by Ian Kershaw
44. BAB, R3/1623, fo. 123, Keitel to Speer (6.12.44).
45. BAB, R3/1623, fos. 125–6, Speer to head of Armaments Commission XIIb Kelchner, 6.12.44; Keitel Fernschreiben, 10.12.44. Even now, Speer felt it necessary (fo. 127, 12.12.44) to intervene again, this time with Grand-Admiral Dönitz, to prevent the destruction of wharves and their installations which had been scheduled for destruction by an order of Coastal Command East (Marinekommando Ost) on 17 November.
46. A point made by Müller in DRZW, 5/2, p. 771.
47. BAB, NS19/1862, fos. 1–5, Bormann to Himmler, 23.10.44.
48. BAB, NS19/4017, fos. 43–56, meeting at Klein-Berkel, 3.11.44.
49. TBJG, II/14, pp. 157–8 (5.11.44).
50. See Dieter Rebentisch and Karl Teppe (eds.), Verwaltung contra Menschenführung im Staat Hitlers, Göttingen, 1986, pp. 7–32; Peter Longerich, Hitlers Stellvertreter: Führung der Partei und Kontrolle des Staatsapparates durch den Stab Heß und die Partei-Kanzlei Bormann, Munich, 1992, pp. 256–64; and Armin Nolzen, ‘Charismatic Legitimation and Bureaucratic Rule: The NSDAP in the Third Reich, 1933–1945’, German History, 23 (2005), pp. 494–518.
51. Kurt Pätzold and Manfred Weißbecker, Geschichte der NSDAP 1920–1945, Cologne, 1981, p. 375; Dieter Rebentisch, Führerstaat und Verwaltung im Zweiten Weltkrieg, Stuttgart, 1989, pp. 528–9.
52. All contained, many from November–December 1944, in BAB, R43II/692b: Deutscher Volkssturm, Bd. 2, fos. 1–28. An impression of the mass of heterogeneous business dealt with by the Party Chancellery in this period can be gleaned from the collection Akten der Partei-Kanzlei der NSDAP, vol. 1, ed. Helmut Heiber, Munich, 1983, Regesten Bd. 1–2, and vol. 2, ed. Peter Longerich, Munich, 1989, Regesten Bd. 4.
53. TBJG, II/14, p. 432 (17.12.44).
54. The Bormann Letters, ed. H. R. Trevor-Roper, London, 1954, p. 148 (11.12.44).
55. See TBJG, II/14, p. 400 (12.12.44) for the paper shortage.
56. BAB, R43II/583a, fo. 64–64v, Reichspostminister to Highest Reich Authorities, etc. (7.11.44).
57. TBJG, II/14, pp. 146–7 (3.11.44), 191 (10.11.44), 224 (17.11.44), 232 (18.11.44), 268 (24.11.44), 308–9 (1.12.44), 444 (19.12.44); BAB, R3/1529, fos. 3–12, Speer’s memorandum to Hitler (6.12.44).
58. TBJG, II/14, pp. 394 (11.12.44), 398 (12.12.44); von Oven, pp. 519 (5.12.44), 520–23 (11.12.44). Text of the decree in ‘Führer-Erlasse’ 1939–1944, ed. Martin Moll, Stuttgart, 1997, pp. 469–70.
59. TBJG, II/14, p. 305 (1.12.44).
60. Von Oven, p. 517 (29.11.44); TBJG, II/14, p. 276 (25.11.44).
61. TBJG, II/14, pp. 317–34 (2.12.44).
62. TBJG, II/14, pp. 159–60 (5.11.44).
63. TBJG, II/14, pp. 208–9 (13.11.44); von Oven, pp. 511–12 (12.11.44).
64. On the film, see David Welch, Propaganda and the German Cinema 1933–1945, Oxford, 1983, pp. 225–35.
65. TBJG, II/14, pp. 310–11 (1.12.44), 345 (3.12.44); Welch, p. 234.
66. TBJG, II/14, pp. 469–70 (23.12.44). More changes were necessary, but, as he had hoped, the premiere took place on 30 January 1945, the twelfth anniversary of Hitler’s takeover of power.
