The Last Prussian

by Messenger, Charles;

  Von Rundstedt constantly disparaged Hitler in private and had done so from very early on – Lieutenant Colonel Eugen Ott, who was working in the Defence Ministry at the time, once heard von Rundstedt and von Schleicher at the beginning of 1934 ‘revile Hitler in the most dreadful way’17 and there is General X’s 1932 comment on von Rundstedt’s relationship with Hitler. The Field Marshal was not, however, prepared to take any direct action against him for a number of reasons. For a start, he was a believer in the principle that the soldier should stay out of politics and it was a field in which he took no overt interest. The few instances in which he did find himself pitchforked into the political arena showed him to be very uncomfortable, as the imposer of martial law in Berlin in 1932 after the removal of the Prussian cabinet, and naive, as evidenced by his first meeting with Pétain. He also claimed to have little in common with those soldiers who did dabble in politics or who wore their political beliefs on their sleeves. To remove Hitler by force would be a political act and on the same level as the Kapp Putsch, which, unlike a significant number of senior officers, von Rundstedt had refused to support from the outset.

  There was also the excuse that he frequently made to those who approached him over taking an active part in the anti-Hitler movement that he could not be sure that his troops would follow him. There is some evidence to support this, the most striking piece being the behaviour of Major Remer in Berlin on 20 July 1944. Faced with the choice of obeying the Generals or Goebbels he chose the latter. Remer was a convinced National Socialist, as was a significant proportion of the junior and middle ranking officers and it is quite likely that they would have placed their loyalty to Hitler above that to von Rundstedt if he had openly declared himself. Furthermore, it was really only after Stalingrad that defeat began to stare the German people in the face. Up until then, Hitler’s successes had muted the opposition. However, simultaneously with the Paulus’s surrender, came the Allied declaration of Unconditional Surrender, something which the Nazi propaganda machine eagerly seized on and used increasingly the more Germany’s enemies closed in on her. In addition, the forces in contact with the enemy on both the Eastern and Western Fronts were not directly involved in the July 1944 Bomb Plot, although some officers were aware of what was in the wind. They had more immediate matters on their minds.

  Furthermore, von Rundstedt consistently refused to act outside the chain of command. To do so, in his eyes, would be both disloyal and a breach of discipline. Unfortunately, of course, up until the end of 1941 his superior was von Brauchitsch, who was personally beholden to Hitler. Thereafter Hitler himself took over overall command of the Army. Keitel, too, von Rundstedt’s other superior, was not nicknamed Lakaitel (lackey) for nothing. Nevertheless, von Rundstedt did try and remonstrate with Hitler over the conduct of the war in private audiences with him, but, as he told von Manstein in March 1944, when the Field Marshals were summoned to Berchtesgaden to reaffirm their personal loyalty to the Führer, Hitler would not listen to him.18 To take action outside the chain of command, even to have Hitler deposed as Commander-in-Chief of the Army, ran totally counter to the Prussian military tradition. As von Manstein said on more than one occasion: ‘Prussian Field Marshals do not mutiny!’19

  The other factor was von Rundstedt’s growing old age and ill-health. When he had his heart attack in Russia in November 1941 he was almost 66 years old. It should have been the signal to both himself and the Supreme Command that it was time that he hung up his sword for good. As it was, he may well have had his heart attack at the back of his mind when he offered his resignation over the Rostov affair a couple of weeks later. Hitler, however, did not retire him and placed him on the Führer-Reserve OKH instead, and made it quite clear, after personally excusing himself for the so called misunderstanding over von Kleist’s withdrawal, that his services would very likely be needed again. The von Rundstedt who arrived in Paris in March 1942 was, however, a different man to the one who had enjoyed such success in Poland, France and even during the early months of the campaign in Russia. He had noticeably slowed up, both physically and mentally, and, in addition to the other grounds for not wishing to be involved with the plotters, he simply could not be bothered. This is reflected in his utterance to Gerhard Engel when he visited him in February 1943. He could, of course, have insisted on being retired, but this ran totally counter to his concept of duty. Besides, as he pointed out, to have done so would have been to desert his troops and would have probably resulted in an officer more sympathetic to the Nazi régime being appointed in his place.

