dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
DOENITZ: Thereupon, of course, I ordered him to cast off these boats, because this burden made it impossible for him to dive.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: That is the second message on Page 40.
DOENITZ: Later, he again sent a long message, describing the supplying of the Italians and Englishmen in the boat. FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER That is on Page 41, at 2310 hours. I shall read that message: "Transferred 163 Italians to Annamite."-The Annamite was a French cruiser which had been called to assist in the rescue.-"Navigation officer of Laconia and another English officer on board. Seven lifeboats with about 330 Englishmen and Poles, among them 15 women and 16 children, deposited at Qu. FE 9612, women and children kept aboard ship for one night. Supplied all shipwrecked with hot meal and drinks, clothed and bandaged when necessary. Sighted four more boats at sea-anchor Qu. FE 9619." Then there are further details which are not important.
DOENITZ: Because I had ordered him to cast off the lifeboats and we considered this general message as a supplementary later report, he was admonished by another message; and from that, the Prosecution wrongly concluded that I had prohibited the rescue of Englishmen. That I did not prohibit it can be seen from the fact that I did not raise objection to the many reports speaking of the rescue of Englishmen. Indeed, in the end I had the impression that the Italians did not fare very well in the rescue. That this impression was correct can be seen from the figures of those rescued. Of 811 Englishmen about 800 were rescued, and of 1,800 Italians 450.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Admiral, I want once more to clarify the dates of the entire action. The Laconia was torpedoed on 12 September. When was the air attack on the lifeboats?
DOENITZ: On the 16th.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: In the night of the 16th? On the 17th?
DOENITZ: On the 16th.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: On the 16th of September. So the rescue took how many days altogether?
DOENITZ: Four days.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: And afterwards was continued until when?
DOENITZ: Until we turned them over to the French warships which had been notified by us.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Now, what is the connection between this incident of the Laconia, which you have just described, and the order which the Prosecution charges as an order for destruction?
DOENITZ: Apart from my great and constant anxiety for the submarines and the strong feeling that the British and Americans had not helped in spite of the proximity of Freetown, I learned from this action very definitely that the time had passed when U-boats could carry out such operations on the surface without danger. The two bombing attacks showed clearly that in spite of good weather, in spite of the large numbers of people to be rescued who were more clearly visible to the aviators than in normal heavy sea conditions when few people have to be rescued, the danger to the submarines was so great that, as the one responsible for the boats and the lives of the crews, I had to prohibit rescue activities in the face of the ever-present-I cannot express it differently-the everpresent tremendous Anglo-American air force. I want to mention, just as an example, that all the submarines which took part in that rescue operation were lost by bombing attack at their next action or soon afterwards. The situation in which the enemy kills the rescuers while they are exposing themselves to great personal danger is really and emphatically contrary to ordinary common sense and the elementary laws of warfare. FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBt1HLER: In the opinion of the Prosecution, Admiral, you used that incident to carry out in practice an idea which you had already cherished for a long time, namely, in the future to kill the shipwrecked. Please state your view on this.
DOENITZ: Actually, I cannot say anything in the face of such an accusation. The whole question concerned rescue or nonrescue; the entire development leading up to that order speaks clearly against such an accusation. It was a fact that we rescued with devotion and were bombed while doing so; it was also a fact that the U-boat Command and I were faced with a serious decision and we acted in a humane way, which from a military point of view was wrong. I think, therefore, that no more words need be lost in rebuttal of this charge.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Admiral, I must put to you now the wording of that order from which the Prosecution draws its conclusions. I have read it before; in the second paragraph it says. "Rescue is contrary to the most primitive laws of warfare for the destruction of enemy ships and crews." What does that sentence mean?
DOENITZ: That sentence is, of course, in a sense intended to be a justification. Now the Prosecution says I could quite simply have ordered that safety did not permit it, that the predominance of the enemy's air force did not permit it-and as we have seen in the case of the Laconia, I did order that four times. But that reasoning had been worn out. It was a much-played record, if I may use the expression, and I was now anxious to state to the commanders of the submarines a reason which would exclude all discretion and all independent decisions of the commanders. For again and again I had the experience that, for the reasons mentioned before, a clear sky was judged too favorably by the U-boats and then the submarine was lost; or that a commander, in the role of rescuer, was in time no longer master of his own decisions, as the Laconia case showed; therefore under no circumstances-under no circumstances whatsoever-did I want to repeat the old reason which again would give the U-boat commander the opportunity to say, "Well, at the moment there is no danger of an air attack"; that is, I did not want to give him a chance to act independently, to make his own decision, for instance, to say to himself, "Since the danger of air attack no longer permits." That is just what I did not want. I did not want an argument to arise in the mind of one of the 200 U-boat commanders. Nor did I want to say, "If somebody with great self-sacrifice rescues the enemy and in that process is killed by him, then that is a contradiction of the most elementary laws of warfare." I could have said that too. But I did not want to put it in that way, and therefore I worded the sentence as it now stands.
