dtufail/nuremberg-trials-corpus huggingface dataset:
RAEDER: Not at all I must repeat that I was connected with these breaches only when on 1 October 1928, I became Chief of the Navy Command in Berlin. I had nothing to do with things which had been done previously. When I came to Berlin, the Lohmann case, which you mentioned previously, had already been concluded. It was in the process being liquidated; and the Reich Defense Minister Groener when The affair was first discovered, ordered the Army as well as the Navy to report to him all breaches which were in process; and from then on he was going to deal with these things together with Colonel Von Schleicher, his political adviser. He liquidated the Lohmann affair! and this liquidation was still in progress when I came there. On 1 October 1928 he had already come to the decision to transfer the responsibility for all these evasions and breaches of the Versailles Treaty to the Reich Government, as a whole, at that time the Muller-Severing-Stresemann Government, since he believed that he could no longer bear the responsibility alone. As a result on 18 October, when I had just become acquainted with these matters, he called a cabinet meeting to which the Chief of the Army Command, General Heye, and I, as well as some office chiefs in both administrations, were called. At this cabinet meeting, General Heye and I had to report openly and fully before all the Ministers as to what breaches there were on the part of the Army and the Navy. The Muller-Severing-Stresemann government took full responsibility and exonerated the Reich Defense Minister, who, however, continued to be responsible for carrying things through. We had to report to the Reich Defense Minister everything which happened in the future and were not allowed to undertake any steps alone. The Reich Defense Minister handled matters together with the Reich Minister of the Interior, Severing, who showed great understanding for the various requirements.
DR. SIEMERS: At this cabinet meeting you and General Heye as Chief of the Agony Command submitted a list of the individual small breaches?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: And thereupon the Government told you, "We will take the responsibility"?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Accordingly, in the following years did you always act in agreement with the Reich Government?
RAEDER: Yes, the Reich Defense Minister, Groener, was extremely sensitive on this point. He had dissolved all the so-called "black" funds which existed and insisted absolutely that he should know about everything and should sanction everything. He thought that only in this way could he take the responsibility towards the Government. I had nothing whatever to do with the Reichstag. The military chiefs were not allowed to have contact with the members of the Reichstag in such matters. All negotiations with the Reichstag were carried out through the Reich Defense Minister or by Colonel Von Schleicher on his behalf. I was therefore in no position to go behind the back of the Reichstag in any way. I could discuss budget matters with the Reichstag members only in the so-called Budget Committee, where I sat next to the Reich Defense Minister and made technical explanations to his statements.
DR. SIEMERS: From 1928 on, that is from your time on, there were no longer any secret budgets within the construction program of the Navy without the approval of the Reich Government?
RAEDER: Without the approval of the Reich Government and, above all, of the Reich Defense Minister who allotted the money to us exactly as the other budgets were allotted.
DR. SIEMERS: May I ask the Tribunal in this connection to look at Document Exhibit Number Raeder-3 which has already been submitted, "Constitution of the German Reich," Document Book 1, Page 10, Article 50; it is brief and reads: "In order to be valid, all decrees and orders issued by the Reich President, including those pertaining to the Armed Forces, must be countersigned by the Reich Chancellor or the competent Reich Minister. By the act of countersigning, responsibility is accepted by the Reich Chancellor." That is the constitutional principle which the Reich Government at that time-Stresemann, Muller, Severing-insisted upon in October 1928. An important part of the building up of the Navy consisted in renewing the old capital ships and cruisers from the last war. In this connection, I take the liberty of submitting to the Tribunal Exhibit Number Raeder-7, Document Book 1, Page 23. This document deals with the so-called ship replacement construction plan. This ship replacement construction plan was, as Page 24 of the document book shows, Paragraph 2, Figure 2, submitted by a resolution of the Reichstag. I should like to refer you to Page 24, Figure 3, of the document which shows that this ship replacement construction plan covered three armored ships, and it adds that the construction might last until 1938. May it please the Tribunal, this figure is important. The Prosecution desired to construe the chance fact that in 1933 a construction plan was drawn up to extend until 1938, to mean that there were aggressive intentions. This ship replacement construction plan of the year 1930 had the same goal in 1938 and, as the Prosecution will admit, can have nothing to do with a war of aggression. The plan was submitted then, Witness, through the Reich Government and you did only the preparatory work?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Is this only true of the ship replacement plan for 1930, or was it always handled in the same way in subsequent years?
