The German Resistance and war crimes

[offizier1916]

[This thread was split off from Nazi Anti-Partisan Reprisals in Italy 1944 at http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?f=6&t=34951 and recaptioned by the moderator -- DT.]

German soldiers commited everywhere war crimes. There was no "saubere Wehrmacht". This is comment knowledge nowadays and the myht was born due to old veterans who couldnt accept that parts of their beloved wehrmacht being branded as criminals and not just having the "10 gebote und Goethe im tonister".

saying that, partisans all over europe committed crimes against the wehrmacht as well. Not being part of a regular army makes you a "non-combattan" operating behind the front lines and as a result you are shot. that was common to every army in the world and not specifically german.

now regarding the degeneracy of the german vengeance, killing women and children of all ages: Germanys occupation policy in a general was more to dominate than to cooperate with the occupied people (this is also a common mode of operation used by all armies in the world). Partisans killed and destryed daily hundreds of trains,tracks, bridges and killed daily german force from ambush. For e.g. in the time between july and september 1942 just 50% of the supplies arrived at the front of the heeresgruppe mitte beacause of partisans. More than 174 locomotives were destryoed by partisans in that interval and nearly 180 villages were destroyd by partisans, because partisans suspected those villages to collaborate with germany. And that situation went even more serious in 1943 for germany. lots of supply for the operation zitadelle in summer 1943 didnt even reach the frontlines due to partisans. So what are yu doing as the gemran high command?

German occupying forces were way to weak to control whole europe and especially the balkans, belorussia and the baltics. German supplies were in heavy danger. Due to this impuissance and the fact that german forces could not arrest those partisans due to endless hiding-oppurtunities, they went many steps too far and decided to kill everyone suspected and even erasing whole villages just because it was located in a partisan-area.

i mean it is suggested, that even von treschkow, approved, from a miliatry point of view as staff officer in heeresgruppe mitte, plans to keep areas clear from partisans. Especially rail-aways with a radius of 150 M around the tracks had to be "partisan-free" and everyone without a pass or not being german had to be shot in that area after a specific daytime.( saying that, von treschkow did not approve the horrible attrocities commited under the guise of an "anti-partisan-operation": killing jews, women and children - in fact it was the opposite. those attrocities were his motivation to eliminate hitler and his bloody beasts around him )

As a young indoctrinated teenage soldier or as an old veteran, completly blunted due to years of war.....yea probably they will commit war crimes.

saying that, i visited oradour sur glane....and i felt ashamed, deeply ashamed what german troops did to those innocent people. i had a lump in my throat.

[michael mills]

.( saying that, von treschkow did not approve the horrible attrocities commited under the guise of an "anti-partisan-operation": killing jews, women and children - in fact it was the opposite. those attrocities were his motivation to eliminate hitler and his bloody beasts around him )

A post-war apologetic myth. The conspiracy to assassinate Hitler, launched primarily by officers of Heeresgruppe Mitte, was not a reaction to the commission of atrocities, in which those officers were themselves implicated, but to the fact that Germany was clearly losing the war, and it was thought that with Hitler out of the way a negotiated peace with the western Allies might be possible, allowing the Wehrmacht to continue fighting in the East.

The killing of Jews in the course of anti-partisan operations was not a "guise", but a logical conclusion from the firmly held belief that the Jews of the Soviet Union were the main "bearers of Bolshevism", and that the defeat of Bolshevism could only be achieved through the physical elimination of the Jewish population. It was an erroneous belief, but a genuine one, and it had a certain basis in the statistically demonstrable fact that the Jews of the Soviet Union were the population group that had benefitted the most from the Communist political and socio-economic system, having risen from the status of a depressed minority to that of a group with a higher socio-economic profile than any other Soviet nationality, and playing a disproportionately important political role.

[offizier1916]

A post-war apologetic myth. The conspiracy to assassinate Hitler, launched primarily by officers of Heeresgruppe Mitte, was not a reaction to the commission of atrocities, in which those officers were themselves implicated, but to the fact that Germany was clearly losing the war, and it was thought that with Hitler out of the way a negotiated peace with the western Allies might be possible, allowing the Wehrmacht to continue fighting in the East.

Well, I thought that most of those people, like Olbricht, Oster, Beck, Treschkow etc. wanted to bring down Hitler and his government even before the ww2 started respectively in a time interval as the war could still be won (41/42). SO i really dont think that to win or to lose the war was the primary motivation for those. i think there is many literature about that.

[michael mills]

The military plotters such as Tresckow and Stauffenberg were not part of the opposition before the outbreak of war. In fact, when Hitler was winning in 1940 they were his enthusiastic supporters.

Before 1940 there were three separate oppositionist groups, with different aims.

1. A group that did not oppose the alliance between the military and the NSDAP, but wished to avoid war in 1938 and 1939 because they thought that Germany was not sufficiently prepared and would be defeated by Britain and France. Beck belonged to that group, as did Halder, Canaris and Weizsaecker. This group did not want to overthrow the Hitler regime, but to stop the drift to war. When Hitler achieved a stunning victory in 1940, this group became largely quiescent, only to emerge again when the tide of war turned in 1942.

2. A group that wanted to eliminate the power of the SS and restore the military as the dominant force in the alliance with the NSDAP, and were prepared to force Hitler to step down in order to achieve that end. Oster and Gisevius belonged to this group.

3. A third, radical group suggested assassinating Hitler. Only a small number of junior officers belonged to that group, and it remained a marginal fringe group without any influence, until Germany began to lose the war.

I suggest you read the essay "The Structure and Nature of the National Conservative Opposition in Germany up to 1940", by Klaus-Juergen Mueller, in the book "Aspects of the Third Reich" edited by Professor H W Koch. It is a useful antidote to the apologetic myth propagated in Germany today.

[offizier1916]

THat guys like Stauffenberg and Treschkow were at the beginning of Hitlers rising in favor of his politics is totally normal. Both coming from old aristrocratic families with a very long military tradition, the defeat of ww1 and the versailler diktat was just not acceptable for them. so with Hitlers rising came along the rising of the german army again. the army was once again an institution to be proud of. and as a career officer hitlers rising opened the door for moving up in the career ladder. As well resentments against jews was common in europe (and def. not only in germany), so i would def. not value statements of the 1930s era from stauffenberg or treschkow that high. ANd do not forget that war, was at this time still the last legal way in political confrontations. only after ww2 the international law forbid aggressive wars (!?!). So war itself was not that objectionable as it is today.

There are many proves that Treschkow and (later) Stauffenberg conceive their plans to bring down Hitler due to the horrible attrocities ss and wehrmacht did to jews and innocent civils and to the own german people and soldiers. I have quite a few books about the Widerstand and some nice Articles from academic-History- magazines.

It is true that Oster and Beck wanted to bring down hitler in the 38-40 interval because they feared a 2-front war with france and a defeat as a result. but this was def. not the motivation since 41. since then it was the horrible attrocities and to top this unnecessary bloody war, destoying whole generations.

those aristocratic WIderständler like Treschkow and Stauffenberg were educated in a very catholic/protestant way. they def. were horrified as they find out about those attrocities. for them, the german army (in a general way, exception are always factored) had to fight gallantly, soldier against soliders, and def. not killing innocents