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Ian Kershaw - The End

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Ian Kershaw The End
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    The End
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    Penguin Press
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    2011
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    New York
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    978-1-59420-314-5
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From the preeminent Hitler biographer, a fascinating and original exploration of how the Third Reich was willing and able to fight to the bitter end of World War II. Countless books have been written about why Nazi Germany lost World War II, yet remarkably little attention has been paid to the equally vital question of how and why it was able to hold out as long as it did. The Third Reich did not surrender until Germany had been left in ruins and almost completely occupied. Even in the near-apocalyptic final months, when the war was plainly lost, the Nazis refused to sue for peace. Historically, this is extremely rare. Drawing on original testimony from ordinary Germans and arch-Nazis alike, award-winning historian Ian Kershaw explores this fascinating question in a gripping and focused narrative that begins with the failed bomb plot in July 1944 and ends with the German capitulation in May 1945. Hitler, desperate to avoid a repeat of the disgraceful German surrender in 1918, was of course critical to the Third Reichs fanatical determination, but his power was sustained only because those below him were unable, or unwilling, to challenge it. Even as the military situation grew increasingly hopeless, Wehrmacht generals fought on, their orders largely obeyed, and the regime continued its ruthless persecution of Jews, prisoners, and foreign workers. Beneath the hail of allied bombing, German society maintained some semblance of normalcy in the very last months of the war. The Berlin Philharmonic even performed on April 12, 1945, less than three weeks before Hitlers suicide. As Kershaw shows, the structure of Hitlers charismatic rule created a powerful negative bond between him and the Nazi leadership- they had no future without him, and so their fates were inextricably tied. Terror also helped the Third Reich maintain its grip on power as the regime began to wage war not only on its ideologically defined enemies but also on the German people themselves. Yet even as each month brought fresh horrors for civilians, popular support for the regime remained linked to a patriotic support of Germany and a terrible fear of the enemy closing in. Based on prodigious new research, Kershaws is a harrowing yet enthralling portrait of the Third Reich in its last desperate gasps.

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Ian Kershaw

THE END

The Defiance and Destruction of Hitlers Germany, 19441945

List of Illustrations

1. Martin Bormann, c. 1942 (photograph: akg-images)

2. Heinrich Himmler, c. 1943 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

3. Joseph Goebbels, 1942 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

4. Albert Speer, 1942 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

5. Captured German prisoners near Falaise, September 1944 (photograph: Topfoto)

6. German civilians evacuate Aachen, October 1944 (photograph: Bettmann/Corbis)

7. Wilhelm Keitel (undated) (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

8. Alfred Jodl, 1944 (photograph: Ullsteinbild/Topfoto)

9. Heinz Guderian, 1944 (photograph: Ullsteinbild/Topfoto)

10. Karl Dnitz, c. 1943 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

11. Digging a trench near Tilsit, September 1944 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK)

12. Erich Koch on inspection in East Prussia, August 1944 (photograph: Ullsteinbild/Topfoto)

13. German soldiers viewing corpses, Nemmersdorf, October 1944 (photograph: akg-images)

14. The Ardennes offensive, December 1944 (photograph: Heinz Rutkowski (Scherl)/Bundesarchiv, Koblenz)

15. Walter Model, 1941 (photograph: akg-images/Ullsteinbild)

16. Georg-Hans Reinhardt, 1939 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK)

17. Ferdinand Schrner, 1942 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK)

18. Gotthard Heinrici, 1943 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

19. Volkssturm men on the eastern front, October 1944 (photograph: Ullsteinbild/Topfoto)

20. Volkssturm men march past Goebbels, November 1944 (photograph: Bundesarchiv, Koblenz)

21. Arthur Greiser, 1939 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK)

22. Josef Groh, 1944 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK)

23. Karl Hanke, c. 1942 (photograph: Ullsteinbild/Topfoto)

24. Karl Holz (undated) (photograph: Bundesarchiv, Koblenz)

25. Refugees crossing the Frisches Haff, February 1945 (photograph: Vinzenz Engel/ Scala, Florence/BPK)

26. Abandoned wagon in East Prussia, January 1945 (photograph: Mary Evans/ Suddeutscher Verlag)

27. Flying court-martial, location unknown, probably 1944/5 (photograph: Ullsteinbild/Topfoto)

28. Hanged German officer, Vienna, April 1945 (photograph: akg-images/Interfoto/AWKZ)

29. Overcrowded boat from Pillau crossing the Baltic Sea, March 1945 (photograph: akg-images)

30. Dresden, February 1945 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK/Walter Hahn)

31. Nuremberg, March 1945 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

32. Young Germans cycling to the front, February 1945 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK)

33. Berlin, April 1944 (photograph: Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin (Inv.-Nr.: F 66/911))

34. Photograph from a series taken by the US Army immediately after the liberation of Buchenwald concentration camp, Weimar, April 1945 (photograph: ITS Archives, Bad Arolsen (Exhibit B-1, Numbers 1-28, Set No 5, Picture No. 2))