RAEDER: The plan as submitted was approved in principle by the Reichstag. Each individual ship, however, had to be approved again in the budget plan of the year in which the construction was to begin. The whole construction program was thus always in close agreement with the Reich Government and the Reichstag.
DR. SIEMERS: In connection with this ship replacement program within the framework of the documentary evidence, I. should like to refer to two points which will greatly shorten the questioning of the witness. For the time being I do not want to quote from Page 26. I ask you to take judicial notice of the rest of the contents, and wish merely to point out that this refers to the great age of all capital ships, and their replacement which this necessitated. On Page 27 of the document book it expressly mentions that the Reichstag in its 89th session of 18 June 1929 asked the Reich Government for an extension of the period for the construction program. The general opinion at that time was, as the ship replacement program shows, set out in the Frankfurter Zeitung of 15 August 1928, where the Frankfurter Zeitung points out that an armored cruiser gains its full value only when it forms part of a squadron. The Frankfurter Zeitung was, as is well known, the best German newspaper; and it was banned only in 1943 during the war by the National Socialist dictatorship which was growing ever stronger. I should like to refer to Page 29 and quote one sentence: "The building of battleships will be extended as far as possible, so as to keep the naval yards at Wilhelmshaven occupied continuously. The ideal time of construction is about three years; and it is then explained that, working on the principle of giving as long employment as possible, the building time is prolonged as much as possible." I believe this shows there was no aggressive intention, since otherwise the building program would have been speeded up. Then I ask you to take judicial notice of Page 30, the construction cost of an armored ship having a tonnage of 10,000 tons, where it mentions that it was about 75 million marks. This figure is important to me as evidence in view of the further course of the testimony, where the cost of the breaches of the Versailles Treaty avid be shown. [finally may I quote from Page 30 a few lines which give the principle for the employment of the Wehrmacht.
DR. SIEMERS: I quote: "Since carrying out the disarmament program, which so far the German Republic alone among all the Great Powers has effected, for the Wehrmacht, which serves to protect the borders and peace, the following eventualities for the taking up of arms comes into consideration: (a) defense against the stealing of territories, (b) defense of neutrality in conflicts among third parties." Burning to the defendant.] I should like to refer to the individual breaches of the Treaty of which the Prosecution has accused you. In this connection, I submit Exhibit Raeder-l, in Document Book 1, Page 1, and I refer to Page 3, Article 191. It concerns the Accusation that Germany, contrary to the Versailles Treaty, constructed submarines. Article 191 reads, and I quote, `'The construction and acquisition of all submersible craft, even for commercial purposes, is forbidden to Germany." I will soon put a question to you in regard to the established fact that the Navy was interested in a firm which dealt with the designing of submarines in Holland and in a general construction program for ships and submarines, which was being carried out in Holland; but in order to save time, it will be simpler if I read from the Lohmann affidavit which I submit as Exhibit Raeder-2, in Document Book 1, Page 4. I quote a short paragraph under 1: "According to the Treaty of Versailles, the German Reich was neither to build nor to acquire U-boats. When in July, 1922, the firm N. V. Ingenieurskantoor Voor Scheepsbouw was established in the Hague, the Navy acquired an interest in it in order to keep informed on modern U-boat construction. The intention was to use the experience gained thereby for the German Navy, when later on the conditions of the Treaty of Versailles would be annulled by negotiations and Germany would be again permitted to build U-boats. Moreover, the Navy wanted, for the same purpose, to train a small nucleus of skilled personnel.
