This document points out the significant effect of the seizure of power by the Nazis in 1933 on increasing the size and determining the nature of the rearmament program. It also refers to the far-reaching independence in the building and development of the Navy, which was only hampered in so far as concealment of rearmament had to be considered in compliance with the Versailles Treaty.
With the restoration of what was called the military sovereignty of the Reich in 1935 and the reoccupation of the demilitarized zone of the Rhineland, the external camouflage of rearmament was eliminated.
We have, if the Court please, a photostat of the German printed book to which I have referred, entitled Der Kampf der Marine gegen Versailles (The Fight of the Navy against Versailles) 1919 to 1935, written by Sea Captain Schüssler. It has the symbol of the Nazi Party with the swastika in the spread eagle on the cover sheet, and it is headed “Secret”, underscored. It is our Document C-156. It is a book of 76 pages of text, followed by index lists and charts. I offer it in evidence as Exhibit USA-41. I may say that the Defendant Raeder identified this book in a recent interrogation and explained that the Navy tried to fulfill the letter of the Versailles Treaty and at the same time to make progress in naval development. I should like to read from this book, if the Court please, the preface and one or two other portions of the book:
“The object and aim of this memorandum, under the heading ‘Preface’, is to draw a technically reliable picture based on documentary records and the evidence of those who took part in the fight of the Navy against the unbearable regulations of the Peace Treaty of Versailles. It shows that the Reich Navy, after the liberating activities of the Free Corps and of Scapa Flow, did not rest but found ways and means to lay with unquenchable enthusiasm, in addition to the building up of the 15,000-man Navy, the basis for a greater development in the future, and so create, by the work of soldiers and technicians, the primary condition for a later rearmament. It must also distinguish more clearly the services of these men, who, without being known in wide circles, applied themselves with extraordinary zeal and responsibility in the service of the fight against the Peace Treaty. Thereby stimulated by the highest feeling of duty, they risked, particularly in the early days of their fight, themselves and their positions unrestrainedly in the partially self-ordained tasks. This compilation makes it clearer, however, that even such ideal and ambitious plans can be realized only to a small degree if the concentrated and united strength of the whole people is not behind the courageous activity of the soldier. Only when the Führer had created the second and even more important condition for an effective rearmament in the coordination of the whole nation and in the fusion of the political, financial, and spiritual power, could the work of the soldier find its fulfillment. The framework of this Peace Treaty, the most shameful known in world history, collapsed under the driving power of this united will.
“Signed, the Compiler.”
Now I wish to invite the Court’s attention merely to the summary of contents because the chapter titles are sufficiently significant for my present purpose.
“I. Defensive actions against the execution of the Treaty of Versailles (from the end of the war to the occupation of the Ruhr, 1923).
“1. Saving of coastal guns from destruction.
“2. Removal of artillery equipment and ammunition, hand and machine weapons.
“3. Limitation of destruction in Helgoland.