Plotting Hitler's Death
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28. Spiegelbild, 34.
29. Manfred Messerschmidt, “Militärische Motive zur Durchführung des Umsturzes,” Schmädecke and Steinbach, Widerstand, 1034.
30. Rüdiger Altmann, Der wilde Frieden: Notizen zu einer politischen Theorie des Scheiterns (Stuttgart, 1987), 200.
31. Zeller, Freiheit, 531.
32. Alexander Stahlberg, Die verdammte Pflicht: Erinnerungen, 1932-1945 (Berlin and Frankfurt, 1994), 456ff.
33. Rothfels, Opposition, 87.
34. Karl Otmar von Aretin, cited in Ulrich Cartarius, Opposition gegen Hitler (Berlin, 1984), 26.
35. Kunrat von Hammerstein, Spähtrupp (Stuttgart, 1963), 295.
36. Meding, Mut, 52. Stauffenberg’s widow, Countess Nina Schenk von Stauffenberg, said something similar: “On the whole, what happened was probably best for the cause” (288).
A NOTE ON THE TEXTS
The following works cited in their German editions in the notes are available in English translation.
Balfour, Michael, and Julian Frisby. Helmuth von Moltke: A Leader against Hitler.
London, 1972.
Bracher, Karl Dietrich. The German Dictatorship: The Origins, Structure, and Effects
of National Socialism. New York, 1970.
Buchheim, Hans, et al. Anatomy of the SS State. Trans. Richard Barry, Marian
Jackson, and Dorothy Lang. New York, 1968.
Ciano, Galeazzo. The Ciano Diaries, 1939-1943. Ed. Hugh Gibson. New York, 1947.
Domains, Max. Hitler: Speeches and Proclamations, 1932-1945. London, 1990.
Fest, Joachim, Hitler. Trans. Richard and Clara Winston. New York, 1973.
--------. The Face of the Third Reich. Trans. Michael Bullock. New York, 1970.
Francois-Poncet, Andre. The Fateful Years: Memoirs of a French Ambassador in
Berlin, 1931-1938. New York, 1949.
Gisevius, Hans Bernd. To the Bitter End Trans. Richard and Clara Winston. Boston,
1947.
Halder, Franz. The Halder War Diary, 1939-1942. Ed. Charles Burdick and Hans-
Adolf Jacobsen. Novato, 1988.
Hassell, Ulrich von. The von Hassell Diaries: The Story of the Forces against Hitler
inside Germany, 1938-1944 Boulder, 1944.
Hoffmann, Peter. German Resistance to Hitler. Cambridge, Mass., 1988.
--------. Hitler’s Personal Security. Cambridge, Mass, 1979.
Höhne, Heinz. Canaris: A Biography of Hitler’s Chief of Espionage Trans. J.
Maxwell Brownjohn. New York, 1979.
Kramarz, Joachim. Stauffenberg: The Architect of the Famous July 20th Conspiracy to
Assassinate Hitler. Trans. R. H. Barry. New York, 1967.
Moltke, Helmuth James von. Letters to Freya, 1939-1945. Ed. and trans. Beate Ruhm
von Oppen. New York, 1990.
Rothfels, Hans. The German Opposition to Hitler: An appraisal. Chicago, 1962.
Schlabrendorff, Fabian von. Revolt against Hitler. New York, 1982
Schöllgen, Gregor. A Conservative against Hiller: Ulrich von Hassell, Diplomat in
Imperial Germany, the Weimar Republic, and the Third Reich, 1881-1944 Trans. Louise Willmot. New York, 1991.
Speidel, Hans. Invasion 1944: Rommel and the Normandy Campaign. Chicago, 1950.
Stahlberg, Alexander. Bounden Duty. The Memoirs of a German Officer, 1932-1945
Trans. Patricia Crampton. New York, 1990.
Steinert, Marlis G. Hitler’s War and the Germans: Public Mood and Attitude during
the Second World War. Ed. and trans. Thomas E. J de Witt Athens, Ohio, 1977.
Stern, Fritz. Dreams and Delusions: The Drama of German History. New York, 1987.
Trial of Major War Criminals before the International Military Tribunal 42 vols.
Nuremberg, 1947-49.
van Roon, Ger.German Resistance to Hitler Count von Moltke and the Kreisau
Circle. Trans. Peter Ludlow. New York, 1971.
Vassiltchikov, Maria. Berlin Diaries, 1940-1945 London, 1986.
