Hitler 1936-1945: Nemesis (Allen Lane History)

by Ian Kershaw

  37. DRZW, ii.248. The following rests above all on Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, ‘Hitlers Gedanken zur Kriegführung im Westen’, Wehrwissenschaftliche Rundschau, 5 (1955), 433–46; and Jacobsen, Fall Gelb, 66ff., 107ff, esp.112ff.

  38. This version was, in fact, captured after a German officer’s plane was forced to land in Belgium. See Jacobsen, Fall Gelb, 93–9.

  39. DRZW, ii.250–51.

  40. IfZ, MA 444/3, ‘Grundsätzlicher Befehl’, 11 January 1940; Domarus, 1446.

  41. Engel, 75.

  42. DRZW, ii.252.

  43. DRZW, ii.254. François Delpla, La ruse nazi. Dunkerque – 24 mai 1940, Paris, 1997, 120 and nn.30–31, could find no reference to the term in contemporary documents. He attributed it to Churchill, who wrote after the war of ‘the German scythe-cut’ (Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War, vol.ii, Their Finest Hour, London etc., 1949, 74). Its first usage in scholarly literature, he suggested, was by Jacobsen in Fall Gelb, published in 1957.

  44. Weisungen, 53; Jacobsen, Vorgeschichte, 64–8; DRZW, ii.253 (map).

  45. Schmidt, 488–9; CD, 223.

  46. Staatsmänner, i.47.

  47. Staatsmänner, i.48.

  48. Above based on Staatsmänner, i.37–59; Schmidt, 488–91; CD, 223–5; CP, 361–5.

  49. CD, 224–5.

  50. TBJG, 1/7, 356 (19 March 1940), 357 (20 March 1940).

  51. TBJG, 1/7, 358 (20 March 1940).

  52. As pointed out by Lukacs, 221.

  53. TBJG, 1/8, 66 (21 April 1940).

  54. TBJG, 1/8, 73 (25 April 1940).

  55. Hillgruber, Strategie, 58.

  56. DRZW, ii.283–4; Below, 228.

  57. Below, 228–9.

  58. DRZW, ii.282.

  59. DRZW, ii.266–7.

  60. Schroeder, 101–2, 349–50, n. 196; Below, 229–30.

  61. Below, 231.

  62. DRZW, ii.284–96; Weinberg III, 125–30; Gruchmann, Zweiter Weltkrieg, pt.I, ch.5; Parker, Struggle, 27ff.; Churchill, ii.66–104.

  63. See DRZW, ii.296 for Rundstedt’s post-war self-exculpatory view. See also Guenther Blumen-tritt, Von Rundstedt. The Soldier and the Man, London, 1952, 74–8. Churchill recognized, even writing in the late 1940s, the misleading nature of the German generals’ accounts (Churchill, ii.68–70). See also, on the ‘halt order’, Gruchmann, Zweiter Weltkrieg, 63; Weinberg III, 130–31; Parker, Struggle, 35–6; Irving, HW, 120–22; Charles Messenger, The Last Prussian. A Biography of Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt, 1875–1953, London etc., 1991,113–20; Lukacs, Duel, 90–97. Delpla, La ruse, here especially 290–92 (also François Delpla, Hitler, Paris, 1999, 326–7) is alone in interpeting the ‘halt order’ as part of a complex diplomatic manoeuvre, involving Göring and Dahlerus, to hold the British to ransom and force them to end the war on German terms.

  64. Schroeder, 105–6 (where Hitler’s comment is dated to the day that he learned of the French armistice offer – 17 June).

  65. Below, 232.

  66. IMG, xxviii.433, Doc.1809-PS (Jodl-Tagebuch); Hans-Adolf Jacobsen (ed.), Dokumente zum Westfeldzug 1940, Göttingen/Berlin/Frankfurt, 1960, 73–86; Jacobsen, 1939–1945. Der Zweite Weltkrieg, 146; Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, Dünkirchen. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte des Westfeldzuges 1940, Neckargemünd, 1958, 70–122, especially 94–5. Jodl repeated after the war that the notion that Hitler refused to send the tanks on to Dunkirk was a ‘legend’. Hitler, he stated, had hesitated to adopt Brauchitsch’s recommendation to do this because the terrain was not suitable for tanks and the risk was too great that the tanks would not be available for the thrust to the south. However, he left the decision to the local commanders, who chose not to deploy the tanks against Dunkirk (IfZ, ZS 678 (Generaloberst Alfred Jodl), ‘Hitler, eine militärische Führerpersönlichkeit. Ein Gespräch mit Generaloberst Jodl von Freg.Kapt. Meckel’, May-July 1946, Fol.3).

