, but not enough. Certainly the existence of laws prohibiting certain behaviour has some deterrent effect, but we have to bear in mind that, for centuries, we have glorified warmaking. Ever since David Hit Goliath in the head with a rock, we have glorified with praise and watching no politician appears without flags flying on both sides, and the band is going and marching. And i was a soldier, and i know, and they gave me all the battle stars, and they gave me all the decoration of war and all that stuff. We have to reverse those thousands of years, because the world has changed. We are not throwing rocks anymore. We are going to kill everybody. From cyberspace, we can cut off the electrical grid of any city on the planet. Are you all crazy . You are standing there watching it happen. The students dont have money to pay tuition, the refugees have no homes to go to, the old people are dying because they cant afford medical care, and you are pouring billions of dollars every day into killing machines. What, in your long life and career, have you learned about the nature of evil, and human beings capacity to commit the most unspeakable, horrific acts against their fellow human beings . Well, i have learnt simply, it is very obvious, that people in very high places, people of good education and high rank, are quite competent at becoming mass murderers, against any group that they think threatens either their nationality or their religion or their economic circumstances. I have seen that. These are not crimes committed by devils with horns. These are committed by educated, well intentioned, patriotic people. But we have to change the hearts and minds of people, so that they recognise that it is not cowardice to be willing to compromise, and to be conciliatory, and be compassionate when you are dealing with people who have other points of view. And i know that it takes courage not to be discouraged. But we have got to have that kind of courage, because it is a tough job, and it will take a long time, and we have to begin in the cradle. So this re education of the human spirit and the human mind, on a worldwide basis, is the task before us, and we are doing it. Look at the emancipation, with those limitations, of the black man. Look at the emancipation of women. Look at marriage. A man can marry a man, a man can become a woman. 0ur realities today, 25 years ago they said, you are out of your mind. And i say dont give up. Law is always better than war, and that is my firm opinion, no matter if you get a bad decision. Law is always better than war. Murder is terrible, and there are three ways of preventing it. 0ne, never give up. Two, never give up. Three and then i hear the echo from the audience, never give up. Ben ferencz, thank you very much for coming on hardtalk. It has been a pleasure. I hope you all dont enjoy it, but think about it. Thank you. Morning. Weve got some rain working its way in from the west but, but before we take a look at that, lets look back at some of the highlights of monday. A beautiful weather watchers picture sent in from cambridgeshire. A lovely afternoon, and we saw highs here of 18 degrees. But the storm clouds gathered in argyll and bute. A very atmospheric shot here. And thats because the rain arrived from the west. Now, its fairly fragmented and its moving somewhat erratically eastwards over the next few hours, perhaps sitting towards dawn in the south east corner. Behind it, some clearer skies, a fresher start to the day across scotland and Northern Ireland. More cloud, though, into the south west. And for wales, the odd spot or two of rain still at eight oclock in the morning. The bulk of the rain probably sitting across the south coast up into 0xfordshire, east anglia and the south east corner. But even then it will be fairly light and well fragmented. Further north, we keep a lot of cloud, Early Morning mist and murk perhaps. Decent spells of sunshine, though, for Northern Ireland and scotland. More of a breeze to the north and west, and that could continue to drift in on one or two showers through the northern and western isles. And the Wind Willjust take the edge off things, i suspect, particularly on exposed coasts. But the sunshine will break through across north west england, wales and the south west by the end of the day. Perhaps just the midlands and Eastern England which will stay pretty cloudy. And, again, still with the odd spot or two of rain. And temperatures are little subdued into the south east. Highs of around 15 degrees. Elsewhere, eight to 13 or ia as the daytime maximum. Now, if you are heading to the premier League Matches in the evening, i dont think you will be disappointed with this story. 8pm kickoff, so obviously its dark but not cold at 8 10 degrees. A similar story, it could be windy in scotland, so that will make it a little bit chilly, but it will be dry, and thats the most important thing. High pressure stays with us through the middle of the week. Weather fronts toppling over the top of that high, and it will continue to stay quite windy in scotland. In fact, on wednesday week could see gales, maybe severe gales, to the extreme north, and a scattering of showers, some of them quite heavy as well, into the far north west. Elsewhere, we start off with some decent spells of sunshine, a little bit of fair weather cloud bubbling up through the afternoon, and temperatures pegged back a little. But, nevertheless, eight to ia degrees the high. All in all, thats not too bad. And its a similar story really for the end of the working week. Thursday into friday, relatively sunny, a little bit of cloud into the afternoon. Putin lays flowers near the scene of the Saint Petersburg metro blast. Ii people died. Authorities say it is a terrorist attack. Translation there was a big bang. It was deafening. I was sitting next to Metal Railing and i think it saved my life. Everybody was knocked in One Direction by the blast. 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