COL. PHILLIMORE: My Lord, I have about three questions.
THE PRESIDENT: Very well.
COL. PHILLIMORE: [Turning to the witness.] When you were a U-boat commander yourself, what was the order with regard to rescue?
MOEHLE: At the beginning of the war we had been told that the safety of one’s own boat was the decisive thing, and that the boat should not be endangered by rescue measures. Whether these orders already existed in writing at the outbreak of the war I do not remember.
COL. PHILLIMORE: When you got this order of the 17th of September 1942, did you take it merely as prohibiting rescue or as going further?
MOEHLE: When I received that order I noticed that it was not entirely clear, as orders of the B. d. U. normally were. One could see an ambiguity in it.
COL. PHILLIMORE: You have not answered my question. Did you take the order to mean that a U-boat commander should merely abstain from rescue measures, or as something further?
MOEHLE: I took the order to mean that something further was implied, only it was not actually ordered but was considered desirable.
COL. PHILLIMORE: The instance you were given about the Bay of Biscay, had you any knowledge of the facts of that incident?
MOEHLE: No, the circumstances of that case are not known to me.