67. BAB, R55/601, fo. 204, Tätigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda report, 7.11.44; TBJG, II/14, p. 192 (10.11.44) .
68. TBJG, II/14, p. 147 (3.11.44); also p. 310 (1.12.44). He acknowledged that the failure of the regime to protect its population in the air war was its greatest weakness in the eyes of the public (p. 165 (6.11.44)). Düren, east of Aachen, one of the most heavily bombed towns of the war, provides an example. Only 13 out of 9,322 buildings were left undamaged by the autumn air attacks and over 3,000 people lost their lives (Friedrich, p. 144). In late December Himmler reported that the population there was ‘completely hostile and unfriendly’ and that the ‘Heil Hitler’ greeting was almost unknown, even among local Party functionaries (BAB, NS19/751, fo. 32, Himmler to Bormann, 26.12.44, also in IfZ, Fa-93).
69. TBJG, II/14, pp. 133 (1.11.44), 238 (19.11.44); Robert Grosche, Kölner Tagebuch 1944–46, Cologne, 1969, pp. 52–6 (30.10.–6.11.44); LHC, Dempsey Papers, no. 178, pt. II, pp. 7–8 (27.11.44), ‘Total War Comes to Cologne’ (account of a prisoner of war who witnessed the raid).
70. Widerstand und Verfolgung in Köln, ed. Historisches Archiv der Stadt Köln, Cologne, 1974, pp. 395–6; Detlef Peukert, Die Edelweißpiraten: Protestbewegungen jugendlicher Arbeiter im Dritten Reich, Cologne, 1980, pp. 103–15; TBJG, II/14, p. 426 (16.12.44).
71. TBJG, II/14, p. 269 (24.11.44).
72. TBJG, II/14, p. 192 (10.11.44).
73. Margarete Dörr, ‘Wer die Zeit nicht miterlebt hat…’: Frauenerfahrungen im Zweiten Weltkrieg und in den Jahren danach, vol. 3, Frankfurt am Main and New York, 1998, p. 437.
74. TBJG, II/14, p. 192 (10.11.44).
75. TBJG, II/14, p. 269 (24.11.44).
76. IWM, Box 367/35, suppl. I, deposition of Rohland, pp. 3–4 (22.10.45).
77. Von Oven, p. 518 (3.12.44). The ‘Morgenthau Plan’, put forward by the Americans at the Quebec Conference in September 1944, had been agreed, apparently with little detailed consideration, by the British (who, surprisingly, seem to have shown scant interest in its proposals). Though President Roosevelt favoured a harsh peace, he was eventually persuaded to back away from the ‘Morgenthau Plan’ by the combined and determined opposition of his Secretary of State, Cordell Hull, and his Secretary for War, Henry Stimson. – Toby Thacker, The End of the Third Reich: Defeat, Denazification and Nuremberg, January 1944–November 1946, pb. edn., Stroud, 2008, pp. 58–60.
78. Von Oven, pp. 524–5 (14.12.44); TBJG, II/14, pp. 407–13 (13.12.44). Vivid descriptions of the dreadful conditions following the raids in Bochum (‘a dead city’) and other major conurbations in the Rhine and Ruhr were given in a secret German censorship report on letters to and from the front, which fell into Allied hands. – NAL, FO898/187, summary of German media reports, fos. 292–5 (27–31.12.44).
79. TBJG, II/14, pp. 408–9, 412 (13.12.44).
80. TBJG, II/14, p. 377 (8.12.44).
81. Robert Ley, the Party’s Organization Leader, sent Hitler a somewhat mixed report on the qualities of the western Gauleiter, after a 14-day visit to the west in November, but there was no hint of disloyalty. – BAB, NS6/135, fos. 12–17, Ley’s report to Hitler, 30.11.44; accurately summarized in TBJG, II/14, pp. 355–7 (5.12.44).
