Hitler's field marshals and their battles. Hitler's field marshals and their battles I was Hitler's adjutant Nikolaus Belov

Samuel Wayne Mitcham Jr. was born on January 2, 1949 in the USA, in a small town in Louisiana. The future World War II historian's mother was a local journalist, and her son, interested in the humanities, followed in her footsteps. After graduating from high school, he continued his studies at the University of Louisiana, and then at the University of North Carolina, majoring in journalism. Samuel Mitchum is a Vietnam War veteran. He saw combat in North Vietnam, where he was a helicopter pilot and company commander. After the war, he continued his military career, successfully moving through staff positions. Mitchum also graduated from the US Command and General Staff College. As a result, he rose to the rank of major general in reserve.

Back in the 1970s Samuel Mitchum became interested in military history, with an emphasis on the Second World War and the historiography of Nazi Germany. For a long time he combined his military career with academic and writing activities. He was and is a teacher and honorary professor at a number of prestigious American universities. Mitchum is also a frequent guest as a lecturer at the most famous US military school in Westpoint. He completed his PhD in Geography in 1986 and is a top-notch recognized cartographer, which has helped him in his work on military books on tactics and battles. Samuel Mitchum He has repeatedly acted as a consultant for documentaries for the BBC, National Geographic, History Channel, and CBS on the topics of the Second World War, battles and commanders.

The first three books about the Second World War and its commanders were three monographs about Erwin Rommel. In the book The author, in the corresponding chapter dedicated to Rommel, emphasizes that it is difficult to fit thoughts into just one chapter. The first book, Rommel's Desert War, was published in 1982, followed by Rommel's Last Battle (1983) and Triumphant Fox: Erwin Rommel and the Rise of the Afrika Korps(Triumph of the Desert Fox: Erwin Rommel and the Rise of the Afrika Korps, 1984). Afterwards he will write two more books about Erwin Rommel: The Desert Fox in Normandy: Rommel's Defense of Fortress Europe(Desert Fox in Normandy: Rommel Defends Fortress Europe, 1997) and Rommel's Greatest Victory (Rommel's Greatest Victory, 1998). Also, in addition to these books and two about German commanders, about which more below, Samuel Mitchum wrote such works as Why Hitler? The Genesis of the Nazi Reich(Why Hitler? The Birth of the Third Reich, 1996), Retreat to the Reich: The German Defeat in France, 1944(Retreat into the Reich: German Defeat in France in 1944, 2000) and The Panzer Legions: A Guide to the German Army Tank Divisions of World War II & Their Commanders(Tank Legions: A Study of German Tank Divisions and Their Commanders in World War II, also 2000). In total, Samuel Mitchum has about 30 books about military history, battles and commanders, of which I have cited only a part.

“Commanders of the Third Reich” and “Hitler’s Field Marshals and Their Battles”

In the author's preface to his historical work, author Samuel Mitchum notes that at one time he was surprised that there was no comprehensive, full-fledged study of the lives and careers of all 25 field marshals of the Third Reich. It is interesting that those interested in the topic, both in countries with an adapted translation and in the English-speaking environment (the latter can be understood by reading English reviews), often confuse two books on similar topics authored by the same Samuel Mitchum. Hitler's field marshals and their battles, which is discussed in this material, is called in the original “Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles” and the first edition was published in 1988 - the author's preface is dated the same year. The second book, which was published exactly ten years later, is Commanders of the Third Reich, and in the original – “Hitler’s Commanders: Officers of the Wehrmacht, the Luftwaffe, the Kriegsmarine & the Waffen-SS”(the full translation is: Hitler's Commanders: Officers of the Wehrmacht, Luftwaffe, Kriegsmarine and Wafen-SS). These are two different books, written at different times, with overlapping personalities, but with a number of significant differences.

In the first book, Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles, author Samuel Mitchum considered only twenty-five personalities. Of these, in approximately equal proportions there are 19 field marshals of the ground forces, and in just one chapter, very briefly, six more field marshals of the Luftwaffe Air Force. Since these Wehrmacht commanders had dozens and hundreds of high-ranking officers under their command, their names are inevitably considered in detailing the campaigns and battles. In the second book, published ten years later, Mitchum again examined, more briefly, the careers of most field marshals. And the icing on the cake was another four dozen officers of all branches of the military who deserved their place in history. In the second book, Commanders of the Third Reich, a total of 59 officers of different branches of the military are considered. Among the most famous officers who did not have a marshal's baton, one can recall Heinz Guderian, Hermann Hoth, Hasso Manteuffel, Erich Raeder, Karl Doenitz, Joseph Dietrich.

HITLER'S FIELD MARSHALS

The first rank of field marshal, which Hitler conferred three years before the start of World War II, and its holder are considered as a prelude to the war itself. Samuel Mitchum projects in the image of von Blomberg the path from Germany, humiliated by the Treaty of Versailles, to a new superpower capable of redrawing the map of Europe. Important attention in the biography of the Minister of Defense is paid to his removal from a high position after revealing the piquant details of his marriage with a young lady. The author characterizes Blomberg as a persistent, ambitious man who, nevertheless, could not defend his disagreement with the future war and who, upon retiring, preferred the same young wife to the fate of Germany.