DR. SIEMERS: The Dutch firm was strictly a designing bureau." May it please the Tribunal, as a precaution I should like to point out in this passage that there is a translation mistake in the English copy. The word "Konstruktion" has been translated "construction," and construction means "building" in German. It was not a construction bureau. As far as I know, "Konstruktion" must be translated "design." Since in view of Article 191 this point is important, I want to correct this. I quote further: "The first German U-boat was commissioned 29 June 1935. The procuring of parts to build U-boats had started correspondingly earlier." I wish to remind you that, when the first submarine was commissioned, the Anglo-German Naval Agreement, . according to which submarine construction was permitted, was already in existence. I will ask if this statement of Admiral Lohmann is correct. RAEDER: Yes. It entirely corresponds with the facts.
DR. SIEMERS: Then I come to Prosecution Document C-141, Exhibit USA-47. This is in the Raeder Document Book Number 10, on Page 22, in the compilation of the British Delegation. This is your letter of 10 February 1932 in regard to torpedo armament of the S-boats, the speed boats.
THE PRESIDENT: Is this in Document Book lea or 10?
DR. SIEMERS: Document Book 10. The old document book.
THE PRESIDENT: I've got my pages wrongly marked somehow. It is all right.
DR. SIEMERS: Please excuse me. That is how the page numbers were given to me.
THE PRESIDENT: It is correct in the other members' books.
DR. SIEMERS: The torpedo armament of speed boats was not expressly permitted in the Versailles Treaty and for that reason you are accused in this connection. Did this involve only the five speed boats mentioned in this document?
RAEDER: Yes. There were five boats which we had ordered for use as patrol boats in the ship-building replacement program and which in themselves had no armament.
DR. SIEMERS: How big were these boats?
RAEDER: Certainly not bigger than 40 tons, probably considerably smaller.
DR. SIEMERS: Were more boats of this type built during the Versailles Treaty?
RAEDER: I cannot say with certainty. In any case, we had no armed boats in addition.
DR. SIEMERS: Yes, excuse me, that is what I mean-more armed boats.
RAEDER: No. We could build 12 plus 4, which makes 16 torpedo boats of 200 tons. A torpedo boat of 200 tons could not be produced in a practical manner at that time because of the question of the motors and the question of seaworthiness. For that reason we did not build these torpedo boats for the time being but kept in service a number of quite old torpedo boats, built at the beginning of the century, in order to be able to train crews with them. We could no longer use these boats for fighting. But so that-as long as we could not replace these boats-we might have a few boats capable of action, however small, which could be of use in blocking the Baltic, I ordered that these patrol boats should be equipped to take torpedo tubes on board. However, so that in 1932 we should not make our situation worse by open breaches of the Treaty, when we hoped that at the Disarmament Conference we might make some progress, I had one boat at a time armed in order to fit and test the armament; and I then had the armament dismounted again so that there was always only one boat available with armament at any one time. We planned to put the torpedo tubes on board the speed boats only if the political situation, that is, the situation after the Disarmament Conference, would permit it. That is what I say in Number 3 in the concluding sentence.
DR. SIEMERS: I can take it then that we were allowed to build 16 torpedo boats making 3,200 tons in all?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: And instead we built only five speed boats totalling 200 tons?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Concerning the accusation made by the Prosecution that you did not count the speed boats against the torpedo boats you actually did not intend to keep anything secret; but you wanted to discuss it with the Control Commission when the time came?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Now I come to the most extensive document in regard to breaches which the Prosecution submitted, Document C-32, USA-50. The document is in Document Book 10a, Page 8; in the new document book of the British Delegation. In this list all breaches are included under date 9 September 1933. The Prosecution justly points out that this compilation is very thorough; and the Prosecution presented it just as thoroughly, although, as I believe I can prove, they are, in the last analysis small matters. I am compelled to ask the witness to answer these points in detail since they were brought up in detail. Breach Number 1 concerns the exceeding of the permitted number of mines. In Column 2 it states that according to the Versailles Treaty, that is, by the Commission, 1,665 mines were permitted; but we owned 3,675 mines. That is 2,000 too many. Will you please tell the Court the significance of this breach; it doubtlessly was a breach.
