Operation Valkyrie: The Secret Story of the 20 July Plot (1944)
The Fuhrer Adolf Hitler is dead. An unscrupulous clique of party leaders alien to the front has attempted under the exploitation of this situation to fall on the backs of the hard struggling front and to seize power for selfish purposes. In this hour of highest danger, the government of the Reich has declared a state of military emergency for the maintenance of law and order and at the same time has transferred the executive power with the supreme commander of the Wehrmacht to me. With this, I issue the following orders. I transfer the executive power in the area of the war at home to the commander of the army reserves under the simultaneous appointment to the supreme commander in the homeland war. Sadly, this announcement was never to be made, but it is not taken from some epic portraying an alternative reality. This was the substance of the Valkyrie Order that was to be broadcast to all command points in the event of an uprising. This might involve the revolt of the 12 million slave labourers that Germany employed. Kept in labour camps, worked to death and living on starvation rations, these had originally consisted of elements that the Nazi party treated with loathing. Homosexuals, Jews, gypsies and the homeless. Their numbers were swollen by vast armies of civilians from the conquered Eastern European lands. But these were no longer considered the only threat to the continued functioning of the Third Reich. High command feared that the devastating success of Allied bombing raids on German cities could cause a complete breakdown in law and order, which could be used by the disaffected to create a revolutionary mob that would pose a challenge to the Reich and would be manipulated by treacherous Nazi leaders or power-seeking renegade officers of the German army, the Wehrmacht, to get rid of Hitler and replace his government. The Fuhrer was well aware that as the number of German lives mounted, so did threats to his own personal security, to the degree that he prided himself on his tactic of rapidly changing his schedules or curtailing his ceremonial visits without notice. Already he avoided visiting Berlin, preferring to retire to his romantic nest in the Bavarian Alps, the Berchtesgaden, or to his massively fortified and secured bunker in a forest in East Prussia, Wolfschanze, or the Wolf’s Lair. Hitler was fond of giving a reference to a wolf in naming his retreats, stamping their identity with his own Christian name, Adolf, which in ancient German meant noble wolf. Now, finding himself more of a lone wolf than at any period since his ascendancy to power, it had not been too difficult to have him approve Operation Valkyrie. The idea of having a plan ready to put into action should rebellion break out must have seemed eminently sensible to the increasingly paranoid ruler of the Reich, particularly since it had been put to him by the man in charge of the Abwehr, the military intelligence, Admiral Canaris. What Hitler did not know was that Canaris had lost faith in him as early as 1938 and had been actively working against him since then. The plan he had approved, whilst overtly one to be put into action should rebellion break out, had in fact been designed to provide the structure for a conspiracy to kill him. It would provide the mechanism to put in place a seamless transfer of power once Hitler was assassinated, and for this to take place there must be no vacuum at the centre in Berlin. The largest military force in Berlin was the Reserve Army, whose function was to provide the training of replacements for frontline troops killed in action. The man who held this key position was General Friedrich Fromm. and it would be he who would, in the normal course of affairs, put Operation Valkyrie into operation and make the broadcast. Although the conspirators were certain that he would fall in with their plans, should he hesitate, he was to be arrested and a substitute general was to take his place. Although Operation Valkyrie had been signed off in 1943, in the summer of 1944, Nothing had been done to implement it. Then, in June of that year, the resistance movement had an enormous stroke of luck. One of their own, a handsome, intelligent and extraordinarily resourceful officer, Klaus Schenk, Graf von Stauffenberg, was appointed Chief of Staff to General Fromm, which not only gave him the right to issue orders under Fromm’s name, but gave him regular access to Hitler. The Valkyrie were the winged and armed warrior maidens of Nordic mythology, whose role was to collect souls of the bravest of the fallen and escort them to Valhalla, the home of the gods. Now, it seemed that one Valkyrie was about to ride again, and the soul she was to claim was that of Germany’s commander-in-chief, Adolf Hitler. The resistance to Hitler was by no means unified in its reasons for opposition or its aims. The plot spread over a period of time, starting with the tensions surrounding Hitler’s aggressive military policy prior to the outbreak of World War II, and ending with the failure of Operation Valkyrie, when the Reich ferociously purged itself of all potential dissidents. Most were plots laid within the army. The reasons for this were manifold. The army felt itself threatened by the First World War private who had seized power and encouraged the growth of Himmler’s SS as a competitor in the military arena. The officer class of the army was largely aristocratic and out of sympathy with a philosophy that challenged the prerogatives of the old class system. What was more, officers serving at the front were unable to close their eyes to the barbarities that took place before them on a daily basis. Finally, the army had the weapons. but there were others political and religious opponents from all walks of life and the army itself was made up of a wide range of individuals who felt impelled to act for a wide variety of reasons some were in sympathy with his ambitions but feared that his tactics either would lead or were already leading germany into disaster some opposed him from the very start on moral or political grounds whilst others rose and some rose to the greatest heights due to their involvement with the Nazi cause, only to find themselves later repelled as the Nazi party revealed its true shape. Some wished to simply topple Hitler and bring him to trial. Politically, they were of every hue, from right-wing monarchists to devout Christian socialists. Amongst them were the legalists, who believed not only that Hitler should have a fair trial, but that the world should see him tried, that all should be open and above board. This was not only so that justice be done, but that there should be no later suggestions that conspiracy had betrayed the fatherland. Rumours of conspiracy had been seeded after the Great War and had finally flowered in the rise of Hitler. The persecution of the Jews… who were pointed out as the great betrayers, and in World War II itself. But there were also those of fervent religious conviction, those who almost comically believed, in the middle of all the carnage, that killing innocent people was wrong. For all this, the greater part of the resistance believed that Hitler had to be assassinated. As the war progressed, The balance of opinion weighed more and more heavily this way. Adolf Hitler had foresworn an armed coup d’etat as a way to power, having attempted using it and failed. Created chancellor in 1933 in the elections of March 6th of that year, the NSDAP won 43.9% of the vote. making it the largest party in the Reichstag, or German Parliament. Within 17 days of the elections, he had manipulated the other parties, with the notable exception of the Socialist Party, into bringing in the Enabling Act. Perhaps the keystone of any democracy is the separation of the legislative and executive powers, with the legislative powers being vested in the Parliament to approve or disapprove any legal act, leaving the executive to carry them out. What the Enabling Act did was to do away with this division, placing the legislative powers in the hands of Hitler’s cabinet. The Socialist Party was immediately declared illegal, and by the 14th of July the other parties were to find that they had voted themselves out of existence. Hitler’s cabinet declared the NSDAP, the Nazi Party, to be the only political party with legal status in Germany. Hitler’s next move was against a body of men who had been instrumental in bringing him to power. The