WALTER VON BRAUCHITCH

The book Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles by Samuel Mitchum characterizes the commander-in-chief of the German ground forces as a man of compromise, and this characteristic runs like a red thread through his entire chapter. At first, he became a candidate that suited both sides - the opinion of Hitler as a dictator and the corps of generals, on the other hand. Afterwards, Brauchitsch himself had to compromise with his conscience and actually accept a bribe in order to close the unpleasant divorce story and get an important position. During the first two years of the war, the commander-in-chief of the ground forces was unable to defend the opinion of the generals to Hitler and, again, compromised with the situation, as with his dismissal.

EWALD VON KLEIST

The story of this Field Marshal Hitler begins with the prelude that he was a real Prussian military man, untainted by scandals, compromises with the Nazis, with an impressive pedigree of three field marshals. The image of von Kleist and his attitude towards the Nazi party and Hitler is considered as an example of a real officer who was only faithful to the oath he swore to serve Germany and its leader personally. Mitchum pays important attention to the managerial qualities of von Kleist as the first major military commander of the tank forces and the immediate superior of Heins Guderian, with whom they often had disputes. The end of Kleist’s career, like most of Hitler’s field marshals, was the Eastern Front, namely unequal forces with the enemy and constant conflict with the orders of Hitler, who did not want to retreat from occupied positions.

German military leader, one of Hitler’s field marshals, whose name is most often mentioned in connection with the order “On the conduct of troops in the eastern space.” Samuel Mitchum examines the life of this World War II field marshal beyond this order in the broader aspect of his image as a Nazi sympathizer. According to the book Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles, Walter von Reichenau is described as a stubborn, headstrong officer who saw the new government as an opportunity for Germany and himself. He was not conquered by the personality of Adolf Hitler, but, on the contrary, every now and then he entered into confrontation with the Fuhrer. Despite his nationalist views, Reichenau saw the party only as a basis for the army. He was passed over for the highest government positions, in particular by Brauchitsch, but proved himself to be a persistent and skillful commander. One of the interesting thoughts of his chapter in the book is that Reichenau, who was no stranger to acting on his own convictions, ignoring the orders of Hitler, would not have allowed the 6th Army to get and remain surrounded at Stalingrad, but he died earlier.

RITTER WILHELM VON LEEEB

One of the elderly field marshals of Hitler's Germany, considered an expert in the defensive theory of war, but who was never allowed to show his knowledge and skills in the right direction. Leeb is known as the commander of Army Group North during the attack on the USSR in 1941-1942. A field marshal who did not share Hitler’s orders to suspend the offensive on Leningrad and blockade - during which the city could have been taken back in September 1941. Resigned of his own accord and not under Hitler's coercion like Barbarossa's other two commanders, he never returned to active duty. Already when Germany had to retreat across Eastern Europe, and then defend its borders from the West and East, Hitler never brought back the recognized defense expert, who was once known as an anti-Nazi and defeatist for arguing with Hitler’s policies.

Like a number of Hitler's other field marshals, Feodor von Bock is known primarily for the peak of his career and the reasons for which he was removed from command of the armies. The author Samuel Mitchum gives several points of view about what kind of person the field marshal was and what his attitude was towards National Socialism and the aggressive war in the East. Feodor von Bock was the commander of Army Group Center of the Wehrmacht, and it was under his leadership that the strongest group of troops moved towards Moscow. In the book Hitler's field marshals the author tries to understand the opinions between von Bock and Hitler - which of them was responsible for the late start of the attack on Moscow, the delays and later the failure to take the capital of the USSR. The field marshal was dismissed, but soon he was returned as commander of Army Group South, whose duties the elderly general carried out until July 1942 and his final departure from the army.

WILHELM KEITEL

Hitler's field marshal in many senses of the phrase, who deserved the most disdainful attitude of his contemporaries and subsequent generations. Wilhelm Keitel went down in history as a field marshal who in World War II did not control an active unit, but was a staff officer - in fact, an intermediate formal link between Adolf Hitler and the army when he needed it. The general, who adapted to his boss, was in awe of him until the last days of his life and retained his post longer than all the field marshals. La Keitel, as he was called behind his back, is considered in the book Hitler’s Field Marshals and Their Battles from precisely this perspective of a formal staff level.

A man whose name has become a household name. The field marshal who became known as the “Desert Fox” and who introduced most of those interested in the topic of World War II to such a front as North Africa. Samuel Mitchum does not hide his admiration for Erwin Rommel at all stages of his career and ranks him as the second most brilliant military strategist among all Hitler's field marshals. Field Marshal, whose life was dishonorably cut short in connection with the Plot against Hitler on July 20th, and who, quite possibly, did not play the full part in the war of which he was capable. A commander who, with superior enemy forces and virtually no replenishment of his own reserves, impressed his enemies month after month. The author himself, Samuel Mitchum, admits that it was difficult for him to limit himself to one chapter about the commander about whom he wrote three books.

Samuel Mitchum calls Wilhelm Liszt Field Marshal of Hitler, about whom, perhaps, a wide circle of people and even those interested know the least and have heard less than others. And this commander of the Second World War earned a reputation as a commander whose formations ensured record rates of advance in enemy territories. He showed himself in this capacity in Poland, then in France, in the Balkans and during the 1942 summer offensive in the Caucasus. After he was dismissed in September of the same year, Wilhelm List was never able to prove himself in his country's defensive war, despite his outstanding military leadership talents. He was against a number of decisions from above, which later turned out to be a disaster for the Wehrmacht at Stalingrad.

