Hitler
Page 155
62. Gerhard Wagner (ed.), Lagevorträge des Oberbefehlshabers der Kriegsmarine vor Hitler 1939–1945 (Munich, 1972); If Z, 1811-PS, Jodl Diary, 13 December 1939. ADAP D 8, 408, note: there are no documents covering the meetings between Hitler and Quisling on 13 and 18 December.
63. Rohde, ‘ “Blitzkrieg” ’, 150ff.; Gerd R. Ueberschär, Hitler und Finnland 1939–1941. Die deutsch–finnischen Beziehungen während des Hitler–Stalin-Paktes (Wiesbaden, 1978), 92ff.
64. Ibid., 140ff.
65. ‘Deutschland und die finnische Frage’ (quote); on the assumed authorship see Ueberschär, Hitler, 112f.
66. ADAP D 8, No. 443; Lagevorträge, 12 December 1939.
67. IMT 34, 063-C, 269f.
68. Salewski, Seekriegsleitung 1, 179f.
69. IMT 28, 1809-PS, 406. On the leadership structure for the Weser Exercise, which was totally geared to Hitler, see Warlimont, Hauptquartier, 82ff.
70. Hubatsch (ed.), Weisungen.
71. IMT 28, 1809-PS, 411.
72. Ibid., 412: ‘Motivating people for the planned action’ will be ‘difficult’.
73. Ueberschär, Hitler, 134ff.
74. Goebbels TB, 9 April 1940.
75. Ibid., 10 April 1940.
76. Ibid., 11 April 1940.
77. ADAP D 9, Nos 82 and 92 (Mussolini’s reply).
78. Walther Hubatsch, Weserübung. Die deutsche Besetzung von Dänemark und Norwegen 1940. Nach amtl. Unterlagen dargestellt (Göttingen, 1960), 110ff.
79. IMT 28, 1809-PS, 397ff., quote 422.
80. Maier and Stegemann, ‘Sicherung’, 219.
War in the West
1. Halder, KTB, 1, 6 March 1940; IMT 28, 1809-PS, 409f.; Jacobsen, Fall Gelb, 137f.
2. IMT 28, 1809-PS, 415f.; Jacobsen, Fall Gelb, 138.
3. IMT 28, 1809-PS, 425–428; Jacobsen, Fall Gelb, 137. From November 1939 onwards the date of the attack was postponed a total of 29 times (ibid., 141).
4. ADAP D 9, No. 214f.
5. Umbreit, ‘Kampf’, 285.
6. Seidler and Zeigert, Führerhauptquartiere, 163ff.; BAF, RW 47/6, KTB Führerhauptquartier, 10 May 1940.
7. This is the conclusion of Warlimont, Hauptquartier, 108; Hubatsch (ed.), Weisungen, No. 11.
8. Halder, KTB 1, 17 (with additional information from Halder for the editor of the KTB) and 18 May 1940. See also IMT 28, 1809-PS, 430.
9. Halder, KTB 1, 18 May 1940.
10. IMT 28, 1809-PS, 433f. See Karl-Heinz Frieser, Blitzkrieg-Legende. Der Westfeldzug 1940 (Munich, 1993), 363ff.; Kershaw, Hitler, 2, 400; Umbreit, ‘Kampf’, 293f.
11. On 25 May the question of whether they should circumvent Paris to the west was heatedly debated by Hitler, Brauchitsch, and Halder, with Halder taking note of the ‘Führer’s very vigorously argued ideas’. See Halder, KTB, 1, 25 May 1940.
12. Ibid., 23 May 1940. Halder was now critical of this transfer of the 4th Army, which had appeared to him desirable on 17 May.
13. IMT 28, 1809-PS, 433, refers to a crisis of confidence.
14. Halder, KTB, 1, 26 May 1940.
15. Goebbels TB, 5 June 1940.
16. ADAP D 9, No. 356; see Ciano, Diary, 30 May 1940.
17. ADAP D 9, No. 357; see Ciano, Diary, 31 May 1940; ADAP D 9, No. 370.
18. Ibid., No. 372; see Malte König, Kooperation als Machtkampf. Das faschistische Achsenbündnis Berlin–Rom im Krieg 1940/41 (Cologne, 2007), 24.
