The German Army 1933-1945 – It’s
Political and Military Failure, by Mathew
Cooper (Scarborough House, Lanham, MD, 1978) p. 532-534
“Things and actions are what they
are, and the consequences of them will be what they will be; why, then, should
we desire to be deceived?” – Bishop Joseph Butler 1692-1752
“The history of the German
opposition to Hitler from 1939 had been a sad one. The conspirator’s plans were
frustrated by the early successes of Hitler’s aggression, the hesitation of his
generals, the strict nature of his police state, and the tight security that
surrounded his person. Death had come to be seen as the only way by which Hitler’s
tyranny could be removed….only failure abroad offered any hope for the
underground opposition. During 1943 there were several attempts on the
Fuherer’s life, but all came to nothing….By 1944 the new men were the most
active. Foremost among them were Colonel Count Claus von Stauffenberg, a
handsome, educated, brace officer in his late thirties who had sustained severe
injuries in early 1943 and was now Chief of Staff to the Reserve Army; General
Friedrich Olbricht, a deeply religious man and Head of the Supply Section of
the Reserve Army, and Henning von Tresckow, Chief of Staff of Army Group
Centre…"
"In the first half of 1944 these officers and civilians built up a new
organization capable of taking over the government as soon as Hitler had been
removed by either bomb or bullet; the plan evolved was code-named ‘Valkerie’.
After the dictator’s death, the key installations in Berlin, such as the radio,
power, and railway stations would be occupied by the military, the SS would be
disarmed, and all Army units at home and abroad would be informed that, as the
Fuhrer and Supreme Commander was dead, the Army had been empowered to form a
new government…At the same time, all senior Party, SS, and Police officials
would be arrested and precautionary measures taken against the militarized
political formations.”
“On 20 July 1944 von Stauffenberg
placed a bomb, concealed in a briefcase, under the table at a midday conference
in the Fuhrer’s East Prussia headquarters, to which he had been asked to give a
report. Having already left the room, he made his escape after the resulting
explosion, but thanks to the small amount of charge used, to the flimsy
construction of the hut in which the conference was being held, and to the
action of another officer, who inadvertently pushed the bomb away from the
target behind a heavy wooden plinth supporting the table, Hitler was not
killed, but merely shocked. Failure at the headquarters as matched by failure
in Berlin; hours were lost through vacillation, bad organization, and ill-luck.
At 6:45 p.m., six hours after the explosion, the news of Hitler’s survival was
broadcast throughout the Reich, and all attempts at a coup came to an abrupt
end….Hitler’s revenge was immediate and terrible. At midday on the day after
the explosion, he broadcast to the German nation:
‘If I speak to you
today, it is first in order that you should hear my voice, and should know that
I am unhurt and well, and secondly you should know of a crime unparalleled in
Germany history. A very small clique of ambitious, irresponsible and, at the
same time, senseless and very stupid officers had formed a plot to eliminate me
and the command of the German Wehrmacht. The bomb….exploded two metres to my
right….I myself sustained only some very minor scratches, bruises, and burns. I
regard this as a confirmation of the task imposed upon me by Providence….The
circle of these conspirators is very small and has nothing in common with the
spirit of the German Wehrmacht and, above all, none with the German people. I
therefore order now that no military authority, no leader of any unit, no
private in the field is to obey any orders emanating from these groups of
usurpers. I also order that it is everyone’s duty to arrest, or, if they
resist, kill at sight anyone issuing or handling any such orders….This time, we
shall get even with them in the way that we National Socialists are accustomed.’”
“How many people were executed in
the ensuing purge, carried out with efficiency by (Heinrich) Himmler’s (SS) security
services, is unknown. One estimate, based on the names of individuals known to
have perished, sets the number at 250, but another states that some 10,000 were
sent to concentration camps, gassed, shot, or hanged. At least two field
marshals and sixteen generals met their end, among whom were Rommel, von
Witzleben, Fellgiebel, Chief of Army Communications, von Hase, commandant of
the Berlin garrison, Hoepner, Olbricht, Oster, Stieff, Chief of the Army Organization
Office, and von Stulpnagel, as well as Colonel von Stauffenberg and Goerdeler.
Beck, von Tresckow, and Wagner, the Army Quartermaster-General, cheated the hangman
by committing suicide. Canaris also died at the hands of the SS. In the wake of
the intense suspiciou that the bomb plot had engendered, Fromm was arrested,
and, in due course, done away with (despite the fact that he had been
responsible for the killing of conspirators on 20 July), and von Kluge,
recalled from the Western Front owing to Hitler’s fear that he was meeting with
the enemy, took poison rather than face certain arrest, humiliation, and death
in Berlin. Many other officers were imprisoned, foremost among them were
Halder, together with his wife, von Falkenhausen, and Thomas….”
“The 20 July Bomb Plot, instead of
destroying Hitler, had only hardened his will to resist. Although he was
obviously a sick man, bent and shuffling, the explosion appeared to have
released a source of hither-to untapped energy; the new Chief of the General
Staff believed that ‘All the forces that had lurked within him were aroused and
came into their own. He recognized no limits anymore…’”
“A document dated 19 November 1945,
signed at Nuremberg by (German Generals) read in part: ‘A group of officers
decided to effect a radical change by killing Hitler [in July 1944]. The
question whether this was the only way to save Germany had undoubtedly been
asked by many. Officers who had been educated in the Christian faith – and they
were the overwhelming majority,…did not find a place in their creed for breaking
their oath of allegiance or for murdering their commander….It is the responsibility
of a man who undertakes to change the government of his country to provide a
new and better government, a new leader. The Army had been trained since the
last war to keep entirely out of politics. It had now, in the hour of
emergency, neither the men nor the means to take the political leadership of
the nation into its hands.’”
