FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: May I perhaps read Document Number Dönitz-4?
THE PRESIDENT: It is Dönitz-3, isn’t it?
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: I have already come to Dönitz-4. I had read from Dönitz-3. I shall now read from Dönitz-4 the entries for 17 April 1939:
“Commander of U-boats receives instructions from Naval Operations Staff to try out Base North. Naval Operations Staff considers the trying out of the base by U-36 due to sail within the next days, highly desirable. Supply goods for tanker Phoenizia in Murmansk going with fishing steamer to Murmansk on 22 November.”
It seems to me that this entry very clearly shows that that could have happened only in accord with the Soviet Union. Furthermore, I want to show that considerations as to bases...
THE PRESIDENT: Wait a minute. Dr. Kranzbühler, the Tribunal thinks you oughtn’t to make these observations on these documents which really don’t support what you are saying. Document Number 3, for instance, doesn’t bear any such interpretation, because it refers to attacks which it was suggested should be made against ships coming from Russian ports, in Paragraph 2. And equally the other document you referred to, Dönitz-4, on Page 5, doesn’t bear the interpretation which you are putting upon it.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: Mr. President, I am afraid that the contents of both documents have been presented too quickly by me. For anyone who is familiar with such war diaries, many things are self-evident which otherwise are not so easy to understand.
Document Dönitz-3 states in that part which I have read that possibilities for the establishment of a Base North exist. These possibilities can be only political possibilities, because one can establish a base in a foreign country only if that country agrees. Document Dönitz-4 shows that the base in question is Murmansk and that this base is being tried out with a supply ship, a fishing steamer, and a U-boat. That convincingly shows in my opinion...
THE PRESIDENT: The objection the Tribunal was raising was to the statement by you that the Soviet Union had agreed, and these documents do not bear out any such statement.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: I am of the opinion that in Document Dönitz-4 that can clearly be seen. It is not possible...