  67. Below, 232–3.

  68. Halder KTB, i.319 (25 May 1940).

  69. IMG, xxviii.434, D0C.1809-PS (Jodl-Tagebuch); Jacobsen, 1939–45, 146–7; Below, 233.

  70. Halder KTB, i.318–19 (24 May 1940, 25 May 1940).

  71. DRZW, ii.297.

  72. Halder KTB, i.318 (24 May 1940); Below, 232.

  73. DGFP, D, 9, 484, N0.357.

  74. DRZW, ii.296; Weinberg III, 130–31.

  75. Halder KTB, i.320–21 (26 May 1940).

  76. In fact, General Sir John Gort, the commander of the British Expeditionary Force, had ordered the evacuation only at 7 p.m. on 26 May, and as few as 8,000 troops were evacuated during the following twenty-four hours (Lukacs, Duel, 96–7). The evacuation continued for another week. Dunkirk fell only on 4 June.

  77. See Lukacs, Duel, 97ff., for Churchill’s political isolation during the days of the evacuation, and the pressure of those wanting to sue for terms, articulated above all by Lord Halifax.

  78. Below, 233; Schroeder, 102.

  79. See Eugen Weber, The Hollow Years. France in the 1930s, New York/London, 1996, 272–9.

  80. Weinberg III, 131; Below, 233–4.

  81. DRZW, ii.307; Oxford Companion, 414.

  82. Schroeder, 106. Trick photography later turned Hitler’s characteristic gesture of raising his leg and slapping his thigh into a jig for joy (Lukacs, Duel, 142).

  83. CD, 263–4, 268.

  84. Below, 234; Domarus, 1527–8.

  85. Lukacs, Duel, 139.

  86. CD, 267 (18–19 June 1940).

  87. CD, 266–7; Schmidt, 495.

  88. TBJG, 1/8, 202 (3 July 1940).

  89. Churchill and Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence, vol.i, ed. Warren Kimball, Princeton, 1984, 49–51, Doc.C-17X (quotation, 49).

  90. Schmidt, 495; CD, 266–7; Domarus, 1528.

  91. IMG, xxviii.431, Doc. 1809-PS (Jodl-Tagebücher).

  92. TBJG, 11/4, 492 (10 June 1942).

  93. Schmidt, 497–502; Keitel, 235–6; Domarus, 1529–30. And see Eberhard Jäckel, Frankreich in Hitlers Europa. Die deutsche Frankreichpolitik im Zweiten Weltkrieg, Stuttgart, 1966, 38–40. Hitler gave orders for the railway carriage and memorial to the French victory to be brought back to Berlin. The monument to Marshal Foch, the French hero of the First World War, was to be left untouched. The carriage was pulled through the Brandenburg Gate on ‘Heroes’ Memorial Day’ (Heldengedenktag) 1941, then put on display in the Lustgarten. (Tb Reuth, 1438, n.105.)

  94. TBJG, 1/8, 186 (22 June 1940).

  95. DRZW, ii.316–19.

  96. Domarus, 1533.

  97. Speer, 185–6.

  98. Below, 235; Schroeder, 106 and 351 n.202. Hitler had already at the beginning of the month paid one visit to the battlefields, taking in the Langemarck Monument and Vimy Ridge (TBJG, 1/8, 154 (4 June 1940), 159 (6 June 1940); Below, 235).

  99. Without indicating any source, Irving, HW, 131, Hauner, 152, and an editorial note to Schroeder, 351 n.203, date the visit to 23 June; Giesler, 387, to 24 June. But both Schroeder, 106, and Below, 235, place the visit after, not before, the trip to the battlefields. Speer, 186, dates the visit to ‘three days after the commencement of the armistice’, which would be 28 June. This is the date given by Domarus, 1534, referring to newspaper reports of 30 June 1940 on the visit.

