Karl Dönitz

Early career and personal life

Dönitz was born on 16 September 1891 in Grünau, near Berlin, to Anna Beyer and Emil Dönitz, an engineer. Karl had an older brother. In 1910, Dönitz enlisted in the Kaiserliche Marine ("Imperial Navy").

On 27 September 1913, Dönitz was commissioned as a Leutnant zur See (acting sub-lieutenant). When World War I began, he served on the light cruiser SMS Breslau in the Mediterranean Sea. In August 1914, the Breslau and the battlecruiser SMS Goeben were sold to the Ottoman Navy; the ships were renamed the Midilli and the Yavuz Sultan Selim, respectively. They began operating out of Constantinople, under Rear Admiral Wilhelm Souchon, engaging Russian forces in the Black Sea. On 22 March 1916, Dönitz was promoted to Oberleutnant zur See. He requested a transfer to the submarine forces, which became effective on 1 October 1916. He attended the submariner's school at Flensburg-Mürwik and passed out on 3 January 1917. He served as watch officer on U-39, and from February 1918 onward as commander of UC-25. On 2 July 1918, he became commander of UB-68, operating in the Mediterranean. On 4 October, after suffering technical difficulties, Dönitz was forced to surface and scuttle his boat. He was captured by the British and incarcerated in the Redmires camp near Sheffield. He remained a prisoner of war until 1919 and in 1920, he returned to Germany.

On 27 May 1916, Dönitz married a nurse named Ingeborg Weber (1893–1962), the daughter of the German general Erich Weber (1860–1933). They had three children, whom they raised as Protestant Christians: a daughter named Ursula (1917–1990) and their sons Klaus (1920–1944) and Peter (1922–1943).

Both of Dönitz's sons were killed in action during World War II. Peter was killed on 19 May 1943 when U-954 was sunk in the North Atlantic with all hands. Hitler had issued a policy stating that if a senior officer such as Dönitz lost a son in battle and had other sons in the military, the latter could withdraw from combat and return to civilian life. After Peter's death, Klaus was forbidden to have any combat role and was allowed to leave the military to begin studying to become a naval doctor. However, on 13 May 1944, his 24th birthday, he persuaded his friends to let him go on the E-boat S-141 for a raid on Selsey. The boat was sunk by the French destroyer La Combattante and Klaus was killed.

Interwar period

He continued his naval career in the naval arm of the Weimar Republic's armed forces. On 10 January 1921, he became a Kapitänleutnant (lieutenant) in the new German navy (Vorläufige Reichsmarine). Dönitz commanded torpedo boats, becoming a Korvettenkapitän (lieutenant-commander) on 1 November 1928. On 1 September 1933, he became a Fregattenkapitän (commander) and, in 1934, was put in command of the cruiser Emden, the ship on which cadets and midshipmen took a year-long world cruise as training.

In 1935, the Reichsmarine was renamed Kriegsmarine. Germany was prohibited by the Treaty of Versailles from possessing a submarine fleet. The Anglo-German Naval Agreement of 1935 allowed submarines and he was placed in command of the U-boat flotilla Weddigen, which comprised three boats; U-7; U-8 and U-9. On 1 September 1935, he was promoted to Kapitän zur See (naval captain).

Dönitz opposed Erich Raeder's views that surface ships should be given priority in the Kriegsmarine during the war, but in 1935 Dönitz doubted U-boat suitability in a naval trade war on account of their slow speed. This phenomenal contrast with Dönitz's wartime policy is explained in the 1935 Anglo-German Naval Agreement. The accord was viewed by the navy with optimism, Dönitz included. He remarked, "Britain, in the circumstances, could not possibly be included in the number of potential enemies." The statement, made after June 1935, was uttered at a time when the naval staff were sure France and the Soviet Union were likely to be Germany's only enemies. Dönitz's statement was partially correct. Britain was not foreseen as an immediate enemy, but the navy still held onto a cadre of imperial officers, which, along with its Nazi-instigated intake, understood war would be certain in the distant future, perhaps not until the mid-1940s.