SA, the Sturmarbeitlung, or assault squad, called the brown shirts on account of their uniform. Formed to protect the Nazi party in 1920 from physical attacks by its political opponents, This street fighting corps had swollen to a current size of 2.9 million men and its leader, an old ally of Hitler, Röhm, was demanding the post of Minister of Defence with a view to incorporating the SA into the army. Since the army had been restricted by the Treaty of Versailles to 100,000 troops, it would be swamped and the response of the army was predictable. Already, the heroic Great War General in Reichstag, President Hindenburg, was threatening to impose martial law. What is more, the random street thuggery of the SA was becoming outdated and their sheer size menaced the Nazi party itself. In June 1934, Hitler struck. At his behest, Himmler, the leader of the rival SS, the Schutzstaffel, or protective squad, had forged a document purporting to show that Rome had accepted French money to topple Hitler. The execution of the leaders of the SA was ordered and carried out in an operation known as the Night of the Long Knives, where not only the leaders of the SA but a number of the regime’s political opponents were massacred. Whilst international cartoonists were not slow to satirise the savagery of the event, one man who was not amused was Henning von Treschkow. Coming from the Prussian military elite, and previously sympathetic to the Nazis’ hostility to the Treaty of Versailles, which had brought the Great War to an end with punitive terms for Germany, he was appalled by the brutality of the operation, and would become an inveterate conspirator against Hitler. Already with a considerable reputation having been awarded the Iron Cross First Class in the Battle of the Marne, his commanding officer had told him, you will either become a chief of the general staff or die on the scaffold. However, for the moment, Hitler had placated the army and President Hindenburg sent him a letter expressing his deep gratitude. In August, he died. And the cabinet declared the presidency dormant, transferring all its powers to Chancellor Hitler. In 1936, Hitler marched into the Rhineland in the name of the Reich, the territory bordering Belgium which had been occupied by the Allies according to the Treaty of Versailles. 30,000 German soldiers entered unopposed by the mighty French army. The French lacked the political stomach to face up to the tyrant, rightly fearing that were they to do so, the British would not back them. The Rhineland was conceded without a drop of blood being spilt. The German public were jubilant and Hitler’s popularity soared. His next move in 1937 would be to annex Austria by force if necessary. This brought him into immediate conflict with his own chief of the general staff, General Ludwig Beck. An ambitious officer with limited vision, Beck was to be proved wrong time and again in his disputes with Hitler. They were not disputes of a moral nature, nor was he opposed to any of Hitler’s aims. It was a matter of timing. Asked to draw up orders for Fall Otto, the plan to enforce union with Austria, he initially refused, only to comply later when he was convinced that the political union, the Anschluss, would not result in war. Austria, Hitler’s homeland that he had planned to invade in order to unite it with Germany, had voluntarily accepted the proposed union. By this time, Hitler’s dictatorship had become absolute. He had sacked the war minister, the position that had previously been known as Minister for Defence, filling the position with his own placeman, General Keitel, changing the name of the post once again, this time to that of Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, or OKW. For himself, he had assumed the responsibility of Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces. By effectively depriving the army of its power to influence the appointment of the war minister, Hitler had created a great number of enemies in the officer ranks. The previous war minister and the commander-in-chief of the armed forces had been forced to resign in what became known as the Bloomberg-Frisch affair. Bloomberg, a 60-year-old field marshal, had married a 26-year-old typist. Hermann Goering was best man at the wedding. Evidence had come into the hands of Heinrich Himmler’s Gestapo that Bloomberg’s wife had been a prostitute. Goering and Himmler presented the police report to Hitler and Bloomberg offered his resignation. Ironically, Hitler had Bloomberg to thank for the fact that the army continued to offer him its support beyond all reasonable expectations, since he had changed the officer’s oath from being one of loyalty to the country to loyalty to the Fuhrer himself. This oath would cause a number of officers to waver when the time came to oppose Hitler. Shortly after, the commander-in-chief of the armed forces, Wernher von Frisch, was accused by Goering and Himmler of homosexual practices. Outraged by the accusation, the commander resigned, although later cleared by a court of honour presided over by Goering. Both men had heavily criticised Hitler’s expansionist policies. This affair further alienated Henning von Treschkau, in addition to the man who was to become his commanding officer, Gunther von Kluge, amongst many others. With regard to the Reich’s expansionist policy, in 1938, Beck, the chief of general staff, was not opposed to the Fuhrer’s plans to dismantle Czechoslovakia. Where General Beck disagreed with the supreme commander was that he believed France would honour her pact with Czechoslovakia and that Britain would back her. In his opinion, the Wehrmacht was not strong enough to take on either of their two armies individually, let alone combined. The result of an invasion would be war and the destruction of Germany. But by now, with his power and popularity enhanced, none of the generals dare oppose the Führer. Despite the fact that Beck privately called him the megalomaniac little private first class. In desperation, Beck campaigned for a mass resignation of all the senior officers of the Combined Armed Forces. He had become a leader of the anti-war movement and was pleased to find an unlikely ally, Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, the Chief of Military Intelligence. Canaris came from a wealthy industrial family of Westphalia and had served as a submarine commander credited with 17 sinkings during World War I. Although never a Nazi party member, he had been involved with the notorious Freikorps after the war and accused of carrying out assassinations. Despite this, he was a highly educated and courteous individual who was drawn to Hitler as the only means of saving Germany from communism. By the time he allied himself to Beck, he had come to the conclusion that the Führer was merely taking Germany down a different path to disaster from that of the Communist Party. Unbeknownst to the Chief of the General Staff, he had already been involved in a plot to wipe out Hitler. and the entire Nazi party prior to the annexing of Austria. Unable to reach agreement with his peers regarding mass resignation, Beck persuaded them that should Hitler make a decisive move towards war, he would be toppled and executed. It was at this point that the British government decided to intervene. Despite being advised of the General’s plans by an intermediary, they decided that they were unable to place much faith in them, on top of which they had an almost superstitious regard for the ability of Adolf Hitler. They also doubted the readiness of the British armed forces to cope with those of Germany, an ironic mirror image of Beck’s doubts. Flying to Munich, the British Prime Minister on his return waved triumphantly a piece of paper that he declared promised peace in our time. The British government had cravenly agreed to the German invasion of the Sudetenland in return for which Hitler had assured them that he had no further territorial claims to make. The excuse once again was that this was land that had been unjustly cut away from Germany by the Treaty of Versailles. The conspiracy, which posed the greatest threat to the dictatorship prior to Operation Valkyrie, collapsed. In a show of defiance of Hitler, Beck resigned his post, accepting at the same time a future appointment in return for his silence. One key opponent of Hitler involved in the plot of 38 was not an army officer. Karl Goedeler, ex-mayor of Leipzig, had been considered as a potential chancellor in 