THE PRESIDENT: You haven't referred us back to the order, but are you referring to Page 36 of the Prosecution's trial brief, or rather British Document Book?
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Yes, Mr. President, Page 36 of the British Document Book.
THE PRESIDENT: There are two orders there, are there not?
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: No. It is one order with four numbered parts.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, there are two paragraphs, aren't there? There is Paragraph 1 and there is Paragraph 2 of 17 September 1942.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: .I think you mean the excerpt from the war diary of the Commander of the U-boats, which is also on-Page 36 in the document book.
THE PRESIDENT: Hadn't you better read the phrase that you are referring to?
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Yes. I am speaking now of the second sentence, dated 17 September, under heading 1, on Page 36 of the document book of the Prosecution.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: The second sentence reads, "Rescue is contrary to the most elementary laws of warfare for the destruction of enemy ships and crews." That is the sentence on which Admiral DOENITZ commented just now.
THE PRESIDENT: On Page 36, the first order is an order to "All Commanding Officers" and Paragraph 1 of it begins, "No attempt of any kind must be made at rescuing members of ships . . ." Is that the paragraph you are referring to? FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER Yes, and of that I mean the second sentence, Mr. President. "Rescue is contrary to the most primitive laws of warfare for the destruction of enemy ships and crews."
THE PRESIDENT: What about the next paragraph, 17 September 1942, Paragraph 2?
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: I just wanted to put that to him. That is an entry in the war diary on which I would like to question him now. Admiral, I now put to you an entry in your war diary of 17 September; there we find: "All commanders are again advised that attempts to rescue crews of ships sunk are contrary to the most elementary 1a\vs of warfare after enemy ships and their crews have been destroyed. Orders about picking up captains and chief engineers remain in force."
THE PRESIDENT: It is differently translated in our document book. You said: "After enemy ships have been destroyed..." In our translation it is "....by annihilating enemy ships and their crews."
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: I think it should be 'by," Mr. President, not "after."
DOENITZ: This entry in the war diary refers to the radio order, the four regular radio messages which I sent during the Laconia incident and which were also acknowledged.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: One moment, Admiral. Please explain to the Tribunal first how such entries in the war diary were made. Who kept the war diary? Did you yourself keep it or who did that?
DOENITZ: Since I am not to conceal anything here, I have to say that the keeping of the war diary was a difficult matter for me because there were no reliable officers available for this task. That entry, as I suspected and as has been confirmed to me here, was made by a former chief petty officer who tried to condense my orders during the entire case into an entry of this sort. Of course, I was responsible for each entry; but this entry had in reality no actual consequences; my radio order was the essential thing.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Admiral, the decisive point here, in my opinion, is whether that entry is a record of your actual reflections or whether it is only an excerpt from the wireless order, an extract which had been noted down by a subordinate according to his best knowledge and ability.
DOENITZ: The latter is correct. My own lengthy deliberations were concerned with the order of the Naval Operations Staff, the order of the Fuehrer, and my own serious decision, whether or not I should discontinue that method of warfare; but they are not included in the war diary.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Admiral, will you explain what is meant in the war diary by the entry, "All commanders are advised again," and so on.
DOENITZ: I do not know exactly what that means. My staff, which is here, has told me that it referred to the four radio messages which I had sent; because before the Laconia case no statement on this subject had been made. "Again," therefore, means that this was the fifth radio message. FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER Thus the order of 17 September 1942 was, for you, the end of the Laconia incident?
DOENITZ: Yes.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: To whom was it directed?
DOENITZ: According to my best recollection, it was directed only to submarines on the High Seas. For the various operation areas- North Atlantic, Central Atlantic, South Atlantic-we had different radio channels. Since the other submarines were in contact with convoys and thus unable to carry out rescue measures, they could simply shelve the order. But I have now discovered that the order was sent out to all submarines, that is, on all channels; it was a technical matter of communication which of course could do no harm.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: You said that the fundamental consideration underlying the entire order was the overwhelming danger of air attack. If that is correct, how could you in the same order maintain the directive for the rescue of captains and chief engineers? That can be found under Heading 2.