Another German commander who is not so familiar to a wide circle of interested people, but who was in actual service until the beginning of 1945. Like other Wehrmacht commanders, he performed well in Poland and France, and then made his mark in the Balkans. The offensive in the Caucasus could not be called so successful, which partially places the blame for the death of Paulus's 6th Army on Weichs. Interestingly, as Samuel Mitchum notes, Weichs received the title of field marshal on the eve of the surrender of the 6th Army. In the same year, he was transferred to the reserve and returned to the Balkans, where he more successfully handled his duties, in particular, in the fight against partisans. In the book Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles, Maximilian von Weichs is given one of the shortest chapters.

The most notorious among all field marshals of Hitler, whose name will forever be associated and associated with the Battle of Stalingrad and the death in the snow of the 6th Army of the Wehrmacht. It is not surprising that Samuel Mitchum pays very little attention to the career of Friedrich Paulus before 1942 and most of the chapter is devoted specifically to the attack on Stalingrad, and after the encirclement and surrender. The author quotes from the opinions of German officers who assessed Paulus’s indecisiveness after the war in their statements and memoirs. At the same time, little importance is given to the participation of Erich Manstein, since his chapter in the book Hitler’s Field Marshals and Their Battles comes next.

The commander of the German Wehrmacht, whom the author of the book Hitler’s Field Marshals and Their Battles more than once, on the pages of the work, calls the most brilliant commander among the field marshals, and possibly the entire Second World War. One senses that Samuel Mitchum admires the military talent of Erich von Manstein, and for good reason. Particular attention is paid to the period from the end of 1942, when he headed Army Group Don, and the subsequent months in a leadership position and difficult relations with Adolf Hitler. A number of interesting facts and thoughts are given about the mutual hostility of these two people, in particular in matters of strategy and warfare. This chapter can be a good help for readers to get acquainted with Manstein’s war memoirs “Lost Victories.”

GEORG VON KÜCHLER

This is another commander from among Hitler's field marshals, about whom few people know and whose name is much less known than the names of some officers who were lower in rank. Almost his entire career was associated with the Eastern Front in World War II until 1944. Georg von Küchler would become commander of Army Group North, succeeding von Leeb in 1942. His military share included subsequent attempts to capture Leningrad, and then two years of retreats and heavy losses on the Eastern Front. After the war, this German field marshal was put on trial as a minor war criminal for his treatment of partisans, and it was on the northern sector of the Eastern Front that this movement developed most actively in Belarus.

Although it is the name of Friedrich Paulus that most often appears when it comes to the heaviest defeat in the battle of the Wehrmacht, the Belarusian operation in the summer of 1944, where German troops were commanded by Ernst Busch, cost the army 300,000 soldiers and the collapse of the Eastern Front to a certain extent. In 1943, this field marshal of Hitler took command of the once powerful Army Group Center, but during this period of the war he was faced with balancing Hitler's impossible orders to stand to the last soldier and the need to fight defensive battles and carry out large-scale retreats on a wide front. Indeed, the name of Field Marshal Ernst Busch is little known to contemporaries.

Hitler's oldest field marshal, who was considered an authority with whom Hitler had to reckon. Samuel Mitchum draws the reader's attention to the fact that Rundstedt was dismissed four times during his military career, but after the commander-in-chief's temper cooled, he was returned. At the same time, the personality and military qualities in the book are considered from the point of view of a tired old man who no longer had to lead such important fronts and so many army formations, showing his usual passivity. The old general, who called Hitler a corporal behind his back, left his place in history.

Another commander of Wehrmacht army groups, whose path covered, as in the case of most of Hitler’s other field marshals, Poland, France, the Eastern Front, and then the Western. Samuel Mitchum sees Kluge as an officer who tried to find a compromise between military exigencies and his own ambitions to maintain his position. That he more than once found a scapegoat, for example, Guderian, for his own omissions of the command. How he waited for the resolution of the Plot against Hitler on July 20, 1944, to choose the winning side. By the way, Kluge is often mentioned in the literature about the Conspiracy as the commander of the Wehrmacht, who could have provided significant assistance to the conspirators, but did not do so, and then committed suicide, after a series of defeats and uncertainty in the future, after being removed from office.

Not as famous as some others Hitler's field marshals, Walter Model was the commander whom Adolf Hitler appointed at critical moments to those fronts where the situation became critical, or there were reasonable doubts about the abilities of the previous commander of the army group. The author himself cites the nickname that his subordinates gave Model – Hitler’s fireman. When other commanders could not stop the disorderly retreat of their troops or curb the advancing troops of the Red Army, Model managed, most often, to stabilize the Eastern Front, and from 1944, the Western Front. A devoted National Socialist and devoted supporter of Hitler, who, taking advantage of his position, could afford to be capricious with the Fuhrer and act at his own discretion. One of several senior German leaders who committed suicide by shooting himself in the run-up to losing the war.

This field marshal did not distinguish himself by grandiose victories on the Eastern Front, was not Hitler’s favorite, and does not possess a military genius. His name will forever be associated with the plot of July 20, 1944. For participation in the putsch against the Nazi regime, this already elderly man was captured, humiliatingly convicted and brutally executed. In this perspective, the author of the book Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles, Samuel Mitchum, devotes very little time to Witzleben's career and devotes the maximum part of the chapter to participation in the Resistance Movement and the brief events of the July 20 Conspiracy. The former field marshal was supposed to become the new commander of the German army after the overthrow of Hitler, but was hanged naked from a string and dishonored by his then contemporaries.

