where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

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aurelien wolff
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where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#1

Post by aurelien wolff » 27 Feb 2019, 09:56

Hello,did it come from general post war memory?

Hanny
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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#2

Post by Hanny » 27 Feb 2019, 10:14

The German Generals Talk 1971/The Other Side of the Hill 1948, by BL hart was iirc the first time the western general public was introduced to what the German generals thought. Halder of course was collating, from German officers everything in USA for the US military to hear a unifom view he wanted them to hear.
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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#3

Post by MarkN » 27 Feb 2019, 13:22

Senior Heer officers blaming a dead man who couldn't answer back for their own strategic incompetence and tactical failures.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#4

Post by Cult Icon » 27 Feb 2019, 17:43

MarkN wrote:
27 Feb 2019, 13:22
Senior Heer officers blaming a dead man who couldn't answer back for their own strategic incompetence and tactical failures.
eh...Be more specific, which ones? Generals are mostly of the operational level rather than strategic.

Guderian and Manstein come to mind from their memoirs.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#5

Post by gracie4241 » 27 Feb 2019, 18:30

Couldn't agree more.I think Halder is a better case, because 1 he sat at a more "strategic "seat than operational one(you're point), and 2 he had a Diary to convict himself (assuming there were any historians not too lazy to compare it with his postwar statements). Halder made a living claiming his opposition to Barbarossa; unfortunately, his diary shows he and Brauchitsch as early as June 1940!! directed staff to start preliminary planning on a campaign against Russia to"solidify german hegemony in Europe"-without telling Hitler. In march 1941 he complained to..his diary about being summoned to the Chancellery to "calm Hitler's UNNECESSARY fretting "about reports of huge numbers of Russian tanks and guns(this from a guy who complained AFTER the war about Hitler underestimating the Soviets).In june 1941. just BEFORE the attack, he met with Brauchitsch to plan the major downsizing of the army beginning in September 1941 AFTER victory in Russia!!!(thus in 10 weeks). I could go on, but you get my point. These "generals wantonly lied because they understood the reporters and historians wanted anything to denigrate the Austrian buffoon and they obliged.Personally, I;m not at all sure Hitler wasn't often more correct than his "generals", although he along with others obviously made mistakes, including Allied leaders as well.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#6

Post by Sid Guttridge » 28 Feb 2019, 16:36

Hi MarkN,

The strategic direction of the war was Hitler's and his alone. That is what Fuhrers are for. The word doesn't mean "Leader" for nothing!

Over 1935 to early 1940 Hitler's instincts usually proved better than those of his generals, whose professional calculations told them that he was acting prematurely. Fortunately for them all, the Allies' nerve or powers of physical resistance gave way first in those years.

However, from mid 1941 Hitler bit off more than he could chew. His generals invaded Russia at his direction, not their own initiative. Likewise, he, not they, declared war on the USA.

Hitler was like a boy racer in a very high-powered car. The Generals designed and built that high-powered car, but Hitler drove it. And, like many boy racers, he eventually crashed it through reckless driving,

Cheers,

Sid.
Last edited by Sid Guttridge on 28 Feb 2019, 19:00, edited 2 times in total.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#7

Post by Sheldrake » 28 Feb 2019, 16:56

20th July 1944?

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#8

Post by Sid Guttridge » 28 Feb 2019, 18:59

Hi Sheldrake,

What about 20th July 1944?

Cheers,

Sid.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#9

Post by MLW » 01 Mar 2019, 01:36

I am not sure how high-powered the German military was. Very little of the army was motorized. Lots of captured foreign weapons were in use. The strategic bombing force was small. Other than U-boats, the navy was weak.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#10

Post by Paul Lakowski » 01 Mar 2019, 03:19

As of 1938 Hitler seized control of the Wehrmacht appointing himself C-IN-C . That means from that point on he was responsible for every failure and success that befell the Germans. His Generals were well within their rights to clarify how they viewed the war and their part in the fiasco that was "Hitler's war".

Frankly demanding they have no right to do so is childish. EVERY general in EVERY war has pleaded their case...mostly to no avail.

What's really pathetic is having to listen to all the 21 century armchair generals bleeding their POV at the expense of all these dead generals who can no longer defend themselves either!

Did WALLIE C-IN-C actually take advice from their 'colleague's'?

Did STALIN as C-IN-C actually take advice from his Generals'?