82. BAB, R55/603, fo. 513, Hauptreferat Pro.Pol. an das RPA Neustadt a.d. Weinstr. (28.11.44).
83. TBJG, II/14, pp. 309–10, 316, 344, 382 (1–3.12.44, 9.12.44); BAB, R55/601, fos. 221–2, Tätigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda report, 14.11.44; von Oven, p. 509 (10.11.44); Das letzte halbe Jahr: Stimmungsberichte der Wehrmachtpropaganda 1944/45, ed. Wolfram Wette, Ricarda Bremer and Detlef Vogel, Essen, 2001, pp. 153, 160, 167 (21.11.44, 29.11.44, 9.12.44).
84. TBJG, II/14, p. 420 (15.12.44).
85. BAB, NS19/751, fos. 23–5, Chief of SS-Hauptamt Gottlieb Berger to Himmler, 17.11.44 (also in IfZ, Fa-93).
86. Cited in Andreas Kunz, Wehrmacht und Niederlage: Die bewaffnete Macht in der Endphase der nationalsozialistischen Herrschaft 1944 bis 1945, Munich, 2007, p. 269.
87. BA/MA, MSg2/2697, fos. 64–7, diary entries of Lieutenant Julius Dufner (27.11–5.12.44). For the bombing of Freiburg, see Peter Zolling, ‘Was machen wir am Tag nach unserem Sieg?’ in Wolfgang Malanowski (ed.), 1945: Deutschland in der Stunde Null, Reinbek bei Hamburg, 1985, p. 121; and, especially, Friedrich, pp. 306–11.
88. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, U’Fw. Hermann S., 6.12.44.
89. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, SS-Rttf. Paul S., 5.12.44.
90. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, SS-Rttf. Paul S., 11.11.44. Propaganda offices reported an improvement in the mood of the civilian population in mid-November, which it partly attributed to the announcement of the V2 attacks. – BAB, R55/601, fo. 215, Tätigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda report, 14.11.44.
91. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, Gefr. Michael M., 11.11.44.
92. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, Kanonier Felix S., 10.11.44.
93.
LHC, Dempsey Papers, no. 199, pt. II, p. 5 (20.12.44), in English.
94. BA/MA, N712/15, NL Pollex, Kriegstagebuch, entry for 26.12.44. Pollex, born in 1898, had served briefly as senior quartermaster (Oberquartiermeister) with Army Group Centre in 1942 before being transferred to the Army General Staff and later in the year being promoted to the rank of colonel. In December 1944 he was sent to Döberitz to take charge of officer training courses (Regimentskommandeur-Lehrgang) then moved on 9 January 1945 to become Chief of Staff to the Chef der deutschen Wehrmachtrüstung.
95. Sönke Neitzel, Abgehört: Deutsche Generäle in britischer Kriegsgefangenschaft 1942–1945, Berlin, 2005, pp. 171, 432–3 (1.1.45) (Eng. edn., Tapping Hitler’s Generals: Transcripts of Secret Conversations, 1942–45, Barnsley, 2007, p. 127).
96. Benjamin Ziemann, ‘Fluchten aus dem Konsens zum Durchhalten: Ergebnisse, Probleme und Perspektiven der Erforschung soldatischer Verweigerungsformen in der Wehrmacht 1939–1945’, in Ralf-Dieter Müller and Hans-Erich Volkmann (eds.), Die Wehrmacht: Mythos und Realität, Munich, 1999, p. 594; Manfred Messerschmidt, ‘Die Wehrmacht in der Endphase: Realität und Perzeption’, Aus Parlament und Zeitgeschichte, 32–3 (1989) (4.8.89), pp. 42–3. General Schörner justified his ferocious military discipline to his own subordinate leading officers in Courland by the need to combat the rapidly growing number of deserters. – BA/MA, RH19/III/727, fo. 49–49v, Schörner to all his generals, 5.12.44.
97. Kunz, p. 267.
98. BA/MA, N712/15, NL Pollex, diary entry for 8.12.44.
99. Hastings, p. 228. Major Hasso Viebig, commanding officer of the 277th Grenadier-Division, recalled in British captivity four months after the offensive the determination of the troops, exhilarated that they were advancing again. – Neitzel, Abgehört, p. 200 and p. 539 n. 158. See also Zimmermann, p. 94 for the initial boost to morale from the offensive.