This field marshal has several distinctive characteristics that make him stand out in this book. He was not a graduate of a military school and initially, even before the First World War, was drafted into the army as a private, rising, thirty years later, to the rank of field marshal. Scherner was the last person to be appointed field marshal by Adolf Hitler - already in April 1945. He was to become the Fuhrer's successor, according to the latter's will, taking leadership of the entire German army as the new commander-in-chief. Samuel Mitchum examines Scherner's service, especially in the final years of World War II, and his notorious cruelty towards enemies, civilians, and even his own subordinates. As well as interesting help, there are several versions of how the field marshal, a devoted Nazi, ended the war. In addition, he was the last of the field marshals to die, surviving Erich von Manstein by only a month.

In addition to the 19 field marshals of the ground forces, to whom the book Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles is dedicated, the author notes at the very beginning that he is not competent enough to analyze the careers of air force commanders. That this is a separate branch of the military with its own characteristics, including appointments as field marshals. There were only six of these in Nazi Germany. The most famous was, of course, Reichsmarschall Hermann Goering. The most famous after him is Albert Kesselring, the author of famous memoirs, and the third most recognizable is Erhard Milch. The remaining three are little known to contemporaries, but their names are worth mentioning. In fact, Mitchum himself devotes only five pages to this entire six-participant chapter at the end of the book. Hugo Sperrle, Wolfram von Richthofen and Robert von Greim.

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Current page: 1 (book has 24 pages in total)

Mitchum Jr. Samuel William, Muller Jean
Commanders of the Third Reich

Mitchum, Jr., Samuel William; Muller Jean

Commanders of the Third Reich

Translation from English by T. N. Zamilova, A. V. Bushuev, A. N. Feldsherova.

Publisher's abstract: The book Hitler's Commanders by Samuel W. Mitchum and Gene Mueller was first published in 1992 by Scarborough House. Its topic is biographies of field marshals, generals and officers of the “Third Reich” *, grouped into seven chapters. Each chapter reflects a specific period in the history of the "Third Reich". Thus, chapter 1 - “Generals of the High Command” shows how the planning of military operations took place, chapters 2 and 3 talk about events on the Eastern Front. Separate chapters are devoted to officers of the German Air Force and Navy, and SS troops.

*Hoaxer: this spelling is “third Reich” - a rudiment, like a shaggy ponytail, left over from Soviet times. The Third Reich is the established name of a certain state during a certain period of its existence. The Third Reich is the Third Empire, and France, like Germany, was the Third Empire - and in this case, in Soviet times, the Third Empire was spelled correctly. The “thousand-year Reich” is reasonably written in quotation marks as a phrase that contradicts historical truth.

To the readers

Introduction

Chapter two. Generals of the Eastern Front

Chapter three. Generals of Stalingrad

Chapter Four. Generals of the Western Front

Chapter five. Lords of the Air

Chapter six. Kriegsmarine officers

Chapter seven. Waffen SS

Notes

To the readers

Hitler's Commanders by Samuel W. Mitchum and Gene Mueller was first published in 1992 by Scarborough House.

Its topic is biographies of field marshals, generals and officers of the “Third Reich”, grouped into seven chapters. Each chapter reflects a specific period in the history of the "Third Reich". Thus, chapter 1 - “Generals of the High Command” shows how the planning of military operations took place, chapters 2 and 3 talk about events on the Eastern Front. Separate chapters are devoted to officers of the German Air Force and Navy, and SS troops.

Samuel W. Mitchum, the author of the main part of the book, is a famous American historian specializing in the history of the German army in the Second World War of 1939-1945. He has written a number of books on this topic: “The Fox the Triumphant”: “Erwin Rommel and the Rise of the Afrika Korps”, “Rommel’s Last Battle: The Desert Fox” and the Company in Normandy”, “Hitler’s Legions. The combat path of the German army in the Second World War", "People of the Luftwaffe", "Hitler's Field Marshals and their battles", "Battle of Sicily, 1943", "Eagles of the Third Reich". Gene Muller played a supporting role in the writing of the book.

The book by Mitchum and Muller will arouse interest among Russian military history buffs primarily because of its description of the fighting on the Eastern Front, the interpretation of which is very different from the Soviet historical concept.

For political reasons, Soviet historians avoided (until recent years) covering our failures, which significantly impoverished the historical picture. Of course, when describing the events of 1941-1943, they could not help but touch on the sad pages of history for Russia, but they were forced to avoid their impartial analysis in every possible way. For example, the events surrounding the Demyansk Pocket, which the Red Army failed to destroy during almost the entire 1942, which cost the lives of a huge number of Soviet soldiers, were either simply ignored by Soviet historians or mentioned in passing. The huge number of “blank spots” in the history of the Second World War does not benefit either science or public opinion. The book by Mitchum and Muller will allow the Russian lover of military history to form a more objective opinion about the events of 50 years ago.

It is worth adding that, unfortunately, literature about the army of the “Third Reich” in our country (despite the huge number of domestic publications about the Second World War) is practically absent. A thin stream of memoirs of some Nazi generals (X. Guderian “Tanks - Forward”, F. Halder “War Diary”, etc.), as well as officers, members of the Free Germany committee (Otto Rühle “Healing in Yelabuga”) is not could solve the problem. It turned out that practically nothing is known about the army, which in 1941 brought the Soviet Union to the brink of defeat, in the war with which millions of our compatriots died. At the same time, a lot of literature is published in the West about Nazism, the Wehrmacht, the SS, military equipment, symbols, etc. (by the way, about the Red Army too). It seems that domestic military history buffs have the right to receive all the information they need.