  100. Speer, 186–7.

  101. Monologe, 116 (29 October 1941).

  102. Speer, 187.

  103. TBJG, 1/8, 202 (3 July 1940).

  104. Speer, 187. In autumn 1941 he told the guests at the evening meal, despite mixed impressions of the city’s beauty, that he had been glad that it had not been necessary to destroy it (Monologe, 116 (29 October 1941)).

  105. TBJG, 1/8, 202 (3 July 1940). England could be defeated in four weeks, Hitler had told Goebbels. See Schroeder, 105, for Hitler indicating on the very night that the armistice came into effect that he was going to make a speech (which she took to be a last appeal to England), and that if they did not comply he would proceed against them ‘unmercifully’. Schroeder dates her letter, however, 20 June 1940 – five days before the ceasefire. Below also indicated Hitler’s p
resumption that his ‘offer’ would be turned down (Below, 236).

  106. Zoller, Hitler privat, 141; Below, 237; TBJG, 1/8, 209–10 (7 July 1940).

  107. StA Neuburg an der Donau, vorl.LO A5, report of the Kreisleiter of Augsburg-Stadt, 10 July 1940.

  108. GStA, MA 106683, report of the Regierungspräsident of Schwaben, 9 July 1940.

  109. See Kershaw, ‘Hitler Myth’, 155–6. Goebbels’s comment that the people were thirsting for war with England (TBJG, 1/8, 205 (5 July 1940)) was on this occasion not far wide of the mark.

  110. Below, 237.

  111. Weinberg III, 145–6; Lukacs, Duel, 172–3. Hitler had assured the French, in the terms of the armistice, that he had no intention of deploying their fleet for war purposes and had allowed the French fleet to remain armed (Domarus, 1532; TBJG, 1/8, 210 (7 July 1940)).

  112. TBJG, 1/8, 210 (7 July 1940).

  113. CD, 275 (7 July 1940); CP, 375–9. Hitler’s words were partly directed at Britain, since he was aware that what he said to Ciano would find its way to the British (Below, 239).

  114. Lukacs, Duel, 173.

  115. TBJG, 1/8, 213 (9 July 1940).

  116. Hillgruber, Strategie, 168; Karl Klee (ed.), Dokumente zum Unternehmen ‘Seelöwe’. Die geplante deutsche Landung in England 1940, Göttingen/Berlin/Frankfurt, 1959, 238–9.

  117. Klee, Dokumente zum Unternehmen ‘Seelöwe,’ 239–40; Karl Klee, Das Unternehmen ‘Seelöwe’, Göttingen/Berlin/Frankfurt, 1958, 58–9; Below, 236.

  118. DRZW, ii.371. See Jodl’s Memorandum of 30 June 1940 in IMG, xxviii.301–3, D0C.1776-PS. Jodl had seen landings only as a last resort, and if air-superiority was assured.

  119. Thomas, German Navy, 195.

  120. Klee, Dokumente, 240–41; BA/MA, PG/31320, Handakten Raeder, Denkschrift, 11 June 1940 (kindly drawn to my attention by Meir Michaelis); see Thomas, Navy, 192.

  121. Lukacs, Duel 180–81; Below, 239–40.

  122. Klee, Unternehmen, 72. Invasion scares had been prevalent in Britain for weeks by this time. Churchill deliberately kept the scare running to build up fighting morale, though doubting personally the seriousness of the invasion threat (John Colville, Downing Street Diaries 1939–1955, London, 1985, 192). I am grateful for this reference to Tilman Remme. Churchill had received an insight into German naval thinking about an invasion in June (Churchill, ii.267).

  123. Halder KTB, II, 19–22 (13 July 1940). Apart from ‘Sealion’, Hitler discussed with Halder proposals put forward by the army leadership for demobilization of some units. Evidently contemplating the likelihood of new military engagements in the near future, Hitler would only agree to disbanding fifteen divisions – subsequently (Halder KTB, ii.20 (13 July 1940), 27 (19 July 1940); DRZW, ii. 371; DRZW, iv.9, 261–2) raised to seventeen – instead of an intended thirty-five divisions, with the bulk of the remaining personnel to be sent on leave and therefore be made available for speedy recall. The initial plans in mid-June 1940 had foreseen the disbanding of forty divisions (DRZW, iv.260).