DOENITZ: There is, of course, a great difference in risk between rescue measures for which the submarine has to stop, and men have to go on deck, and a brief surfacing to pick up a captain, because while merely surfacing the submarine remains in a state of alert, whereas otherwise that alertness is completely disrupted. However, one thing is clear. There was a military purpose in the seizure of these captains for which I had received orders from the Naval Operations Staff. As a matter of principle, and generally, I would say that in the pursuit of a military aim, that is to say, not rescue work but the capture of important enemies, one must and can run a certain risk. Besides, that addition was not significant in my view because I knew that in practice it brought very meager results, I might say no results at all. I remember quite clearly having asked myself, "Why do we still pick them up?" It was not our intention, however, to drop a general order of that importance. But the essential points are, first the lesser risk that the state of alert might not be maintained during rescue and, secondly, the pursuit of an important military aim. FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBt1HLER: What do you mean by the last sentence in the order, "Be harsh"?
DOENITZ: I had preached to my U-boat commanders for 51/  years, that they should be hard towards themselves. And when giving this order I again felt that I had to emphasize to my commanders in a very drastic way my whole concern and my grave responsibility for the submarines, and thus the necessity of prohibiting rescue activities in view of the overwhelming power of the enemy air force. After all it is very definite that on one side there is the harshness of war, the necessity of saving one's own submarine, and on the other the traditional sentiment of the sailor.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: You heard the witness Korvettenkapitan Mohle state in this Court that he misunderstood the order in the sense that survivors should be killed, and in several cases he instructed submarine commanders in that sense.
DOENITZ: Mohle is . . .
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: One moment, Admiral. I want to put a question first. As commanding officer, do you not have to assume responsibility for a misunderstanding of your order?
DOENITZ: Of course, I am responsible for all orders, for their form and their contents. Mohle, however, is the only person who had doubts about the meaning of that order. I regret that Mohle did not find occasion to clarify these doubts immediately, either through me, to whom everybody had access at all times, or through the numerous staff officers who, as members of my staff, were either also partly responsible or participated in the drafting of these orders; or, as another alternative, through his immediate superior in Kiel. I am convinced that the few U-boat commanders to whom he communicated his doubts remained quite unaffected by them. If there were any consequences I would of course assume responsibility for them.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: You are acquainted with the case of Kapitanleutnant Eck, who after sinking the Greek steamer Peleus in the spring of 1944 actually fired on life boats. What is your view of this incident?
DOENITZ: As Kapitanleutnant Eck stated at the end of his interrogation under oath, he knew nothing of Mohle's interpretation or Mohle's doubts nor of the completely twisted message and my decision in the case of U-386 That was the incident which Mohle mentioned when the submarine met pneumatic rafts with fliers, and I voiced my disapproval because he had not taken them on board. A written criticism of his actions was also forwarded to him. On the other hand, some authority pointed out that he had not destroyed these survivors. Eck knew nothing about the interpretation or the doubts of the Mohle order, nor of this affair. He acted on his own decision, and his aim was not to kill survivors but to remove the wreckage; because he was certain that otherwise this wreckage would on the following day give a clue to AngloAmerican planes and that they would spot and destroy him. His purpose, therefore, was entirely different from the one stated in the Mohle interpretation.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Eck said during his examination that he had counted on your approval of his actions. Did you ever hear anything at all about the Eck case during the war?
DOENITZ: No. It was during my interrogation here that I heard about it, for Eck was taken prisoner during that same operation.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Do you approve of his actions, now that you know of them?
DOENITZ: I do not approve his actions because, as I said before, in this respect one must not deviate from military ethics under any circumstances. However, I want to say that Kapitanleutnant Eck was faced with a very grave decision. He had to bear responsibility for his boat and his crew, and that responsibility is a serious one in time of war. Therefore, if for the reason that he believed he would otherwise be spotted and destroyed-and that reason was not unfounded, because in the same operational area and during the same time four submarines, I think, had been bombed-if he came to his decision for that reason, then a German court-martial would undoubtedly have taken it into consideration. I believe that after the war one views events differently, and one does not fully realize the great responsibility which an unfortunate commander carries.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Apart from the Eck case did you, during the war, or after, hear of any other instance in which a U-boat commander fired on shipwrecked people or life rafts?
DOENITZ: Not a single one.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: You know, do you not, the documents of the Prosecution which describe the sinking of the ships Noreen Mary and Antonico? Do you or do you not recognize the soundness of these documents as evidence according to your experience in these matters?
