The End

14. BAB, R55/610, fos. 182–3, Westfalen-Sud, Merkpunkte zur Versammlungsaktion Februar/Marz 1945, 12.3.45.

15. Das letzte halbe Jahr: Stimmungsberichte der Wehrmachtpropaganda 1944/45, ed. Wolfram Wette, Ricarda Bremer and Detlef Vogel, Essen, 2001, p. 310 (31.3.45).

16. BA/MA, MSg2/2697, diary of Lieutenant Julius Dufner, fos. 123–7 (entries for 5, 7, 9, 12.3.45). Hitler did not lay the wreath in Berlin on the final ‘Heroes’ Memorial Day’. Goring substituted for him.

17. BAB, R55/622, fo. 181, Briefubersicht Nr. 10, 9.3.45.

18. BAB, NS6/137, Der Reichspropagandaleiter der NSDAP an alle Gaupropagandaleiter, 5.3.45.

19. TBJG, II/15, p. 471 (11.3.45).

20. Guderian, p. 427.

21. BAB, NS6/169, fos. 115–21, Guderian to Bormann, 26.2.45; Bericht des Dienstleiters der Partei-Kanzlei, Pg. Mauer, undated. The characteristic demeaning of General Staff officers, part of the standard reportage of Party propagandists, is repeated, for example, in NS6/374, fo. 18, report to Dr Gerhard Klopfer, head of Abteilung III (Staatliche Angelegenheitern) in the Party Chancellery, by Oberleutnant Koller, part of the Sondereinsatz team, 16.3.45, and in NS6/140, fos. 44–5, Vorlage for Bormann, signed by Willi Ruder, 6.3.45, offering critical comments on General Staff officers attending an NSFO course in Egerndorf. Even Goebbels rejected the constant attempt to make Wehrmacht officers the scapegoats for the military defeats of the previous two years as a crass oversimplification, with harmful consequences for the authority of officers.—TBJG, II/15, p. 406 (3.3.45). The Party Chancellery itself thought the repeated talk about sabotage and failure of officers (which for long it had promoted) had to be halted if trust between the Party leadership and the Wehrmacht was to be improved.—NS6/137, fo. 27, Vorlage for Bormann, 7.3.45.

22. BAB, NS19/2068, fos. 57, 65, Meldungen aus dem Ostraum, 15.3.45 (includes reports from Danzig, Stettin and Kustrin); in addition, for Kustrin, NS6/135, fos. 190, 192–8, part of a long report for Borman from the Kreisleiter of Kustrin-Konigsberg, 5.4.45.

23. BAB, NS6/354, fos. 100–101^v, Bormann: Rundschreiben 156/45g, Plunderungen durch deutsche Soldaten in geraumten Gebieten, to Gauleiter and other Party functionaries, 24.3.45, attaching a copy of Keitel’s order of 8.3.45 threatening punishment by court martial for any soldier suspected of looting. See also NS6/135, fo. 83, Pg. Noack (of Abt. IIF of the Party Chancellery, Arbeitsstab fur NS-Fuhrungsfragen) to NS- Fuhrungsstab der Wehrmacht, reporting complaints about plundering of property by soldiers, 14.3.45; and fo. 199, Vermerk fur Pg. Stosch, re plundering, 19.3.45.

24. DZW, 6, pp. 549–50; Sonke Neitzel, Abgehort: Deutsche Generale in britischer Kriegsgefangenschaft 1942–1945, Berlin, 2005, p. 190, 9.3.45 (Eng. edn., Tapping Hitler’s Generals: Transcripts of Secret Conversations, 1942–45, Barnsley, 2007, pp. 141–2).

25. BAB, NS6/135, fos. 79, 97, Erfahrungs- und Stimmungsberichte uber die Haltung von Wehrmacht und Bevolkerung, 23.3.45, 29.3.45.

26. BfZ, Sammlung Sterz, O’Wm. Peter B., 9.3.45.

27. Henke, p. 806 and n. 132.

28. BAB, R55/601, fos. 295–7, Tatigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda reports, 21.3.45.

29. BAB, NS6/169, fos. 4–9, Bericht des Hauptgemeinschaftsleiters Twittenhoff uber den Sondereinsatz der Partei-Kanzlei in Hessen-Nassau, for period 24–30.3.45. The consequence of providing a realistic description was the recommendation that Twittenhoff was not suitable for further work in the ‘Special Action’ of the Party Chancellery.