Now about the advantages and disadvantages of the book. The authors (as stated in the preface) did not seek a thorough analysis of military operations, but wanted to give more information about the personal qualities of Hitler’s generals. But here they stumbled, devoting too much space to describing the career advancement of the book’s heroes. It is also worth noting that the book by Mitchum and Muller is written in a rather monotonous, poor language, which caused certain problems in its translation.

Mitchum and Muller did a lot of work, studying a huge number of sources. Like a biologist dissecting frogs, they studied in detail all aspects of the lives of their heroes, without neglecting their “dirty laundry.” Unfortunately, the book cannot be called objective. Obviously, in an attempt to achieve this quality, the authors behaved impartially, distanced themselves from the events they described and chose a “policy of non-interference.” Their main mistake was that the book did not show Germany’s opponents at all. Of course, both the allies and the Red Army are in the book. Mitchum and Muller mention many divisions, corps and armies, and name some well-known names in the USA (the USSR is represented only by Stalin). However, behind the numbers of military units one cannot see the people who defeated Hitler’s legions in terrible hardships. The Red Army and the Allied troops appear before the reader as completely impersonal masses, acting according to the old principle: “Die erste Kolonne marschiert, die zweite Kolonne marschiert...”. It seems that Hitler’s generals fought in sandboxes at their headquarters. It is safe to say that the authors failed to take an impartial approach to the topic of the Second World War.

For a Soviet person, without a doubt, all persons involved in the outbreak of the Second World War are, to one degree or another, criminals. Therefore, the authors’ statements that some of the results of the Nuremberg trials are a travesty of justice sound blasphemous to us. We leave them to the conscience of Messrs. Mitchum and Mueller.

The figures given by the authors in the book are borrowed mainly from German sources and require a fairly critical approach. The editor left without comment some of the authors' statements, believing that the reader familiar with Russian historical literature would form his own opinion about this.

The publication of this book in the year of the 50th anniversary of the Victory over fascism seems to us not to be accidental. The tens of millions of Soviet citizens who died in the flames of the Second World War deserved for their descendants to know what a terrible force they had to face.

Complete information about that powerful military machine that our ancestors crushed will only elevate their noble feat in our eyes.

Introduction

Growing up in America in the fifties, the assessment of the time regarding Hitler's command was very simple: all Germans are Nazis, and all Nazis are evil. And as a human being, any Nazi degraded in strict accordance with his rank. If you follow this dubious logic, then the German general must have been an absolutely terrible creature. A typical Nazi (i.e. German), German general must be cruel, completely insensitive to human suffering and completely ignorant of everything that went beyond his professional sphere. No other qualities were noted in him other than a certain set of military skills (and an unsurpassed talent as a destroyer and disruptor). Of course, he had to eat only with his hands, wipe his mouth with his sleeve, hiccup loudly, unceremoniously interrupt his interlocutor when it seemed necessary to him, yell at his subordinates, throw everything he could get his hands on, brag and feel truly happy only when carries out unprovoked attacks on innocent neutral countries. And his favorite hobbies were genocide, bombing defenseless cities and eating infants.

This picture changed somewhat when I became an adult. I experienced a bit of a shock when I discovered the fact that not all Germans were Nazis and not all Nazis were Germans; Moreover, the people who worked closely with Hitler (at least until 1945) were none other than German officers. Later, my interest in military history led me to delve quite deeply into the bottomless depths of the Wehrmacht and found out that in the armed forces of the Reich people of all types were represented: heroes and cowards, Nazis and anti-Nazis, Christians, atheists, professionals, well educated and well-mannered university graduates, behind-the-scenes politicians, opportunists, innovators, dissidents, geniuses, dullards, optimists looking to the future with hope, and people who preferred to live in the past. They represented different social strata, their biographies were very contradictory, as were their levels of education, professional skills or intelligence. And, of course, their careers were also very different from each other.

The purpose of this book is to describe the lives of some German officers representing all components of the Wehrmacht, as well as the Waffen SS. These officers were selected by Dr. Mueller and myself based on the diversity of their personalities and careers, the availability of information, and our own interests. Some readers may doubt the validity of this choice, but since during the Second World War the number of generals was 3,663 people, it is not surprising that our selection will differ from the selection of others. On the contrary, it would be very strange if suddenly all the authors began to discuss the circle of the same people.

