Erich Johann Albert Raeder (24 April 1876 – 6 November 1960) was a naval leader in Germany before and during World War II. This article covers Raeder's life as the Großadmiral (Grand Admiral) up to the start of World War II. Raeder attained this naval rank, the highest possible, in 1939, becoming the first person to hold that rank since Alfred von Tirpitz. Raeder led the Kriegsmarine (German War Navy) for the first half of the war; he resigned in 1943 and was replaced by Karl Dönitz. He was sentenced to life in prison at the Nuremberg Trials, but was released early due to failing health. Raeder is also well known for dismissing Reinhard Heydrich from the Reichsmarine in April 1931 for "conduct unbecoming to an officer and a gentleman".
The fall of Zenker and the rise of Raeder In 1927, the Phoebus film studio went bankrupt.Wheeler-Bennett p. 188. Subsequently, bankruptcy proceedings established that the studio was a front company created by Captain Walter Lohmann of the Reichsmarine to obtain nitrate and that the navy had poured millions of Reichsmark to subsidize the financially struggling studio over the last few years.Bird Weimar pp. 180–189. The public outrage centered less around the fact that Navy had established a front company to help violate Versailles, but rather that the Navy had run the Phoebus studio in such an inept manner as to require millions of Reichsmark in secret subsidies to keep it afloat, and even then, the Phoebus studio had still gone bankrupt. These disclosures of his knowledge of this matter and his initial claims of ignorance of Captain Lohmann's activities forced the Defence Minister Otto Gessler to resign in disgrace in January 1928. The commander in chief of the Navy, Admiral Hans Zenker insisted that he knew nothing of the secret subsidies to Phoebus, but his denials grew increasingly unconvincing as 1928 went on, and finally he was told by the President, Field Marshal Hindenburg in September 1928 that he would have to resign for the good of the service.Bird Weimar pp. 187–189. In October 1928, Raeder was promoted to Admiral and made Commander-in-Chief of the Reichsmarine, the Weimar Republic Navy (Chef der Marineleitung). Raeder was appointed C-in-C largely because it was felt by the rest of the admirals' that he was the best man to deal with politicians, and win them over to the Seemachtidelogie.Thomas p. 261. The Defense Minister General Wilhelm Groener disliked Raeder and might have vetoed his nomination, but he wanted Zenker's successor to be someone who was not connected in any way with the Phoebus affair which had become a major embarrassment to the Defense Ministry, which led him to support Raeder as the best man available. Upon taking command, Raeder promptly caused a political storm when during a dinner with leading officers to honor him as the new naval chief, he proposed a toast to the deposed Wilhelm II.Wheeler-Bennett p. 191.
From when he assumed leadership of the Reichsmarine in 1928, Raeder's leadership was extremely authoritarian with no tolerance extended to those whose views differed from his.Herwig p. 87. In 1929, Raeder successfully pressured the Berlin publishing house of E.S. Mitter from publishing a book by Wegener critical of Tirpitz's leadership. Despite Raeder's best efforts to suppress it, another publishing house printed Wegener's book The Naval Strategy of the World War later in 1929. Other officers complained about the way in which Raeder sought to re-write history in the Official History in a way that gloried Tirpitz with no regard to what actually happened with Admiral Assemann of the Historical Branch complaining to Raeder: "I am convinced that it makes no difference to you Herr Admiral, what we write ... We must only write in such a way that you have peace with the old admirals".Thomas p. 57. In 1937, Raeder banned a study of the Navy in World War I critical of Tirpitz because "it is unconditionally necessary to hold back all publications contra Tirpitz". In private, Raeder was prepared to admit that Tirpitz had made mistakes, but to do so publicly was anathema to him as would mean damaging the mystique of the "Tirpitz cult" that Raeder believed essential to maintain the prestige of the Navy.Bird Weimar pp. 26–27. Raeder's strong authoritarian tendencies came to the fore as soon he assumed command of the Reichsmarine in 1928 when he sent out a circular making clear that dissent would not be allowed while at the same time carrying out the "great seal hunt" of 1928–29 when Raeder forced most of the senior admirals into early retirement in order to promote men who were loyal to him.Thomas p. 54.
