VOLUME XIV

. 16 May 46
honest willingness to understand. The voices from the circles
of British war veterans are hardly less valuable than the
attitude of the official leaders. In November 1918, for instance,
when the German Fleet was taken by British squadrons to be
interned in Scapa Flow, the British Commander in Chief,
Lord Beatty, the great foe of our Admiral Hipper, sent the
famous signal, 'Do not forget that the enemy is a contemptible
beast.' This Grand Admiral expressed his dislike for Germany
on many occasions, but on 26 June this same Lord Beatty
stated in the House of Lords, 'I am of the opinion that we
should be grateful to the Germans. They came to us with
hands outstretched, announcing that they agreed to the ratio
of 35:lOO.' If they had submitted other proposals, we could
not have prevented them. We may be truly grateful for the
fact that there is at least one country in the world whose
competition in regard to armament we do not need to fear."
Then I should like to refer to Page 73, which limits battleships
to 35,000 tons. This limitation plays a part in the Prosecution
Document C-23. The fact that in this document next to the words
"Panama Canal" are placed the words "battleships 35,000 tons" has
a certain significance. The limitation to 35,000 tons is not so
decisive and important as the Prosecution would like us to believe.
This is the origin: The United States of America at that time wanted
to limit the tonnage to 35,000 tons on account of the width and
depth of the Panama Canal, for the Panama Canal would have
had to be enlarged in order to admit ships of greater tonnage.
I shall return to this point later since this limit of 35,000 tons
was not maintained.
Then as evidence of the basis for comparison with German
U-boats, I should like .to point to Page 76 where the figure
mentioned is 52,700 tons. It is a historical fact-which is set down
here-that France took no part in this limitation and at that time
was the strongest U-boat power with her 96,000 tons, 96 ready
and 15 under construction. It is also a historical fact that Ger-
many-and this is shown on the same page-had agreed to abolish
submarines, having had to destroy 315 after the first World War.
Grossadmiral, did this accord with the British Fleet apparent
in these documents show itself on another, or on any particular
occasion?
RAEDER: I tried to maintain this good understanding and to
express these sentiments to the British Navy as, for instance, when
I was informed of the death of Admiral Jellicoe through a phone
call from an English news agency. He stood against us as the
head of the English Fleet in the first World War, and we always