FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: When, at what stage, did the military use of enemy merchant ships become clear to the Naval Operations Staff?
WAGNER: The fact that enemy merchant vessels were armed became clear after a few weeks of the war. We had a large number of reports about artillery fights which had occurred between U-boats and armed enemy merchant ships. Certainly one, and probably several boats were lost by us. One British steamer, I think it was called Stonepool, was praised publicly by the British Admiralty for its success in combating submarines.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: The Tribunal already has knowledge of the order of 4 October allowing attacks against all armed merchant ships of the enemy and also of the order of 17 October allowing attacks on all enemy merchant ships with certain exceptions.
Were these orders the result of experiences which the Naval Operations Staff had regarding the military use of enemy merchant ships?
WAGNER: Yes, exclusively.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: Both orders contain exceptions favoring passenger ships. They were not to be attacked even when they were members of an enemy convoy. To what were these exceptions due?
WAGNER: They were due to an order from the Führer. At the beginning of the war he had stated that Germany did not have any intention of waging war against women and children. He wished, for that reason, that also in naval war any incidents in which women and children might lose their lives should be avoided. Consequently, even the stopping of passenger ships was prohibited. The military necessities of naval warfare made it very difficult to adhere to this order, particularly where passenger ships were traveling in enemy convoys. Later on, step by step, this order was altered as it became evident that there was no longer any peaceful passenger traffic at all and that enemy passenger ships were particularly heavily armed and used more and more as auxiliary cruisers and troop transport ships.
FLOTTENRICHTER KRANZBÜHLER: Were the orders of the German Naval Operations Staff regarding the combating of armed enemy ships and later enemy ships as a whole made known to the British Admiralty?
WAGNER: Neither side made its war measures known during the war, and that held true in this case also. But in October the German press left no doubt whatsoever that every armed enemy merchant ship would be sunk by us without warning, and later on it was equally well known that we were forced to consider the entire enemy merchant marine as being under military direction and in military use.
These statements by our press must no doubt have been known to the British Admiralty and the neutral governments. Apart from that, and I think this was in October, Grossadmiral Raeder gave an interview to the press on the same theme.