Political role In October 1928, Raeder was cross-examined by a Reichstag committee investigating secret rearmament and violations of the Treaty of Versailles.Wheeler-Bennett pp. 190–191. Raeder testified that he had frequently violated the Versailles treaty, but denied any intention of aggressive war. With considerable help from the President Paul von Hindenburg and the Defence Minister General Wilhelm Groener and Kurt von Schleicher, Raeder succeeded in pressuring the S.P.D. government of Hermann Müller into approving spending for the "pocket battleships" despite the fact that the SPD had elected in the May 1928 Reichstag elections on a platform of stopping the "pocket battleship" project.Wheeler-Bennett pp. 192–194. Hindenburg, Groener, and Schleicher as former or current Army officers did not care much for Raeder's navalist plans, but feared that allowing the SDP to stop the Panzerschiffe would create a dangerous example that might one day wreck the Army's budget plans. Raeder's testimony had been intended to help clear the consciences of Müller and other S.P.D ministers who were planning to perform a policy U-turn on the "pocket battleships" by stressing that he was supposedly not returning to the policy of Tirpitz and aggressive navalism. The approval of the "pocket battleship" programme by the government in November 1928 was largely due to pressure from the Reichswehr, which formed a "state within the state", and was a major blow to German democracy in that the military successfully pressured the government into approving something that it had been elected in order to stop; in effect the military claimed the right on matters of national defence to overrule the elected politicians.Wheeler-Bennet pp. 190–192. Right from the beginning when he assumed command of the Reichsmarine in 1928, Raeder waged a skilful public relations battle highly reminiscent of and closely modelled after the campaigns of Tirpitz in the early 20th century to convince both the politicians and the German public of the importance of sea power to Germany's future greatness.Thomas pp. 55–56. Raeder's efforts were welcomed, but not many officers complained in private that Raeder lacked Tirpitz's flair and understanding of the public.Bird Weimar pp. 260–261.
Raeder always saw his role as much political as naval.Bird Weimar p. 260. Raeder was keenly aware that the Army was the senior service and that many in Germany took the view that because the great High Seas Fleet that Tirpitz had built had done almost nothing in World War I that it would be a waste of money and time to attempt to rebuild Tirpitz's fleet.Thomas p. 53. Because of the High Seas Fleet mutiny of 1918, the right distrusted the navy as a hotbed of revolution, treason and mutiny while because of the Kapp putsch of 1920 the left distrusted the navy as a hotbed of counter-revolution, treason and putsche; accordingly in the 1920s neither right-wing or left-wing parties were in favour of improving the Navy's budget.Thomas pp. 36–39. For Raeder, convinced as he was that sea power was the key to national greatness to merely sit back and wait for the politicians to come understand the importance of sea power was never an option, and hence his non-stop lobbying for a bigger naval budget. Raeder did not care for the "pocket battleships" programme that had been launched in 1928, in private calling the Panzerschiffe an unfortunate design forced by Versailles and much preferred to build large capital ships.Mulligan p. 1019. Raeder only supported the "pocket battleships" as a way of keeping German shipyards busy and as the only way of improving the naval budget until such time as Germany would overthrow the provisions of the Treaty of Versailles, and start building the capital ships that Versailles had outlawed. For Raeder, the Panzerschiffe had only two roles to play: Raeder feared that because of Versailles that German shipbuilding skills were starting to become enfeebled, and that unless German shipbuilders received major contracts German naval technology would fall behind. Ever since the Washington conference of 1921–22 which had led to the naval arms limitation treaty of 1922, the world's leading naval powers had systemically classified warships into various specific types in order to control naval spending. By designing deliberately the "pocket battleship" that had combined elements of a battleship and a cruiser, Germany was disrupting the Washington system, which Raeder hoped that would lead the other powers to allow Germany to have capital ships in exchange for abandoning the Panzerschiffe.Bird Erich Raeder p.81. Raeder hoped that the revolutionary design for the Panzerschiffe combinding elements of a battleship and cruiser would lead to a surge of national pride in the Reichsmarine, which would create navalist feelings amongst the German public, which in turn would force the politicians to increase the naval budget.Bird Weimar pp. 218–219.
As a sign of his thinking for the future, all of the war plans that Raeder drew up from 1929 onwards for war in the future assumed that the Navy would go to war with regular capital ships instead of the "pocket battleships".Mulligan pp. 1019–1020. For the present, the first war plan that Raeder drew up in January 1929 stated that there was nothing that the Reichsmarine could do to stop a French fleet from entering the Baltic. Raeder used that assessment to argue for more spending on the Navy. In war plans that Raeder drew up in 1931–32 stated that the Reichsmarine would start a war with a surprise attack on the Polish naval base of Gdynia that was intended to destroy the Polish Navy and would then attack French ships in the North Sea before they could enter the Baltic. In a report in November 1932, Raeder stated he needed umbau (rebuilding) programme of one aircraft carrier, six cruisers, six destroyer flotillas, sixteen U-boats and six battleships to allow Germany to control both the Baltic and North Seas.
Naval "family": Raeder's values