19. Halder, KTB, 1, 5, 6, and 10 June 1940.
20. Goebbels TB, 6 June 1940. This meeting took place in the ‘Eagle’s Nest’; at the beginning of July the headquarters was moved to the south Belgian village of Brûly-de-Pesche (Halder, KTB, 1, 3 June 1940); Warlimont, Hauptquartier, 116; Christa Schroeder, Er war mein Chef. Aus dem Nachlaß der Sekretärin von Adolf Hitler (ed.), Anton Joachimsthaler (Munich, 1985), 102ff. (with varying dates); Seidler and Zeigert, Führerhauptquartiere, 173ff. Hitler moved into his new quarters on 6 June (BAF, RW 47/6).
21. Umbreit, ‘Kampf’, 302ff.
22. Goebbels TB, 15 June 1940.
23. On the meetings see Schmidt, Statist, 494f.; Ciano, Diary, 18/19 June 1940, records very clearly Mussolini’s disappointment at his missed opportunity for winning military fame.
24. The idea first emerged on 20 May. See IMT 28, 1809-PS, 309ff., Jodl Diary.
25. Schmidt, Statist, 498f.; Keitel, Leben, 269f.; Eberhard Jäckel, Frankreich in Hitlers Europa. Die deutsche Frankreichpolitik im Zweiten Weltkrieg (Stuttgart, 1966), 38ff.
26. Keitel, Leben, 269, on Hitler’s authorship.
27. Domarus, 2, 1530.
28. Umbreit, ‘Kampf’, 316ff.
29. This is the convincing interpretation of Frieser, Blitzkrieg-Legende, 409ff.
30. For reports by participants see Keitel, Leben, 273f.; Arno Breker, Im Strahlungsfeld der Ereignisse. Leben und Wirken eines Künstlers. Porträts, Begegnungen, Schicksale (Preußisch Oldendorf, 1972), 151ff.; Engel, Heeresadjutant, 26 June 1940; Hermann Giesler, Ein anderer Hitler. Bericht seines Architekten Hermann Giesler. Erlebnisse, Gespräche, Reflexionen (Leoni am Starnberger See, 1977), 386ff.; Speer, Erinnerungen, 185ff. As a result of erroneous statements by the contemporary witnesses (Speer: 28 June, Engel: 26 June) there has been confusion in the literature about the date of the visit: Kershaw, Hitler, 2, for example, gives 28 June, Cédric Gruat, Hitler in Paris. Juni 1940 (Berlin and Schmalkalden, 2011), discusses whether the visit took place on 23 or 26 June 1940. The puzzle can be solved, however, with the help of the Führer headquarters diary. See BAF, RW 47/6.
31. The VB on 30 June 1940, the Berlin Illustrierte Zeitung on 4 July 1940.
32. Picker, Tischgespräche, 21 July 1941; Hitler, Monologe, 25/26 September–11 October and 29 October 1941, 13/14 January 1942, and 13 June 1943.
33. Edict of 25 June 1940. See Speer, Erinnerungen, Facsimile on p. 191.
34. On the preparation and implementation see Goebbels TB, 3–7 July; BAB, R 55/20007, Working plan for the Führer’s return from the battlefield and the Reichstag session on 3 July1940; announcements and reports in the VB (B), 6 and 7 July 1940.
35. ADAP D 10, No. 129.
36. See, in particular, Kershaw, Hitler, 2, 407; Kershaw, Hitler-Mythos, 136f.; Thamer, Verführung, 648. For a different view see Below, Adjutant, 237: ‘The response to the western campaign was a mixture of fear, incomprehension and grudging admiration’.
37. Goebbels TB, 25 June and 3 July 1940.
38. Ibid., 9 July 1940.
39. Jäckel, Frankreich, 55.
40. Hans-Adolf Jacobsen, 1939–1945. Der Zweite Weltkrieg in Chronik und Dokumenten (Darmstadt, 1961), 149f. For the collection of relevant excerpts from Halder’s diary see Karl Klee, Dokumente zum Unternehmen ‘Seelöwe’. Die geplante deutsche Landung in England 1940 (Göttingen, 1959), 136ff.; Karl Klee, Das Unternehmen ‘Seelöwe’. Die geplante deutsche Landung in England 1940 (Göttingen, 1958), 63ff.
41. On 21 May tête-à-tête, on 20 June together with Keitel. See Klee, Dokumente, 238f. Below, Adjutant, 236 recalls that Hitler hardly discussed the question of an invasion of Britain in the second half of June. See Klee, ‘Seelöwe’, 57ff.
