by Ian Kershaw
200. LB Darmstadt, 136 (25 July 1943).
201. MadR, xiv.5562–3 (2 August 1943).
202. Speer, 296.
203. TBJG, II/9, Z05–6 (2 August 1943).
204. TBJG, II/9, 229 (6 August 1943).
205. Warlimont, 375–7, 379; Oxford Companion, 1001, 1003.
206. In fact, having rejected Kesselring because of his lack of reputation, compared with that of Rommel, Hitler eventually came, in the autumn, to prefer the optimism of the former and give him overall command in Italy (LB Darmstadt, 186 (26 July 1943) and n.258; Warlimont, 386).
207. Warlimont, 374–8; Irving, HW, 554–5, 559–60.
208. TBJG, II/8, 535 (25 June 1943).
209. Himmler had seen Hitler or Bormann with unusual frequency from the day after the fall of Mussolini until his appointment as Reich Minister of the Interior. Hitler had decided upon the appointment at the latest by 16 August, when Lammers began drawing up the necessary documents for a change of minister. Though for months Frick’s fall had seemed predestined – prevented only by Hitler’s notorious unwillingness for prestige reasons to make changes in personnel in the leading echelons of the regime – Himmler’s appointment was plainly an improvised reaction to the potential internal threat in Germany in the wake of the crisis in Italy. Goebbels and Bormann had both harboured pretensions to succeed Frick. Evidently, the determining factor in favour of Himmler was not administrative – he made few changes in this sphere – but control over the instruments of repression. (For the circumstances of Himmler’s appointment, see especially Birgit Schulze, ‘Himmler als Reichsinnenminister’, unpubl. Magisterarbeit, Ruhr-Universität Bochum, 1981, 16–23; also Rebentisch, 499–500; Jane Caplan, Government without Administration. State and Civil Service in Weimar and Nazi Germany, Oxford, 1988, 318–19; Peter Diehl-Thiele, Partei und Staat im Dritten Reich. Untersuchungen zum Verhältnis von NSDAP und allgemeiner innerer Staatsverwaltung, Munich, 2nd edn, 1971, 196–7.
210. Domarus, 2028–9.
211. TBJG, II/9, 458 (10 September 1943); Irving, HW, 561.
212. Manstein, 458–67; Below, 346; Domarus, 2029, 2032–3; Irving, HW, 562–3.
213. Below, 346; TBJG, II/9, 449–50 (9 September 1943), 457 (10 September 1943)).
214. Goebbels was telephoned by Hitler before 7p.m., within an hour of the BBC broadcasting the news of the capitulation, and told to come to FHQ that very night. Plans to fly were vitiated by dense mist – it had poured down that day – so by 9.20p.m. he had left on the night train to East Prussia {TBJG,/9, 449–50, 454 (10 September 1943), 455, 457 (10 September 1943)).
215. TBJG, II/9, 455–6 (10 September 1943).
216. TBJG, II/9, 458 (10 September 1943); Warlimont, 380; Irving, HW, 564.
217. TBJG, II/9, 460 (10 September 1943).
218. Warlimont, 381; Below, 346; Weinberg III, 599; Oxford Companion, 573, 588.
219. See TBJG, II/9, 456 (10 September 1943).
220. Irving, HW, 567–8.
221. Below, 347, who says Hitler ruled out entirely any accommodation with the western powers; TBJG, II/9, 464, where his preference for overtures to Britain is recorded, 466–7 (10 September 1943); see also 566 (23 September 1943). For the possible Soviet interest in a separate peace at this time, see Weinberg III, 609–11.
222. Domarus, 2034–9 (10 September 1943).
223. Goebbels was delighted at its impact (TBJG, II/9, 489–90, 493–4 (12 September 1943), 499 (13 September 1943)); for the SD’s monitoring, see Kershaw, ‘Hitler Myth’, 211.
224. TBJG, II/9, 468, 473, 475, 483–4, 485–7 (10 September 1943).
225. Warlimont, 385–6; TBJG, II/9, 460–61, 464–5 (10 September 1943).
226. TBJG, II/9, 500–501 (13 September 1943); Below, 346–7; Otto Skorzeny, Geheimkommando Skorzeny, Hamburg, 1950, 135–51.
