One Hundred and Thirty-Sixth Day:
Wednesday, 22nd May, 1946
[Page 311]
Q. Admiral, Major Elwyn Jones then submitted the
affidavit of Walter Geise. I should be grateful if you
would look at it again. It is Document D-722. The first
line reads:
A. Yes. In order to save officers, we filled a large
number of unimportant positions with civilians, people
who we thought were worthy of our confidence. Looking
after a safe or carrying its key was really the task of
the assistant second adjutant, who later had to be used
elsewhere.
Giese had been a sergeant in the Navy for many years,
and for twelve years had been a clerk in the Navy, and
therefore, had had a certain amount of practice in
keeping books.
[Page 312]
DR. SIEMERS: Mr. President, I believe what Major Elwyn
Jones presented was also in the document. What matters
is the question of interpretation and the witness has
been referred to very definite points. If I should be
mistaken I beg your pardon. I believed that I also had
the right, in re-examination, to refer to certain
points in the document.
THE PRESIDENT: If you want to, you can draw our
attention to the paragraphs.
THE WITNESS: I can be very brief.
Giese had no inside information about the facts, and
even if he had, without the right to do so, looked into
the minutes of the adjutant, which were not a shorthand
record, but merely notes to aid his memory, he could
never have got the correct information without having
taken part in the conference. Also, it was not his
duty, in the reception room, to decide who should be
admitted to the Commander-in-Chief, but rather was it
the adjutant's, or mine. He did not even know who could
be admitted. And it is a bold statement or assumption
when he says that a man like Hagelin saw Raeder each
time instead of seeing me first. For the rest, Hagelin
came to me perhaps four or five times.
BY DR. SIEMERS:
Q. Do you believe Giese was present when Raeder talked
to Hitler?
A. Giese? No, never. Giese sat in the reception room
and took care of Raeder's telephone calls.
THE PRESIDENT: Dr. Siemers, nobody here suggests that
he was. Major Elwyn Jones was not putting it that this
man Giese was present at talks between Raeder and the
Fuehrer or Raeder and Hagelin.
DR. SIEMERS: Mr. President, this is his affidavit, and
in the affidavit, it says, as I should like to point
out now, on Page 3, "According to all I heard, I can
say that the idea of this undertaking emanated from
Raeder and met with Hitler's joyous agreement."
How could he know that?
THE WITNESS: I might stress that even I, as Chief of
Staff, was not present at these private conferences,
and Herr Giese had to stay by the telephone and had no
other possible source of information except that of
giving his imagination free rein.
BY DR. SIEMERS:
Q. That is enough, thank you. I come now to Document
D-872. That is the war diary of the Naval Attache in
Japan, in connection with which you were told that you
must have known that Japan, on 7th December, would
attack America. The telegram which is mentioned here is
of 6th December. When could that telegram have arrived
in your office?
A. You mean, when could I have received it personally?
Q. Yes; you or Raeder.
A. Not before the next morning.
Q. That would be 7th December?
A. At the earliest. In this case, the Chief of Staff of
the Naval Operations . Staff would decide whether for
operational reasons that telegram should be presented
at once, or not.
Q. Admiral, you remember that document?
A. Yes.
Q. Is Pearl Harbour mentioned in it?
A. No. I tried to explain that, that Pearl Harbour had
no connection with that telegram from Admiral
Dannecker, and that Dannecker depended on sources
[Page 313]
Q. Admiral, the prosecution has submitted it to prove
that military negotiations had taken place with Japan.
Am I correct in saying that that message referred to
nothing more than possible developments?
A. Yes, of course. I have tried before to explain that
there were no military negotiations between the
Admiralty staffs. Rather the naval attache was charged
with examining and transmitting all information of
value which came to him.
Q. Then a document was shown you which was not
submitted, an interrogation of Raeder of 10th December,
1945. May I ask you to look at the bottom of Page 5 of
this document which I am handing to you, and the
passage which was read on Page 6?
THE PRESIDENT: Major Elwyn Jones, that ought to have a
number, ought it not?
MAJOR ELWYN JONES: That will be Exhibit GB 483, my
Lord.
BY DR. SIEMERS:
On that document, Page 5, at the bottom, is Document
C-75 mentioned?
A. No.
Q. I believe you are mistaken, Admiral, or else I have
made a mistake.
A. I have an English copy - do you mean the English
one?
Q. Yes, the English copy, because it does, not exist in
German.
A. You mean the last paragraph?
Q. I believe the last line or the line before the last.
The page numbers are very hard to read. Maybe you have
the wrong page?
DR. SIEMERS: This interrogation, Mr. President,
concerns Document C-75. I believe the witness will find
it right away. Mention has been made of this document
recently, and in accordance with the wish recently
expressed by the Tribunal, I am submitting it, it is
Directive 24, about the co-operation with Japan, and
the full text is in Document Raeder 128. The Tribunal
will recall that the British Delegation -
THE PRESIDENT: Has it already been put in, C-75, has it
already been put in?
DR. SIEMERS: I submit it now, C-75.
THE PRESIDENT: No, has it already been put in? Has it
already been offered in evidence?
DR. SIEMERS. You may recall that the prosecution has
submitted Document C-75 as Exhibit USA 151 -
THE PRESIDENT: Well, that is all I wanted to know. If
it has already been put in, it doesn't need a new
number, isn't that the position?
