DR. SIEMERS: I now come to the charge of the Prosecution with regard to a war of aggression against Russia. The charge of the Prosecution on this subject cannot be very well understood. Land warfare only was concerned, so that the Navy did not have to make any preparations, with the exception of a few in the Baltic Sea. The Prosecution itself has furthermore stated that Raeder had been opposed to the war against Russia. The only thing which might be left of the charge of the Prosecution is its claim that Raeder had fundamentally been in favor of the war against Russia also and had only been opposed to Hitler with regard to the time factor. With reference to Document Number C-170 the Prosecution states that Raeder had only recommended the postponement of the war against Russia until after the victory over Britain. In the light of Document C-170 this actually might appear plausible. In reality, however, the case is different, and the true state of affairs has been cleared up by the detailed presentation of evidence. The witness Admiral Schulte-Mönting has clearly stated, without being contradicted in cross-examination, that Raeder not only raised objections with regard to the time but that he argued with Hitler about a campaign against Russia and did so for moral reasons and reasons of international law, because he was of the opinion that the Non-Aggression Pact with Russia as well as the trade agreement should be observed under all circumstances. The Navy was especially interested in deliveries from Russia and always tried to observe the treaties strictly. Besides this basic principle of observing treaties, that is, besides this general reason, Raeder was of the opinion that a war against Russia would also be wrong from the strategic standpoint. His own testimony and that of Schulte-Mönting show that in September, November, and December 1940 Raeder tried again and again to dissuade Hitler from contemplating a war against Russia. It is correct that in Document C-170 only the strategic justification for his opposition has been recorded. However, this is not at all surprising because in the papers of the Naval Operations Staff naturally only justifications were recorded which were of naval-technical and strategic importance, but not political reasons.
I have already shown that as a general principle Hitler did not permit Raeder, as Commander-in-Chief of the Navy, to intervene in questions concerning foreign policy, that is to say, in things which did not belong in his department. If Raeder did on occasion undertake this contrary to the will of Hitler in cases of special importance, then he could do so only privately, and was then unable to record these conversations in the War Diary. However, he always told everything to his Chief of Staff as his closest confidant. As a result Schulte-Mönting could absolutely confirm that Raeder in this case opposed Hitler because of misgivings with regard to morality and international law, and furthermore also employed strategic reasons in the hope of thus being able to bring more influence to bear on Hitler. Schulte-Mönting even stated—just like Raeder—that in November the latter had gained the impression, after a discussion, that he had dissuaded Hitler from his plans. I believe that this has clarified the matter, and only the tragic fact remains that Hitler paid just as little attention to Raeder’s political objections with regard to Russia as with regard to Norway and France.
A similar situation obtains with regard to the charge of the Prosecution referring to the war of aggression against the United States and the violation of the neutrality of Brazil. Both of these charges are sufficiently refuted within the framework of the evidence, so that I am only going to discuss them very briefly.
According to the statement of the Prosecution, Raeder somehow collaborated in the plan to induce Japan to attack the United States. As a matter of fact no naval strategic conferences were held between Japan and Raeder. Raeder always held the conviction that a war against the United States must be avoided just as much as a war against Russia. This attitude is understandable seeing that he had always held the opinion that Hitler should under no circumstances wage a war against Britain. Since the war against Britain had now come about, it was Raeder’s duty as Commander-in-Chief of the Navy to use all his strength to fight successfully against Britain. Raeder knew the limitations of the fighting capacity of the Navy; and it was, therefore, quite out of the question that he should have collaborated in an extension of the naval war, considering, as he did, that the conduct of a war against Britain was already a too difficult task. Document C-152 submitted by the Prosecution therefore mentions only a proposition that Japan should attack Singapore and is based on the assumption that the United States should be kept out of the war. This suggestion made to Hitler that Japan should attack Singapore was correct in every respect. After all, we were at war with England, and Raeder was forced to try to concentrate all his forces against that country. He was thus justified in suggesting that Japan—as Germany’s ally—should attack England. Moreover this, the only discussion by Raeder, was not held until 18 March 1941, while Hitler had already in his Directive Number 24 of 5 March 1941 established the guiding principle that Japan must attack Singapore, which he considered a key position of Britain (Document C-175).
