privations as gas and electricity supplies were restricted, water often available only at street standpipes and food rations tightened. People frequently had to walk or cycle to work, since public transport systems functioned only partially at best. In country areas not as yet scarred by the war, conditions were generally better. There was food to be had—often hoarded, despite the penalties for doing so. Nor, except for areas on the edge of urban conglomerates, was there the nightly terror of air raids, although anyone at work in the fields might be exposed to the ever more frequent attacks from ‘low-flyers’. It was, however, no rural idyll. Huge and increasing numbers of refugees from bombed-out cities and then from the ravaged regions of the east had to be put up—not always graciously—in already cramped and crowded accommodation, and fed from falling ration allowances. In areas close to the front, soldiers too had to be found billets. Incomers were often far from grateful for what was on offer, complaining about primitive conditions and showing reluctance to help out in farm work.82
Whether in town or countryside, those with a ‘brown’ background in the Nazi Party or one of its subsidiary organizations could not fail to recognize how widely they were by now despised by much of the population. But they were still the holders of power. Despite gathering criticism, people were rightly wary of being too outspoken and paying the consequences. Anyone with a history of anti-Nazi views had to be especially careful. The numbers of those sure the war was lost was growing daily. Few could be other than fearful of the future. But there was still a dwindling minority prepared to believe—perhaps more from desperation than conviction—that Hitler had something up his sleeve, even at this late hour. Many who had lost faith in the Fuhrer nevertheless saw no alternative to fighting on if the land was not to fall to the feared Bolsheviks. Then there were the desperadoes who had allied themselves so closely with the Nazi regime for so long that they had a vested interest in continuing the struggle since they had no future once it was over. The Soviet breakthrough in the east triggered the start of their final fling. With nothing to lose, the radicalism of the Party fanatics threatened any who stood in their way.
Whatever the varied attitudes, ranging from outright anti-Nazis to still fervent loyalists, the mass of divided, dislocated and disillusioned Germans could do little or nothing to shape what the future held for them. Beyond the refusal of the Nazi leadership, most obviously and crucially Hitler himself, to contemplate capitulation, the continuation of an evidently lost war rested heavily upon the capacity of the regime to raise troops and provide them with armaments, and on the willingness and determination of the Wehrmacht to fight on even when the only outcome seemed certain to be disastrous defeat.
V
Letters home from the front inevitably indicate a range of attitudes among ordinary soldiers. Most, in fact, avoided any political comment and confined themselves to private matters. Of those who expressed opinions about the war, some were defeatist (despite the dangers of such views being picked up by the censors, with dire consequences for the writer) and others simply resigned to what they had to face; but most still exuded optimism and resilience—often perhaps to assuage the anxieties of relatives. A corporal based in Courland did not hold back in his criticism of Party functionaries who, he said (in sentiments commonplace within Germany), would ruthlessly sacrifice everything rather than serve at the front. ‘If only common sense could triumph among tyrants,’ he wrote, adding, perceptively, ‘but they know that they themselves are in any case doomed. So they will first ruthlessly sacrifice the entire people.’83 In another letter home, a soldier, recounting stories he had heard from an eyewitness of the ‘indescribable rage’ of refugees as they fled from the Red Army, thought they would soon have Communism ‘if the Americans don’t save us from it’.84 A sergeant writing from Breslau was fearful, but fatalistic: ‘The Russians are getting ever closer, and there’s the danger that we’ll be encircled. But our life is in God’s hand and I still hope that we’ll see each other again.’85
A quite different tone was more usual. ‘The very serious situation at present shouldn’t take away our confidence!’ wrote one soldier. ‘It’ll be different, believe me! We must, must have patience and mustn’t, mustn’t lose faith.’86 Another, asking for necessary material sacrifice at home, thought it would be possible with courage to hold the front and force back the ‘great steamroller from the east’.87 An NCO based in East Prussia expressed his sadness at the ‘refugee misery’, but also the anger that it provoked, a feeling shared unquestionably by many soldiers and a further motivation to uncompromising efforts to fend off the Soviet threat.88 A corporal, upset that the Tannenberg monument in East Prussia had had to be blown up and worried about the possible loss of Silesian industry, still strongly believed, he wrote, that Germany would eventually master the enemy.89 An injured grenadier, in a field hospital in Germany after being transported by sea from Pillau out of the East Prussian cauldron, was confident, despite the worrying situation. ‘We must have faith,’ he declared. ‘I believe for certain that a change will soon come. On no account will we capitulate! That so much blood has already been spilt in this freedom fight cannot be in vain. The war can and will end in German victory!’90