Dönitz came to recognise the need for more of these vessels. Only 26 were in commission or under construction in the summer of 1935. In the time before his command of submarines, he perfected the group tactics that first appealed to him in 1917. At this time, Dönitz first expressed his procurement policies. His preference for the submarine fleet was for the production of large numbers of small craft. In contrast to other warships, the fighting power of the U-boat, in his opinion, was not dependent on its size, as the torpedo, not the gun, was the machine's main weapon. Dönitz had a tendency to be critical of larger submarines and listed a number of disadvantages in their production, operation and tactical use. Dönitz recommended the Type VII submarine as the ideal submarine. The boat was reliable and had a range of 6,200 nautical miles (11,500 kilometres). Modifications lengthened this to 8,700 nautical miles (16,100 kilometres).

World War II

On 1 September 1939, Germany invaded Poland. Britain and France soon declared war on Germany, and World War II began. On Sunday, 3 September, Dönitz chaired a conference at Wilhelmshaven. At 11:15 am, the British Admiralty sent out a signal "Total Germany". B-Dienst intercepted the message and it was promptly reported to Dönitz. Dönitz paced around the room and his staff purportedly heard him repeatedly say, "My God! So it's war with England again!"

Dönitz abandoned the conference to return within the hour, a far more composed man. He announced to his officers, "We know our enemy. We have today the weapon and a leadership that can face up to this enemy. The war will last a long time, but if each does his duty, we will win." Dönitz had only 57 boats; of those, 27 were capable of reaching the Atlantic Ocean from their German bases. A small building program was already under way, but the number of U-boats did not rise noticeably until the autumn of 1941.

Dönitz's first major action was the cover up of the sinking of the British passenger liner Athenia later the same day. Acutely sensitive to international opinion and relations with the United States, the death of more than a hundred civilians was damaging. Dönitz suppressed the truth that the ship was sunk by a German submarine. He accepted the commander's explanation that he genuinely believed the ship was armed. Dönitz ordered the engagement to be struck from the submarine's logbook. Dönitz did not admit the cover up until 1946.

Hitler's original orders to wage war only in accordance with the Prize Regulations were not issued in any altruistic spirit but in the belief that hostilities with the Western Allies would be brief. On 23 September 1939, Hitler, on the recommendation of Raeder, approved an order that all merchant ships making use of their wireless upon being stopped by U-boats should be sunk or captured. This order marked a considerable step towards unrestricted warfare. Four days later, enforcement of Prize Regulations in the North Sea was withdrawn, and on 2 October, complete freedom was given to attack darkened ships encountered off the British and French coasts. Two days later, the Prize Regulations were cancelled in waters extending as far as 15° West, and on 17 October, the German Naval Staff gave U-boats permission to attack without warning all ships identified as hostile. The zone where darkened ships could be attacked with complete freedom was extended to 20° West on 19 October. Practically the only restrictions now placed on U-boats concerned attacks on passenger liners and on 17 November, they too were allowed to be attacked without warning if clearly identifiable as hostile.

Commander of the submarine fleet

On 1 October 1939, Dönitz became a Konteradmiral (rear admiral) and "Commander of the Submarines" (Befehlshaber der Unterseeboote, BdU). For the first part of the war, despite disagreements with Raeder on where best to deploy his men, Dönitz was given considerable operational freedom for his junior rank.

From September until December 1939, U-boats sank 221 ships for 755,237 gross tons, at the cost of nine U-boats. Only 47 merchant ships were sunk in the North Atlantic, a tonnage of 249,195. Dönitz had difficulty in organising Wolfpack operations in 1939. A number of his submarines were lost en route to the Atlantic, through either the North Sea or the heavily defended English Channel. Torpedo failures plagued commanders during convoy attacks. Along with successes against single ships, Dönitz authorised the abandonment of pack attacks in the autumn. The Norwegian campaign amplified the defects. Dönitz wrote in May 1940, "I doubt whether men have ever had to rely on such a useless weapon." He ordered the removal of magnetic pistols in favour of contact fuses and their faulty depth control systems. In no fewer than 40 attacks on Allied warships, not a single sinking was achieved. The statistics show that from the outbreak of war to approximately the spring of 1940, faulty German torpedoes saved 50–60 ships equating to 300,000 GRT(Gross register tonnage).