Wilmot, Chester. The Struggle for Europe Westport, 1972.
Zeller, Eberhard. The Flame of Freedom. The German Struggle against Hitler Trans.
R. P. Heller and D. R. Masters. London, 1967.
CHRONOLOGY
1933
Jan. 30 Hitler appointed chancellor
Feb. 3 Hitler meets with commanders of the Reichswehr for the
first time
Feb. 27-28 Reichstag fire. Government issues emergency decree “to
protect the people and the state”
March 5 Reichstag elections. Nazis receive 43.9 percent of the vote
March 21 Potsdam Day celebrations, intended to show unity of
Prussianness and National Socialism
March 23 Enabling Act passed
Apr. 1 Boycott of Jewish businesses
Apr. 7 Act to Restore a Professional Public Service passed
May 2 Trade unions disbanded and German Labor Front founded
June-July Political parties dissolved
July 20 Concordat with Vatican signed
1934
April 24 People’s Court established
June 30 Night of the Long Knives. Liquidation of SA leaders and
other political opponents begins
Aug. 2 Hindenburg dies. General Werner von Blomberg orders
Reichswehr to swear loyalty to Hitler. Hitler granted unlimited power as “Führer and chancellor”
1935
Jan. 2 Admiral Wilhelm Canaris takes over as chief of Military
Intelligence
March 4-5 Synod of the Confessional Church decides to denounce Nazi racial theories and the “new heathens” from the pulpit. Seven hundred pastors arrested
March 16 Reintroduction of universal conscription
Aug. on Wave of arrests directed against socialist resistance group Beginning Anew
Sept. 15 Nuremberg laws enacted
Oct. Wave of arrests by the Gestapo. By May 1936, over seven thousand seized for political reasons
1936
March 7 German troops march into the demilitarized Rhineland
May 26 Campaign against monasteries and convents. Morals charges brought against 276 members of religious orders for alleged homosexuality
May 28 Whitsun declaration of the Confessional Church condemns Nazi racial policies
Aug. The Socialist Front in Hannover, one of the largest northern German resistance groups, headed by Werner Blumenberg, broken up by Gestapo
Nov. Gestapo arrests members of the left-wing socialist organization Red Fighters
1937
Jan. 30 Enabling Act extended for four years. Hitler withdraws Germany’s signature from the discriminatory clauses of the Treaty of Versailles
March 14 Papal encyclical Mit brennender Sorge (With Deepest Anxiety) condemns Nazi policy toward the church. Mass arrest of clergymen, expropriation of church publishing houses and presses
July 1 Pastor Martin Niemöller arrested and sent to a concentration camp
Nov. 5 Hitler announces war plans to the military leadership and the foreign minister. Immediate targets: Austria and Czechoslovakia
Dec. Large-scale operation mounted in many major cities against left-wing resistance organizations
1938
Feb. 4 Dismissal of Blomberg and Army Commander in Chief Fritsch. Hitler creates the High Command of the Armed Forces (OKW) under Wilhelm Keitel. Walther von Brauchitsch named commander in chief of the army. Hitler himself takes over as supreme commander of the entire armed forces (Wehrmacht)
March 12 Annexation of Austria
March 13 Law proclaiming the Anschluss passed
May 30 Directive from Hitler announcing the invasion of
Czechoslovakia
Aug. 18 Chief of General Staff Ludwig Beck resigns in protest of Hitler’s aggression. Franz Halder appointed as successor
Summer Conspiracy of civilian and military resistance groups launched. Main part
icipants are Halder, Hans Oster, and Erwin von Witzleben
Sept. 28 Oster and Friedrich Wilhelm Heinz’s plan for a task force to invade the Chancellery and kill Hitler fails
Sept. 29 Munich conference grants Sudetenland to Germany
Oct. 21 Hitler issues secret orders to prepare “to eliminate the rest of Czechoslovakia”
Nov. 9 Kristallnacht, a “spontaneous” pogrom against Jews. Police forbidden to intervene
1939
March 15 Entry into Czechoslovakia. Under pressure from Germany, Slovakia declares its independence
April 3 Hitler issues directive to prepare for the invasion of Poland
May 23 Hitler explains invasion plans to his generals
Summer Civilian and military resistance circles plan to remove Hitler from power to prevent war. Opposition groups around Harro Schulze-Boysen and Arvid and Mildred Harnack form the Red Orchestra
Aug. 23 Hitler-Stalin pact divides Poland and Eastern Europe into spheres of interest
Sept. 1 Outbreak of the Second World War with invasion of Poland
Sept. 21 Reinhard Heydrich issues guidelines for the Einsatzgruppen in occupied Poland
