Morning Session (continued 2)
Reading edition
DÖNITZ: The difference was that neutrals outside the zone were treated according to the Prize Ordinance. According to the London Agreement, we were obliged, before sinking the ship, to see that the crew were safe and within reach of land. There was no obligation to do so inside the zone. In that case we acted according to the Hague Agreement for the application of the Geneva Convention, which provides that the survivors should be taken care of after the fight if the military situation permits.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Will you agree that an order in express terms to annihilate, to kill, the survivors of a ship that is sunk would be an appalling order to give?
DÖNITZ: I have already stated that the attacks on survivors were contrary to a soldier’s idea of fair fighting and that I have never put my name to any order which could in the slightest degree lead to anything of the kind—not even when it was proposed to me as a reprisal measure.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Will you agree that even with the discipline in your own branch of the service, there was a possibility that some U-boat commanders would have refused to comply with an order to annihilate survivors?
DÖNITZ: No such order was ever given.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: I think it is quite a fair question. What if it were given in express terms, “Annihilate survivors after you sink a ship”? You know your officers. Would there, at any rate, have been some danger that some of them would have refused to carry out that order?
DÖNITZ: Yes. As I know my U-boat forces, there would have been a storm of indignation against such an order. The clean and honest idealism of these would never have allowed them to do it; and I would never have given such an order or permitted it to be given.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Yes, that is what I put to you.
Now, just look at Page 33 of the English document book. That contains your own Standing Order Number 154 (Exhibit Number GB-196). Let me read it to you, rather slowly, if the Tribunal does not mind. It says:
“Do not pick up survivors and take them with you; do not worry about the merchant ship’s boats; weather conditions and distance from land play no part. Have a care only for your own ship and strive only to attain your next success as soon as possible. We must be harsh in this war.”
First of all, tell me, what do you mean by “your next success”? Doesn’t that mean the next attack on a vessel?
DÖNITZ: Yes.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: Now, just look at that order of yours and compare it with the words of the London Treaty. The Treaty, you remember, says that a warship, including a submarine, may not sink or render incapable of navigation a merchant vessel without first having placed passengers, crew, and ship’s papers in a place of safety. For this purpose, the ship’s boats are not regarded as a place of safety unless the safety of the passengers and crew is assured in the existing sea and weather conditions, by the proximity of land or the presence of another vessel.
Defendant, you had that article of the London Treaty in front of you, had you not, when you were drafting this order? And you were deliberately excluding from your order the matters mentioned in the London Treaty? Listen to your order: “Do not worry about the boats; weather conditions”—one thing mentioned in the Treaty—“and distance from land”—another thing mentioned in the Treaty—“play no part.”
Your order could have been put in other language almost as clearly: “Disregard all the matters that are stated in Paragraph 2 of the London Treaty.”
Now tell me, didn’t you have the London Treaty in front of you when you drew that order?
DÖNITZ: Of course I had the London Treaty in my mind and in front of me. I stated in detail yesterday, however, that we were thinking in terms of an engagement, a ship under escort, as is shown by the order as a whole. You have taken just one paragraph. There was, therefore, no question of applying the London Agreement, which does not refer to ships under escort.
Secondly, we were thinking of an area in the immediate vicinity of the permanent positions, enemy defenses off the harbors on the British coast. The London Agreement has nothing to do with fighting ships under escort. Those are two entirely different things; and that order applied to this area and the combating of ships under escort. I explained that in detail yesterday.
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: But if you say that that only applied when it was a question of attacking ships in convoy, would you look at Page 26 of the English document book and at Page 57 of the German document book? There you will find the account of the sinking of the Sheaf Mead on 27 May 1940. And if you will look at the U-boat’s log, opposite the time group 1648 hours—which is on Page 27 of the English and Page 57 of the German (Exhibit Number GB-192)—this is what the log says:
“A large heap of wreckage floats up. We approach it to identify the name. The crew have saved themselves on wreckage and capsized boats. We fish out a buoy; no name on it. I ask a man on the raft. He says, hardly turning his head ‘Nixname.’ A young boy in the water calls, ‘Help, help, please.’ The others are very composed; they look damp and somewhat tired and have a look of cold hatred on their faces. Then on to the old course.”
If you turn to Page 57 of the German document book, or Page 28 of the English, you will find the last sentence from the survivors’ report describes the submarine as doing this:
“They cruised around for half an hour, taking photographs of us in the water. Otherwise they just watched us but said nothing. Then she submerged and went off without offering us any assistance whatever.”
There you see the point, Defendant, that your own commander says that there was a young boy in the water calling, “Help, help, please,” and your submarine takes a few photographs, submerges, and then goes off.
THE PRESIDENT: Sir David, ought you not to refer to the passage just after the name of the vessel, under 1648, “It is not clear....”?
SIR DAVID MAXWELL-FYFE: “It is not clear whether she was sailing as a normal merchant ship. The following seemed to point to the contrary.”
And then, My Lord, it gives a number of matters.
Of course, My Lord, I am on the point of survivors at the moment. I am not taking this instance as a matter of wrongful sinking; I am taking it as an instance of carrying out this order.
I am very much obliged to Your Lordship, but that is why I didn’t do it.
THE PRESIDENT: The Tribunal will adjourn now.