One aspect of this book that deserves special mention is the relatively small number of field marshals as subjects for description and analysis. This is explained by the fact that my book “Hitler’s Field Marshals and Their Battles,” published in 1990, can serve as a kind of source of information, and mentioning them all here again seemed inappropriate to me. But we decided to make exceptions: Wilhelm Keitel, Ritter Wilhelm von Leeb, Georg von Küchler, Feodor von Bock and Friedrich Paulus. Keitel is included here because Dr. Müller knew his family and had already written a book about it several years ago. Paulus is here because in the chapter devoted to Stalingrad, he could not help but be mentioned. The remaining three - Leeb, Küchler and Bock - are discussed in the chapter on Eastern Front commanders because they represent three different types of generals. Leeb was a Christian, anti-Nazi, puritanical Bavarian general of the old school, of no use to Hitler and his camarilla. Bok could not be labeled either a Nazi or an anti-Nazi; he could only be called Bok, for whom nothing existed except Bok himself. Küchler plays a kind of intermediate role. It’s absolutely true that the treatment of all three is significantly different from that in “Marshals”, where the emphasis is on their battles, and here on their personalities and characters. Dr. Mueller and I would like to express our gratitude to the many people who assisted in completing this work. First, we would like to thank our wives, Donna Mitchum and Kay Mueller, for their patience and final proofreading. Many thanks also go to Paula Leming, Professor of Foreign Languages, for her assistance in translating the sources, Colonel Jack Angolia, Colonel Anthony Johnson, Colonel Thomas Smith, and Dr. Waldo Dalstead for providing numerous photographs, and Valerie Newborn, the staff of the Hugh Library for their assistance with interlibrary loan to the staff of the National Archives, the Library of Congress, the War College, the Defense Audiovisual Agency, the Air University, and the Bundesarchiv (Germany) for their assistance in authenticating documents and photographs used in this book. And also thanks to Colonel Edmond D. Marino for his invaluable advice.

Samuel W. Mitchum Jr.

Chapter first. Generals of the High Command

Wilhelm Keitel, Bodwin Keitel, Alfred Jodl, Ferdinand Jodl, Bernhard Lossberg, Georg Thomas, Walter Buhle, Wilhelm Burgdorf, Hermann Reinecke

WILHELM KEITEL was born on the Helmscherode estate in western Brunswick on September 22, 1882. Despite his passionate desire to remain a farmer, as all his ancestors had been, the 650-acre plot of land was too small to support the needs of two families. Keitel subsequently enlisted in the 46th Field Artillery Regiment stationed at Wolfenbüttel with the rank of Fanenjunker, which he was awarded in 1901. But the desire to return to Helmsherode did not leave him throughout his life.

On August 18, 1902, Keitel was awarded the rank of lieutenant, and he entered an instructor course at the artillery school in Jüterbog, and in 1908 he became a regimental adjutant. In 1910 he was awarded the rank of chief lieutenant, and in 1914 - Hauptmann.

In 1909, Wilhelm Keitel married Lise Fontaine, an attractive, intelligent young lady from Wülfel. Her father, a wealthy man, the owner of an estate and a brewery, initially disliked Keitel for his “Prussian” origin, but later agreed to this marriage. Lisa gave birth to Wilhelm three sons and three daughters. Like their father, the sons became officers in the German army. Lisa, who initially played the proactive role in this marriage, always passionately desired her husband’s promotion up the career ladder. Strictly speaking, Mr. Fontaine was not entirely right regarding the origin of his son-in-law - he was not a Prussian, but a Hanoverian. Adolf Hitler and the Allied prosecutors made the same mistake at the Nuremberg trials.

In the early summer of 1914, Keitel went on vacation to Switzerland, where he heard the news of an assassination attempt on Archduke Franz Ferdinad. Keitel was quickly requested to join his regiment stationed in Wolfenbüttel, with which he was transferred to Belgium in August 1914. He had the opportunity to participate in battles on the front line, and in September, after being seriously wounded by a grenade fragment in his right hand, he was taken to the hospital, from where, after recovery, he returned to the 46th Artillery Regiment as a battery commander. In March 1915, he was appointed to the General Staff and was transferred to the XVII Reserve Corps. At the end of 1915, he met Major Werner von Blomberg. which turned into a devoted friendship throughout the subsequent careers of both.

The Treaty of Versailles, which ended the First World War, contained very strict conditions. The General Staff of the German Army was dissolved, and it itself was reduced to 100,000 people and had only 4,000 officers (1). Keitel was included in the officer corps of the Weimar Republic and spent three years as an instructor at the cavalry school in Hanover, and then was assigned to the headquarters of the 6th Artillery Regiment. In 1923 he was promoted to the rank of major, and between 1925 and 1927 For a year he was part of the organizational directorate of troops, which was essentially the secret name of the General Staff.

In 1927 he returned to Munster as commander of the 11th Battalion, 6th Artillery Regiment. In 1929, he was awarded the rank of Oberstleutnant: a very significant promotion, considering that in those days promotion was extremely slow. In the same year, he returned to the General Staff as chief of organization; management.

At the end of the summer of 1931, a very interesting event occurred in Keitel’s life and career - a trip to the USSR as part of a German military exchange delegation. He liked the Russia he saw, its vast expanses, abundance of raw materials, five-year plan for the development of the national economy, and the disciplined Red Army. After this train, he continued his hard work to increase the size of the German armies, which was contrary to the Versailles Peace Treaty. Although Wilhelm Keitel did an excellent job with the task entrusted to him, which was later recognized even by his sworn enemy Field Marshal Erich von Manstein, his abilities were still not unlimited. This exhausting (and also not entirely legal) activity had a negative impact on his health and mental state. Keitel, always nervous, smoked too much. In 1932, he was diagnosed with thrombophlebitis of his right leg. He was being treated at Dr. Gur's clinic in the Czech Tatras when the news reached him that Adolf Hitler had become Reich Chancellor of Germany on January 30, 1933. Keitel's closest friend, Werner von Blomberg, was appointed Minister of Defense on the same day.