227. TBJG, III/9, 567–8 (23 September 1943).
228. Below, 347.
229. Mack Smith, 350–58; Woller, 45ft
230. TBJG, II/9, 561, 563, 565–7 (23 September 1943).
231. Warlimont, 388; Weinberg III, 606; Irving, HW, 565–7; Glantz and House, 172–3. Manstein, 450–86, outlines the Soviet advance and German rearguard action from his own perspective.
232. Manstein, 486–7; and see Irving, HW, 578–9.
233. Weinberg III, 605–7 (for the above military developments).
234. IMG, xxxiiii.68–9, Doc. 4024-PS, Globocnik’s report to Himmler of 4 November 1943. See also Leon Poliakov and Josef Wulf, Das Dritte Reich und die Juden. Dokumente und Aufsätze, 2nd edn, Berlin, 1955,44–5; Hilberg, Vernichtung, iii.1299; Fleming, Hitler und die Endlösung, 71 n.132.
235. Leni Yahil, The Rescue of Danish Jewry. Test of a Democracy, Philadelphia, 1969, 285ff.; Herbert, Best, 363–4, 367; Ulrich Herbert, ‘Die deutsche Besatzungspolitik in Dänemark im 2. Weltkrieg und die Rettung der dänischen Juden’, Tel Aviver Jahrbuch für deutsche Geschichte, 23 (1994), 93–114; Hilberg, Vernichtung, ii.586–96; Longerich, Politik, 555–60.
236. Michaelis, 360–70; Hilberg, Vernichtung, ii.714–15; John Cornwell, Hitler’s Pope. The Secret History of Pius XII, London, 1999, 298–318. Odilo Globocnik, who had organized ‘Action Rein-hardt’ in the General Government, had been appointed Higher SS and Police Leader in Istria at the end of August. Some of the key experts on gassing, formerly with the T4 ‘euthanasia action’, had gone with him. It looks, therefore, as if the intention was to set up an extermination unit for the Italian Jews (N($$)P, iii. 1168). For reflections on different Italian and German behaviour towards Jews, see Jonathan Steinberg, All or Nothing. The Axis and the Holocaust 1941–43, London/New York, 1991, 168–80, 220–41.
237. IMG, xxix.145–6, Doc.908; trans., slightly amended, N ($$) P, iii.1199–1200; partial extract, Michalka, Das Dritte Reich, ii.256–7.
238. Fleming, Hitler und die Endlösung, 73–4.
239. TBJG, II/10, 72 (7 October 1943).
240. Smith and Peterson, Himmler. Geheimreden, 169 (entire text of the speech, 162–83; typescript, BDC, 0.238 I – H. Himmler; handwritten notes, BDC, 0–238 III – H.Himmler); Fleming, Hitler und die Endlösung, 74–5.
241. Irving, HW, 575–6.
242. Domarus, 2045.
243. Domarus, 2050–59. The speech was recorded for radio transmission that evening. Hitler had a written text for the first part, but improvised much of the second. This necessitated Goebbels, with Hitler’s permission, cutting ‘a few somewhat awkward formulations’ from the broadcast version (TBJG, II/10, 262 (9 November 1943)).
244. Broszat/Frei, 278.
245. Kershaw, ‘Hitler Myth’, 211–13.
246. Domarus, 2054–5.
247. Weisungen, 270.
248. LB Darmstadt, 218–19 (20 December 1943).
CHAPTER 13: HOPING FOR MIRACLES
1. Domarus, 2073 (text of the Proclamation, 2071–4).
2. Domarus, 2075 (text of the Daily Command, 2074–6).
3. Domarus, 2076.
4. Speer referred, in a series of short reflections on Nazi leaders which he wrote in captivity directly after the end of the war, to Hitler’s increased emphasis on ‘Fate’, attributing it to his manic overwork and loss of ability to detach himself from events and think freely. (Speer Papers, AH/II, Bl.13. I am grateful to Gitta Sereny for giving me access to this material in her possession.)