35. Prisoners on a death march from Dachau, April 1945 (photograph: private collection, courtesy KZ Gedenksttte Dachau)

36. Germans surrender to the Red Army, Knigsberg, April 1945 (photograph: Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin (Inv.-Nr.: F 61/1661))

37. Houses display white flags in Worms, March 1945 (photograph: Scala, Florence/BPK)

38. Heinrich von Vietinghoff, 1944 (photograph Scala, Florence/BPK)

39. Karl Wolff, 1942 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

40. Keitel signs the complete German capitulation, 8 May 1945 (photograph: Bundesarchiv, Koblenz)

41. An angel on the spire of Freiburg minster, 1946 (photograph: Scala, Florence/Walter Frentz Collection)

List of Maps

1. The European fronts, July 1944

2. The Allied breakthrough in the West, June to September 1944

3. The Red Armys advance, June to August 1944

4. East Prussia

5. The Ardennes offensive

6. The Red Armys January 1945 offensive

7. The Collapse of the Third Reich, March 1945

8. Dnitzs Reich, 1 May 1945

9. Europe at the final surrender

Acknowledgements

One of the most pleasant parts of finishing a book is to thank those who, in different ways, have contributed to the making of it.

My thanks first of all to the British Academy for a grant which helped me to undertake the initial, exploratory research. I am also grateful to the archivists and staff of the various record repositories where I have worked: the Bundesarchiv in Berlin/Lichterfelde, the Bundesarchiv/Militrarchiv in Freiburg, the Bibliothek fr Zeitgeschichte in Stuttgart, the Bayerisches Hauptstaatsarchiv and Staatsarchiv Mnchen, the Staatsarchiv Augsburg, the International Tracing Service, Bad Arolsen, the National Archives in London, the Imperial War Museum at Duxford, and the Liddell Hart Centre for Military Archives in Kings College, London. At the Bibliothek fr Zeitgeschichte in Stuttgart, part of the Wrttembergische Landesbibliothek, I had every reason to be most grateful for the help and advice of the librarys director and good friend of mine, Professor Gerhard Hirschfeld, and the head of its archival collections, Dr Irina Renz. Dr Susanne Urban was most helpful in guiding me through the extensive sources related to the death marchesonly recently opened to researchersat the International Tracing Service in Bad Arolsen, where I would also like to express my thanks to the director, M. Jean-Luc Blondel. At Duxford, I benefited greatly from Dr Stephen Waltons expert assistance in consulting the valuable holdings of German documents. I started, and finished, the research for the book in the incomparable Institut fr Zeitgeschichte in Munich, where I have had the good fortune to be a welcome guest for many years, and I would like to express my warmest thanks to the director, Professor Horst Mller, and his colleagues, especially the library and archives staff, who as always dealt with my many requests with unfailing courtesy and friendliness.

Professor Otto Dov Kulka (Jerusalem), a highly esteemed colleague and friend with whom I have shared a lengthy and fruitful correspondence over many years, first pointed me in the direction of the records at Bad Arolsen. Beyond that, as ever I have been extremely grateful for his interest in my work, and for his valuable suggestions. Laurence Rees, good friend and brilliant producer of television documentaries, was kind enough to make available to me relevant transcripts of interviews, kept in the BBC Archives in London, from one of the series on which we collaborated, offered excellent advice, and was as always stimulating company, cheerfully helpful and most encouraging.

Numerous other friends and colleagues also helped, sometimes perhaps without being aware of how helpful they had been. Among them, I owe thanks to Professor Daniel Blatman (Jerusalem), for answering a number of queries about the death marches, and for related material which he kindly sent me. Dr Andreas Kunz, of the Bundesarchiv/Militrarchiv in Freiburg, gave me some valuable tips on relevant archival holdings on my first visit there in connection with this project. Dr Heinrich Schwendemann of the University of Freiburg most generously went to great lengths to send me documents related to the French occupation of south-west Germany in 1945 and other relevant material that was not easy for me to access. Other colleagues who also supplied me with documents, papers or other materials, provided answers to my questions, or made me think more clearly about what I was attempting include Professor John Breuilly, Dr Michael Buddrus, Mr George Burton, Dr Simone Erpel, Dr Wolfgang Holl, Dr Holger Impekoven, Professor Tim Kirk, Dr Michael Kloft, Dr Alexander Korb, Mr Michael D. Miller, Professor Bob Moore (who went to undue trouble to send me a batch of documents on a specific point related to the Netherlands, his chief area of expertise), Professor Jonathan Steinberg, Dr Klaus Wiegrefe and Dr Benjamin Ziemann. I am glad of the opportunity to extend my warm thanks to all and apologize to anyone whom I have inadvertently omitted.

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