Dönitz was encouraged in operations against warships by the sinking of the aircraft carrier Courageous. On 28 September 1939, he said, "It is not true Britain possesses the means to eliminate the U-boat menace." The first specific operation — named "Special Operation P" — authorised by Dönitz was Günther Prien's attack on Scapa Flow, which sank the battleship Royal Oak. The attack became a propaganda success, though Prien purportedly was unenthusiastic about being used that way. Historian Stephen Roskill wrote, "It is now known that this operation was planned with great care by Admiral Dönitz, who was correctly informed of the weak state of the defences of the eastern entrances. Full credit must also be given to Lieutenant Prien for the nerve and determination with which he put Dönitz's plan into execution."

In May 1940, 101 ships were sunk — but only nine in the Atlantic — followed by 140 in June; 53 of them in the Atlantic for a total of 585,496 GRT that month. The first six months in 1940 cost Dönitz 15 U-boats. Until mid-1940 there remained a chronic problem with the reliability of the G7e torpedo. As the battles of Norway and Western Europe raged, the Luftwaffe sank more ships than the U-boats. In May 1940, German aircraft sank 48 ships (158 GRT), three times that of German submarines. The Allied evacuations from western Europe and Scandinavia in June 1940 attracted Allied warships in large numbers, leaving many of the Atlantic convoys travelling through the Western Approaches unprotected. From June 1940, the German submarines began to exact a heavy toll. In the same month, the Luftwaffe sank just 22 ships (195,193 GRT) in a reversal of the previous months.

Intelligence battle

Intelligence played an important role in the Battle of the Atlantic. In general, BdU intelligence was poor. Counter-intelligence was not much better. At the height of the battle in mid-1943, some 2,000 signals were sent from the 110 U-boats at sea. Radio traffic compromised his cyphers by giving the Allies more messages to work with. Furthermore, replies from the boats enabled the Allies to use High-frequency direction finding (HF/DF, called "Huff-Duff") to locate a U-boat using its radio, track it and attack it. The over-centralised command structure of BdU and its insistence on micro-managing every aspect of U-boat operations with endless signals provided the Allied navies with ample intelligence. The enormous "paper chase" [cross-referencing of materials] operations pursued by Allied intelligence agencies were not thought possible by BdU. The Germans did not suspect the Allies had identified the codes broken by B-Dienst. Conversely, when Dönitz suspected the enemy had penetrated his own communications, BdU's response was to suspect internal sabotage and reduce the number of staff officers to the most reliable, exacerbating the problem of over-centralisation. In contrast to the Allies, the Wehrmacht was suspicious of civilian scientific advisors and generally distrusted outsiders. The Germans were never as open to new ideas or thinking of war in intelligence terms. According to one analyst, BdU "lacked imagination and intellectual daring" in the naval war. These Allied advantages failed to avert heavy losses in the June 1940 to May 1941 period, known to U-boat crews as the "First Happy Time". In June 1941, 68 ships were sunk in the North Atlantic (318,740 GRT) at a cost of four U-boats, but the German submarines would not eclipse that number for the remainder of the year. Just 10 transports were sunk in November and December 1941.

On 7 May 1941, the Royal Navy captured the German Arctic meteorological vessel München and took its Enigma machine intact, which allowed the Royal Navy to decode U-boat radio communications in June 1941. Two days later the capture of U-110 was an intelligence coup for the British. The settings for high-level "officer-only" signals, "short-signals" (Kurzsignale) and codes standardising messages to defeat HF/DF fixes by sheer speed were found. Only the Hydra settings for May were missing. The papers were the only stores destroyed by the crew. The capture on 28 June of another weather ship, Lauenburg, enabled British decryption operations to read radio traffic in July 1941. Beginning in August 1941, Bletchley Park operatives could decrypt signals between Dönitz and his U-boats at sea without any restriction. The capture of the U-110 allowed the Admiralty to identify individual boats, their commanders, operational readiness, damage reports, location, type, speed, and endurance from working up in the Baltic to Atlantic patrols. On 1 February 1942, the Germans had introduced the M4 cypher machine, which secured communications until it was cracked in December 1942. Even so, the U-boats achieved their best success against the convoys in March 1943, due to an increase in U-boat numbers, and the protection of the shipping lanes was in jeopardy. Due to the cracked M4 and the use of radar, the Allies began to send air and surface reinforcements to convoys under threat. The shipping lanes were secured, which came as a great surprise to Dönitz. The lack of intelligence and increased numbers of U-boats contributed enormously to Allied losses that year.