30. BAB, NS6/169, fo. 49, Vorlage an Reichsleiter Bormann, 19.3.45; fo. 51, Sprenger to Bormann, 14.3.45.

31. DZW, 6, pp. 550–51; 1945: Das Jahr der endgultigen Niederlage der faschistischen Wehrmacht. Dokumente, ed. Gerhard Forster and Richard Lakowski, Berlin, 1975, pp. 212–14, Staff of Army Group G to Gauleiter Gustav Simon about signs of a hostile attitude towards German troops and flight, in drunken condition, of the Volkssturm at the attack of the Americans on Trier. For further examples of a negative stance of the civilian population towards the Wehrmacht—even one case, in Gottingen, when civilians were said to have fired on their own tanks—see John Zimmermann, Pflicht zum Untergang: Die deutsche Kriegfuhrung im Westen des Reiches 1944/45, Paderborn, 2009, p. 75.

32. BAB, NS6/51, fos. 1–3, Letter from Hauptmann Heinz Thieme, Pzjager Abt. 246, SD agent, Abt. Ostland, to Bormann, 15.3.45.

33. Marlis Steinert, Hitlers Krieg und die Deutschen, Dusseldorf and Vienna, 1970, p. 559; Neitzel, Abgehort, p. 190 (9.3.45) (Eng. edn., Tapping Hitler’s Generals, p. 141). See also Saul K. Padover, Psychologist in Germany: The Story of an American Intelligence Officer, London, 1946, pp. 219, 230, 270, for his experiences of defeatist attitudes and Germans welcoming the arrival of the Americans.

34. See John Zimmermann, ‘Die Kampfe gegen die Westalliierten 1945—ein Kampf bis zum Ende oder die Kreierung einer Legende?’ in Jorg Hillmann and John Zimmermann (eds.), Kriegsende 1945 in Deutschland, Munich, 2002, pp. 130–31.

35. TBJG, II/15, p. 406 (3.3.45).

36. Katharina Elliger, Und tief in der Seele das Ferne: Die Geschichte einer Vertreibung aus Schlesien, Reinbek bei Hamburg, 2006, p. 107.

37. Workers in Berlin were reported in March as saying that no punishment was severe enough for the cowardice of deserters.—Das letzte halbe Jahr, p. 277 (3.3.45).

38. IfZ, Fa-91/2, fos. 330–31, Parteikanzlei, Vermerk fur Pg. Walkenhorst, 10.3.45. For Hanke’s brutal rule in Breslau in the last months of the war, see Guido Knopp, Der Sturm: Kriegsende im Osten, pb. edn., Berlin, 2006, pp. 150–62.

39. DZW, 6, p. 548, for Rundstedt’s order. For Kesselring’s advocacy, after taking command in the west, of ruthlessness towards deserters and those seen to be failing in their duty, see Andreas Kunz, Wehrmacht und Niederlage: Die bewaffnete Macht in der Endphase der nationalsozialistischen Herrschaft 1944 bis 1945, Munich, 2007, pp. 276, 279. Hitler’s order to establish the ‘flying court martial’ is printed in Rolf-Dieter Muller and Gerd R. Ueberschar, Kriegsende 1945: Die Zerstorung des Deutschen Reiches, Frankfurt am Main, 1994, pp. 163–4; see also Neitzel, Abgehort, pp. 202–3, 540 n. 161 (Eng. edn., Tapping Hitler’s Generals, pp. 150–51). Hubner, a fanatic who had long been involved in attempts to instil Nazi ideology into the troops, was given unrestricted powers to impose the death penalty.— DRZW, 9/1 (Forster), pp. 580–82; Manfred Messerschmidt, Die Wehrmachtjustiz 1933–1945, Paderborn, 2005, p. 413. Flying courts martial had been in use by Army Group North since 3 February.—BAB, NS6/354, fo. 88, RS 123/45g, Ma?nahmen zur Starkung der Front durch Erfassung Versprengter (passing on to the Gauleiter an order of the Commander-in-Chief Army Group North, Colonel-General Lothar Rendulic?), 9.3.45.

40. 1945: Das Jahr der endgultigen Niederlage der faschistischen Wehrmacht, pp. 229–30.

41. Henke, p. 348.

42. DZW, 6, p. 548.

43. DZW, 6, p. 522; Stettin/Szczecin 1945–1946, Rostock, 1994, pp. 35, 37.

44. BAB, NS6/354, fos. 163–165^v, PK Bekanntgabe 149/45g, 19.3.45, transmission by Bormann of Schorner’s secret circular of 27 February.

45. DZW, 6, p. 539.

46. Zimmermann, Pflicht, p. 338; Christopher Clark, ‘Johannes Blaskowitz—der christliche General’, in Ronald Smelser and Enrico Syring (eds.), Die Militarelite des Dritten Reiches, Berlin, 1995, pp. 35, 43.

47. DZW, 6, p. 545.

48. Quoted in DRZW, 10/1 (Zimmermann), p. 316; and Zimmermann,