Sept. 27 Warsaw surrenders
Oct. 9 Hitler announces his intention to launch an invasion in the West by November 12
Oct.-Nov. Preparations made for Erich Kordt’s attempt to assassinate Hitler with a bomb
Nov 8. Acting alone, Georg Elser fails to kill Hitler in Munich
1940
April 9 Beginning of operation that will lead to occupation of Denmark and Norway
May 10 Beginning of the campaign in the West. Capitulation of Holland (May 15) and Belgium (May 28) and truce with France (June 22)
Dec. 18 Directive from Hitler for Operation Barbarossa: “Before the end of the war against England,” the Wehrmacht is to defeat the USSR in “a quick campaign”
1941
March 30 Hitler declares to his generals that the Russian campaign will be a “struggle of annihilation”
Spring Henning von Tresckow organizes a group of conspirators within Army Group Center
May 13 Hitler cancels the jurisdiction of the military courts over the areas of the Soviet Union that will be occupied. Illegal acts against Soviet civilians no longer punishable; crimes against the occupying Germans to be punished extrajudicially
June 6 Commissar Order calls for the liquidation of political commissars in the Soviet Union
June 22 Beginning of the Russian campaign. The three army groups are followed by four Einsatzgruppen of security police and the SD
Nov.-Dec. The Russian winter destroys Hitler’s plans for blitzkrieg against the Soviet Union
Dec. 19 Hitler dismisses Field Marshal Walther von Brauchitsch and assumes supreme command of the army himself
1942
Feb. The revolutionary left-wing resistance organization led by Beppo Romer and Robert Uhrig is broken up in Berlin. Forty-five death sentences issued
March 22 Pastoral letter of Catholic bishops on the “Struggle against Christianity and the Church”
Spring The resistance organization Revolutionary Socialists broken up in Bavaria and Austria
Aug. 20 Roland Freisler named president of the People’s Court
Sept. 24 Franz Halder replaced as chief of general staff by Kurt Zeitzler
Fall Gestapo breaks up the Red Orchestra
Nov. 22 The Sixth Army (some 250,000 troops) cut off near Stalingrad
1943
Jan. 24 Franklin D. Roosevelt and Winston Churchill announce at the Casablanca Conference (Jan. 14-26) their demand for “unconditional surrender”
Feb. 2 Capitulation of the Sixth Army in Stalingrad
Feb. 18 Flyers distributed in Munich by White Rose, a student resistance group with Catholic and youth-organization roots
March 13 Attempt by conspirators in Army Group Center to blow up Hitler fails
March 21 Colonel Rudolph-Christoph von Gersdorff s assassination attempt in the Berlin Zeughaus fails
April 5 Arrest of Hans von Dohnanyi, Dietrich Bonhoeffer, Josef Müller, and other members of the resistance group within Military Intelligence. Hans Oster’s activities are curtailed
July 12-13 Establishment of the National Committee for a Free Germany in Krasnogorsk, near Moscow
Summer Friedrich Olbricht, Tresckow, and Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg begin to rework the Valkyrie plans for a coup
Oct. 1 Stauffenberg assumes his position as chief of staff in the General Army Office under General Olbricht
Nov. 28- Teheran Conference. Roosevelt, Stalin, and Churchill
Dec. 12 agree in principle on the division of Germany
1944
Jan. 19 Helmuth von Moltke and members of the Solf Circle arrested
Jan.-March Captain Axel von dem Bussche, Lieutenant Ewald von Kleist-Schmenzin, and Cavalry Captain Eberhard von Breitenbuch all fail in various plans to assassinate Hitler
Feb. 12 Admiral Wilhelm Canaris relieved of his duties. Hitler orders the creation of a “unified German secret information service” under Himmler
June 6 Allied invasion of Normandy commences
June 22 Julius Leber and Adolf Reichwein meet in Berlin with members of the outlawed central committee of the German Communist Party. Beginning of the Soviet offensive on the eastern front in the area of Army Group Center
July 4-5 Adolf Reichwein and Julius Leber arrested
July 11 Stauffenberg plans to assassinate Hitler at Führer headquarters on the Obersalzberg
July 15 Stauffenberg plans to assassinate Hitler at the Wolf’s Lair, Führer headquarters in Rastenburg
July 20 Stauffenberg sets off a bomb in the conference barracks at Rastenburg. Hitler survives. Coup attempt in Paris canceled when plans fail at army headquarters in Berlin. Late that night Stauffenberg, Olbricht, Albrecht Mertz von Quirnheim, and Werner von Haeften are executed in the army courtyard on Bendlerstrasse. A wave of arrests begins