DOENITZ: No. I believe that they cannot stand the test of an impartial examination. We have a large number of similar reports about the other side, and we were always of the opinion, and also stated that opinion in writing to the Fuehrer and the OKW, that one must view these cases with a good deal of skepticism, because a shipwrecked person can easily believe that he is being fired on, whereas the shots may not be aimed at him at all, but at the ship, that is, misses of some sort. The fact that the Prosecution gives just these two examples proves to me that my conviction is correct, that apart from the Eck case no further instances of this kind occurred during those long years in the ranks of the large German U-boat force.
FLOTTENRIGHTER KRANZBUEHLER: You mentioned before the discussion with the Fuehrer in May 1942, during which the problem whether it was permissible to kill survivors was examined, or at least touched upon by the Fuehrer. Was' that question reexamined at any time by the Commander-in-Chief of U-boats or the Naval Operations Staff?
DOENITZ: When I had become Commander-in-Chief of the Navy . . . FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER That was in 1943?
DOENITZ: I think in the summer of 1943 I received a letter from the Foreign Office in which I was informed that about 87 percent of the crews of merchant ships which had been sunk were returning home. I was told that was a disadvantage and was asked whether it was not possible to do something about it. Thereupon I had a letter sent to the Foreign Office in which I wrote that I had already been forced to prohibit rescue because it endangered the submarines, but that other measures were out of the question for me.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: There is an entry in the War Diary of the Naval Operations Staff which deals with this case. I submit this entry as DOENITZ-42, on Pages 92 to 94 in Volume II of the document book. I shall read as introduction the first and second sentences of Page 92. The entry is dated 4 April 1943. "The German Foreign Office pointed out a statement of the British Transport Minister according to which, following sinkings of merchant vessels, an average of 87 percent of the crews were saved. On the subject of this statement the Naval Operations Staff made a comprehensive reply to the Foreign Office." Then there is the reply on the next pages, and I should like to call to your attention a part of it first, under Heading 1, about the number of convoy ships sunk. What is the importance of that in this connection?
DOENITZ: That so many people certainly returned home.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Furthermore, under Heading 2, it is mentioned that the sailors do not need a long period of training, with the exception of officers, and that an order for the picking up of captains and chief engineers already existed. What is the meaning of that?
DOENITZ: It is intended to emphasize that a matter like that is being judged in the wrong light.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: One moment, Admiral. By "a matter like that," you mean the usefulness, from a military point of view, of killing the shipwrecked?
DOENITZ: I mean that crews were always available to the enemy; or unskilled men could very quickly be trained. FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER Under Heading 4, you point to the great danger of reprisals against your own submarine crews. Did such reprisals against German U-boat crews occur at any time in the course of the war?
DOENITZ: I do not know. I did not hear anything about reprisals in that respect. I only received reliable reports that when U-boats were bombed and destroyed from the air, the men swimming in the water were shot at. But whether these were individual acts or reprisals carried out on orders, I do not know. I assume they were individual acts.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: The decisive point of the entire letter seems to be in Heading 3; I shall read that to you: "A directive to take action against lifeboats of sunken vessels and crew members drifting in the sea would, for psychological reasons, hardly be acceptable to U-boat crews, since it would be contrary to the innermost feelings of all sailors. Such a directive could only be considered if by it a decisive military success could be achieved." Admiral, you yourself have repeatedly spoken about the harshness of war. Are you, nevertheless, of the opinion that psychologically the U-boat crews could not be expected to carry out such an order? And why?
DOENITZ: We U-boat men knew that we had to fight a very hard war against the great sea powers. Germany had at her disposal for this naval warfare nothing but the U-boats. Therefore, from the beginning-already in peacetime-I trained the submarine crews in the spirit of pure idealism and patriotism. That was necessary, and I continued that training throughout the war and supported it by very close personal contacts with the men at the bases. It was necessary to achieve very high morale. very high fighting spirit, because otherwise the severe struggle and the enormous losses, as shown on the diagram, would have been morally impossible to bear. But in spite of these high losses we continued the fight, because it had to be; and we made up for our losses and again and again replenished our forces with volunteers full of enthusiasm and full of moral strength, just because morale was so high. And I would never, even at the time of our most serious losses, have permitted that these men be given an order which was unethical or which would damage their fighting morale; much less would I myself ever have given such an order, for I placed my whole confidence in that high fighting morale and endeavored to maintain it.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: You said the U-boat forces were replenished with volunteers, did you? D(5NITZ: We had practically only volunteers.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBUEHLER: Also at the time of the highest losses?
DOENITZ: Yes, even during the time of highest losses, during the period when everyone knew that he took part in an average of two missions and then was lost.