1932, just prior to Hitler’s rise to power. With Hitler in control, he was one of the few politicians with the courage to continue to challenge the Nazi agenda, particularly with regard to the suppression of the Jews. Despite being re-elected in 1934, he resigned, having found his position being continually undermined by his deputy mayor, a devout National Socialist. Becoming head of overseas sales to the firm of Robert Bosch, he used his ability to travel to communicate the intentions of the Third Reich to interested parties, including Winston Churchill, and to seek support for the Bec Putsch. At the same time, he attempted to interest the British government in accepting 10,000 Jews who were stranded on the Polish border. In both the latter ventures, he was unsuccessful. Despite his agreement with Chamberlain, the German Chancellor had further adjustments to make to the Treaty of Versailles. In the 1918 agreement, much of eastern Prussia had been transferred from Germany to Poland, including the Danzig corridor. Hitler was now ready to reclaim it. Though Poland already had in place a non-aggression pact with Germany dating from 1934, on August 25th 1939, a British-Polish common defence pact was signed, bringing the British position in line with that of the French. This was one day before the planned invasion of Poland, and Hitler accordingly postponed it. Again, the senior officers of the Wehrmacht heaved a sigh of relief. With Goedler drafting the peace terms that a post-Hitler government would seek with England and France, the generals again prepared to get rid of Hitler, with the signal for action this time being an active declaration of war against the Western nations, which many believed… would inevitably lead to world war. Despite the high ranking of the officers involved, including the new Chief of Army General Staff Halder, who succeeded Beck, the plot fizzled out. How much Hitler knew of it is unclear. Admiral Canaris warned that if the conspirators met at Zossen, the headquarters of the army, they would be arrested, and Halder was told by the Fuhrer himself that he would destroy the spirit of Zossen, with the latter interpreted as a clear warning. Lulled by the Allies’ apparently spineless desire to continue talks, on September 1st, the German army invaded Poland, and on September 3rd, Britain and France declared war on Germany. One of the most appealing characters to become involved in the resistance to Hitler is Helmut Graf von Moltke, whose anti-fascist views were hardened in the Polish campaign. Despite his aristocratic and strong military background, his great-grandfather had successfully led the German army in the Austro-Prussian and Franco-Prussian wars. Moltke’s views tended towards socialism and philanthropic ventures. Adept as he was in law, he turned down the chance of becoming a judge, because that would have involved him becoming a Nazi. Instead, he completed his legal studies in Oxford. In 1939, he was recruited into the Abwehr under Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, and was appalled by what he saw as the Reich army moved through the occupied territories. Certainly more than a thousand people are murdered in this way every day, and another thousand German men are habituated to murder. On home leave, the treatment of the Jews devastated him. The Berlin Jews are being rounded up. How can anyone know these things and walk around free? Although he was never an advocate of assassinating Hitler, Both on account of his religious beliefs and his fear that he would become a martyr, he passed on information and offered to go to any lengths to assist the British war effort, but his offer was ignored. He and a number of like-minded individuals founded a philosophical political group, became known as the Kreisau Circle, whose subjects included the treatment of war criminals after what they perceived as Hitler’s inevitable fall from power. Although non-activist in its nature, his circle remained in close touch with many of the conspirators and would ultimately share their fate. Not that there were any firm lines drawn between activists and non-activists. Ulrich Graf von Schwerin, for example, had a foot in both camps. This passionately Christian aristocrat, both an officer and a landowner, not only belonged to the Kreisau Group, but would participate in Operation Valkyrie. The von Stauffenberg brothers were also members of the Circle. As the slaughter on the front began, Hitler gave his first proof of what was later to appear both to himself and to others that he led a charmed life. A communist sympathiser from Württemberg who had spent some time working in a watch factory, Georg Elser had also been watching Germany move to war with anxiety. his opposition to the nazi state was initially based on his support of the workers movement though it was to broaden to incorporate his loathing for the treatment of the jews together with a fear that hitler would plunge germany into an inferno he planned his attempt with care On November 8, 1938, he traveled to Munich to attend the annual celebrations in commemoration of the Beer Hall Putsch, Hitler’s youthful attempt in 1923 to seize control of the state by force during a political rally in the Bürgerbräukeller, the Beer Hall. Having observed what he felt to be inadequate security precautions, he returned the next year, and hiding overnight in the beer hall over the course of a month, he hollowed out a pillar next to the speaker’s rostrum and placed a bomb inside. However, Hitler descended the podium earlier than projected in order to take the train back to Berlin. The bomb exploded after he had left, killing eight people, and Elser was captured. tortured by the Gestapo and placed in Sachsenhausen concentration camp. Prior to the war, the Soviet Union had been maneuvering to reach a mutual support pact with France and Germany, but had been rebuffed. Fearing that the Allies would not support Russia if an attack were made on it by Germany, on August 23, mud. Stalin signed a 10-year Soviet-German pact, leaving Germany secure from attack in the east as it invaded its Polish neighbour. What made the agreement tighter was that it contained a secret protocol which provided for the partition of Eastern Europe into Soviet and German spheres of interest. By early October, the dismembering of Poland had been completed. A general who had proved himself an outstanding strategist in this campaign was Lieutenant General Günther von Kluge, who led the 4th Army both in Poland and later in the thrust through the Ardennes that was to result in French capitulation. A 32-year-old lieutenant, von Stauffenberg, noted with aristocratic disapproval the population mix that was to be found in Poland. but found solace in the good use to which it would be put. In a letter to his wife, he commented, the population here are an unbelievable rabble, a great many Jews and mixed folk, a folk that only feels good under the naut. The thousands of prisoners here will be well used in our agriculture. Despite these attitudes, he was a long way from being in total sympathy with the Nazi movement. He felt Kristallnacht, or the infamous Night of the Broken Glass, had brought shame on Germany. This was the night of November 1938 in which more than 200 synagogues had been burnt, tens of thousands of Jewish businesses had been burnt and looted, and over 25,000 Jews deported to the concentration camps. Witnessed by Georg Elser as he attended the rally in Munich, it had strengthened his conviction that Hitler must die. There were others who shared Elza’s opinion, including von Stauffenberg’s uncle, Nicholas Graf von Uxküll. His approach to von Stauffenberg to join the resistance had already been turned down. Before the occupation of Poland was complete, the latter would have changed his mind, sickened by what he had seen. With British troops deployed on the continent during the phony war, in which neither side attacked the other, the ex-mayor of Leipzig, Gerdler, again approached the Chief of Army General Staff, Hadler, to take part in a coup d’etat. This time, Hadler refused point blank. The Fuhrer had gambled and won. He did not report this meeting, perhaps fearing reprisals for his condoning the earlier conspiracy. In 1940, Hitler launched a successful attack on Denmark and Norway, with the aim of securing the iron reserves of Sweden. Meanwhile, the Soviets had invaded the Baltic states, which they were later to secure and occupy, and declared war on Finland, resulting