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Partly-printed DS, in German, signed “A. Jodl,” one page, 7.75 x 12, November 14, 1945. Document headed (translated), "The International Military Tribunal, Defendant's Application for Summons for Witness," made while preparing his defense for the Nuremberg trials. Jodl and his defense lawyer, Franz Exner, request testimony from "Schoch, Colonel on the General Staff," citing his knowledge of Jodl's "anti-National Socialist attitude before 1933." Jodl asserts that the testimony will "exonerate me from the accusation of having helped the NSDAP to power." Signed at the conclusion in fountain pen by Alfred Jodl, and countersigned by his defense counsel, Franz Exner. Backed by a lightweight cardstock sheet and in very good to fine condition, with light toning and dampstaining to the upper half.
The witness, Hans-Wolfgang Karl Albert Schoch, was a career German General Staff officer who had known Jodl before the Nazi seizure of power. Jodl sought his testimony to establish that he had held anti-Nazi views prior to 1933 and therefore had not helped bring the NSDAP to power. Unlike many witnesses requested by Jodl, Schoch ultimately submitted a sworn affidavit, dated June 16, 1946, that was entered into the defense record.
In his affidavit, Schoch addressed several points used by Jodl’s defense to portray him as a conventional professional soldier rather than an ideological Nazi. He testified that the much-publicized 'Alpine Fortress'—the supposed plan for a fanatical last stand in the mountains of southern Germany and Austria—had no real military substance, and he also described German operations on the Italian front as being conducted under ordinary military rules rather than pursuant to a program of indiscriminate resistance or unlawful warfare. The testimony supported Jodl’s broader effort to distance himself from Nazi political aims and criminal orders, but it did not change the outcome: the tribunal convicted him on all four counts, and he was executed on October 16, 1946.
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