American entry

Following Germany's declaration of war on the United States on 11 December 1941, Dönitz implemented Operation Drumbeat (Unternehmen Paukenschlag). The entry of the United States benefited German submarines in the short term. Dönitz intended to strike close to shore in American and Canadian waters and prevent the convoys — the most effective anti–U-boat system — from ever forming. Dönitz was determined to take advantage of Canadian and American unpreparedness before the situation changed.

The problem inhibiting Dönitz's plan was a lack of boats. On paper, he had 259, but in January 1942, 99 were still undergoing sea trials and 59 were assigned to training flotillas, leaving only 101 on war operations. 35 of these were under repair in port, leaving 66 operational, of which 18 were low on fuel and returning to base, 23 were en route to areas where fuel and torpedoes needed to be conserved, and one was heading to the Mediterranean. Therefore, on 1 January, Dönitz had a fighting strength of 16–25 in the Atlantic (six of them close to Iceland on "Norwegian operations"), three in the Arctic Ocean, three in the Mediterranean and three operating west of Gibraltar. Dönitz was severely limited to what he could accomplish in American waters in an initial offensive.

From 13 January 1942, Dönitz planned to begin a surprise offensive from the Gulf of St. Lawrence to Cape Hatteras. Unknown to him, Ultra had read his Enigma signals and knew the position, size, and intentions of his boats, down to the date the operation was scheduled to begin. The attacks, when they came, were not a surprise. Of the 12 U-boats that began the offensive from the Grand Banks southward, just two survived the war. The operation began the Battle of the St. Lawrence, a series of battles which lasted into 1944. It remained possible for a U-boat to operate in the Gulf into 1944, but countermeasures were strong. In 1942, the global ratio of ships-to-U-boats sunk in Canadian waters was 112:1. The global average was 10.3:1. The solitary kill was achieved by the RCAF. Canadian operations, as with American efforts, were a failure during this year.

Along with conventional U-boat operations, Dönitz authorised clandestine activities in Canadian waters, including spying, mine-laying, and recovery of German prisoners of war (as Dönitz wished to extract information from rescued submariners concerning Allied tactics). All of these things tied down Canadian military power and imposed industrial, fiscal, and psychological costs. The impunity with which U-boats carried out these operations in Canadian waters into 1944 provided a propaganda effect. One of these operations was the well-known Operation Kiebitz to rescue Otto Kretschmer.

Commander-in-chief and Grand Admiral

On 30 January 1943, Dönitz replaced Erich Raeder as Commander-in-chief of the navy (Oberbefehlshaber der Kriegsmarine) and Großadmiral (grand admiral) of the Naval High Command (Oberkommando der Marine). In a communique to the navy he announced his intentions to retain practical control of the U-boats and his desire to fight to the end for Hitler. Dönitz's inability to delegate control of the U-boat service has been construed as a weakness in the U-boat arm, contributing to the perception that Dönitz was an "impatient warrior", preoccupied with fighting battles and tactics rather than a strategist or organiser.

Dönitz's promotion earned Hitler his undying loyalty. For Dönitz, Hitler had given him a "true home-coming at last, to a country in which unemployment appeared to have been abolished, the class war no longer tore the nation apart, and the shame of defeat in 1918 was being expunged." When war came, Dönitz became more firmly wedded to his Nazi faith. Hitler recognised his patriotism, professionalism, but above all, his loyalty. Dönitz remained so long after the war was lost. In so doing, he wilfully ignored the genocidal nature of the regime and claimed ignorance of The Holocaust.