RAEDER: I should like to say in advance that this list was prepared for our Navy representative at the Disarmament Conference, so that if these things should be mentioned, he could give them an explanation. That is why it was so explicit, even though most of the things it contains are of minor importance. I should like to add to what I said previously, in regard to the danger of attacks by Poland, that in view of the political situation at that time we always feared that the Poles, if they should undertake an invasion of our country, might receive certain support from the sea by France, inasmuch as French ships, which at that time often visited the Polish port of Gdynia, could attack our coast through the Baltic entrances, the Belt, and the Sound. For this reason the defense of the Baltic entrances by mines played an important role. Thus, we undertook this breach of the Treaty in order to be able to close at least the Baltic entrances at the narrow points, which was of course possible only for a certain time. With these mines only a stretch of 27 nautical miles could have been closed. Thus, we would have been able to close a part of Danzig Bay on which Gdynia was situated, or a part of the Belt, by laying several rows of mines. This was the only method which could be effective for any length of time. This was purely a question of defense, but still they exceeded the number of mines permitted from the war supplies still available.
DR. SIEMERS: Just now in the calculation of the 27 nautical miles you included the total number which Germany had at that time.
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Not just the number which exceeded that which was permitted?
RAEDER: No, the total.
DR. SIEMERS: So that the number in excess is only half this number?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: And then I should like to have an approximate comparison. I was told, by way of comparison, that the British in the first World War laid about 400,000 to 500,000 mines in the North Sea. Do you recall if this number is approximately right?
RAEDER: Approximately it may be right. I cannot say exactly from memory.
DR. SIEMERS: I believe the approximation suffices to give a picture of the relative values. A second small question now. Is it true that for mining English ports Reich Marshal Goering's Luftwaffe in one action alone used 30,000 to 50,000 mines? Do you know of that?
RAEDER: I have heard so.
DR. SIEMERS: Then there is a second point. I quote, "Continuous storing of guns from the North Sea area for Baltic artillery batteries." This involves 96 guns, only 6 of which are of large caliber, the others of smaller caliber. May I ask you to explain this breach of the Treaty?
RAEDER: This is quite a small breach. We were allowed a comparatively large number of guns on the North Sea coast. On the other hand, according to plans the Baltic coast was comparatively bare of guns, since they wanted to retain free entry to the Baltic, whereas we had the greatest interest in closing the Baltic against attacks. For this reason we stored the gun barrels, which belonged in the North Sea but which had been brought to the Baltic for repairs, in sheds in the Baltic area for a long time in order to be able to mount these guns on the Baltic coast in case of attack. The North Sea coast had many guns; and because of the shallowness, it was much easier to defend than the Baltic coast. That was the breach.
DR. SIEMERS: In practice it only involved moving them from the North Sea to the Baltic coast. That is, not mounting them, but merely storing them.
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Then under Figure 3, another charge, "nonscrapping of guns." A total of 99 guns is mentioned of which the ten largest, of 28 centimeters, were actually scrapped. Please comment on this.
RAEDER: When we acquired new guns, as for example, for the battleship Deutschland, six 28-centimeter guns were constructed, or for the Deutschland and the cruisers, forty-eight 15-centimeter guns, we had to scrap a corresponding number of old guns. Ten of this number were actually scrapped. All the guns were turned over to the Army for scrapping and we received a receipt for them, saying that the guns had been scrapped. We learned, however, that the Army in fact had not scrapped the guns, but with the exception of the ten 28-centimeter guns, it intended to use them for arming the fortifications to be built in case of attack, since the Army had no such guns at all.
DR. SIEMERS: I should like to make the time clear. This must have been a breach of the Treaty which occurred long before the time you took office as Chief of the Navy Command.
RAEDER: This happened between 1919 and 1925 for the most part. In any case I had nothing to do with these matters.
DR. SIEMERS: Number 4 is very simple: "Deviation from the places settled by the Entente for the disposition of coastal batteries."