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#11

Post by Duncan_M » 02 Mar 2019, 18:09

Paul Lakowski wrote:
01 Mar 2019, 03:19
As of 1938 Hitler seized control of the Wehrmacht appointing himself C-IN-C . That means from that point on he was responsible for every failure and success that befell the Germans. His Generals were well within their rights to clarify how they viewed the war and their part in the fiasco that was "Hitler's war".

Frankly demanding they have no right to do so is childish. EVERY general in EVERY war has pleaded their case...mostly to no avail.

What's really pathetic is having to listen to all the 21 century armchair generals bleeding their POV at the expense of all these dead generals who can no longer defend themselves either!

Did WALLIE C-IN-C actually take advice from their 'colleague's'?

Did STALIN as C-IN-C actually take advice from his Generals'?
He didn't seize control of the Wehremacht, he removed the ministry of war position, which was just another political buffer between the OKW and himself. He was already the C-in-C, he was the leader of Germany, remember? He did it because Germany was on a path to war.

Funny how you defend the generals who can't defend themselves and yet they created the "Germany lost because Hitler didn't listen to us generals" myth after he died and couldn't defend himself either. Luckily we have things like diaries proving the generals were lying, so proper history is finally being written and its not dependent on the lies in various post war memoirs by some sour grape generals trying to blame hitler for their own incompetence. While hitler screwed up badly throughout the war, so did his generals.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#12

Post by Paul Lakowski » 02 Mar 2019, 21:40

C-IN-C was an actual position that Groner established in the late 1920s , and Von Blomberg was first to hold . The position was Apolitical- so Hitler was never C-IN-C just by being head of government.

Honestly listening to winging over 'lies' in some ones diary is mindless and juvenile. Its his opinion Vs the next POV. The fact that historians were forced to rely on these diaries for so long. Thats a serious problem in the study of history.

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#13

Post by Felix C » 02 Mar 2019, 22:00

Paul Lakowski wrote:
01 Mar 2019, 03:19
As of 1938 Hitler seized control of the Wehrmacht appointing himself C-IN-C . That means from that point on he was responsible for every failure and success that befell the Germans. His Generals were well within their rights to clarify how they viewed the war and their part in the fiasco that was "Hitler's war".

Frankly demanding they have no right to do so is childish. EVERY general in EVERY war has pleaded their case...mostly to no avail.

What's really pathetic is having to listen to all the 21 century armchair generals bleeding their POV at the expense of all these dead generals who can no longer defend themselves either!

Did WALLIE C-IN-C actually take advice from their 'colleague's'?

Did STALIN as C-IN-C actually take advice from his Generals'?

Pardon my ignorance. Who is Wallie?

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#14

Post by Peter89 » 03 Mar 2019, 07:23

Fact is that the senior German officiers knew what was happening to the Jews (Nuremberg laws), disabled (T4 program), and bolsheviks (Commissar Order), so they were 100% aware of the nature of the system they served.

Hitler really had a fundamental impact on how WW2 was waged, but he had the senior staff in his pocket. The truth is that many of the senior staff could be bought like you buy a fridge. And I'm talking about more than just the K5 Kontos.

I think the best example is Guderian, who was a good general otherwise, but could be silenced with a ~900 acre land in Poland in 1943. Up to that point he frequently disagreed with Hitler, but from that point on - nothing. He knew of the Stauffenberg plot, but did nothing, just made himself isolated until it blows over, the coward. Later he posed as one of the Court of Honor, and let his comrades be sentenced to death, and remained loyal to a regime which brought ruin upon his country. A great man and soldier indeed. As the Soviets captured his beloved estate, he started to disagree with Hitler once again. You might think it's a joke but it is not; Hitler fired him as Chief of General Staff in March 1945. Some years later he wrote the Erinnerungen eines Soldatens (The memoirs of a soldier), which was a complete crap, complaining about the Polish border which cut him off from his estate.

Postwar senior German officiers never admitted that they were corrupt to the bone. They let their military knowledge be overshadowed by corruption money.

This is how Hitler was behind this and this is how the German generals could have performed somewhat better without him.
"Everything remained theory and hypothesis. On paper, in his plans, in his head, he juggled with Geschwaders and Divisions, while in reality there were really only makeshift squadrons at his disposal."

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Re: where the "Hitler should have listen to his general " come from?

#15

Post by Cult Icon » 03 Mar 2019, 07:33

names of generals besides Guderian, Halder, and Manstein???

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