In October 1933, Keitel began his military service. He was first the infantry commander (and one of two deputy commanders) of the 111th Infantry Division at Potsdam, near Berlin. In May 1934, he heard Adolf Hitler speak at the Sportpalast stadium in Berlin, and the Fuhrer's words touched him very much. Almost simultaneously with this event, Keitel's father died, and Wilhelm inherited Helmscherode. He had already begun to seriously think about leaving the army and taking care of the estate, despite the fact that a month ago he had been awarded the rank of lieutenant general, however, as he himself wrote later: “My wife would not be able to take care of the house with my stepmother and sister, and I won’t be able to solve this problem” (2). There is no doubt that Lisa passionately wanted him to continue to remain in the army, and Keitel remained.

In July 1934, Keitel was transferred to the 12th Infantry Division, stationed at Leibniz, more than five hundred kilometers from Helmscherode. This distance explains his repeated decision to leave the service. General Baron Werner von Fritsch, commander of the army, managed to convince Keitel by offering him a new appointment, which he accepted. On October 1, 1934, Keitel, now in Bremen, took command of the 22nd Infantry Division.

Keitel devoted himself to his work with pleasure, carried out a lot of organizational work, creating a new division that would be distinguished by high combat readiness and combat effectiveness. (Most of the formations in the organization of which he took an active part were subsequently defeated at Stalingrad). During this work he often appeared in his native Helmsherod and managed to increase his fortune. Later, already in August 1935, War Minister Blomberg offered Keitel the post of head of the armed forces department. Although Keitel himself was hesitant to accept this appointment, his wife persuaded him to do so, and he eventually agreed.

Since his arrival in Berlin, General Keitel, having cast aside all previous hesitations, entered into his new role with enthusiasm. In close collaboration with Oberstleutnant Alfred Jodl, commander of Division L (national defense), they became very friendly, and this friendship continued until the implementation of the plan for a unified command structure for all branches of the armed forces, which received the approval of War Minister Blomberg. But since the three pillars of the armed forces themselves - the army, navy and especially the Luftwaffe (Goering aviation) decisively abandoned this principle, realizing what was going on, Blomberg also abandoned it. This turn forced Keitel to turn all his hopes to the support of the Fuhrer himself (the principle of Fuhrership in the army) and his personal favor. After the war, he presented a document at the Nuremberg trials in which he argued that the “principle of Fuhrerism” runs through all elements of life and inevitably affects the army” (3).

Keitel could be proud that in January 1938 his eldest son, Karl-Heinz, a cavalry lieutenant, wooed Dorothea von Blomberg, one of the daughters of the Minister of War. Another wedding also took place: Field Marshal von Blomberg, widowed several years ago, in mid-January married Eva Grun, a 24-year-old stenographer at one of the Reich food departments. Blomberg's wedding was a modest civil ceremony, with Adolf Hitler present as witnesses. and Hermann Goering.And no one could yet suspect that this modest ceremony would cause the crisis that marked the end of the Nazi revolution.

Soon after the Blombergs exchanged rings, one of the lower police ranks unearthed a dossier on Margaret Troup, which he immediately handed over to the department of Count Wolf-Heinrich Helldorf, then the police president of Berlin. After reading the documents, he was horrified: Margarita was a former prostitute and was repeatedly arrested for posing for pornographic postcards. Helldorf, a former officer himself, decided to hand over the matter to Keitel, in the hope that the chief of the military department would be able to quietly put the brakes on everything. Were Margarita Grun and Eva Grun the same person? Is this sex model really the same woman that the Minister of War just married? Keitel could not know this and handed the matter over to Hermann Goering, who knew the minister’s wife. It could not have occurred to Keitel that he had long been waiting for the opportunity to overthrow Blomberg and thereby clear the way for himself to the War Ministry. Goering went straight to Hitler and... told him the whole story, which ultimately led to Blomberg's resignation. But events, nevertheless, did not develop in the direction Goering desired.

After Blomberg's resignation, Keitel was summoned to the Fuhrer. Hitler shocked Keitel by informing him that the commander-in-chief of the German army, General von Fritsch, had been accused of homosexuality, for which he should be held criminally liable under Article 175. And although all these charges were the result of a carefully thought-out game by Heinrich Himmler and Goering (with the help of Reinhard Heydrich, head of Himmler's secret service), and although Fritsch was later acquitted by a military tribunal, the resignation of Blomberg and Fritsch led to the creation of the Supreme High Command of the Wehrmacht - OKW and the complete subordination of the German armed forces to the will of the Fuhrer - Adolf Hitler.

On February 4, 1938, much to the chagrin of Hermann Goering, the Fuhrer personally took over the post of Minister of War, giving Keitel at the same time the powers of chief of the OKW. Why was Keitel chosen by Hitler to be commander of the armed forces? Because the Führer needed someone he could rely on to carry out his will and who could maintain order in the house, someone who would carry out his every order without question and who could be made a living personification of the Führer principle . Keitel, like no one else, was suitable for this role. As General Warlimont would later write, Keitel was “sincerely convinced that his appointment required him to identify himself with the wishes and instructions of the Supreme Commander, even in cases where he personally did not agree with them, and to honestly convey them to the attention of all subordinates” (4). .