5. TBJG, II/12, 421 (7 June 1944).
6. This was the opinion, immediately after the war, of Albert Speer, who wrote that Hitler remained inwardly ‘convinced of his mission (von seiner Mission… überzeugt)’, and that the war could not be lost (Speer Papers, AH/II, Bl.14). Below, 361, however, wondered whether Hitler’s over-optimism represented his true feelings. That Hitler had since autumn 1942 harboured no illusions about the outcome of the war is strongly argued in a hitherto unpublished paper, which he kindly made available to me, by Bernd Wegner, ‘Hitler, der Zweite Weltkrieg und die Choreographic des Untergangs’.
7. Speer Papers, AH/II, Bl.I-II.
8. See, am
ong numerous witnesses of this, TBJG, II/13, 142 (23 July 1944). Goebbels himself thought Hitler had become old and gave an impression of frailty.
9. KTB OKW, iv, ed. Percy Ernst Schramm, pt.2, 1701–2. Though Schramm’s description dates from several months later, he points out that the deterioration in Hitler’s appearance had been a steady progression. For a similar description, by Werner Best, referring to 30 December 1943, see Ernst Günther Schenck, Patient Hitler. Eine medizinische Biographie, Düsseldorf, 1989, 390–91.
10. Schenck, 190–215; Irving, Doctor, 66ff., 259–70; Fritz Redlich, Hitler. Diagnosis of a Destructive Prophet, New York/Oxford , 1999, 237–54, 358–62.
11. Redlich, 224–5.
12. Ellen Gibbels, ‘Hitlers Nervenkrankheit. Eine neurologisch-psychiatrische Studie’, VfZ, 42 (1994), 155–220; also Redlich, 232–3; Schenk, 426–38.
13. Redlich, 276.
14. Speer Papers, AH/Schl., Bl.2, for Speer’s view of Hitler as a ‘demonic phenomenon (in seiner dämonischen Erscheinung)’, and one of the ‘eternally inexplicable historical natural phenomena (eines dieser immer unerklärlichen geschichtlichen Naturereignisse)’.
15. After the first weeks of the year at the Wolf’s Lair, he repaired to the Berghof, where he stayed, with no more than a day or two’s absence, until he left his alpine retreat for the last time on 14 July 1944. He then returned to the Wolf’s Lair until his final departure from there on 20 November. After staying for three weeks in Berlin, he moved on 10 December to his field headquarters in the West, the Adlerhorst (Eagle’s Nest), which had been constructed in 1939–40 at Ziegenberg, near Bad Nauheim, where he oversaw the Ardennes offensive and remained until January 1945 (Hauner, Hitler, 187–95; Das Große Lexikon des Zweiten Weltkriegs, ed. Christian Zentner and Friedemann Bedürftig, Munich, 1988, 13, 204).
16. Hitler, who had announced his intention of giving the speech only two days earlier, was, according to Goebbels, in good form. The Propaganda Minister thought he would persuade Hitler to allow a broadcast version of the speech, but evidently did not succeed in this (TBJG, II/11, 332, 347–8 (23 February 1944, 25 February 1944)). Nor was there a report, or even an announcement of the speech, in the VB (Tb Reuth, v.1994, n.38). But Domarus, 2088–9, was mistaken in thinking that Hitler had let the entire event drop that year.
17. GStA Munich, MA 106695, report of the Regierungspräsident of Oberbayern, 7 August 1944: ‘Lieber ein Ende mit Schrecken als ein Scbrecken ohne Ende!’
18. These were, for example, Jodl’s sentiments when he addressed a gathering of Gauleiter in February in Munich (TBJG, II/n, 345 – 6 (25 February 1944)). Goebbels followed in like vein at a meeting of Propaganda Leaders in Berlin a few days later (Tb Reuth, v. 1996, n.41).