In the last quarter of 1942, 69 submarines had been commissioned, taking the total number to 393, with 212 operational. Dönitz was not satisfied and immediately began a naval construction programme which, in contrast to Raeder's, laid all its emphasis on torpedo boats and submarines. Dönitz's proposed expansion ran into difficulties experienced by all of his predecessors: the lack of steel. The navy had no representation on Albert Speer's armaments ministry, for naval production was the only sphere not under his control. Dönitz understood this worked against the navy because it lacked the elasticity to cope with breakdowns of production at any point, whereas the other services could make good production by compensating one sector at the expense of another. Without any representatives, the battle of priorities was left to Speer and Göring. Dönitz had the sense to place U-boat production under Speer on the condition that 40 per month were completed. Dönitz persuaded Hitler not to scrap the surface fleet capital ships, though they played no role in the Atlantic during his time in command. Dönitz reasoned that the destruction of the surface fleet would provide the British with a victory and heap pressure on the U-boats, for these warships were tying down British air and naval forces that would otherwise be sent into the Atlantic.

Hunter-killer era

From mid-June 1943, the technological and industrial superiority of the Allied navies allowed the Americans, Canadians, and British to form hunter-killer groups consisting of fast anti-submarine escorts and aircraft carriers. The purpose of naval operations changed from avoiding U-boats and safeguarding convoys to seeking them out and destroying them wherever they operated. USN hunter-killer groups operated throughout the Atlantic. Argentia had been an important base for the naval task forces until superseded by the Royal Canadian Navy in early 1943. U-boat operations were "crushed" by these task forces: 14 were sunk and only two of seven crews operating in Brazilian waters returned to Germany.

Dönitz reacted by deploying his U-boats near the Azores where land-based aircraft still had difficulty reaching them. In this region, he hoped to threaten the Gibraltar–Britain convoy route. Dönitz intended to concentrate his power in a rough arc from West Africa to South America and the Caribbean. He hoped to maintain a presence in the western and central Atlantic, reduce losses and await new weapons and anti-detection devices. In this, he failed to "stem the tide of U-boat losses." A large portion of the 39 U-boats deployed on these operations were intercepted. From May 1943, one historian wrote: "U-boats rash enough to close with an Atlantic convoy [...] were simply inviting destruction."

Dönitz's crews faced danger from the outset. The transit routes through the Bay of Biscay were heavily patrolled by aircraft. From May to December 1943, 25 U-boats were sunk by Coastal Command, more were sunk by the USAAF and Royal Navy — five and four, respectively — with one shared by the navy and Coastal Command. To counter radar aircraft, Dönitz ordered his submarines to group together and merge their powerful anti-aircraft armament together while surfaced and recharging their batteries, after initially ordering the groups to remain surfaced throughout the journey and fight off aerial attackers with gunfire. The decision was to cost BdU heavy casualties. A group of U-boats were more likely to attract a radar contact, and Allied pilots soon learned to swarm their targets. Dönitz ordered his captains to traverse the Bay under the lee of the neutral Spanish coast, with a sharply rising coast which shielded U-boats from radar. After 4 August 1943, the number of destroyed U-boats fell from one every four days to one every 27 days until June 1944.

US hunter–killer groups extended their patrols to the central Atlantic in the summer. They sank 15 U-boats from June through to August 1943. A number of supply submarines were destroyed, crippling the Germans' ability to conduct long range operations. At the end of the summer, practically all supply U-boats had been destroyed. In September 1943, Dönitz ordered his submarines back to the North Atlantic. U-boats were equipped with the G7es torpedo, an acoustic torpedo, which the grand admiral hoped would wrest the technological initiative back. The torpedo was the centrepiece of Dönitz's plan. Great faith was also placed in the installation of Wanze radar to detect aircraft. It was intended as a successor to the Metox radar detector. A number of his boats were later retrofitted with the submarine snorkel, permitting the submarine to stay submerged. Dönitz placed much faith in the Type XXI submarine. He accepted that the older submarines were obsolete now that Allied defences in the air were complete. He required a "true submarine", equipped with a snorkel to allow his crews to stay submerged, at least to snorkel depth, and evade radar-equipped aircraft. Dönitz was pleased with the promised top speed of 18 knots.

