RAEDER: I did not understand.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Do you remember telling the Tribunal that morning that using the enemy’s colors on a warship was a permissible ruse de guerre so long as you stopped before you went into action. Do you remember saying that?
RAEDER: Yes; of course, that is the principle which is absolutely recognized in naval warfare, that at the moment of firing you have to raise your own flag.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Are you telling the Tribunal that it is a recognized procedure in naval warfare to use another country’s colors in making an attack on a neutral country, an unannounced attack on a neutral country? There was no war between you and Norway and there was no reason for there to be any ruse. You were at peace with Norway. Are you saying that?
RAEDER: It was all a question of pulling down the flag and raising the German flag if we met the British. We did not want to fight with the Norwegians at all. It says somewhere that we should first of all try to effect a peaceful occupation.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Can you give me a precedent even where the German Navy, before this operation, had ever attacked a neutral country with which it was at peace, using enemy colors? You tell me when you did it before?
RAEDER: I do not know. I cannot tell you whether any other navy did it. I have...
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: You can assume any other navy—I even ask—have you ever done it?
RAEDER: No, we have not done it and apart from that, we did not do it because on 8 April, we gave the order by wireless—and you know from our War Diary—that this should not be done, so it is quite useless to talk here about what might have been done if it has not been done.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I wanted to get clear on what your views on the permissibility of naval warfare were. I want to come to one other point, and then I am finished with this section of the case. With regard to the attack on the Soviet Union, I am not going to ask you about all your own views and what you said to Hitler, because you told us that at length; but I would just like you to look at Document Book 10a, Page 252 of the English book and Page 424 of the German book.