100. For the course of the offensive, see DZW, 6, pp. 128–34, DRZW, 7 (Vogel), pp. 625–32; Jung, chs. 4–7; Lothar Gruchmann, Der Zweite Weltkrieg, pb. edn., Munich, 1975, pp. 310–12; Gerhard L. Weinberg, A World at Arms: A Global History of World War II, Cambridge, 1994, pp. 766–8; Stephen B. Patrick, ‘The Ardennes Offensive: An Analysis of the Battle of the Bulge’, in Nofi, pp. 206–24; and Hastings, ch. 8. Peiper’s panzer regiment was responsible for the deaths of more than 400 American and Belgian prisoners in all. – DZW, 6, p. 130. The Malmédy massacre of 84 prisoners is judiciously discussed by Michael Reynolds, The Devil’s Adjutant: Jochen Peiper, Panzer Leader, Staplehurst, 1995, pp. 88–97.
101. LHC, Dempsey Papers, no. 241, pt. II, p. 3 (30.1.45), diary entry of Lt. Behmen, 18th Volksgrenadier Division, in English.
102. LHC, Dempsey Papers, no. 217, pt. II, p. 5 (6.1.45), in English.
103. BAB, R55/793, fos. 16–18, Material for Propagandists, No. 19 (11.12.44). Such propaganda had nevertheless limited effect. Goebbels noted in mid-December that the population in the west had no fear of the Anglo-Americans and farmers were reluctant, therefore, to be evacuated. – TBJG, II/14, p. 402 (12.12.44).
104. LHC, Dempsey Papers, No. 246, pt. II, p. 3 (4.2.45), in English.
105. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, Gefr. W.P., 17.12.44.
106. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, Gefr. S.F., 17.12.44.
107. BfZ, Sterz-Sammlung, Uffz. Werner F., 19.12.44.
108. TBJG, II/14, pp. 429, 433 (17.12.44), 438–9 (18.12.44), 445 (19.12.44); von Oven, pp. 526–9 (17.12.44, 20.12.44).
109. See VB, 19.12.44, where the headline simply read, ‘German Offensive in the West’.
110. BAB, R55/601, fos. 249–50, Tätigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda report, 19.12.44. See also Klaus-Dietmar Henke, Die amerikanische Besetzung Deutschlands, Munich, 1995, pp. 316–17.
111. TBJG, II/14, p. 450 (20.12.44), and, still in the same vein, p. 468 (23.12.44).
112. Das letzte halbe Jahr, p. 183, report for 18–24.12.44 (2.1.45).
113. NAL, FO898/187, summary of German media reports, fo. 315 (18–26.12.44).
114. TBJG, II/14, p. 452 (20.12.44).
115. DRZW, 7 (Vogel), p. 631.
116. IWM, Box 367/27, p. 7, Speer Ministry Interrogation Reports, deposition of Saur, 11–13.6.45. According to Goebbels’ aide Rudolf Semmler, the offensive was by 21 December ‘already seen to be a definite failure’. – Rudolf Semmler, Goebbels – the Man Next to Hitler, London, 1947, p. 171 (21.12.44).
117. Speer, p. 425.
118. Guderian, p. 381.
119. DRZW, 7 (Vogel), p. 629; Hastings, p. 261.
120. DZW, 6, p. 133, and p. 137 for the figures that follow.
121. TBJG, II/14, pp. 436–7 (29.12.44). He had acknowledged a ‘somewhat more critical’ situation six days earlier (p. 469 (23.12.44)) and a deterioration on 28.12.44 (pp. 480–81). Wehrmacht propaganda agents in Berlin also commented at this time on the confidence of soldiers returning from the front, but hinted that the enthusiasm at home had waned. – Das letzte halbe Jahr, p. 193, report for 25–31.12.44 (3.1.45).
122. TBJG, II/14, p. 500 (31.12.44).
123. BA/MA, MSg2/2697, diary of Lieutenant Julius Dufner, fo. 78 (1.1.45).
124. BAB, R55/612, Echo zur Führerrede, summary report to Goebbels, fos. 22–3, 2.1.45; fos. 17–102 for replies of propaganda offices to request for information on the reception of Hitler’s speech and that of Goebbels himself, 1–2.1.45.