RAEDER: Previously, up to the time of the World War, especially the heavy batteries and the medium-sized batteries were placed very close to each other, or rather in the batteries the guns were placed very close to each other. According to our experience in the World War the heavy and medium-sized guns within the batteries were placed further apart, so that a single hit would not destroy several guns at once. For this reason we re-arranged these heavy and medium batteries and moved the guns a little further apart. For that reason they were no longer exactly in the places where they had been at the time of the Treaty. Otherwise nothing was changed.
DR. SIEMERS: Would not these things have been approved by the Control Commission because they were purely technical?
RAEDER: I cannot say, I never took part in these negotiations.
DR. SIEMERS: Number 5 concerns the laying of gun platforms for artillery batteries and the storing of A. A. ammunition. In Column 2 there is again the question of changing to a different place than that allowed by the Entente. Does the same thing apply here as to Number 4?
RAEDER: No, not completely. We wanted to put the A. A. batteries where they were particularly useful and could be fully utilized, whereas the Commission did not want to have them at these places. As a result we left the A. A. batteries where they were; but at other points we prepared so-called gun platforms, which were improvised wooden platforms, so that in case of attack from any enemy we could set up the A. A. guns in order to use them most effectively. In the same way...
DR. SIEMERS: This is only a question then of platforms for an A. A. battery, only the foundations for a defense?
RAEDER: Yes, only foundations.
DR. SIEMERS: Then comes Number 6: "Laying gun platforms in the Kiel area."
RAEDER: The Kiel area was especially bared of guns, because the entrance through the Belt to Kiel was to be as little armed and as open as possible. For this reason the setting up of guns in the Kiel area was especially forbidden; and in order to be able to set lip some guns in a hurry, in case of necessity, gun platforms were prepared there also.
DR. SIEMERS: The next point the Prosecution gives comes under Number 7: "Exceeding the caliber permitted for coastal batteries." "Coastal batteries" shows that it is for defense, but nevertheless it was brought up as an accusation.
RAEDER: Yes. It says here that instead of six 15-centimeter, three 17-centimeter guns were built. Of course, it is a deviation, insofar as the guns were to stay there; but it is open to doubt whether these six 15-centimeter guns might not have been better along the coast than the three 17-centimeter guns.
DR. SIEMERS: I see, you mean that they are actually less than the number permitted?
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Instead of five 15-centimeter there were only three 17-centimeter?
RAEDER: Instead of six.
DR. SIEMERS: Yes, instead of six only three, and the caliber was 2 centimeter larger.
RAEDER: Yes.
DR. SIEMERS: Then comes Number 8, the arming of M-boats. M-boats are mine sweepers.
RAEDER: We had the old mine sweepers which in case of attack on the Baltic were to serve the double purpose of finding the mines and of guarding the mine barrage which we wanted to lay in the exits of the Belt in order to close the Baltic, and of defending it against light enemy forces. For this reason we gave each one a 10.5-centimeter gun and one machine gun C-30.
DR. SIEMERS: Actually a minimum armament?
RAEDER: Yes, quite a minimum armament.
DR. SIEMERS: Number 9 can be quickly settled, I believe: "Arming of six S-boats and eight it-boats." The six S-boats are those which were discussed in the Document C-141?
RAEDER: Yes, it says here boats armed with torpedoes.
DR. SIEMERS: Number 10: "Setting up practice A. A. batteries." Is that a breach of the Treaty?
RAEDER: Yes, it was, after all, an A.A. battery. It was only because near the garrisons where there were barracks with our men we wanted an opportunity to practice A. A. firing exercise. That is why we set up these batteries near the barracks. There was no intention of using them in this place for defense. It was only a matter of expediency for training.
DR. SIEMERS: Then comes Number 11.
RAEDER: The individual cases are gradually becoming more ridiculous. I consider it a waste of time.
DR. SIEMERS: I am sorry, Admiral, that I must put you to this trouble; but I believe it is necessary, since the Prosecution read almost all these items into the record and wanted to put a construction on them which puts you at a disadvantage.