  This leaves the question of the 1944 Court of Honour. His involvement in this was something for which some Germans, while they would be and were prepared to forgive him for everything else, could and cannot excuse him. Von Rundstedt was personally ordered by Hitler, as Commander-in-Chief of the Wehrmacht, to preside over the Court. To have refused would have been to disobey an order from his superior, and a dereliction of duty in his eyes. In addition, if he had refused, it would not have prevented the proceedings from continuing and someone more ruthless would have been doubtless found to substitute for him. This is not, however, the justification that he gave after the war for his participation. It is clear from the von Fritsch affair, when von Rundstedt failed to present von Fritsch’s challenge to Himmler, that where there was a choice between the collective honour of the Army and that of the individual, he would opt for the former. When he told the IMT Commission at Nuremberg that he could not evade presiding over the Court of Honour ‘in the interest of the Army’ von Rundstedt was indicating that again it was collective rather than individual honour in which he was primarily concerned. On the other hand, he also asserted that he did his best to protect those whose guilt was in doubt. For those who were clearly guilty he had no sympathy; what they had done was ‘base, bare-faced treachery’. Furthermore, he claimed that the majority of the German people and the Wehrmacht were still firm supporters of Hitler. Even if it had succeeded, Germany, because of the Allied demand for unconditional surrender, would have found herself in no better position than she was in May 1945. Therefore, he claimed, as has already been described, if he had been involved in the plot he would have been dubbed the ‘greatest traitor’. Although von Rundstedt himself never mentioned it, underlying much of this was the fact that the German people increasingly hoped that the Western Allies would eventually see sense and join Germany in the defence of Western Europe against the real enemy, Stalin’s Russia. What probably made von Rundstedt angrier than anything else, though, was that the failure of the July 1944 Bomb Plot merely served to weaken the Army’s position vis-á-vis the Nazi régime still further. The freedom of action that he and his fellow high commanders had striven for so long receded even further into the distance and the impending Götterdämmerung was merely brought closer.

  In summary, von Rundstedt and his brother Prussian officers were trapped by the military ethic which had for so long been their strength and the strength of their country. Hitler was astute enough to realise this and wove an ever smaller mesh in the net that encased them. When Hitler came to power in 1933, the threat to the Army lay not in himself but in his uniformed henchmen the SA, who saw themselves as the National Socialist successors to the Reichswehr. This threat was removed by the Night of the Long Knives, which was nothing more than multiple murder. The fact that two senior army officers, both members of the Prussian aristocracy, were among the victims should have warned the Army. Indeed, as we have seen, some did protest to von Blomberg, but unfortunately he either considered this a small price to pay for the confirmation of the primacy of the Army, especially since he had never been a friend of von Schleicher (the main reason why Hitler had appointed him as Defence Minister in the first place), or he feared that to rock the boat now would put the Army under threat again. The upshot was the oath of allegiance to Hitler in person. Once the officer corps had sworn this it was lost, since to break it would be dishonourable. Unfortunately, von Rundstedt and his fellows, who adhered rigidly to
the principle that officers should be apolitical, believed that matters would not get out of hand while von Hindenburg was President. They forget that he was growing ever more senile. When the old man finally passed away, Hitler was too quick for them.