in Finnish concessions. These successes in the face of the apparent inertia led to an outcry of frustrated rage in Britain. resulting in the downfall of Neville Chamberlain and his replacement by Winston Churchill. For the anti-Hitler plotters of Germany, this was good news indeed, since Churchill’s resolute opposition to Hitler over the years was well known. With the fall of France in June of 1940, Hungary, Romania and Czechoslovakia all petitioned to be allowed to join the Axis powers, and by November of that year, their request was granted. They were to join with the Fuhrer in his next great endeavor. Known under the code name Operation Barbarossa, this was the planned invasion of Russia, involving 4.5 million soldiers who were to be moved to the French border. Hitler was about to open a battle on two fronts. It seemed so foolhardy that Stalin refused to believe the warnings of his spy network. He was convinced that the Germans would finish their confrontation with Britain before turning their attention to Russia. He had no doubt that an attack was forthcoming. Not only was the fascist philosophy in direct opposition to that of communism, but the German supreme commander believed that Russia was made up of Slavs, a slave race. Little better than the Jews. Operation Barbarossa envisaged splitting the Germany invading force into three army groups. Army Group North, which would proceed through the Soviet-held Baltic states and seize Leningrad. Army Group South, which was to strike through the Ukraine and onto the oil-rich lands of the Caucasus. Most important of all was Army Group Center, whose role under von Bock was to advance through Smolensk and take Moscow. When Bock fell ill in 1942, von Kluge succeeded him. Both were appalled at their mission to take Moscow with their army split three ways and argued unavailingly with Hitler that the combined forces should be deployed against the Russian capital. They were outraged to learn that rather than reinforcing their army, the Führer planned to divert the bulk of Army Group Center’s Panzer Divisions north to Leningrad and south to the Ukraine. Von Kluge began to doubt Hitler’s sanity. Their only support would be the troops of the Waffen-SS, who combined great courage and commitment in battle with an excellence in suppressing and demoralizing the local populations. Under these circumstances, von Kluge was pleased to have been presented with an outstanding chief of staff, Colonel Henning von Treschgau. It cannot have hindered the advancement of the man who was to become the main recruiting officer for Operation Valkyrie, as well as the instigator of a number of plots of his own, that he was the nephew of the commander of Army Group Centre, von Bock. On 22nd June 1941, roughly 4 million Axis troops went into action. Army Group Centre, consisting mainly of the 2nd and 3rd Panzer Group and the 4th and 9th Army, faced four Soviet armies that occupied a salient that extended deep into German-occupied Polish territory. As Panzer Groups broke through at the junctions of the armies, the infantry struck at the salient. surrounding the Soviet troops. A shattering defeat was inflicted on the Russian military. But now the army stalled, awaiting orders from Berlin, giving the Soviets time to regroup. A counterattack took place on the 6th of July, but was crushed in a pincer movement carried out by the 2nd and 3rd Panzer Groups. and 180,000 Red Army prisoners were taken. Despite supplies beginning to run short, the generals argued for an all-out drive on Moscow. But Hitler sent the panzer groups to the north and the south. With Kiev falling in the south and another 300,000 Soviet troops taken prisoner, The drive to Moscow finally began on October 2nd. Again, the Soviets seemed to be able to find an inexhaustible supply of reinforcement. Exhausted and deprived of supplies, Von Kluge could be seen trudging through the mud, carrying a copy of an account of Napoleon’s fateful Russian campaign. With the 4th Panzer Group, which had finally come to the aid of Army Group Centre, within 15 miles of Moscow, the first blizzard began. Frostbite and disease took their toll, and on December 6th the Red Army struck back, driving the Germans back over 200 hard 1 miles. It had been hard to sow the seeds of discontent in the minds of senior military officers during the time of the spectacular victories of the summer campaign. Despite this, von Treschkow had not given up hope, and his efforts were reinforced by von Bock’s aide-de-camp Heinrich Graf von Leindorf, who had witnessed a massacre of the Jewish population while serving in Belarus. Despite being unable to make any impression on his uncle von Bock, who refused to tolerate any attack on his leader, von Treschgau and his young confederate had already planned to kidnap Hitler when he came to visit Army Group Center in the middle of August. However, due to the care with which security arrangements were now being made, the car they were to use to show for him was rejected for one of his own fleet. Meanwhile, the conspirators in Berlin were centering their hopes about Field Marshal Erwin von Witzleben, the Commander-in-Chief West with his headquarters in Paris. Originally only seen as forming part of a far-fetched plan to convince senior commanders on a prearranged signal to refuse to carry out Hitler’s orders, he persuaded them that Hitler must be seized and overthrown. A plan was in place for the following summer. At the time of the reactivation of the Russian campaign, prior to that, he would be going to hospital for an operation on his hemorrhoids. Unfortunately, whilst he was in hospital, Hitler decided to retire him. Von Stauffenberg had been attached to the army high command during the Russian campaign, away from the front, but deep in Soviet territory. One of his duties… was to attempt to recruit so-called volunteer units from Russian prisoners of war, and frequently he must have had the occasion to see not only how the SS, but also the Wehrmacht, or regular army, treated their Russian prisoners. It is estimated that around one million were shot in cold blood. Another 2.8 million died over eight months in 1941 to 1942. These were not prisoners of war, in the sense that the words are normally understood, that is, members of the fighting forces. All males between the ages of 15 and 65 were included. After being marched hundreds of kilometres to the camps, conditions when they arrived were atrocious. The camps were simply barbed wire enclosures. There were no barracks, and they were left to survive as best they could. unprotected and with little to eat in the depths of a Russian winter. The cold did its work more efficiently than the gas chambers of the death camps, an eventuality that had been taken into account by the military planners. Added to this, disciplinary executions continued to take place as regular events. Though the majority of the prisoners starved to death, Goering joked, in the camps for the Russian prisoners of war, after having eaten everything possible, including the soles of their boots, they have begun to eat each other. And what is more serious, a German sentry. It was under these conditions that von Stauffenberg met the general von Treschgau and another recruit, Fabian von Schlabrendorf, and was swiftly won over to their cause, the assassination of the German leader. Like many of the plotters, Schlabrendorff, adjutant to von Treschkau, had received training as a lawyer. As well as taking an active role in more than one attempt, he was to act as secret liaison officer between von Treschkau and Berlin, including Beck and Goedler. Stolfenberg was to remain in Russia for the Battle of Stalingrad, the bloodiest battle in the history of the world. And this city, 200 miles southwest of Moscow, was to be the theatre in which the Reich’s plans to dominate Europe were to face one of its heaviest setbacks. It endured from August 1942 to February 1943. Incidentally, 51,000 Russians had been recruited into the Axis forces by Stauffenberg and his colleagues for this battle. Losses were huge, with those of the Red Army put at 1.2 million and the Axis at 850,000. Stalingrad had held. Of 91,000 Germans taken prisoner, only 5,000 were ever to return home. In February 1943, Stauffenberg requested a transfer to active service and was posted as operations officer to the 10th Panzer Division in Tunis. Of the German presence in North Africa, historian William A. Murray has written, the decision to reinforce