42. Klee, Dokumente, 240ff.; on this see Klee, ‘Seelöwe’, 66. At the end of June Jodl described the invasion in a memorandum as ‘ultima ratio’. See IMT 28, 1776-PS, 301ff., here p. 302; see Klee, ‘Seelöwe’, 61f.
43. Halder, KTB 2, 13 July 1940; Klee, ‘Seelöwe’, 71f. The creation of a colonial empire in central Africa, on the other hand, was not one of Hitler’s priorities at this time; rather he regarded the African colonies (including Britain’s colonial possessions, whose future depended on the development of the war with that country), as bargaining tools in his negotiations with France, Italy, and Spain. His comment during the meeting on 13 July that ‘we shall claim the French and Belgian Congo’, suggests that this demand was not a high priority and that it was far more modest than that envisaged by the simultaneous plans of the Foreign Ministry and the Navy. See Hildebrand, Reich, 653ff.; Gerhard Schreiber,
‘Die politische und militärische Entwicklung im Mittelmeerraum 1939/40’, in Screiber, Bernd Stegemann and Detlef Vogel, Der Mittelmeerraum und Südosteuropa. Von der ‘non belligeranza’ Italiens bis zum Kriegseintritt der Vereinigten Staaten (Stuttgart, 1984), 250ff.; Karsten Linne, Deutschland jenseits des Äquators? Die NS-Kolonialplanungen für Afrika (Berlin, 2008).
44. ADAP D 10, No. 166.
45. Sebastian Balta, Rumänien und die Großmächte in der Ära Antonescu 1940–1944 (Stuttgart, 2005), 71ff.
46. Halder, KTB, 1, 22 May 1940, concerning Brauchitsch’s presentation to Hitler: ‘Führer thinks that Russia will accept his request for it to restrict itself to Bessarabia’.
47. ADAP D 10, No. 4: On 23 June Schulenburg was informed by Molotov that a ‘solution to the Bessarabian question could no longer be delayed’; they were seeking a peaceful solution but if necessary were prepared to use force.
48. Ibid., No. 56.
49. In the Second Vienna Award, Romania agreed to a partial return of Transylvania to Hungary (see below p. 706). In the Treaty of Craiova it had to give the southern part of the Dobruschda to Bulgaria.
50. Hillgruber, Strategie, 178ff.; Ralf-Dieter Müller, Der Feind steht im Osten. Hitlers geheime Pläne für einen Krieg gegen die Sowjetunion im Jahr 1939 (Berlin, 2011), 184ff.
51. Halder, KTB, 1, 30 June 1940; see also Müller, Feind, 196, who points out that the remark cannot be simply interpreted as ‘Hitler’s view’, as the editor, Jacobsen, assumed.
52. Halder, KTB, 2, 3 July 1940.
53. Goebbels TB, 20 July 1940; for Hitler’s directive concerning Preparations for an Invasion of England see Hubatsch (ed.), Weisungen, No. 16. On Hitler’ stay on the Obersalzberg see Kershaw, Hitler, 2, 407ff.
54. VB (B), 20 July 1940, ‘Die monumentale Rede Adolf Hitlers’.
55. Domarus, 2, 1562.
56. That is clear from the introductory sentence: ‘It has been reported to the Führer’. See Müller, Feind, 211. This was also the interpretation of Hillgruber, Strategie, 218, and Heinrich Uhlig, ‘Das Einwirken Hitlers auf Planung und Führung des Ostfeldzuges’, in Aus Politik und Zeitgeschichte 1960, 165.
57. Halder, KTB, 2, 22 July 1940; Hillgruber, Strategie, 216ff.
58. Domarus, 2, 1562.
59. Bernhard von Lossberg, a former colleague of Jodl’s, claimed in a written statement of 7 September 1956, that as early as July 1940 he had on his own initiative produced a 30-page plan and given it to Jodl (If Z, ZS 97). Warlimont, Hauptquartier, 126f., however, describes Jodl’s revelation of the plan to the L staff (to which Lossberg also belonged) on the 29th as coming as a complete surprise. This can be seen as a retrospective attempt to cover up the staff’s initiative. See If Z, ZS 678, Manuscript: Hitler, a military leader? Account of conversations with Frigate Captain Meckel, early summer 1946: ‘The army [sic!] had already learned of the Führer’s intentions when these were still being considered. Thus a plan of operations was drafted even before one had been ordered.’ See also Kershaw, Hitler, 2, 415; Hillgruber, Strategie, 222.