  Hitler quickly recognised that the Army viewed von Rundstedt as the doyen of the officer corps. It was he, more than any other, who displayed the qualities of the ideal Prussian officer. If, therefore, he could cultivate von Rundstedt and ensure that he remained on the active list as long as possible, it would go a long way towards confirming the loyalty of the officer corps to himself. He realised, though, that this had to be carried out with some delicacy. He was careful not to be too obvious about it. If he had been, von Rundstedt might have recoiled. The birthday gifts, the attendance at King George V’s funeral, and the Italian, Hungarian and Yugoslav orders conferred on von Rundstedt were all designed to ensure his loyalty, but Hitler never tried to make von Rundstedt one of his inner circle or display too much direct attention to him. By the same token, this was possibly one of the reasons why Hitler rejected von Rundstedt’s name for Commander-in-Chief after the demise of von Fritsch, although much stronger grounds were that he was able to place von Brauchitsch in a position where he could blackmail him. Von Rundstedt, on the other hand, would have been another von Fritsch and not the pliable Commander-in-Chief that Hitler considered essential if he was to achieve his territorial and political aims in Europe successfully.

  This leads on to the question of why von Rundstedt himself never wanted to be Commander-in-Chief of the Army, which would have been the natural ambition of a dedicated career officer. It would have been logical for him to have succeeded von Hammerstein-Equord in February 1934 instead of von Fritsch, who was, in any event, junior to von Rundstedt. Whether von Rundstedt was asked if he wanted the post is not recorded, but it is more than likely that he was and refused it. Certainly this was what he did at the beginning of 1938 when Beck asked him if he was prepared to succeed von Fritsch. One can surmise in both instances that von Rundstedt rejected the notion for two main reasons. First, he hoped to retire and would be prevented from doing so if he accepted the post, not that this made any difference in the end. Second, he probably feared that it would involve him too much in politics. An additional reason might also have been that he viewed the prospect of working directly under von Blomberg in 1934 and Keitel in 1938 with distaste.

  The only senior officer to really voice the view that the officer corps must step outside its rigid code was Ludwig Beck, a Rhinelander of middle class background. In July 1938, when he was urging von Brauchitsch to tell Hitler that his generals would not support him in his expansionist policies, he wrote:

  ‘History will indict the highest leaders of the Wehrmacht with blood-guilt if they do not act in accordance with expert and statesmanlike knowledge and conscience. Their duty of soldierly obedience finds its limits when their knowledge, conscience and responsibility forbid the execution of an order.’20

  It was a prophecy which became largely true seven years later and among those who would pay the penalty was von Rundstedt.

  When the Americans captured von Rundstedt in May 1945 there was an initial thought among the Western Allies that he should be screened at ASHCAN as a possible defendant at the IMT at Nuremberg, but this was quickly dismissed. Instead, the Field Marshal became an object of most intense curiosity and his reaction, once he had overcome his initial humiliation at surrendering without offering resistance, was to display courtesy and dignity. This became even more marked when he was handed over to the British, whom he clearly preferred to the Americans. Much of the reason for this was very possibly that he viewed the British officer class as having much more in common with that of the old Prussian Army, In return, his British captors were charmed by him and it served to reinforce their conviction that he was the most outstanding German commander they had fought against.

  The relationship that von Rundstedt developed with Liddell Hart was especially close. While the latter quickly formed the opinion that von Rundstedt had too orthodox a mind he quickly grew to like him. Apart from being the Field Marshal’s champion during the period of adversity which he was to endure, he remained in close contact with the family until his death. All the von Rundstedt grandchildren individually stayed with the Liddell Harts and Sir Basil took a great interest in their lives.

  The British decision to try von Rundstedt and his fellow Field Marshals for war crimes was entirely as a result of external pressures. Their own war crimes investigation on him had found no case to answer and it was only the United States Taylor Memorandum of August 1947 that made Clement Attlee’s Labour Government think again. Up until this time, they seem to have ignored the Polish demand to try him for war crimes committed in their country in 1939. There now followed a year’s debate as to whether charges should be instigated. Certainly the Taylor Memorandum produced evidence which was new to the British and, on the surface at least, did provide a case to answer. On the other hand, it must be remembered that the Americans had entered the war crimes business late in the war. It was not until the Malmédy Massacre of December 1944 that they began seriously to pursue the matter, while the British had cases on file that stretched back to May 1940. By autumn 1947 the Government was beginning to feel that the time had come to look forward in terms of the reconstruction of Western Europe rather than to continue to dwell on the past. Public opinion in Britain also reflected the same view. The Americans, however, seem to have keenly felt the failure to achieve a guilty verdict in the IMT High Command case and believed that the senior commanders must be indicted if German militarism was to be destroyed for all time.