North Africa was one of the worst of Hitler’s blunders. Admittedly, it kept the Mediterranean closed for six months, with a negative impact on the Allied shipping situation, but it placed some of Germany’s best troops in an indefensible position, from which, like Stalingrad, there would be no retreat. The campaign lasted from November 1942 to May 1943 and resulted in the total defeat and surrender of the Axis army, with 275,000 troops being taken prisoner. Von Stauffenberg would not be there to witness that sad day for the German army. On April 7th, his car had driven into a minefield. He lost his left eye, his right hand and two fingers of his left hand, together with a number of other less major injuries. He was flown back to Munich and it was feared that he would be left totally blind. By midsummer, using his three remaining fingers, he was writing to General Olbricht that he expected to return to active service within three months. He had told his wife Nina, I feel I must do something now to save Germany. It was General Ulbricht who had developed Operation Valkyrie with the idea of creating a plan ostensibly to deal with civil unrest which could be put into action when Hitler was assassinated. His distaste for the extreme right went back to the days of the Beer Hall Putsch, which he steadfastly opposed. unlike many of his colleagues. His fears regarding the Nazis intensified during the Night of the Long Knives, where he played an active role in thwarting them, assigning certain of their targeted victims to military political duties under army protection. He was Chief of the Army General Office and second to General Friedrich Fromm, the officer who the plotters had not taken into their confidence, but on whom they were relying to put into effect Operation Valkyrie, when the moment arrived. Together with von Treschkau, he was currently contemplating another course of action known under the codename of Operation Flash. In February 1943, as von Stauffenberg made his way to Tunisia, Ulbricht had decided the time had come to put Operation Flash to the test. They were unable to use German bombs, whose fuse made a low hissing noise. So they had sequestered a bomb that the RAF had dropped for the use of saboteurs. After a number of false starts, it was finally agreed that the Führer would visit Army Group Central Headquarters in Smolensk on March 13, 1943. At the last minute, von Treschkau suggested to his chief, von Kluge, that they used a cavalry unit to wipe out Hitler and his escort as they arrived. The cavalry commander, Lieutenant Colonel Börselanger, was not averse, but von Kluge continued to vacillate. The plotters fell back on Operation Flash. A decision was taken that the bomb be placed on Hitler’s plane to explode on his return. This would have the benefit of appearing to have possibly been an accident, since there continued to be a real fear amongst the conspirators that the death of Hitler might lead to civil war, either with the loyalist troops taking on the disaffected or the army facing up to the SS. Even with this fear, consideration was given to assassinating him in the officers’ mess. But this was abandoned due to the number of friendly generals he would have taken with him. Schlabrendorff was delegated the task of smuggling the bombs onto the Fuhrer’s plane, made into a packet that was described as containing a couple of bottles of brandy. He handed it to Colonel Heinz Brandt, a man who was to play a crucial cameo role in Operation Valkyrie. He had been primed to expect the package by von Treschgau, who had explained that it was a present for his friend General Helmut Stief. Here was another sympathetic to the anti-Hitler movement. Again, he had been repelled by what he had seen in Poland, but lacked the courage of his convictions. Although he had once personally volunteered to assassinate Hitler, he later would back away from any active involvement. Just before handing the package to Brandt as he boarded the plane, he reached in and pressed a button that broke a small bottle, releasing a corrosive acid that would eat away a wire that held back a spring. When the spring was released, it would let go the striker that set off the detonator. The intriguer’s excitement turned to dismay when a radio announcement told, not of a plane crash, but of Hitler’s arrival at Wolf’s Lair in Rastenburg, East Prussia. Not only had he survived another death plot, but Brandt was walking around with a package containing a bomb that was bound to be discovered sooner rather than later. Von Treschkau quickly picked up the phone and told Brandt that the wrong bottles had been sent. The intended present had contained spirits of a much higher quality. Schlabrandorff flew to Hitler’s headquarters the next day, where he exchanged the bomb for two bottles of brandy. On later inspection, it was revealed that although the striker had hit the detonator, the latter had failed to fire. Hitler owed his life to the colder atmosphere in the hold of the plane. A second attempt was to be made eight days later, March 21st, this time in the form of a suicide mission by the Chief of Intelligence in Army Group Center, Colonel Freiherr von Gerstorf. At the Sieghaus in Berlin, Hitler was to take part in the Heroes’ Day ceremonies. Again, the cold was to play a part. Although the bombs supplied by von Treschkow had 10-minute fuses, in the cold of the courtyard, they might take twice as long to explode. The colonel had to have time to get close enough to Hitler without attracting attention to be sure of success. As it was, Hitler only remained for eight minutes. His policy of altering his schedules was proving effective. The arrest of an Abwehr agent in the autumn of 1942 alerted Himmler to the duplicitous role of a number of key personnel of the Military Intelligence Agency, and on April 5th, Admiral Canaris’ number two, Colonel Hans Oster, was placed under house arrest. Also arrested was the Protestant pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer, who had spoken out against the treatment of the Jews and had handled funds to be used by underground networks in aiding Jews’ escape. He had close contacts with the Abwehr, who had furnished him with the necessary false documents for carrying out his missions. Himmler had his own agenda for closing down the Abwehr and would succeed by February 1944. Its role would thence be taken over by his own RHSA, the Central Security Office, which served his SS as the Abwehr had served the army. Minister for the Interior and head of the Schutzstaffel, Himmler may have had more knowledge of the conspiracies against Hitler than he cared to reveal, and was prepared to manipulate events for his own convenience. He was to be approached in the summer of 1943 by Johannes von Poppitz, the Prussian finance minister, and a member of the ex-mayor of Leipzig’s group, a leading luminary of the Berlin conspiracy. He approached Himmler with the intention of persuading him to join a group that would overthrow the Führer and negotiate peace with the Western powers. Although Himmler turned down the proposal, he did not mention the secret meeting that had taken place. Moreover, in June 1944, he mentioned to the disgraced Admiral Connaris that he knew a conspiracy was taking place, specifically mentioning the names of Beck and Goedler. Whether this was a threat or a warning is unclear. Presumably, he was very aware that the Admiral would pass on the information. In early 1943, General Steiff, who had been the supposed recipient of the explosive bottles of brandy, and whom Himmler had called a little poisoned dwarf, arranged to plant a bomb in Hitler’s headquarters, but later reconsidered his position. His secret stock of bombs exploded within the headquarters precinct, and it was only due to the fact that the investigating Abwehr officer was himself part of the conspiracy, that the plotters were not discovered. In November, Infantry Captain Axel von Dembusch was to model a new army overcoat that Hitler had designed and was to approve. This time, with a bomb that would detonate as the Reichsfuhrer closely inspected his own artistry, Dembusch was to grab and hold him till the device exploded. Two days before the event, Allied bombardment destroyed the store holding the prototypes. Shortly after, Den Busch was seriously wounded, but a replacement was found, Heinrich von Kleist, the son of one of the elder conspirators. A new inspection was set for February 11th, 1944, but Hitler failed to