Aug. Beginning of trials before the People’s Court and the first executions
1945
Feb. 4-11 Yalta Conference
April 25 American and Soviet troops meet near Torgau on the Elbe
April 30 Hitler commits suicide
May 8 Germany surrenders unconditionally
SHORT BIOGRAPHIES
Beck, Ludwig (1880-1944)
Career officer. In October 1933 named chief of the troop office in the Ministry of Defense and in 1935 army chief of general staff. Attempted in vain in the summer of 1938 to persuade the generals to resign en masse in order to prevent war. Resigned thereafter himself for reasons of conscience and became a central figure in the military-civilian resistance. After some initial reluctance, participated in planning assassination attempts and was supposed to become regent after Hitler’s death. After the failure of the coup attempt on July 20, 1944, General Friedrich Fromm demanded that he commit suicide in army headquarters on Bendlerstrasse. He botched the attempt, succeeding only in severely wounding himself, and a sergeant finished the job.
Blaskowitz, Johannes (1883-1948)
Career officer of the old school. Commander in chief of the German occupation forces in Poland. Wrote two memoranda to Walther von Brauchitsch about the atrocities in Poland and the horrified reaction of the troops. Relieved of his command on several occasions during the battle of France. Later, however, took other commands, no longer calling Hitler’s policies into question. In January 1945 assigned command of an army group in Holland, where he capitulated to the British on May 5, 1945. Committed suicide on February 5, 1948, by jumping out a window of Nuremberg prison.
Blomberg, Werner von (1878-1946)
Appointed minister of defense in 1933. From 1935 until 1938 minister of war and commander in chief of the Wehrmacht. Became a field marshal in 1936. Nicknamed “the rubber lion” by fellow officers for his ability to adapt. Believed that the Night of the Long Knives was justified because public order was threatened by insurgents; iss
ued a “muzzle edict” forbidding all criticism within the army. Following the death of President Hindenburg on August 2, 1934, facilitated a virtual putsch by ordering all soldiers to swear allegiance to the “Führer Adolf Hitler.” Discredited by the Nazis in January 1938, and forced to resign within a few weeks. Died in American custody.
Blumentritt, Günther (1892-1967)
Appointed colonel on the army general staff in 1938. On the general staff of Army Group South during the Polish and French campaigns and appointed chief of staff to the Fourth Army in 1940. Posted to Army Group Center during the Soviet campaign. Became quartermaster general on the army general staff in July 1942. Appointed chief of general staff to the commander in chief in the West. Thanks to his diplomatic skill, the Wehrmacht, the SS, and the SD were able to agree on how to word an official version of events in Paris on the night of July 20-21, 1944. In 1945 was named commander in chief of the Twenty-Fifth Army and then of the First Parachute Army. On April 10, 1945, became commander in chief of the army named after him.
Bock, Fedor von (1880-1945)
Career officer. Promoted to field marshal in 1940. Commander in chief of army groups in Poland, France, and the Soviet Union (Army Group Center). After the attack on Moscow ground to a halt, was posted to Army Group South in January 1942. Dismissed on July 15, 1942, for lack of success. At war’s end, placed himself at the disposal of the Dönitz government. Killed during an air raid in early May 1945.
Despite his outrage at the anti-Semitic violence of November 9, 1938, later refused to participate actively in the resistance.
Bonhoeffer, Dietrich (1906-45)
A prominent Protestant theologian, son of the well-known psychiatrist and neurologist Karl Bonhoeffer. Pastor in London between 1933 and 1935. For a time, private lecturer at the university in Berlin. A leading representative of the Confessional Church. In 1940 drafted into the OKW Military Intelligence Office. Helped draft memoranda on the future democratic government of Germany and compiled files on crimes committed by the SS. Important foreign contacts with A. W. Visser ’t Hooft–the secretary-general of the provisional World Council of Churches in Geneva-and Bishop George Bell. Arrested on April 5, 1943, for undermining the war effort. Hanged on April 9, 1945, after a summary trial in the Flossenbürg concentration camp.