You see the entry for the 26th of March:
“British landing in Norway not considered imminent. Raeder suggests action by us at next new moon, 7th of April, to which Hitler agrees. Further discussions about laying of mines at Scapa before German invasion of Norway. Hitler agrees with Raeder and will issue instructions accordingly.”
RAEDER: May I come back to it now. Here it says, the 26th of March 1940: “Occupation of Norway by British was imminent when the Russian-Finnish peace was concluded.”
That very Russian-Finnish affair was making it particularly urgent for us to carry out a landing because the danger existed that the British, under the pretext of supporting the Finns, would carry out a bloodless occupation of Norway.
Then I go on to the question of the Führer, whether a landing by the British in Norway might be imminent. One must consider that Assmann had summarized all that from war diaries, and this question is explained by the fact that the Führer wanted to know whether the situation had changed in any way, because the peace had been signed. However, the situation had not changed at all, because we knew in reality that the landings by the British were not to be carried out to help the Finns, but for other reasons. That question, therefore, whether at the time, because of the peace treaty, the British landings might be particularly imminent, was answered by me in the negative. Commander-in-Chief Navy suggests action by us at next new moon, 7th April—Führer agrees. Everything remained as before. Only the question whether because of this peace treaty we ought to land at once, I answered “no.” That is completely different from what you have been telling me.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You read out the entry for the 26th of March. What is the entry for the 26th of March? You read it out in German and we can translate it.
RAEDER: “Occupation of Norway by the British was imminent when the Russian-Finnish peace treaty was signed. Apparently, because of the treaty, it was postponed. Question by the Führer, whether at that moment a landing by the British in Norway was imminent, was answered in the negative by the Commander-in-Chief Navy....”
Yes, that did not mean that because of that we had to renounce the idea.
“Commander-in-Chief Navy suggests action by us at next new moon.” The reasons for our landing remained the same as before; only the Finnish business could no longer be used by the British.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: The peace treaty, the end of the war with Finland, had taken place in the middle of March. That was off the map at that time?