60. Halder, KTB, 2, 22, 26, and 27 July 1940. See also 29 July 1941 on the order to the chief of the general staff of the 18th Army, Marx, to prepare a plan of attack. This was already ready on 5 August ( Jacobsen, 1939–1945, 164ff.). Marx had already produced a plan for Halder at the beginning of July for a preventive attack by the 18th Army against the Soviet Union (Halder, KTB, 2, 4 July 1941); Müller, Feind, 204ff. and 221ff.; Ernst Klink, ‘Die Landkriegsführung’, in Horst Boog et al., Der Angriff auf die Sowjetunion (Frankfurt a. M., 1991), 263 and 271ff.
61. Halder, KTB, 2.
62. Ibid.; see Kershaw, Hitler, 2, 416f.
63. Halder, KTB, 2, 31 July 1940.
64. On the Madagascar project see Adler, Mensch, 69ff.; Magnus Brechtken, ‘Madagaskar’ für die Juden’. Antisemitische Idee und politische Praxis 1885–1945 (Munich, 1997) (contains a comprehensive bibliography of the older literature); Browning, Die ‘Endlösung’ und das Auswärtige Amt. Das Referat D III der Abteilung Deutschland 1940–1943 (Darmstadt, 2010), 54ff.; Hans Jansen, Der Madagaskar-Plan. Die beabsichtigte Deportation der europäischen Juden nach Madagascar (Munich, 1997), esp. 320ff.; Leni Yahil, ‘Madagascar: Phantom of a Solution for the Jewish Question’, in Bela Vargo and George L. Mosse (eds), Jews and Non-Jews in eastern Europe 1918–1945 (New York, 1974), 313–34; Longerich, Politik, 273ff.
65. See in detail Brechtken, ‘Madagaskar’.
66. Published in VfZ 5 (1957), 194–8 (with a brief introduction by Krausnick). Himmler had also recommended in this memorandum the removal of ‘racially valuable’ children from their Polish parents; while this would be ‘cruel and tragic’, it would be preferable to ‘extermination’.
67. Ibid.; the minute about Hitler’s reaction was dated 28 May 1940.
68. Ciano, Diary, 18/19 June 1940; Schmidt, Statist, 494f.; Lagevorträge; ADAP D 10, Doc. 345; Goebbels TB, 17 August 1940.
69. ADAP D 10, No. 101.
70. PAA, Inland II g 177.
71. BAB, R 113/1645, Spatial planning assessment of Madagascar, 21 August 1940.
72. PAA, Inland II g 177, Heydrich letter, 24 June 1940. According to Rademacher, 30 August 1940, in the meantime Ribbentrop had ordered the participation of the RSHA in the planning (ibid.).
73. Ibid.
74. Ibid. Brack is wrongly referred to as Brake, but given his correct title (Oberbefehlsleiter).
75. According to RSHA information for Himmler (Hildebrand, Reich, 739).
76. For details see Longerich, Goebbels, 459; Main source: Goebbels TB, 20, 25, and 26 July.
77. Jäckel, Frankreich, 75ff.
78. BAB, R 43 II/1334a. The wording of this quotation by Bormann can be regarded as accurate on the basis of a copy produced by the Reich Interior Ministry. See Rebentisch, Führerstaat, 251.
79. Alfred Gottwaldt and Diana Schulle, Die ‘Judendeportationen’ aus dem deutschen Reich 1941–1945. Eine kommentierte Chronologie (Wiesbaden, 2005), 37ff.; Jacob Toury, ‘Die Entstehungsgeschichte des Austreibungsbefehls gegen die Juden der Saarpfalz und Badens (20/23 Oktober 1940) – Camp de Gurs’, in Jahrbuch des Instituts für deutsche Geschichte 15 (1986), 431–64. Toury points out (443) that in the draft of a letter of 7 December 1940 Rademacher corrected the formulation ‘deportation ordered by the Führer’ to ‘deportation approved by the Führer’.