  124. Halder KTB, ii.21 (13 July 1940), trans. Halder Diary, 227. See also Below, 240. By ‘others’, Hitler meant the Soviet Union (Hillgruber, Strategie, 155 n.53).

  125. As a wave of fear of fifth-columnists mounted in Britain once the German western offensive had begun, Mosley and his wife Diana (née Mitford), a long-standing admirer of Hitler, were placed in internment (Skidelsky, 449ff.).

  126. Engel, 85 (15 July 1940).

  127. Below, 240.

  128. Weisungen, 71.

  129. Blumentritt, 85–7; and see Messenger, 125–7.

  130. Domarus, 1539.

  131. Below, 240–41; Shirer, Berlin Diary, 356.

  132. Engel, 85–6 (22 July 1940). BA, R4311/1087a contains records relating to handsome gifts during the war of estates to Keitel, Guderian, Reichenau, Leeb, and others.

  133. Below, 237, 240 (for the feeling that Brauchitsch did not deserve promotion).

  134. Shirer, Berlin Diary, 355–6.

  135. TBJG, 1/8, 229 (20 July 1940).

  136. William L. Shirer, This is Berlin. Reporting from Nazi Germany 1938–40, London, 1999, 35.

  137. Shirer, Berlin Diary, 357.

  138. Domarus, 1558.

  139. Domarus, 1558 (text of the speech, 1540–59).

  140. Below, 242; CD, 277 (19 July 1940); Domarus, 1560.

  141. Lukacs, Duel, 193ff.

  142. CP, 381.

  143. TBJG, 1/8, 231 (21 July 1940).

  144. For the following: Halder KTB, ii.30–33 (22 July 1940); trans. Halder Diary, 230–32; Klee, Dokumente, 245–6. And see DRZW, ii.370.

  145. For continued considerations of the need to discuss terms with Hitler, see John Charmley, Churchill: the End of Glory. A Political Biography, London/New York, 1993, 422–32; and Lukacs, Duel, 97ff. Ribbentrop’s plan to engage the Duke of Windsor, then in Portugal, as a go-between to groups in Britain prepared to entertain peace, presumably with the aim of bringing the Duke back to the throne at the expense of his brother, George VI, ended with the departure of the Windsors on 1 August to the Bahamas, where the Duke, from Churchill’s standpoint out of harm’s way, took up the position as Governor. (Hillgruber, Strategie, 153–4; Walter Schellenberg, Schellenberg, Mayflower edn, 1965, 67–80.)

  146. Halder KTB, ii.30–33 trans. Halder Diary, 230–32 (22 July 1940). According to Below, Hitler had commented at the beginning of July that he wanted to avoid war with England because a showdown with Russia was unavoidable (Below, 236). A month earlier than this, on 2 June, he was reported to have remarked in conversation with von Rundstedt that with England, he imagined, now ready for peace he could start to settle the account with Bolshevism (Warlimont, 113; Walter Ansel, Hitler Confronts England, Durham NC, 1960, 175–6).

  147. Speer, 188.

  148. See Hitler’s reported comments to Rundstedt and Jodl about the attack on Bolshevism (Warlimont, 111, 113). And see Bernd Stegemann, ‘Hitlers Kriegsziele im ersten Kriegsjahr 1939/40. Ein Beitrag zur Quellenkritik’, Militärgeschichtliche Mitteilungen, 27 (1980), 93–105, here especially 99.

  149. Halder KTB, i.358 (16 June 1940); 372 (25 June 1940); DRZW, iv.9; Carr, Poland, 115.

  150. Halder KTB, ii.6 and n.I (3 July 1940); trans. Halder Diary, 220–21. Halder had already spoken about preparations to a small number of his planning staff in mid-June (Dirks/Janßen, 131).

