Hitler. 1936-1945: Nemesis

order by or wish of Hitler, see Fleming, Hitler und die Endlosung, 62ff.

145. BDC, SS-HO/1220, Chef des OKW, 16 December 1942, betr. Bandenbekampfung; SS-HO/1238, Reichsfuhrer-SS, December 1942: ‘Meldungen an den Fuhrer uber Bandenbekampfung, Meldung Nr.51, Ru?land-Sud, Ukraine, Bialystok. Bandenbekampfungserfolge vom 1.9 bis 1.12.1942’. Himmler’s handwritten note at the top indicates that he presented the report to Hitler on 31 December 1942.

146. See Walter Laqueur, The Terrible Secret. Suppression of the Truth about Hitler’s ‘Final Solution, Harmondsworth, 1982, 15n., 17–18; Steinert, 257. Raul Hilberg, Die Vernichtung der europaischen Juden, revised trans. edn, Frankfurt am Main, 1990, iii.1283–4, has an unduly complex explanation of the excision of the explicit language by Himmler. The Reichsfuhrer, he suggests, was keen to boast of his ‘achievements’. But he faced a problem. Speer and the Commander of the Reserve Army, General Fritz Fromm, had criticized Himmler and queried with Hitler himself the RSHA’s statistics on arrests of Jews who, they claimed, were needed for the armaments industry. Himmler’s way round his problem was to have a statistical report drawn up for Hitler, but to present it in camouflaged language. Irving, HW, 392, 503–4, 871, takes the view that the Korherr report was doctored to prevent Hitler knowing about the killing operations.

147. See Mommsen, ‘Realisierung’, 414–17.

148. TBJG, II/3, 561 (27 March 1942).

149. In his speech to the Reichs — and Gauleiter after Rover’s death, Hitler indicated that he had little interest in overseas colonies, stating instead: ‘Our colonial territory lies in the East’ (TBJG, II/4, 363 (24 May 1942)).

150. Irving uses this to allege that Hitler did not know of the ‘Final Solution’; see HW, 327 and 850–51 (n. to 326).

151. Laqueur, 18 refers to Himmler’s chief of staff, Karl Wolff, denying in his post-war trial that his boss had ever mentioned mass murder to him. Himmler’s chief adjutant, Werner Grothmann, indicated similarly in an interview long after the war that he had never heard Himmler discuss the ‘Final Solution’ (Franklin D. Roosevelt Library, Hyde Park, New York, Toland Papers, C-58, I/T2/Si/10, taped interview with John Toland, 7 October 1971). Once — if the much later account of a telephonist in Fuhrer Headquarters is to be trusted — the Reichsfuhrer-SS did inadvertently break the code. He was, it was recalled, overheard on the line in mid-May 1942 telling Bormann he had good news for the Fuhrer from Auschwitz that again 20,000 Jews had been ‘liquidated’ there. He immediately corrected the word to ‘evacuated’. But Bormann angrily reminded him that such reports, as arranged, were only to be sent to him by SS courier for passing on to the Fuhrer (Schulz, 98). The veracity of the account is impossible to check. That Hitler was sent frequent reports by SS courier sounds doubtful; as does Himmler’s slip of the tongue. The date, too, seems early, since the routine and systematic mass extermination in Auschwitz only began in July 1942 (Longerich, Politik, 515).

152. Domarus, 1446: ‘Grundsatzlicher Befehl’, 11 January 1940; Laqueur, 18–19. The number of persons with indirect or partial knowledge was of course far wider.

153. This was given as a reason, in autumn 1942, why Gauleiter Greiser should not proceed with his aim to exterminate 30,000 Poles suffering from incurable tuberculosis (Kershaw, ‘Improvised Genocide?’, 72).

154. See Steinert, 252–7, including (257) reference to Bormann’s secret circular to Gauleiter, informing them on Hitler’s behalf, that ‘in public treatment of the Jewish question all discussion of a future complete solution (Gesamtlosung) must cease. It can however be mentioned that the Jews are conscripted en blsoc for appropriate deployment of labour.’

155. IMG, xxvii.270–73, here 270, Doc. 1517-PS, Alfred Rosenberg: ‘Vermerk uber Unterredung beim Fuhrer am 14.12.41’.

156. Steinert, 252–3.

157. IMG, xxix. 145, 1919-PS; Anatomie, i.329; ii.446– 7.

158. See Jackel, ‘Hitler und der Mord an den europaischen Juden’, 161.

159. See note 144 above: BDC, SS-HO, 933: RFSS to Berger, 28 July 1942: ‘Verbot einer Verordnung uber den Begriff “Jude”’.