125. Hitler: Reden und Proklamationen 1932–1945, ed. Max Domarus, Wiesbaden, 1973, pp. 2179–85 for the text of the speech.
126. BHStA, Minn 72417, unfoliated, 28.11.44–5.1.45.
127. BAB, R43II/1648, fo. 20, Lammers to Highest Reich Authorities, 17.12.44.
128. TBJG, II/14, pp. 282 (27.11.44), 328–9 (2.12.44), 370–72 (7.12.44); David Irving, Göring: A Biography, London, 1989, pp. 447–8, 476.
129. Michael Bloch, Ribbentrop, pb. edn., London, 1994, pp. 418–19.
130. Ronald Smelser, Robert Ley: Hitler’s Labor Front Leader, Oxford, New York and Hamburg, 1988, p. 291.
131. The Bormann Letters, pp. 152 (26.12.44), 158 (1.1.45)
132. Felix Kersten, The Kersten Memoirs, 1940–1945, London, 1956, pp. 238–9 (10.12.44); BAB, NS19/3912, fo. 115, Berger to Himmler, for rumours of Himmler’s disgrace (21.12.44). Himmler had been appointed in November to be Commander-in-Chief Upper Rhine. As head of the Replacement Army, and Chief of Police, Himmler was seen to be in a good position to raise a makeshift army as a defence force to help the German 19th Army try to hold back the Allied drive into Alsace. The newly created Army Group Upper Rhine, stationed in an area between the Black Forest and the Swiss frontier, was heavily patched together from stragglers, Volksgrenadier and anti-aircraft units, border police, non-German battalions from the east, and Volkssturm men. Refusing to leave his Black Forest headquarters, Himmler created a vacuum which fostered intrigue at Führer Headquarters, possibly involving Bormann and some disaffected influential SS leaders. – Heinz Höhne, The Order of the Death’s Head, London, 1972, pp. 509–11; Peter Padfield, Himmler: Reichsführer-SS, London, 1990, pp. 546, 554–6. Berger requested Himmler to cut short his activity as Commander-in-Chief Upper Rhine and return to Führer Headquarters. His request, he said, ‘comes not only from the fabrication of rumours promoted by certain sides with all energy – Reichsführer-SS is in disgrace, the Wehrmacht lobby – Keitel – has indeed triumphed – but because I sense that if Reichsführer-SS is not at Headquarters our political work, as the basis of everything, suffers immeasurably’. Himmler replied (fo. 116), via his personal adjutant, SS-Standartenführer Rudolf Brandt, on 29 December, stating that it would only be a short time before he could place the command of Army Group Upper Rhine in other hands, and that he might have the opportunity to speak briefly about the matter to Berger. Letter and telephone, he added, cryptically, were ‘not suitable for this topic’. Himmler’s short-lived command of Army Group Upper Rhine, as part of the weak and brief German offensive in Alsace in January, ended in failure. But whatever rumours there had been, they had evidently not undermined his standing with Hitler. Acc
ording to Goebbels, Hitler was ‘extraordinarily satisfied’ with the work of the Reichsführer. – Peter Longerich, Heinrich Himmler: Biographie, Munich, 2008, pp. 736–7.
133. TBJG, II/14, pp. 497–8 (31.12.44); von Oven, pp. 529–30 (26.12.44), 534–6 (28.12.44).
134. Speer, pp. 425–7.
135. NAL, WO204/6384, interview with SS-Obergruppenführer Wolff, fo. 2, 15.6.45.
136. Guderian, pp. 382–4. It has been adjudged that ‘the fatal role of the Ardennes offensive was indirectly to weaken the eastern front’ through binding forces needed for defence against the Red Army. – Heinz Magenheimer, Hitler’s War: German Military Strategy 1940–1945, London, 1998, p. 264. However, as Jung, p. 201, points out, even had the Ardennes offensive proved more successful, the transfer of exhausted Wehrmacht units to the east would not have sufficed to hold off the Soviet offensive. See also Henke, p. 342.