show. Another attempt had been made on December 26th, 1943, at Wolfshanze, Wolfslehr. A young officer had been sent by General Ulbricht, the creator of Operation Valkyrie, to brief the Supreme Commander on army replacements. The meeting was cancelled. In the visitor’s case, together with his briefing papers, was a bomb. He had been practicing how to set it off using three fingers and a pair of tongs. The young officer was von Stauffenberg. At Bendlerstrasse, the dynamism that Stauffenberg had brought to the Berlin resistance was somewhat offset by the fact that the most senior of the military officers involved in their plans, General Beck, was convalescing after a serious cancer operation, and von Witzleben, also under medical orders, had been stripped of his command. The hopes of the conspirators were now to centre on a man who held the respect as a military man, not just of the German army, but of the world. In January 1944, one month after Stauffenberg’s first attempt, Rommel had become commander of Army Group B in the West, the army that was to deal with the expected Anglo-American invasion of France. Having been forced to retire from the North African arena, Rommel was now transferred to France. Here, he was going to be in close contact with two old comrades who would induct him into the circle of conspirators. One was the head of the Belgian military government, Alexander von Falkenhausen, who was to be arrested after the war and sentenced to 12 years hard labour for war crimes. During his rule, 28,900 Jews and 43,000 non-Jews were deported to German camps. His sentence was overturned three weeks later, as witnesses emerged, including the Chinese-born Belgian hero, Kwan Zhai Lung, that he had saved the lives of many others. In fact, he had been called to Berlin to explain his behaviour. Both Karl Goedeler and Field Marshal von Witzleben were his friends, and he shared with them a detestation of National Socialism. Karl von Stülpenagel was the other, the military commander of France. An extreme right-winger during Hitler’s early years, the Czechoslovakian crisis found him involved in the first general’s plot to topple Hitler. He had proved himself to be an outstanding tactician during Operation Barbarossa, where the 17th Army won two major battles. But this, and his subsequent promotion, had not weakened his resolute opposition to the direction that Germany had taken. The intermediary between these men and Rommel was his old civilian friend, Dr. Karl Strohlin. He and Gödel had had the temerity in August 1943 to draw up a paper presented to Himmler’s Ministry of the Interior which, to quote William L. Shearer, demanded a cessation of the persecution of the Jews and the Christian churches, the restoration of civil rights and the re-establishment of a system of justice, divorced from the party and the SS Gestapo. Rommel was convinced. and told strohlin it is my duty to come to the rescue of germany he was one who feared that killing hitler would sanctify him and advised that he be arrested and brought before a german court for crimes against humanity including the germans themselves As has been seen, not all the conspirators agreed with his legalistic methodology. Von Rundstedt, Rommel’s senior officer and commander of Western forces, was alerted by Rommel personally of his intentions and expressed his sympathy, but when asked to join, responded, You are young, you know and love the people, you do it. There had been a number of approaches to the Allies by Gödel, to obtain a favourable response to and support of a new German government. But the answer as to what terms might be obtained remained the same. Unconditional surrender. Looking eastwards, some hoped for a more favourable reaction from Russia. But such wistful thinking had to be abandoned when it was made clear that the Russians would also stick to the terms demanded by the Casablanca Conference. Unconditional surrender. They were there on their own. In January 1944, the same month in which Rommel was called to France, von Moltke’s Kreisau Circle, that had devoted itself to discussions of subjects such as the legal systems to be adopted in a post-Nazi era, was broken up and its principal members arrested. Moltke advised his wife to go into hiding, without telling him where, so that her whereabouts could not be forced out of him under torture. By this time, Operation Valkyrie was in its final form. Stauffenberg was insistent that timing was everything. The Berlin police could be counted on for their support, since their chief, von Heldorf, was himself one of the conspirators. For all that, there were large numbers of SS and Luftwaffe personnel in Berlin, greatly outnumbering the army. Even with Hitler dead, These troops could be expected to oppose any attempt to overthrow the regime. In the first two hours, the National Broadcasting Headquarters, the Telegraph and Telephone Centrals, the Reich Chancellery, the Ministries and the Headquarters of the SS Gestapo must all be secured. Wolf’s Lair must also be cut off from any contact with the outside world. All this must take place before the announcement contained in Valkyrie could be transmitted by von Witzleben, the new commander-in-chief of the Wehrmacht, Beck, the new head of state, and Goedler, the new chancellor. Although Stauffenberg did not believe they would make the attempt that summer, on June 6, 1944, the Allies landed on the beaches of Normandy. Due to bad weather, the Luftwaffe had been unable to make their normal reconnaissance flights, and Rommel had drawn up a report that the invasion was not imminent. Only Hitler believed that Normandy would be the focal point of the invasion. but for once he had not enforced his views. The bulk of the German army was in the north of France, beyond the Seine. Rommel had made his way to Germany, but on receiving the news, turned back. Hitler had left orders that he was not to be disturbed, and when finally awoken, commanded that it all be cleaned up not later than tonight. The warlord arranged to meet with Rommel and his commander von Rundstedt in France on June 29th, pleading with him to make peace while some of the army still remained in existence. It was all to no avail. Hitler had now come to the conclusion that the D-Day landings were little more than a blip on the screen. The war would be won by the new miracle weapon, the V-1. As it became clear that the Normandy landing was a success, Goedeler and Beck began to wonder whether the plot, even if successful, would serve any purposes. But von Treschgau, the spider who had spun the web to catch the Fuhrer, was beginning to see it as having more symbolic than practical purpose. An attempt must be made to wipe the stain from the soul of Germany. The assassination must be attempted at all costs, even if it should not succeed. An attempt to seize power in Berlin must be made. What matters now is not the practical purpose of the coup, but to prove to the world and for the records of history that the men of the resistance dared to take the decisive step. Compared to his objective, nothing else is of consequence. With this reassurance from von Treschkau on July 11th, Stauffenberg had again flown to meet Hitler with his briefcase stuffed with a bomb. The night before, the conspirators had extended their net to take in Himmler and Göring as well. Himmler failed to attend, and when Stauffenberg phoned Olbricht to stress that he could still kill Hitler and Göring, he was told to wait until he could catch all three. On his return that night, he met with Ulbricht and Beck to stress that next time he must take action. Whether or not Himmler and Goering were present, the others agreed. On July 15th, Stauffenberg returned to Wolf’s Lair, with the conspirators so certain of their success that it was decided that Valkyrie be put into action two hours before the start of the meeting with Hitler. Back in Berlin, at 11 o’clock, General Ulbricht issued Valkyrie 1, and the troops began to march with orders to occupy the Wilhelmstrasse centre. The colonel arrived at the conference room, made his report, and retired to inform Ulbricht that all was in order. and that he was about to return to the meeting and arm the bomb. Arriving back at the meeting, he discovered Hitler had cut it short and left. Warning Ulbricht of yet another failure, he returned to Berlin, where Goedler was yet again arguing for the Western solution, a separate peace with the West, allowing the Axis powers to continue their struggle against the Soviets. Beck would have none of it. He no longer believed that a separate peace could be negotiated, but,
