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The Distortion of Reality

Omer Bartov

in Hitler's Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich

This chapter presents how the troops' perception of reality and understanding of their actions was distorted by the conditions and circumstances of their existence. The extent to which Nazi ideology ... More

This chapter presents how the troops' perception of reality and understanding of their actions was distorted by the conditions and circumstances of their existence. The extent to which Nazi ideology shaped the Wehrmacht into Hitler's army is illustrated. The chapter also highlights that it was the years of premilitary and army indoctrination which molded the soldiers' state of mind, prepared them for the horrors of war, and instilled into them such determination and ruthlessness. The chapter displays how Wehrmacht's propaganda relied on a radical demonization of the enemy and on a similarly extreme deification of the Führer. The astonishing efficacy of these images is shown by reference to a wide array of evidence presented and these played an important role in the distorted reconstruction of the memory and history of the war.Less

Renouncing War

Konrad H. Jarausch

in After Hitler: Recivilizing Germans, 1945-1995

This chapter deals with the Potsdam policy of demilitarization, which went beyond disarming the Wehrmacht and eventually led to a distancing from militarism.

Introduction

Omer Bartov

in Hitler's Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich

This chapter proposes that the only way to approach the issues surrounding the Wehrmacht in the Third Reich is through a careful analysis of the anatomy of the German army. Four theses are given ... More

This chapter proposes that the only way to approach the issues surrounding the Wehrmacht in the Third Reich is through a careful analysis of the anatomy of the German army. Four theses are given which focus on the war experience, social organization, motivation, and perception of reality of Germany's soldiers. The chapter also asserts that by examining the attitudes of both the higher and the lower echelons of the army, the degree to which the Wehrmacht constituted an integral part of state and society in the Third Reich will be able to be gauged. This chapter concludes with an outline of the topics to be discussed on the succeeding chapters.Less

The Demodernization of the Front

Omer Bartov

in Hitler's Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich

Between the year 1941 and 1942, the Wehrmacht's combat units underwent a radical process of demodernization, just as the Third Reich's economy was being mobilized for a total industrial war. This ... More

Between the year 1941 and 1942, the Wehrmacht's combat units underwent a radical process of demodernization, just as the Third Reich's economy was being mobilized for a total industrial war. This chapter examines the contradiction between the Wehrmacht's image as the most modern army of its time, and the profound process of demodernization it underwent particularly on the Eastern Front. Through a detailed reconstruction of life at the front, the chapter demonstrates the effects of the immense material attrition on the troops' physical condition and state of mind. Strong emphasis is given on the winter of 1941–2, when the majority of Germany's soldiers were forced into trench warfare highly reminiscent of the Western Front of 1914–18, while facing, however, an increasingly modernized enemy. Several consequences of the demodernization of the front are also presented in this chapter.Less

The Destruction of the Primary Group

Omer Bartov

in Hitler's Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich

Cohesion in the German army was to a large extent maintained by a conscious and systematic nurturing of what has come to be termed as “primary groups”, a social organization with its roots tracing ... More

Cohesion in the German army was to a large extent maintained by a conscious and systematic nurturing of what has come to be termed as “primary groups”, a social organization with its roots tracing back to military tradition that expected soldiers to feel a special kind of bond and loyalty to their unit. This chapter explores the destruction of the “primary group,” the social unit which had traditionally constituted the backbone of the German army. The chapter explores how the tremendous losses in the fighting, the lack of replacements, and the rapid manpower turnover among combat units, diminished the Wehrmacht reliance on the “primary group” as the key for its cohesion. Further, the chapter displays how the widely accepted sociological theory of Shils and Janowitz, which states that the Wehrmacht avoided disintegration due to its social organization, is irrelevant in Eastern Front conditions.Less

The Perversion of Discipline

Omer Bartov

in Hitler's Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich

While the intellectual combination of the old military tradition with modern fighting techniques can be regarded as one of the keys to the Wehrmacht's astounding military successes, the strict ... More