I should like to interpose one sentence here. It can be seen from the report by General Marshall that no common plan had been found to exist between Germany and Japan.
As Schulte-Mönting has affirmed, Raeder was just as surprised by the sudden attack by Japan on Pearl Harbor as every other German. The attempt of the Prosecution to discredit this statement during the cross-examination of Schulte-Mönting by introducing a telegram from the naval attaché in Tokyo to Berlin, dated 6 December 1941 (Document D-872), failed. In the first place Raeder probably only received this telegram after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on 7 December had already started; and besides, Pearl Harbor is not mentioned at all in the telegram.
The charge of the Prosecution with regard to Brazil has been refuted just as effectively because, after my statements during the hearing of evidence, the Prosecution did not revert to this point in any of the cross-examinations of Raeder, Schulte-Mönting, and Wagner. The charge was that, according to Jodl’s diary, the Naval Operations Staff authorized and approved the use of arms against Brazilian warships and merchant vessels fully 2 months before the outbreak of war between Germany and Brazil (Document 1807-PS).
Apart from the testimony of witnesses, this case is refuted by documents, namely, the complete excerpt from Jodl’s diary which I submitted as Exhibit Number Raeder-115, as well as by Documents Number Raeder-116 to 118. These documents reveal that Brazil had violated the rules of neutrality by permitting the United States to make use of Brazilian airfields as a base for attacks on German and Italian U-boats. The Brazilian Air Ministry had furthermore officially announced that attacks had been made by the Brazilian Air Force. Considering such conduct, which is against all the rules of neutrality, the demand of the Naval Operations Staff for armed action against Brazilian vessels is justified. So here again the Prosecution failed to prove Raeder to have committed a crime or even a violation of international law.
The Prosecution has very painstakingly submitted an exceedingly large amount of material, and the wealth of detail called for great care in the submission of evidence for the Defense. I have endeavored to deal with all the charges in the submission of evidence or in my final plea, and have made efforts to show as clearly as possible that none of them, partly on factual, partly on legal grounds, comply with the requirements of a criminal case within the meaning of this Charter. Insofar as I have not, in spite of my desire for great exactitude, dealt with certain documents, it was because they seemed to me of small importance and in any case of no importance in criminal law; for instance, the many cases in which Raeder was only mentioned because—without officially taking any part—he received a copy of the documents for routine reasons. It would have been tedious to go into such recurrent cases, even if the Prosecution reiterated these formal indications, so that one was often tempted to recall the saying of Napoleon that repetition is that turn of speech which acts as the best evidence.
I further believe that in my final plea for Admiral Raeder I may forego argumentation regarding genuine war crimes, the crimes against humanity, since I am unable to establish any connection between these and Raeder from the material submitted by the Prosecution. Also no particular charge is made against Raeder in this connection, with the exception of the two cases connected with the Commando Order, namely, the shooting of two soldiers in Bordeaux and the shooting of the British soldier Evans, who was made a prisoner by the SD on the Swedish border after he had previously participated in the midget submarine attack on the Tirpitz. Thus far the charge has been refuted by testimony insofar as it concerns the Navy. Both cases did not come, or came only later, to the knowledge of the Naval Operations Staff—just before Raeder’s departure. In both cases action was taken on the basis of the Commando Order by Hitler himself or by the SD without the knowledge and will of the Naval Operations Staff; and what is most important, in both cases the documents of the Prosecution showed that these soldiers were in civilian clothes and, therefore, were not entitled to the protection of the Geneva Convention (Document Number D-864, Exhibit GB-457 and Document UK-57, Exhibit GB-164).