President of Germany

Dönitz admired Hitler and was vocal about the qualities he perceived in Hitler's leadership. In August 1943, he praised his foresightedness and confidence: "Anyone who thinks he can do better than the Führer is stupid." Dönitz's relationship with Hitler strengthened through to the end of the war, particularly after the 20 July plot, for the naval staff officers were not involved; when news of it came, there was indignation in the OKM. Even after the war, Dönitz said he could never have joined the conspirators. Dönitz tried to imbue Nazi ideas among his officers, though the indoctrination of the naval officer corps was not the brainchild of Dönitz, but rather a continuation of the Nazification of the navy begun under his predecessor Raeder. Naval officers were required to attend a five-day education course in Nazi ideology. Dönitz's loyalty to him and the cause was rewarded by Hitler, who, owing to Dönitz's leadership, never felt abandoned by the navy. In gratitude, Hitler appointed the navy's commander as his successor before he committed suicide.

Dönitz's influence on military matters was also evident. Hitler acted on Dönitz's advice in September 1944 to block the Gulf of Finland after Finland abandoned the Axis powers. Operation Tanne Ost was a poorly executed disaster. Dönitz shared Hitler's senseless strategic judgement — with the Courland Pocket on the verge of collapse, and the air and army forces requesting a withdrawal, the two men were preoccupied in planning an attack on an isolated island in the far north. Hitler's willingness to listen to the naval commander was based on his high opinion of the navy's usefulness at this time. It reinforced isolated coastal garrisons along the Baltic and evacuated thousands of German soldiers and civilians in order that they might continue to participate in the war effort into the spring of 1945.

Through 1944 and 1945, the Dönitz-initiated Operation Hannibal had the distinction of being the largest naval evacuation in history. The Baltic Fleet was presented with a mass of targets, and the subsequent Soviet Baltic Sea submarine campaign in 1944 and Soviet Baltic Sea campaign in 1945 inflicted grievous losses during Hannibal. The most notable was the sinking of the MV Wilhelm Gustloff by a Soviet submarine. The liner had nearly 10,000 people on board. The evacuations continued after the surrender. From 3 to 9 May 1945, 81,000 of the 150,000 persons waiting on the Hel Peninsula were evacuated without loss. Albrecht Brandi, commander of the eastern Baltic, initiated a counter operation, the Gulf of Finland campaign, but failed to have an impact.

Flensburg Government

On 4 May, Admiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg, representing Dönitz, surrendered all German forces in the Netherlands, Denmark, and northwestern Germany to Field Marshal Bernard Montgomery at Lüneburg Heath southeast of Hamburg. A day later, Dönitz sent Friedeburg to US General Dwight D. Eisenhower's headquarters in Reims, France, to negotiate a complete surrender to the Allies.

The Chief of Staff of OKW, Generaloberst (Colonel-General) Alfred Jodl, arrived a day later. Dönitz had instructed them to draw out the negotiations for as long as possible so that German troops and refugees could surrender to the Western powers, but when Eisenhower let it be known he would not tolerate their stalling, Dönitz authorised Jodl to sign the instrument of unconditional surrender at 1:30 on the morning of 7 May. Just over an hour later, Jodl signed the documents. The surrender documents included the phrase, "All forces under German control to cease active operations at 23:01 hours Central European Time on 8 May 1945." At Stalin's insistence, on 8 May, shortly before midnight, (Generalfeldmarschall) Wilhelm Keitel repeated the signing in Berlin at Marshal Georgy Zhukov's headquarters, with General Carl Spaatz of the USAAF present as Eisenhower's representative. At the time specified, World War II in Europe ended.

On 23 May, the Flensburg Government (also known as the "Dönitz government") was dissolved when Dönitz was arrested by an RAF Regiment task force. Generaloberst Jodl, Reichsminister Speer and other members were also handed over to troops of the Herefordshire Regiment at Flensburg.

Dönitz's Großadmiral's ceremonial baton, awarded to him by Hitler, can be seen in the regimental museum of the King's Shropshire Light Infantry in Shrewsbury Castle. His Kriegsmarine flag, which was removed from his headquarters, can be seen at the RAF Regiment Heritage Centre at RAF Honington and his car pennant in the regimental museum of the Herefordshire Light Infantry.