160. See TBJG, II/4, 402 (30 May 1942) for the ‘psychological pressure’ during the winter on account of ‘the unsuccessful Napoleonic adventure’.

161. See Kershaw, Popular Opinion, 365, 368–9.

162. See TBJG, II/4, 482, 489 (10 June 1942).

163. S. W. Roskill, The War at Sea, London, 1954, 1956, 1960, i.599ff., 614, ii.467ff., 475, iii.364ff. See also Overy, Why the Allies Won, 47 (with different figures), 49, 52.

164. Gruchmann, Der Zweite Weltkrieg, 183; Weinberg III, 350 (who gives the number of British troops captured as 28,000); DRZW, vi.623–33; Winston S. Churchill, The Second World War. Vol.IV, The Hinge of Fate, London etc., 1951, 371–8.

165. Weinberg III, 350–51.

166. Below, 312; Irving, HW, 399; Weinberg III, 350–51.

167. TBJG, II/4, 416 (31 May 1942). Hitler repeated that the attacks would be on ‘cultural centres’, since those on military and economic targets had hardly been worthwhile. The appointment of Air Marshal Arthur Harris as Commander-in-Chief of the RAF’s Bomber Command on 23 February had sharply intensified the British strategy of ‘area bombing’, aimed at demoralization of the population living in the centres of German cities (Overy, Why the Allies Won, 112–13).

168. TBJG, II/4, 422 (1 June 1942); 431 (2 June 1942).

169. Below, 311–12.

170. Kriegstagebuch des Oberkommandos der Wehrmacht (Wehrmachtfuhrungsstab), Bd.II: i.Jan-uar 1942–31. Dezember 1942, ed. Andreas Hillgruber, Frankfurt am Main, 1963 (=KTB OKW, ii.), ii/i, 395–6 (1 June 1942); Bock, 490 (1 June 1942); Picker, 381 (1 June 1942).

171. Picker, 381 (2 June 1942).

172. TBJG, II/4, 489 (10 June 1942).

173. A military alliance, rather than a formal pact, had been arrived at in spring 1941. The Finns had initially put out a declaration of neutrality on the day of the German attack on the Soviet Union, though Hitler’s own proclamation the same day had pointed out that German soldiers at the northern point of the front were fighting alongside Finnish divisions. Immediate Soviet attacks on Finland led to a Finnish declaration of war on 25 June 1941. (See DRZW, iv.Ch.VI, pts.1–4, especially 39off., 400–404.)

174. Bernd Wegner, ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland. Das geheime Tonprotokoll seiner Unterredung mit Mannerheim am 4. Juni 1942’, VfZ, 41 (1993), 122 n.23; Domarus, 1889.

175. Wegner ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland’, 122–3, 127.

176. Wegner ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland’, 124, 128; Domarus, 1889.

177. Wegner, ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland’, 126 and (for the text) 130–37.

178. Wegner, ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland’, 127.

179. Wegner, ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland’, 125–6 and n.40, 134 n.74. For the ‘preventive war’ legend, and the way it was exploited by Nazi propaganda, see above, Ch.9, notes 4, 39.

180. Wegner, ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland’, 128.

181. TBJG, II/4, 489 (10 June 1942).

182. Wegner, ‘Hitlers Besuch in Finnland’, 129.

183. TBJG, II/4, 450 (5 June 1942). Daluege rang Goebbels at 10a.m. to say that Heydrich had died a half an hour earlier. Presumably, he had first rung FHQ. But Hitler, as Goebbels pointed out, could not make any decision about the state funeral since he was in Finland and not expected back until the evening. So he must already have left FHQ when the news arrived. He landed in Finland at 11.15a.m. (Domarus, 1889). Whether Hitler was informed during his six-hour visit to Finland, or learnt of Heydrich’s death only on return (Domarus, 1890) is uncertain.

184. Picker, 386 (4 June 1942). Hitler referred here, as on an earlier occasion, on 3 May 1942 (Picker, 306– 8), to attempts on his own life. Hitler repeated, when in Berlin for Heydrich’s funeral, that he had warned him only to travel in an armour-plated car (TBJG, II/4, 486 (10 June 1942)).