19. Below, 357.
20. Below, 352.
21. Below, 357.
22. ‘Freies Deutschland’, established in September 1943, blended together the organizations ‘Nationalkomitee “Freies Deutschland”’ (NKFD), which had been set up in July 1943 by the Soviet leadership and comprised largely German Communist emigrés and prisoners-of-war, and the ‘Bund Deutscher Offiziere’ (Federation of German Officers), headed by General Walter von Seydlitz-Kurzbach (one of the Sixth Army’s senior commanders who had been captured with Paulus at Stalingrad). (Benz, Graml, and Weiß, Enzyklopddie, 408, 596–7.)
23. See Waldemar Besson, ‘Zur Geschichte des nationalsozialistischen Führungsoffiziers (NSFO)’, VfZ, 9 (1961), 76–116; Gerhard L. Weinberg, ‘Adolf Hitler und der NS-Führungsoffizier (NSFO)’, VfZ, 12 (1964), 443–56; Volker R. Berghahn, ‘NSDAP und “geistige Führung” der Wehrmacht 1939 – 1943’, VfZ, 17 (1969), 17 – 71; and Messerschmidt, 441ff. For Hitler’s order of 22 December 1943, see Besson, 94; and for the response in the army, Below, 356. The mandate to create a corps of National Socialist Leadership Officers was given to General Hermann Reinecke. Their task was to spread commitment to the National Socialist ideology through lectures and indoctrination. By the end of 1944, there were around 1,100 full-time and 47,000 part-time ‘Leadership Officers’, most of them in the reserve. (Benz, Graml, and Weiß, Enzyklopädie, 608.)
24. Manstein, 500 – 503, quotation 503; Domarus, 2076 – 7.
25. Manstein, 504.
26. Manstein, 505; Domarus, 2077.
27. Guderian, 326 – 7, quotation 327.
28. Irving, Doctor, 126, mentions around 105 generals as present on the basis of Morell’s diary.
29. IfZ, F19/3, ‘Ansprache des Führers an die Feldmarschälle und Generale am 27.1.1944 in der Wolfsschanze’, 56 – 7 (for new U-Boats); quotation, 63 (‘… daß niemals auch nur der leiseste Gedanke einer Kapitulation kommen kann, ganz gleich, was auch geschehen möge). Irving, HW, 598; IfZ, ED 100, Irving-Sammlung, Hitler-Dokumentation (1944), extract from Nachlaß von Salmuth (undated, but from 27 March 1946, according to Irving, HW, 881); cold atmosphere: Manstein, 511; TBJG, II/11, 368 (29 February 1944), report to Goebbels by Schmundt.
30. IfZ, F19/3, ‘Ansprache des Führers an die Feldmarschlle und Generale am 27.1.1944 in der Wolfsschanze’, 48 (‘In der letzten Konsequenz müßte ich, wenn ich als oberster Führer jemals verlassen sein würde, als Letztes um mich das gesamte Offizierkorps haben, das müßte dann mit gezogenem Degen um mich geschart stehen…’; differing (inaccurate) wording in Manstein, 511, and Domarus, 2080 (based on Linge), and in Traudl Junge, unpubl. memoirs, IfZ, ED TOO, Irving-Sammlung, Fol. 106.
31. IfZ, F19/3, ‘Ansprache des Führers an die Feldmarschälle und Generale am 27.1.1944 in der Wolfsschanze’, 49 (‘So wird es auch sein, mein Führer!’); Manstein, 511 (with slightly different wording, both of Hitler’s remark and his own interjection).
32. IFZ, F19/3, ‘Ansprache des Führers an die Feldmarschälle und Generale am 27.1.1944 in der Wolfsschanze’, 49 (‘Das ist schön! Wenn das so sein wird, dann werden wir diesen Krieg nie verlieren können – niemals, da kann sein, was sein will. Denn die Nation wird dann mit der Kraft in den Krieg gehen, die notwendig ist. Ich nehme das sehr gern zur Kenntnis, Feldmarschall vonManstein!’). Manstein, 512, inaccurately quotes Hitler’s words, and states that Hitler then somewhat abruptly concluded his speech. In fact almost a fifth of the speech was still to come at this point.