  The year that it took the British Government to make up its mind to put the MARCO defendants on trial provides a sorry saga. It became a long running battle between the Foreign Office, which was very aware of the international political implications of not bringing them to trial, and the War Office, which was responsible for conducting war crimes trials and which viewed the prospect of bringing to trial men whom it considered distinguished fellow soldiers as distasteful. The Government’s handling of the affair contravened the traditional British sense of fair play and united all shades of political opinion against it. Further, this opposition laid open to question the ethics of the war crimes machinery as it had been set up. It was in particular the practice of declaring an individual to be a war criminal before he had been tried and the Government’s lack of moral courage in keeping the Field Marshals in the dark for so long over their disposal that rankled most. Indeed, it seemed that the Government only took action in this latter respect after pressure by the media.

  As for the charges themselves, von Rundstedt had a case to answer, primarily on the principle that a commander is responsible for the actions of his troops. Yet, the Allies were operating double standards when it came to this. In a lecture entitled The Responsibility of Junior Officers to the Laws of War given at the Royal United Services Institute, London, in November 1951, the lecturer was asked ‘how many generals, admirals, and so on the Allied side, have been tried’ by court-martial for war crimes. The lecturer did not give a straight answer,21 but the truth was that none had been. Yet, if the same ground rules has been applied to Allied senior commanders as to German, more than one distinguished leader would have appeared in the dock. One would have been General George S Patton, whose troops murdered unarmed and surrendered Italian soldiers in Sicily in July 1943. Worse, Patton tried to cover it up by pretending that the victims were snipers or had attempted to escape.22 Another was Admiral of the Fleet Viscount Cunningham, who had flagrantly violated the 1929 Geneva Convention on Prisoners-of-War, which dictated that as soon as possible after capture they were to be taken to a place of safety. Italian frogmen launched a daring attack on the Mediterranean Fleet in Alexandria harbour in December 1941 and crippled the battleships Queen Elizabeth and Valiant. The frogmen were captured after they had placed their charges and taken ashore. Cunningham, on his own admission, then ordered
them to be put on board the Queen Elizabeth and confined them deep in the hull in an effort to force them to reveal where they had placed the charges.23

  Further strong grounds for indicting von Rundstedt were over the carrying out of illegal orders such as the Commissar and Commando Orders. The Wehrmacht was subject in this respect to Article 47 of the Military Penal Code of 1872, which stated that: ‘If through the execution of an order pertaining to the service a penal law is violated, then the superior giving the order is alone responsible. However, the obeying subordinate shall be punished as an accomplice: (1) if he went beyond the order given to him, or (2) if he knew that the order of the superior involved an act which aimed at a civil or military crime or offence.’ When the Commissar Order was issued by von Brauchtisch, on Hitler’s command, in early 1941, von Rundstedt stated that he immediately complained to the Commander-in-Chief on the grounds that it was an illegal order for a soldier to carry out. On the other hand, he also stated after the war that Hitler had stated that the Commissars were not soldiers and hence had no right to be treated as such. As for his own June 1942 Parachutist Order, which, of course, preceded the more infamous Commando Order issued by Hitler by some four months, it was justifiable except possibly the handing over of those captured behind the lines in uniform to the Gestapo. He must have known what fate was likely to be in store for them. Yet, as Liddell Hart pointed out after the war, it was similar to handing over German parachutists in uniform to the Police Special Branch, which fulfilled much the same role in Britain, albeit without the brutality. However, the only two specific incidents in which British Special Forces members were executed in pursuance of the Parachutist or Commander order during von Rundstedt’s time as C-in-C West were those of the SSRF members, who had not landed by parachute, in September 1942 and the FRANKTON members who fell into German hands. No evidence exists to link von Rundstedt directly with either of these two crimes.