80. Frank, Diensttagebuch, 12 July 1940.
81. Biuletyn, Doc. 38.
82. Goebbels TB, 25 July 1940.
83. Ibid., 26 July and 1 August 1940.
84. Hubatsch (ed.), Weisungen.
85. Goebbels TB, 5 and 7 August 1940.
86. Klee, Dokumente, 238 (Raeder); KTB OKW 1, 32; Bock, Pflicht, 165.
87. Goebbels TB, 7–10 August 1940.
88. Basil Collier, The Defence of the United Kingdom (London, 1957), 163ff., on the preparations.
89. Ibid., 183ff. and 456f.
90. Ibid., 203ff. and 458ff.
91. Kurt Mehner (ed.), Die geheimen Tagesberichte der deutschen Wehrmachtführung im Zweiten Weltkrieg 1939–1945. Die gegenseitige Lageunterrichtung der Wehrmacht-, Heeres- und Luftwaffenführung über alle Haupt- und Nebenkriegsschauplätze: ‘Lage West’ (OKW-Kriegsschauplätze Nord, West, Italien, Balkan), ‘Lage Ost’ (OKH) and ‘Luftlage Reich’, 12 vols (Osnabrück 1984–1995). On the – unauthorized – attack on London see Klaus A. Maier, ‘Die Luftschlacht um England’, in Maier, Errichtung, 386.
92. Mehner (ed.), Tagesberichte, 26 August 1940 for Berlin. 29 August–1 September 1940.
93. Domarus, 2, 1575ff., quote p. 1580.
94. On the British attacks see Mehner (ed.), Tagesberichte. Führer directive for attacks on the population and air defences of major English cities, including London, 5 September 1940 (quoted in Maier, ‘Luftschlacht’, 386). See also Goebbels TB, 5 and 8 September 1940.
95. BAK, ZSg. 102/27, 10 and 18 September 1940; VB (B), 11 September 1940, photo page; 14 September, ‘Englands Schuldkonto wächst weiter’.
97. KTB OKW 1, S 82.
98. Halder, KTB, 2, 7 October 1940.
Diplomatic Soundings
1. Kershaw, Hitler, 2, 438; Gerhard Weinberg, Eine Welt in Waffen. Die globale Geschichte des Zweiten Weltkriegs (Stuttgart, 1995), 188ff.
2. Sommer, Deutschland, 349ff.
3. According to ibid., 380ff., Hitler’s decision can be dated to the second week in August.
4. Hillgruber, Strategie, 203; Sommer, Deutschland, 429.
5. See Michalka, Ribbentrop, 286ff., who describes Ribbentrop’s policy as an ‘alternative’ to Hitler’s programme.
6. Lagevorträge, 6 and 26 September 1940; Hillgruber, Strategie, 188ff.; Salewski, Seekriegsleitung 1, 280ff.
7. On 26 July Hitler met the Romanian prime minister and his foreign minister on the Obersalzberg. Hitler offered the Romanians a guarantee of Romania’s territorial integrity, but linked this to the signing of a long-term economic agreement. See ADAP D 10, No. 234. On 27 July Hitler received the Bulgarian head of state and offered him support for the transfer of south Dobruschka (ibid., No. 245). On 29 July Ribbentrop instructed the German envoy in Bucharest to recommend to the Romanian government the transfer of south Dobruschka to Bulgaria (ibid., No. 253). The Romanians followed this advice (ibid., Nos 262 and 323). The Germans were prepared to give military support to Hungary’s revisionist objectives (ibid., No. 146). However, Hitler requested King Carol to agree to negotiate with both countries about their revisionist aims (ibid., No. 171). See Hans-Joachim Hoppe, Bulgarien, Hitlers eigenwilliger Verbündeter. Eine Fallstudie zur nationalsozialistischen Südosteuropapolitik (Stuttgart, 1979), 82ff.
8. ADAP D 10, No. 347.
9. Ibid., Nos 384, 376, and 399f.
10. Ibid., No. 407; Ciano, Diary, 28 August 1941.
11. ADAP D 10, No. 413, Docs 408–10 on the conference.
12. Friedrich Christof, Befriedung im Donauraum. Der zweite Wiener Schiedsspruch und die deutsch–ungarischen diplomatischen Beziehungen 1939–1942 (Frankfurt a. M., 1998), esp. 69ff.
13. ADAP D 11, Nos. 17, 19, and 21; Balta, Rumänien, 77ff.; Andreas Hillgruber, Hitler, König Carol und Marschall Antonescu. Die deutsch–rumänischen Beziehungen 1938–1944 (Wiesbaden, 1954), 93ff.