33. On hearing of the incident, Goebbels was not inclined to take it seriously (TBJG, II/11, 249 (6 February 1944)). He altered his view some weeks later after Schmundt had described what had happened, referring then to Manstein’s ‘stupid interjection’ (biöder Zwischenruf), made ‘in rather provocative fashion (in ziemlich provozierender Form)’. Schmundt recalled that the meeting had taken place in a glacial atmosphere (in einer eisigen Kühle). Goebbels noted that Hitler’s relationship with his generals was ‘somewhat poisoned (etwas vergiftet)’ (TBJG, II/11, 368 (29 February 1944)).
34. Manstein, 512.
35. Below, 360.
36. Manstein, 510–11.
37. Manstein, 512.
38. See Irving, HW, 881 note, from Schmundt’s diary, where the interruption and tension of late were noted in connection with Manstein’s retirement.
39. TBJG, II/11, 205–6, 208 (31 January 1944).
40. Domarus, 2082–6.
41. TBJG, II/11, 273–4 (10 February 1944).
42. MadR, 16, 6299 (4 February 1944).
43. On 21 December 1943, Hitler had made Goebbels head of the newly-founded Reichsinspektion der zivilen Luftkriegsmaßnahmen (Reich Inspectorate of Civilian Air-War Measures) (Moll, 380).
44. TBJG, II/11, 401 (4 March 1944).
45. TBJG, II/11, 402 (4 March 1944).
46. TBJG, II/2, 406–7 (6 June 1944).
47. Speer, 372; Irving, HW, 531.
48. Below, 363–4.
49. TBJG, II/12, 354–5 (24 May 1944).
50. Speer, 374–8, quotation 377.
51. TBJG, II/11, 247 (6 February 1944).
52. Speer, 378; Heinz Dieter Hölsken, Die V-Waffen. Entstehung-Propaganda-Kriegseinsatz, Stuttgart, 1984, 142.
53. Irving, HW, 609.
54. TBJG, II/11
, 247 (6 February 1944). Jodl told the Gauleiter later that month that the retaliation would finally begin in mid-April (TBJG, II/11, 347 (25 February 1944).
55. Irving, 609.
56. Below, 363.
57. Below, 363; and see Hoffmann, Security, 229–32, 241–4.
58. Hauner, 188; Irving, HW, 607; both have Hitler leaving on 23 Feb., but Morell’s diary records that he took the train on the evening of 22 February (Irving, Doctor, 129). TBJG, II/11, 332 (23 March 1944), for Hitler’s notification that he would speak in Munich. Goebbels, in referring to Hitler’s intention to come to Munich, offered an implicit criticism in the very next lines of his diary entry by noting that it would be good if the Führer were to visit Berlin or another city that had suffered from the bombing. So far he had not visited a single such city, and ‘that cannot be sustained in the long run’.
59. Schenck, 352, 391; Irving, Doctor, 128–9; Redlich, 346; TBJG, II/11, 297 (16 February 1944).
60. Irving, Doctor, 131–2; Redlich, 228–9, 346; Schenck, 308.
61. Irving, Doctor, 131; Redlich, 346; Schenck, 382ff.
62. TBJG, II/11, 346–7 (25 February 1944).
63. TBJG, II/11, 347–8 (25 February 1944).
64. Irving, Doctor, 129; TBJG, II/11, 349 (25 February 1944).
65. TBJG, II/11, 408–9 (4 March 1944); Irving, Doctor, 129; Irving, HW, 608. For the building of the underground passages, see Josef Geiss, Obersalzberg. The History of a Mountain, Berchtes-gaden, n.d. (1955), 147–56; and Hanisch, 35. By 1944, British intelligence had built up a surprisingly detailed knowledge of the layout of the Berghof, devised with the intention of a possible assassination attempt there on Hitler. (Operation Foxley: the British Plan to Kill Hitler, London, 1998, 87ft (for security arrangements), 100–101 (for the air-raid shelters).)
66. TBJG, II/11, 389 (3 March 1944).
67. Hauner, Hitler, 194. The armistice between Finland and the Allies was concluded on 19 September 1944: German troops had to leave Finland within two weeks.