Nazism and antisemitism

Dönitz was a dedicated Nazi and a passionate supporter of Hitler, something he attempted to obscure after the war. Raeder described him as "a picture-book Nazi and confirmed anti-Semite". Several naval officers described him as "closely tied to Hitler and Nazi ideology." On occasion, he spoke of Hitler's humanity. His fervent pro-Hitler attitude led to him being known ironically as "Hitler Youth Quex", after the fictionalised hero of a Nazi novel and feature film. He refused to help Albert Speer stop the scorched earth policy dictated by Hitler and is also noted to have declared, "In comparison to Hitler we are all pipsqueaks. Anyone who believes he can do better than the Führer is stupid."

Dönitz contributed to the spread of Nazism within the Kriegsmarine. He insisted that officers share his political views and, as head of the Kriegsmarine, formally joined the Nazi Party on 1 February 1944, as member 9,664,999. He was awarded the Golden Party Badge for his loyalty to the party later that year. Dönitz's influence over naval officers contributed to none joining the attempts to kill Hitler.

From an ideological standpoint, Dönitz was anti-Marxist and antisemitic and believed that Germany needed to fight the "poison of Jewry". Several antisemitic statements by Dönitz are known. When Sweden closed its international waters to Germany, Dönitz blamed this action on their fear and dependence on "international Jewish capital". In August 1944, he declared, "I would rather eat dirt than see my grandchildren grow up in the filthy, poisonous atmosphere of Jewry."

His fellow officers noted he was under Hitler's influence and closely wedded to Nazi ideology. On German Heroes' Day (12 March) of 1944, Dönitz declared that, without Adolf Hitler, Germany would be beset by "the poison of Jewry", and the country destroyed for lack of the "uncompromising ideology" of Nazism:

What would have become of our country today, if the Führer had not united us under National Socialism? Divided along party lines, beset with the spreading poison of Jewry and vulnerable to it, because we lacked the defence of our present uncompromising ideology, we would have long since succumbed under the burden of this war and delivered ourselves to the enemy who would have mercilessly destroyed us.

Nuremberg war crimes trials

Following the war, Dönitz was held as a prisoner of war by the Allies. He was indicted as a major war criminal at the Nuremberg trials on three counts. One: conspiracy to commit crimes against peace, war crimes, and crimes against humanity. Two: planning, initiating, and waging wars of aggression. Three: crimes against the laws of war. Dönitz was found not guilty on count one of the indictment, but guilty on counts two and three.

During the trial, the army psychologist Gustave Gilbert was allowed to examine Nazi leaders on trial for war crimes. Among other tests, a German version of the Wechsler–Bellevue IQ test was administered. Dönitz and Hermann Göring scored 138, which made them equally the third-highest among the Nazi leaders tested. Dönitz was also examined by Chief Medical Officer Lt. Col. Rene Juchli, who reported that Dönitz suffered from "a chronic prostate disorder".

At the trial, Dönitz was charged with waging unrestricted submarine warfare against neutral shipping, permitting Hitler's Commando Order of 18 October 1942 to remain in full force when he became commander-in-chief of the Navy, and to that extent, responsibility for that crime. His defence was that the order excluded men captured in naval warfare, and that the order had not been acted upon by any men under his command. Added to that was his knowledge of 12,000 involuntary foreign workers working in the shipyards, and doing nothing to stop it. Dönitz was unable to defend himself on this charge convincingly when cross-examined by prosecutor Sir David Maxwell Fyfe.

On 25 February 1945, Hitler asked Dönitz whether the Geneva Convention should be renounced. Hitler's motives were twofold. The first was that reprisals could be taken against Western Allied prisoners of war; second, it would deter German forces from surrendering to the Western Allies, as was happening on the Eastern Front where the convention was in abeyance. Instead of arguing the conventions should never be renounced, Dönitz suggested it was not expedient to do so, so the court found against him on this issue; but as the convention was not renounced by Germany, and British prisoners in camps under Dönitz's jurisdiction were treated strictly according to the Convention, the Court considered these mitigating circumstances.