DR. SIEMERS: Mr. President, may I remind you that it
needs a new number, because only the first part was
submitted by the prosecution.
MAJOR ELWYN JONES: It has already been submitted as
Exhibit USA 151, my Lord.
THE PRESIDENT: Well, I think we are not giving fresh
numbers, Dr. Siemers, to parts of documents which had
already been put in. If the document has been put in,
then when you want to use a fresh part of the document
it has the same number as the old number; that is all.
DR. SIEMERS: But, Mr. President, if the prosecution in
their document put in only the first three paragraphs,
then I cannot -
[Page 314]
MAJOR ELWYN JONES: My Lord, the position with regard to
C-75 is that the whole of the original has been put in
as Exhibit USA 151, but only an extract from the
original was included in the English document which was
put before the Tribunal.
THE PRESIDENT: Yes, I see. All I was concerned with was
the number of the thing. It has got the number USA 151,
and I thought our practice had been that it should
continue to have that number. You can put in any part
of it you like, and if it is a question of translation,
no doubt the prosecution will hand it to the
translation department, and have it translated for you;
but you are attempting to give it a new number, that is
all.
DR. SIEMERS: I beg your pardon, once more, but I was
asked recently to submit the document anew, and that is
where the misunderstanding arose. Under these
circumstances, now that I hear that it has been
submitted in its entirety, I can withdraw it; I should
be grateful if the Tribunal were also to receive the
complete translation of the document in English and not
only the first two paragraphs.
BY DR. SIEMERS:
Q. Admiral, have you found it in the meantime?
A. Yes, it is on Page 7 as you thought and not on Page
5.
Q. I apologize. It is right, then, that the
interrogation refers to Document C-75.
A. Yes.
Q. Document C-75, Admiral, is Directive No. 24
concerning collaboration with Japan, and it says:
Now Raeder, on 10th November, 1945, stated his position
in respect to this, and, according to the next page of
the document, he said that which Major Elwyn Jones has
just put to you. May I ask you to look at it again? It
says there, on page - I thought it was at the top of
Page 6, maybe it is at the top of Page 8 -
A. The top of Page 8. I do not know English as well as
German, but I would translate it: "If that which Japan
needs - "
Q. If I remember correctly, the word is "need."
A. Yes, he uses the word "need" - "and other things,
things that the Japanese need."
Q. That is to say, Japan's needs and other things which
Japan requires. Therefore, the conversations mentioned
by Raeder were not concerned with strategic points?
A. No, these are two entirely different things.
Q. So that Raeder's answer is concerned purely with
questions of supplies and material.
A. Yes, purely questions of supplies and material.
Q. Thank you.
A. We had discussions with all navies, not only with
the Japanese.
Q. Then I come to the commando order about which you
testified already. I want to put to you the following:
You have been shown Document 658, which says that
according to the Armed Forces communique soldiers were
executed, and that the soldiers wore uniforms and that
the Fuehrer's order was something new
[Page 315]
A. I believe that I have to answer the question in the
following manner Normally, the fact of an execution is
not entered in the War Diary -
THE PRESIDENT: I don't think that is really a matter
which we can go into, whether he thinks this is an
entry which is a criticism of the order.
THE WITNESS: I believe he wanted to establish that it
was something new.
BY DR. SIEMERS:
Q. Never mind, Admiral. A factual question. The
prosecution asserts again that it concerns soldiers in
uniform. The Wehrmacht communique announced the
execution on 9th December. The execution, as I have
already shown in another connection, did not take place
until 11th December. I am presenting to you now
Document UK 57, and ask you to look at the second
paragraph under Figure 4. The heading Figure 4 reads:
"Sabotage against German ships near Bordeaux"; then it
says: "December 12th, 1942"; and farther on we read:
"From the submarine the participants went two by two in
paddle-boats up the north of the Gironde. They wore
special olive grey uniforms. After carrying out the
blastings they sank the boats and tried, with the aid
of French civilians, to escape to Spain in civilian
clothes." Did these soldiers behave correctly according
to the provisions of International Law?
A. In my opinion, no.
DR. SIEMERS: Then I have no more questions.
THE WITNESS: If they had had a clear conscience, they
would not have needed to wear civilian clothes.
DR. SIEMERS: Excuse me, just this final question:
Before that execution, which directly followed the
order of the Fuehrer did you personally in the High
Command receive any enquiries or information?
A. No, neither an enquiry nor any information.
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(Part 10 of 11)
[DR. SIEMERS continues his redirect examination of Erich Schulte-Monting] "I was born in Stettin on 24th November, 1900 the
son of a bricklayer's foreman, Ernst Giese."
Then it says:
"I sat in the reception room of the
Commander-in-Chief as assistant to the adjutant."
Then it says, in the same paragraph:
"I received the minute book from the adjutant at
midday after the conference had ended and locked it
up in the armour-plated safe."
Then it says on the second page:
"I did not have much contact with the
Commander-in-Chief personally, I merely submitted to
him or took from him top secret correspondence."
Admiral, am I right in assuming, therefore, that Giese
was a sort of messenger?
"The following guiding lines apply: Our common war
aim is to defeat England quickly and thereby keep
the USA out of the war."
Besides that, the document also mentioned that which I
recently mentioned, that Singapore should be occupied
by Japan.