Keitel decided to split the OKW into three divisions: the operations department, whose leadership was entrusted to Alfred Jodl, the Abwehr (counterintelligence department) under Admiral Wilhelm Canaris, and the economic department, headed by Major General Georg Thomas. These three departments competed fiercely with other departments of the “Third Reich”. The Operations Department of the OKW competed with the General Staffs of the three services, but especially with the Army General Staff; the Economic Department had rivals in the Todt Organization and the Five-Year Plan Directorate. As for the Abwehr, its interests intersected with the interests of the army and naval intelligence, with Ribbentrop's foreign affairs department, as well as with Himmler's security service (SD), which ultimately absorbed the Abwehr in 1944.

All these divisions did not fit well with each other, and the number of problems and conflicts was constantly growing. Throughout the reign of the Nazis, the number of all kinds of organizational groups and cells multiplied, which, in turn, further spurred competition and contributed to the fact that in the end a structure was created in which it was possible to avoid having only a single Fuhrer, capable and endowed with the appropriate powers to overcome all crises and make important decisions, and his name was Adolf Hitler.

Of decisive importance in the implementation of the concept of high command was the friendship of the Fuhrer and Keitel, who had unlimited trust in Hitler and served him faithfully. The OKW transmitted the Führer's orders and acted in a coordinated manner regarding the German economy, which was increasingly subordinate to the demands of the army. General Warlimont described the OKW as the working headquarters "or even the military bureau" of Hitler the politician. But despite this, Keitel also had something to gain: he had a decisive influence on at least two circumstances: he was successful in having his personal nominee Walter von Brauchitsch one day replace the compromised General Fritsch, and also in , that his younger brother Bodwin became head of the army personnel department.

The OKW never acted as Keitel imagined - it never truly became the command of the armed forces. Hitler literally used Keitel during the Austrian Crisis in 1938 to force Austrian Chancellor Kurt von Schuschnigg to submit to Germany. When the Second World War began, the OKW chief was mainly engaged in desk work. All operational planning was carried out by the General Staff; Keitel supported the attack on Poland, as well as all of Hitler’s successful companies in Denmark and Norway. Holland, Belgium and France in 1940. Although in reality the plan for the occupation of Norway (Operation Weserubung) was developed by Warlimont, Jodl and Hitler, the OKW chief created the administrative structure to carry out this operation. The campaign, which took 43 days, was successfully completed and was the only military operation that was coordinated by the OKW.

Together with other generals, Keitel applauded Hitler's victory over France in June 1940, in gratitude for which Hitler made him a field marshal on July 19, 1940, while simultaneously paying him a reward of 100 thousand Reichsmarks. Keitel did not spend this amount, because he felt that he had not earned this money. That same month, Keitel went on vacation to hunt in Pomerania and stopped in Helmscherode for a few days. Returning to his duties in August, he continued to work on preparing the Sea Lion plan for the invasion of Britain (which remained on paper).

Hitler preferred an invasion of the Soviet Union to an attack on the last of his European enemies. Keitel was seriously alarmed and rushed to object to Hitler. Hitler insisted that this conflict was inevitable and therefore Germany was obliged to strike now, because now all the advantages were on its side. Keitel hastily drew up a memorandum in which he substantiated his objections. Hitler gave the newly-minted field marshal a wild scolding, to which Keitel responded with an offer to Hitler to replace him as head of the OKW with someone else more suitable for the Fuhrer. This resignation request was not accepted by the Fuhrer and led him even further. He shouted that only he himself, the Fuhrer, had the right to decide who would replace him as the chief of the OKW. After that, Keitel turned without a word and left the office. From that moment on, he submitted to the will of Adolf Hitler. And this submission was almost absolute, except for the very rare weak objections that arose on individual issues that were not of fundamental importance.

In March 1941, Hitler secretly made a decision and developed a new concept of war, the traditional rules of which were pushed aside. This war, in his opinion, was supposed to be cruel and involve the absolute extermination of the enemy. In accordance with this, Keitel issued the notorious draconian “commissar order”, according to which all political workers of the Red Army were subject to complete and unconditional physical destruction. Keitel's signature also appeared on another order, issued in July 1941, which provided for the transfer of all political power in the occupied territories in the East to the Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler. This order was, in fact, a prologue to genocide.

Keitel tried unsuccessfully to soften some of the wording in the Fuhrer's orders, but continued to carry them out. He was unconditionally loyal to Hitler, and he mercilessly exploited their relationship. Hitler's General Staff issued a series of orders aimed at weakening the resistance of the Land of Soviets. Among them were instructions according to which, for every German soldier killed in the occupied territory, 50-100 communists should be shot (5). These orders came from Adolf Hitler, but under them was the signature of Wilhelm Keitel.

The failure of Germany's plans to achieve a quick and decisive victory over Russia brought the wrath of Hitler and the generals upon them. forced him to take even tougher measures. Keitel humbly endured Hitler's tyranny and continued to sign infamous orders, such as the order of December 7, 1941 "Nacht und Nebel" ("Darkness and Fog"), according to which "persons who pose a threat to the security of the Reich must disappear without a trace in the darkness and fog." All responsibility for the implementation of this order was assigned to the SD. Under the cover of this order, many members of the Resistance and anti-fascists were secretly killed (6). In most cases, their bodies were never found.

Although at times the OKW chief expressed a weak voice against Hitler's proposals, he still remained extremely loyal to him and represented exactly the type of personality that Hitler preferred to have in his circle. Unfortunately, Keitel's behavior had the most unfavorable effect on his subordinates. Keitel never spoke out in their defense and, for any reason, betrayed the will of the Fuhrer (7). For such indecisiveness, many officers called him “lackeyel.”