  151. TBJG, 1/8, 232 (22 July 1940).

  152. TBJG, 1/8, 234 (24 July 1940); Domarus, 1562.

  153. Kubizek, 287–90.

  154. Halder KTB, ii.43 (30 July 1940).

  155. DRZW, ii.371.

  156. Halder KTB, ii.45–6 (30 July 1940).

  157. IfZ, ZS 678, Generaloberst Alfred Jodl, ‘Hitler, eine militärische Führerpersönlichkeitß, Summer, 1946, Fol.5: ‘Das Heer hatte von den Absichten des Führers schon erfahren, als diese noch im Stadium der Erwägung waren. Es wurde deshalb ein Operationsplan entworfen, noch ehe der Befehl dazu erging.’ IfZ, ZS 97, Major-General Bernhard v. Loßberg, Fol. 10 (Letter of Loßberg, 7 September 1956). Loßberg also pointed out (Fol.15, letter of 16 September 1956) that a further feasibility study (by Major-General Marcks, see Jacobsen, 1939–1945, 164–7) from the OKH General Staff was already submitted by 5 August, although Hitler had only spoken to Jodl for the first time about the Russian campaign on 29 July. And already by 20 August, operational plans were so far advanced that General Quarter-Master Eduard Wagner was in a position to report to Halder on planning for troop supplies (Eduard Wagner, Der Generalquartiermeister. Briefe und Tagebuchaufzeichnungen des Generalquartiermeister s des Heeres General der Artillerie Eduard Wagner, ed. Elisabeth Wagner, Munich/Vienna, 1963, 261–3, especially 263). According to Jodl, in a further post-war statement (IfZ, MA 1564–1 Nuremberg Document NOKW-065, a ten-page statement by Jodl, dated 26 September 1946, here pp.9–10 (Frames 0654–5)), Hitler was concerned about the Russian threat to the Romanian oil-fields. However, the feasibility studies over the next weeks completely ruled out any early move. Preparations could not b
e completed in under four months and by that time it would be winter when, Jodl’s staff reckoned, military operations in the east would be impossible. For the time being, the idea of an attack on the Soviet Union was shelved. But Warlimont was commissioned in August with working out improvements aimed at speeding up troop concentration in the east. Then in November, Hitler passed on to Jodl the order that all sections of the Wehrmacht should start planning for an operation against Russia. (See also Lukacs, Duel, 213–14.) As Loßberg pointed out, the later operational plans bore a strong resemblance to the feasibility studies of summer 1940 for what he had dubbed – after his small son – ‘Operation Fritz’ and was later renamed ‘Barbarossa’. (IfZ, ZS 97, Fols.10–11, 14–15.)

  158. According to Warlimont’s later account, Jodl checked the doors and windows were closed before telling them that Hitler had decided to rid the world of Bolshevism ‘once and for all’ by a surprise attack on Russia the following May (Warlimont, 111).

  159. Warlimont, 111–12.

  160. Warlimont, 112. See also Lukacs, Duel, 214.

  161. Halder KTB, ii.46–50 (31 July 1940); trans. Halder Diary, 241–5.

  162. Halder KTB, ii.6 (3 July 1940).

  163. Hillgruber, Strategie, 213–14.

  164. Weisungen, 75–6.

  165. DRZW, ii.378, 382. Below, 244, has fighters in action from the 8th.

  166. Below, 244. Churchill, ii.Ch.XVI, provides a graphic description of the ‘Battle of Britain’.

  167. DRZW, ii.386 (and, for Göring’s directive of 2 August 1940, aimed initially at destroying the British fighter-arm in the London area before major attacks on the capital, 380 and nn.50–51).

  168. Steinert, 367 and n.160.

  169. Below, 244.

  170. Domarus, 1580.

  171. Below, 244. For the ‘Blitz’, see Churchill, ii. Ch.XVII-XVIII.

  172. Hillgruber, Strategie, 174.

  173. Halder KTB, ii.128–9 (7 October 1940); Hillgruber, Strategie, 177.

  174. Hillgruber, Strategie, 175–6.

  175. Halder KTB, ii.98–100 (14 September 1940); DRZW, ii.389.

  176. Below, 246.

  177. Domarus, 1585.

  178. DRZW, ii.396; Below, 245. The city centre of Coventry (including the cathedral) was destroyed. The dead numbered 380, the injured 865. Twelve armaments factories were also damaged, though not put out of production. British decoding of German signals had forewarned the RAF of a major attack on cities in the Midlands and had even indicated Coventry as the main target. However, the air-defence of Coventry was woeful. Almost all the fleet of over 500 German bombers reached the target. Only one plane was certainly brought down (Oxford Companion, 275; Churchill, ii.332–3).