While the intellectual combination of the old military tradition with modern fighting techniques can be regarded as one of the keys to the Wehrmacht's astounding military successes, the strict compliance required from the troops, and the draconian punishments meted to offenders, as this chapter proposes, played a major role in maintaining unit cohesion under the most adverse combat conditions. However, the chapter also emphasizes that in the Third Reich, especially during the war, the soldiers' submission to a disciplinary system, led to their profound brutalization because they were unpunished for such atrocious actions. This in turn, created a convenient safety valve for the army which made it possible to demand strict combat discipline, and cohesion came to depend on a perversion of the moral and legal basis of martial law.Less

Conclusion

Omer Bartov

in Hitler's Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich

This chapter concludes with an argument that in Germany, the popular memory of “Barbarossa” is based on the same inversion of reality which was common during the Third Reich, whereby the war's ... More

This chapter concludes with an argument that in Germany, the popular memory of “Barbarossa” is based on the same inversion of reality which was common during the Third Reich, whereby the war's military events and physical hardships are greatly overemphasized, while its truly unique aspect, namely its inherent criminality, is repressed and “normalized.” Cause and effect were reversed: barbarism was perceived as the outcome of the enemy's bitter resistance to occupation, not as its main trigger. Further, the chapter demonstrates that the central contention of this study is that just as we cannot speak of the Wehrmacht as an institution in isolation from the state, so too it is impossible to understand the conduct, motivation, and self-perception of the individual officers and men who made up the army without considering the society and regime from which they came.Less

The German Surrender of 1945

Richard Bessel

in How Fighting Ends: A History of Surrender

This chapter discusses how in 1945 Nazi Germany did not surrender when defeat became likely, or even when it became inevitable, but fought literally to the bitter end. Nazi ideology, allegiance to ... More

This chapter discusses how in 1945 Nazi Germany did not surrender when defeat became likely, or even when it became inevitable, but fought literally to the bitter end. Nazi ideology, allegiance to Hitler, guilt and fear of retribution, regime terror, and determination not to repeat what had happened in 1918 contributed to this hugely destructive outcome. However, surrender at local level did not occur uniformly: in some places there was dogged resistance to the end and the terror unleashed by the regime kept the population wedded to its strategy of self-destruction; in others German soldiers melted away, and German civilians hung out white sheets from their homes and tried to negotiate local surrenders when Allied soldiers approached. In the end, uncompromising Nazi ideology evaporated with the collapse of the Nazi regime, and the population finally embraced defeat and life after surrender.Less

Spreading Complicity: Pleasure and Qualms in the Cynical Army

Thomas Kühne

in Belonging and Genocide: Hitler's Community, 1918-1945

Drawing on private letters and diaries of ordinary soldiers, this chapter shows how the strategy of community building through crime was expanded to the bulk of adult German men in the Wehrmacht. ... More

Drawing on private letters and diaries of ordinary soldiers, this chapter shows how the strategy of community building through crime was expanded to the bulk of adult German men in the Wehrmacht. From the beginning to the end of the war, soldiers, often naively, enjoyed the pleasures and the emotional closeness of comradeship. They still had some sense of right and wrong. Notwithstanding the after-the-fact myths of ignorance of the Holocaust on the part of ordinary Germans, most of these soldiers—seventeen million—had some idea that the war they waged went far beyond anything considered morally acceptable.Less

Repression

Alexander Prusin

in Serbia under the Swastika: A World War II Occupation

Focuses on the German anti-guerrilla warfare in Serbia in 1941. Although German military and civil officials did not consider the Serbs as ideological enemies solely on the basis of race, the ... More