like Ulbricht, argued that the plot against Hitler must go forward nonetheless, if only to save Germany’s honour. Ulbricht had just about managed to save his own skin, persuading Keitel, the head of the armed forces, and Fromm, his own boss, that the order to the troops had been a practice exercise. The same day, they heard that General von Falkenhausen had been dismissed from his post as military governor of Belgium and northern France. Two days later, Rommel’s staff car was shot up by low-flying aircraft, and it was not thought at first that he would survive. The conspirators had lost what they described as their pillar of strength. The day after, Gurdela heard that Himmler had issued orders for his arrest. On the evening of 19th July, Stauffenberg worked on his final report at the Bendlerstrasse. Having been summoned to brief Hitler with the latest information regarding replacements on the Eastern Front. With a bomb supplied by General Stief, who had adapted one of the RAF bombs the night before, to ensure that it would detonate in exactly 10 minutes on the fateful day of July 20th, Stauffenberg set off, for the last time, to Wolf’s Lair. After breakfast, he met with the Chief of Signals of OKW as arranged. General Velgebel was to isolate Führer headquarters by shutting down all radio, telegraph and telephone communication. General Keitel, head of OKW, now informed him that the meeting had been put forward to 12.30. Since it was already midday, there was little time left for preparation. In the anteroom, Stauffenberg broke the capsule containing the acid. The bomb was armed. Due to his difficulty in manipulating the tongs, it took longer than he intended, and when he rejoined Keitel, the latter was fuming. They were late. As they entered the building, he explained to the sergeant in charge of the phones that he was expecting an urgent call. All this making sure that Keitel would hear. Entering the room, he noticed the windows were open, which would have an effect of reducing the blast. Unperturbed, he made sure the bomb would be right next to Hitler, who was seated at the centre of the briefing table, an unusual affair which was supported on two heavy blocks rather than the normal four legs. Altogether there were 23 officers in attendance as Hitler studied in detail the map spread out in front of him. One of them was Colonel Heinz Brand, the officer who had unwittingly carried the bomb in the guise of the two bottles of brandy. He paid little attention as the new arrival placed his briefcase on the floor, a couple of feet away from the war leader. Stauffenberg then left with the fabled phone call as an excuse. But nobody saw him leave. It was shortly after this that Colonel Brand made his move that would change history. He wished to get a better view of the map and found a briefcase entangling his feet. He picked it up and placed it on the other side of one of the heavy wooden table supports. It would dampen the effect of the bomb, though he would not be spared. Hitler was coming to the end of his survey, when Keitel noticed that Stauffenberg you had not returned. He hurried from the room as at 12.42pm the bomb went off. Stauffenberg saw the building erupt into smoke and flame, with bodies hurled into the air, and he had no doubt that there would not be a single survivor. With steel nerves, he had bluffed his way through the challenges of three separate outposts, leaving it to his adjutant and co-conspirator Lieutenant Haeftant to dismantle a second bomb and throw the parts into the undergrowth as they sped to the airport. His plane had no radio contact, but phoning Olbricht on landing, he was dumbfounded. On the Bändlerstrasse, the Valkyrie orders had been removed from Olbricht’s safe, but neither General Beck nor von Witzleben had arrived to read them out, Ulbricht himself may have been mindful of the fiasco that had occurred the last time he read them out. Consequently, none of the plans to secure Berlin had been carried out. With Stauffenberg’s return, Ulbricht was stirred into activity. He issued orders, including some signed by General Fromm unwittingly. Summoned to Fromm’s presence in order to persuade the general to get off the fence, he asked for Fromm to be connected to Wolf’s lair, expecting to receive confirmation of Hitler’s death. He was astounded not only to be immediately put through to Keitel, the head of the armed forces, who had supposedly died in the explosion. Worse was to follow. Hitler had survived the attempt. Four had been killed, including Colonel Brandt, and five injured. But Hitler was feeling so full of life, despite his minor injuries, that he was to declare to Mussolini, who visited him within an hour of the explosion, It is obvious that nothing is going to happen to me. Undoubtedly, it is my fate to continue on my way and bring my task to its conclusion. What happened today is the climax. Slipping away, Ulbricht reunited with Stauffenberg and Beck. Stauffenberg was sure that Keitel was bluffing. But in any event, he agreed with the Chief of Staff that the plot must go forward. In accordance with this decision, Stauffenberg put in a call to General von Stülpnagel’s headquarters in Paris. Decisively and with great energy, the General went into action. Before the end of the day, all the 1,200 SS men serving in Paris together with their officers had been locked up. Ulbricht returned with Stauffenberg to Fromm’s office, where a last attempt was made to persuade the commander of the reserves that Hitler was dead. The general appeared to be meditating his options until Ulbricht informed him that wherever the truth lay, it was too late to prevaricate. Valkyrie had been set out. Rank insubordination, screamed the general, and requested that the officer who had issued the order, Colonel von Quirheim, be brought into his presence. Attempting to put further pressure on Fromm, Stauffenberg revealed that he had placed the bomb and had seen the ensuing eruption. Fromm’s response was that the attempt had failed and that Stauffenberg must shoot himself instantly. When Stauffenberg refused, Fromm threatened to put all three officers under arrest. Albrecht replied, You deceive yourself. It is we who are going to arrest you. By the end of the day, the plotters were in control of Bendlerstrasse, but of nowhere else in Berlin. Nor had the panzers arrived. General Hoepner, a brilliant tank commander who had been sacked by Hitler, was amongst the conspirators and was present in the Benelustrasse on that very day, but his contacts seemed to have been ignored. Unbelievably, it had been left to a relatively junior officer, Major Remmer, to effect the arrest at the Ministry for Propaganda of one of the most important figures of the Third Reich, Joseph Goebbels. Remmer was not a party to the plot. but he was prepared to fulfill his mission under the misconception that Hitler was dead. Goebbels asked him if he could recognize the Fuhrer’s voice, and the answer being in the affirmative, offered to put him in touch by telephone. Hitler ordered him to crush the rising, obeying only the orders of Goebbels and Himmler. Remmer withdrew his troops from the Wilhelmstrasse. and proceeded to occupy the Kommandantur in Unter den Linden, sending out squads to intercept any other patrols that might be marching through the city. At 6.30 pm, an announcement was made that there had been a failed attempt to kill Hitler. Transmitted across Europe, generals in Prague and Vienna, who had been preparing to arrest the SS and Gestapo, began to waver. At 8.20, Himmler announced that Keitel had been appointed chief of the replacement army and only his orders should be obeyed. The failure to take over the broadcasters was having disastrous consequences. When Witzleben finally arrived, he gave Beck and Stauffenberg a dressing down for the mishandling of the whole affair, though he had not bothered to be there himself to oversee events. He left in a rage. At 9pm it was announced that General von Hasse, who had instructed Major, now Colonel, Remmer, to arrest Goebbels, had himself been arrested. Then around 10.30 a group of armed officers serving under Ulbricht, having become increasingly suspicious about what was going on in the Bandelstraße, entered to demand explanations from their senior officer. A number of shots were fired during which Stauffenberg was hit in the arms before the conspirators were subdued. They were shepherded into Fromm’s office, where they were met by their former prisoner Fromm, who ordered them to disarm. Beck requested that as Fromm’s ex-commander, he be excluded from the order. Understanding his request, Fromm simply told him to make sure he kept the revolver pointed at himself. He did. and pulled the trigger, but the bullet merely grazed his head. His request that he be allowed a second attempt was granted. But when this failed, Fromm ordered an officer to help the old gentleman. He was dragged from the room and shot in the neck. Hoepner turned down the same offer. Fromm turned to Stauffenberg, his adjutant Heifton, Albrecht and Metz, a colonel of the general staff. Well,