How representative such attitudes were is impossible to tell, though, as in these letters, hopes and fears were surely especially prominent in the minds of most soldiers overwhelmed by the crisis in the east. Political opinion is barely mentioned. It was, of course, dangerous to voice criticism of the regime. But expressly pro-Nazi feeling was also seldom registered. Contempt for Party functionaries was by now widespread in the Wehrmacht, as among the civilian population, though it surfaces only rarely in the letters home, for obvious reasons. On the other hand, attitudes supportive of Nazism were not always clearly definable. The regime’s extreme nationalism fed into the feeling that the homeland must be protected, come what may. And years of strident anti-Bolshevik propaganda and racist stereotyping matched, for many soldiers, their own experience of the brutal practices of the Red Army and shored up their determination to resist the onslaught of those whom, influenced by Nazi indoctrination, they frequently saw as ‘Asiatic hordes’ or ‘Bolshevik beasts’. Propaganda slogans such as ‘Victory or Siberia’ or ‘We are Fighting for the Lives of our Wives and Children’ were probably not without effect, even if it cannot be judged how well they were received.91 One junior officer, serving in the west but closely following the reports of events in the east with deepening sadness and pessimism, probably echoed the views of many when he jotted in his diary: ‘Enough of slogans. They no longer cut any ice.’92 On the western front at this time, Allied army psychiatrists investigating the mentality of captured Germans reckoned that about 35 per cent of them were Nazis, though only about 10 per cent ‘hard core’. The remaining 65 per cent showed, they estimated, no clear signs of what they saw as a Nazi personality type.93 Whether such assessments on the eastern front would have reached similar conclusions cannot be known.
Whatever their private views, the rank-and-file could not influence events. Overwhelmingly, they simply obeyed orders. The number of desertions was rising, even on the eastern front, but they represented, nevertheless, a tiny proportion of those serving. There were signs of sagging morale, certainly, but, countered by severe punishment, this never threatened to turn into outright mutiny. Crucial to the continued readiness to fight was in any case less the behaviour of the ordinary soldiers than the stance of their commanders.
The inner tensions of the military leader trying, in desperate days, to stem the flow of the Red Army’s inexorable march through East Prussia can be seen in the daily diary entries and letters home to his wife of Colonel-General Reinhardt, in the eye of the storm as Commander-in-Chief of the beleaguered Army Group Centre. Reinhardt, a firm regime loyalist, wrestled with problems of conscience more widely felt in the military leadership as he struggled to reconcile responsibility to those under his command with obedience to Hitler, even when the orders he received diametrically contradicted his own judgement on what he knew to be necessary. After the war he still saw no alternative to his actions. Resignation, unless Hitler demanded it, had not been possible. Even the thought of feigning illness to lay down his command had caused him ‘the most serious psychological struggles’. Under the illusion that he could personally influence events, and that ‘it was pointless to sacrifice himself’ since a willing successor would easily be found, he saw no alternative to remaining in post.94
Mid-evening on 14 January, with the offensive in its earliest stages, Hitler telephoned to hear Reinhardt’s view of the situation of his Army Group, but abruptly ended the conversation before the commander had a chance to express his concern at the shortage of reserves. Hours later, during a restless night, Reinhardt received Hitler’s order to transfer two vital panzer divisions to Harpe’s hard-pressed Army Group A, struggling to hold the Soviet advance on the Vistula. This would further weaken his limited reserves. But he was told there was no point in protesting; the Fuhrer’s decision was final. Reinhardt noted that the consequences in East Prussia could only be ‘catastrophic’. Removing the last reserves would inevitably bring an enemy breakthrough very soon. ‘Monstrous blow for us! But has to be borne, as our position is also dependent on Harpe,’ he stoically jotted in his