Focuses on the German anti-guerrilla warfare in Serbia in 1941. Although German military and civil officials did not consider the Serbs as ideological enemies solely on the basis of race, the outbreak of resistance elevated racial stereotypes to the forestage of occupation policies, particularly since the Germans did not have enough troops to suppress the resistance. In comparison to Poland or Ukraine, where maintaining security was the prerogative of Himmler’s SS and police, his forces in Serbia were too small for such a task. As a result, it was the Wehrmacht, which assumed the essentially police functions. The German officer corps’ commitment to the Nazi ideology ensured that it perceived its task through political prism and applied unrestricted terror as the most effective method for crushing the resistance.Less

Old Wine in New Wineskins: Operational Thinking in the Reichswehr and the Wehrmacht between Reality and Utopia

Gerhard P. Gross

David T. Zabecki (ed.)

in The Myth and Reality of German Warfare: Operational Thinking from Moltke the Elder to Heusinger

Chapter 6 examines the rearmament of the German military from disorganization in peacetime (the Reichswehr) through the foundation of a centralized and unified military (the Wehrmacht) at the start ... More

Chapter 6 examines the rearmament of the German military from disorganization in peacetime (the Reichswehr) through the foundation of a centralized and unified military (the Wehrmacht) at the start of World War II. Although Schlieffen’s plan of swift annihilation and operational maneuvers had proven unsuccessful, the German military blamed this failure on the incompetence of individual commanders. As a result, the dogmatic adherence to quick, operational warfare independent of political considerations remained unquestioned. Instead, military leaders like Joachim von Stülpnagel and Hans von Seeckt debated the value of a total people’s war as a means of achieving a battle of annihilation in future conflicts. Not all of Germany’s failures in World War I were ignored, however. Wilhelm Groener noted the lack of cooperation between not only branches of the armed forces but also military and political leadership. He called for the centralization of command and control in a political body—a call that was answered by the rise of Adolph Hitler and the establishment of the Wehrmacht under Werner von Blomberg.Less

Afrikaner and Französen

Derek R. Mallett

in Hitler's Generals in America: Nazi POWs and Allied Military Intelligence

Chapter 1 relates the Allied capture of the German general officers who were eventually held as prisoners of war in the United States. The chapter begins with the first large group of generals who ... More

Chapter 1 relates the Allied capture of the German general officers who were eventually held as prisoners of war in the United States. The chapter begins with the first large group of generals who surrendered in Tunisia; hence the captors referred to their prisoners as Afrikaner. The chapter proceeds to recount the capture of the next large group of German generals to fall into Western Allied hands, the Französen, those captured following the successful Allied invasion of northwest France. The chapter examines the British relationship with these men, the interrelations of the prisoners themselves, and British perceptions of the prisoners’ respective political loyalties. It serves as a lens of comparison through which the American treatment of these prisoners can be viewed.Less

Hitler’s Generals Come to America

Derek R. Mallett

in Hitler's Generals in America: Nazi POWs and Allied Military Intelligence

Chapter 2 describes the initial transfer of four Wehrmacht general officers to the United States for interrogation at Byron Hot Springs, California. The chapter follows the transfer of the generals ... More

Chapter 2 describes the initial transfer of four Wehrmacht general officers to the United States for interrogation at Byron Hot Springs, California. The chapter follows the transfer of the generals through Mexia, Texas, and then to their “permanent” home in Clinton, Mississippi. The chapter demonstrates how poorly American accommodations for German general officer prisoners compared to those of their British counterparts and questions American motivations for bringing these men to America in the first place.Less

The Seeds of the American Transformation

Derek R. Mallett

in Hitler's Generals in America: Nazi POWs and Allied Military Intelligence

Chapter 3 chronicles the transfer of dozens more Wehrmacht general officers from British to American custody. The chapter emphasizes early signs of American independence from British tutelage in ... More

Chapter 3 chronicles the transfer of dozens more Wehrmacht general officers from British to American custody. The chapter emphasizes early signs of American independence from British tutelage in dealing with German general officer prisoners. The chapter contends that, following D-Day, American authorities began to see their German general officer prisoners as potentially useful. The U.S. Provost Marshal General’s Office improved conditions at Camp Clinton and began contemplating a re-education program for these high-ranking officers.Less