gentlemen, are you ready? he asked. The four officers were marched down to the courtyard and instantly shot in the lights of a staff car. Fromm’s role in this is still open to question. It remains unclear whether he was attempting to protect the reputation of the army by such swift action or whether he was merely hoping to cover his own back. If the latter, he was out of luck. At 1 a.m. the Fuhrer broadcast to the nation, announcing that he was speaking to them to make them aware of a crime unparalleled in German history. He ended that he would finish with the usurpers a gang of criminal elements which will be destroyed without mercy. We shall settle accounts with them in the manner to which we National Socialists are accustomed. He made clear what he meant. No military tribunals for them. We’ll haul them before the People’s Court. No long speeches from them. The Court will act with lightning speed, and two hours after the sentence, it will be carried out by hanging without mercy. The People’s Court had been set up outside the legal framework and had jurisdiction over a great number of so-called political offences. which could include go slows at work, black marketeering and defeatism. It was presided over by Roland Freisler, who served as a prosecutor, judge and jury. During the Great War, he had been interned in a Russian prisoner of war camp, and it was believed by many senior national socialists that at this point he became a Bolshevik. This stigma was to stay with him, and it was thought prevented him from reaching higher office, despite his fervent Nazi beliefs and the ruthless nature of his judgments. When von Witzleben was to appear before him, unwashed and unshaven, without his false teeth or a belt for his trousers, his judge was to shout at him, You dirty old man, why do you keep fiddling with your trousers? Von Witzleben was to be one of the first eight of the many to be judged before the People’s Court. Appearing with him were von Hasse, who had given the order for the arrest of Himmler, Steiff, who had been the recipient of the bomb in the Brandy Package, and General Hoepner, the Panzer Commander. Together with them were four junior officers who had worked closely with Stauffenberg, including one of his cousins, Jörg von Wartenburg. On August 8th, they were hanged like cattle, as Hitler had ordered. In Plotzensee prison, where so many of the German resistance were to be executed, they were singled out for exemplary punishment, being hanged by a noose of piano wire attached to a meat hook. The scene was filmed for Hitler’s delectation. General Fromm was arrested by Himmler, who was the new chief of the replacement army, and tried before the People’s Court on a charge of cowardice. Perhaps because of the ambiguous nature of his involvement in the plot, he was spared hanging and died before a firing squad. Gerdler went into hiding before July 20th, having been advised that the Gestapo had a warrant out for his arrest. Hitler put a reward of one million marks on his head. and he was spotted by a female acquaintance who had joined the Luftwaffe. He was arrested and though tried by the People’s Court in September, he was only executed the following July together with von Poppitz, the Prussian finance minister. It is thought that both had been spared for a period by Himmler, who wished to make use of them in negotiations with the Allies. When it became clear that no such transactions were likely to take place, their lives were forfeit. On the Eastern Front, Major General Henning von Treschgau turned to his adjutant Schlabrendorff and said, We have done the right thing. Hitler is not only the enemy of Germany, but of the whole world. He added that in a few hours he would be standing before God. and felt that he could answer for himself with a clear conscience. On that morning of July 21st, he drove off to no man’s land and pulled the pin on a hand grenade. It blew his head off. Stolpnagel, who had carried out the detention of the SS in Paris, failed in his attempt to convince Field Marshal von Kluge to support him. With regret at the failure of the plot, of which he denied all knowledge, he advised Stolpnagel to change into civilian clothes and disappear. Recalled, to account for his actions, he stopped by Verdun, the great fortress town, and attempted to commit suicide, but only succeeded in blinding himself. In his subsequent delirium, it is said that he repeatedly screamed out the name of Rommel. He was carried on a stretcher to face Roland Friesler and strangled to death in Plotzensee prison. Kluger committed suicide on being questioned about his being out of touch during the critical day. He was sure that he was being implicated. Stolzmannakos II, Colonel Hofacker broke down under torture and further implicated Rommel. Rommel was in no doubt what was awaiting him. He had told his former chief of staff, General Spiedel, now under arrest, that Hitler has now gone completely mad. He is venting his sadism on the conspirators of July 20th. Rommel was in no way to do anything about it, having received serious fractures to his skull, temple and cheekbones and grave damage to his left eye. Keitel, The head of the armed services arrived at his home with two attendants, one of whom was bearing poison. If he agreed to take it, he would escape the people’s court. His family would be unharmed and he would be awarded a state funeral. He agreed, telling his son he would be dead in a quarter of an hour. The official version was that he had died of a cerebral embolism. Altogether, 7,000 people were arrested in connection with the plot of July 24th, of which 4,980 were executed, over half by the People’s Court. They included von Molke, the founder of the Kreislauf Circle. who commented with regard to his judge, Thus it is documented that not plans, not preparations, but the spirit as such shall be persecuted. Viva Friesler! Also in the roll call were Stauffenberg’s brother and the pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer. Still, there was one who escaped the hangman’s noose, and this was Schlabrendorff. The luck of the man who had the nerve to smuggle a bomb disguised as brandy onto the Fuhrer’s plane and then turn up the next day to retrieve it held good. As he was being led into the People’s Court on February 3rd, an American bomb fell on the court, killing Judge Friesler instantly, as well as destroying the records relating to Schlabendorff and most of the other survivors. After being shuffled around a variety of concentration camps before finally being released by American forces, he became a judge himself after the war in the West German constitutional courts. Many others played their part in resisting Hitler and what he stood for. Some in small ways by refusing to carry out minor duties. Others by sheltering or giving aid to those who were the victims of persecution. Others by committing acts of sabotage. Mass protests by members of the Roman Catholic Church forced Hitler to reverse his policy of liquidating those who were seriously mentally or physically disabled. All who infringed the orders of the Reich did so at the risk of their own lives. Rather than seeing the general’s plot in isolation, it is more helpful to see it as part of the continuum of the struggle of the human spirit to resist oppression even when the odds are overwhelming. None of these people would have dreamt of falling back on the excuse that they were simply carrying out orders. As Major General Henning von Treschgau put it, orders are laws for idiots.
In 1944, German officers launched the 20 July Plot, known as Operation Valkyrie, to assassinate Hitler and seize control of the regime. Their bold plan failed, but it remains one of the most significant acts of resistance within Nazi Germany.