Among the war-crimes charges, Dönitz was accused of waging unrestricted submarine warfare for issuing War Order No. 154 in 1939, and another similar order after the Laconia incident in 1942, not to rescue survivors from ships attacked by submarines. By issuing these two orders, he was found guilty of causing Germany to be in breach of the Second London Naval Treaty of 1936. However, as evidence of similar conduct by the Allies was presented at his trial, his sentence was not assessed on the grounds of this breach of international law.

Later years and death

Dönitz was released on 1 October 1956 and retired to the small village of Aumühle in Schleswig-Holstein in northern West Germany. There, he worked on two books. His memoirs, Zehn Jahre, Zwanzig Tage (Memoirs: Ten Years and Twenty Days), were released in Germany in 1958 and became available in an English translation the following year. This book recounted Dönitz's experiences as U-boat commander (10 years) and President of Germany (20 days). In it, Dönitz explains the Nazi regime as a product of its time, but argues he was not a politician and thus not morally responsible for many of the regime's crimes. He likewise criticises dictatorship as a fundamentally flawed form of government and blames it for many of the Nazi era's failings. The historian Alan P. Rems has written that Dönitz's memoirs are unconvincing and that, "unimpeded by a meaningful Nuremberg verdict, Dönitz fashioned a legend that could be embraced by the most unregenerate Nazis as well as credulous Allied officers who accepted his sanitised version of history and showered Dönitz with letters of support as a wronged brother-in-arms".

Dönitz's second book, Mein wechselvolles Leben (My Ever-Changing Life) is less known, perhaps because it deals with the events of his life before 1934. This book was first published in 1968, and a new edition was released in 1998 with the revised title Mein soldatisches Leben (My Martial Life). In 1973, he appeared in the Thames Television production The World at War, in one of his few television appearances.

Dönitz was unrepentant regarding his role in World War II, saying that he had acted at all times out of duty to his nation. In 1976, Dönitz appeared in The Memory of Justice. In the documentary, Dönitz discusses the Nuremberg trials and his experience of 1946 along with Albert Speer. He lived out the rest of his life in relative obscurity in Aumühle, occasionally corresponding with collectors of German naval history. Around 1974, Dönitz was contacted by the neo-Nazi conspiracy theorist and early Reichsbürger Manfred Roeder, who tried to prove that the German Reich still existed. Roeder assumed that Dönitz remained the legal head of state, but the former admiral considered the idea ridiculous and firmly stated that he no longer considered himself President of Germany. Regarding this as a resignation declaration, Roeder subsequently declared himself the new leader of Germany and eventually became active as a terrorist.

Dönitz died in Aumühle of a heart attack on Christmas Eve in 1980 at the age of 89. As the last German officer with the rank of Großadmiral (grand admiral), he was honoured by many former servicemen and foreign naval officers who came to pay their respects at his funeral on 6 January 1981. He was buried in Waldfriedhof Cemetery in Aumühle without military honours, and service members were not allowed to wear uniforms to the funeral. Also in attendance were over 100 holders of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross.

Summary of career

Decorations and awards

General Honor Decoration (Allgemeines Ehrenzeichen) (7 June 1913)

Iron Cross (1914)

2nd class (7 September 1914)

1st class (5 May 1916)

Friedrich Cross of the Duchy of Anhalt, 1st class (17 January 1916)

Knight of the Royal House Order of Hohenzollern with Swords (10 June 1918)

Honour Cross of the World War 1914/1918 (30 January 1935)

U-boat War Badge 1918 Version

Special U-boat War Badge with diamonds (1939)

Sudetenland Medal (20 December 1939)

Clasp to the Iron Cross (1939)

2nd class (18 September 1939)

1st class (20 December 1939)

Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves

Knight's Cross on 21 April 1940 as Konteradmiral and Befehlshaber der U-Boote (B.d.U.)

223rd Oak Leaves on 6 April 1943 as Großadmiral and Oberbefehlshaber der Kriegsmarine and Befehlshaber der U-Boote

Golden Party Badge of the National Socialist German Workers Party (1943)

Ottoman War Medal (7 November 1916) (Ottoman Empire)