DR. SIEMERS: In this connection I should like to point out that the witness referred to this point because this is the only passage from this document which the Prosecution have not read. In this document the sentences about the research staff, as I noticed immediately, were not read. This research staff was what Hitler wanted to obtain.
Herr Grossadmiral, after this speech, was anything changed in your department?
RAEDER: No. The conclusion drawn was: First, that the ship construction program was to be continued in the same way as in the past—so Hitler himself said—and in the second place, he said that the armament programs were to be geared for the year 1943-1944. That was the positive thing which I could conclude for myself.
At that time, moreover, I was strongly impressed by the speech which Hitler himself made at the launching of the battleship Bismarck in Hamburg. There he said that the Wehrmacht, as the keenest instrument of war, had to protect and help to preserve the peace founded on true justice. That made the greatest impression on me at that time with regard to Hitler’s intentions.
DR. SIEMERS: Was the fleet at that time in a position to do this?
RAEDER: No. It was completely incapable.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Siemers, if there are any passages in this document which have not been read and to which you attach importance, you may read them now; and for the rest, all that the Tribunal thinks you ought to do is to ask the defendant, what his recollection was or what happened at that meeting, and if he can supplement the document as to what happened at the meeting, he is entitled to do so. The Tribunal does not intend to prevent your reading anything from the document which has not yet been read nor from getting from the witness anything which he says happened at the meeting.
DR. SIEMERS: Mr. President, I understood the witness to mean that he recalled the research staff which the Prosecution had not mentioned. Thus it came about that the witness, since he too knows the document, at the same time pointed out that the research staff was also mentioned in the document. I believe that can explain the misunderstanding. The situation is clear to me, and perhaps I may read this sentence in that connection.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, certainly.
DR. SIEMERS: Under Number 3, toward the end of the Document L-79, it says: