against the moral indolence and numbness of the German people. Under the name White Rose they issued appeals and painted slogans on walls calling for an uprising against Hitler. They also established ties with like-minded students in Berlin, Stuttgart, Hamburg, and Vienna. On February 18, 1943, Hans and Sophie Scholl were arrested while throwing hundreds of leaflets from the gallery of the atrium at Ludwig-Maximillian University in Munich. Their motives were among the simplest and, sadly, the rarest of all: a sense of right and wrong and a determination to take action.
The Nazis, having long based their power on the assumption that self-interest and the fear of standing out would suffice to keep the population under control, were stunned by this effrontery. The People’s Court, under its president, Roland Freisler, was sent to Munich for a special session. In a trial lasting less than three and a half hours, Hans and Sophie Scholl and Christoph Probst were sentenced to death. The executions were carried out later the same day. Their mentor, the philosopher of music Kurt Huber, suffered a similar fate a few days later, as did other members of the group. Although Hans and Sophie Scholl could easily have fled after dropping their leaflets, they submitted without resistance to the university porter who came after them shouting, “You’re under arrest!” Apparently they hoped to set an example of self-sacrifice that would inspire others. “What does my death matter if by our action thousands of people are awakened and stirred to action?” Sophie Scholl asked after reading the indictment. The only visible result, however, was a demonstration of loyalty to the regime staged right in front of the university just two hours after her execution. Three days later, in the university’s main auditorium, hundreds of students cheered a speech by a Nazi student leader deriding their former classmates. They stamped their feet in applause for the porter, Jakob Schmied, who “received the ovation standing up with his arms outstretched.”41
In the meantime, back on the eastern front, Tresckow had so expanded his influence over Kluge that the field marshal had grown to tolerate conspiratorial activities in his immediate surroundings and not infrequently even supported them. As the military situation worsened, he seemed eager to discuss removing Hitler and overthrowing the regime, although he still preferred that the Fuhrer be eliminated by “accident” or killed by an officer from far away, or even by a civilian. Tresckow resolved to go for broke. Strolling with Kluge and Gersdorff near army group headquarters, he suggested that “that man” finally be removed. When Kluge replied, as he had so often, that he agreed but could not bring himself to commit murder, Tresckow threw all caution to the wind. “Field Marshal,” he said, “beside you walks someone who made an attempt on Hitler’s life not so long ago.” Kluge is said to have stopped in his tracks, seized Gersdorff by the arm, and asked in great agitation, “For heaven’s sake, what did you do?” As Gersdorff replied that he had only done what the situation called for, Kluge took “a few more steps, threw his arms out in a theatrical gesture, and said, ‘Children, I’m yours.’”42
The field marshal did more than ever to support the conspirators during the summer of 1943, although he never acted without Tresckow’s prompting. He extended and strengthened his contacts with the civilian opposition, attempted to win the support of other military commanders, and dispatched Lieutenant Colonel Voss to see Rundstedt in Paris. Eventually he even sent Gersdorff to see Manstein in hopes of persuading him to take part in a joint action and asking if he would “assume the position of chief of the army general staff after a coup.” The records of the discussion in Army Group South headquarters in Saporoshe speak volumes not only about Manstein but about the attitude of most of the officers: their indecision, their narrow-mindedness, their ambivalence, and ultimately their servility. Gersdorff s notes begin with the short summary he presented of his mission:
ME: Field Marshal Kluge is extremely concerned about the course of the war. As a result of the antagonism between the OKW and the OKH and Hitler’s ever-clearer amateurishness as a leader, the collapse of the eastern front is only a matter of time. Hitler must be made to realize that he is headed straight for disaster.
MANSTEIN: I fully agree. But I’m not the right person to say so to Hitler. Without my being able to stop it, enemy propaganda has portrayed me as eager to seize power from Hitler. So he is now very distrustful of me. Only Rundstedt and Kluge could undertake such a mission.
ME: Perhaps all the field marshals should go together to the Fuhrer and hold a pistol to his chest.
MANSTEIN: Prussian field marshals do not mutiny.
ME: There are enough instances of it in Prussian history…In any event, Prussian field marshals have never been in a position like the one they’re in today. Unprecedented situations require unprecedented methods. But we, too, no longer believe that a joint action would have any chance of success. In Army Group Center we have long been convinced that every effort must now be taken to save Germany from catastrophe.
MANSTEIN: Then you want to kill him?
ME: Yes, Herr Field Marshal, like a mad dog!
At this point Manstein leapt up and ran excitedly around the room shouting, “Count me out! That would destroy the army!”
ME: You said yourself that Germany will go down to defeat unless something is done. The army isn’t the main concern. It’s Germany and the German people.
MANSTEIN: First and foremost, I’m a soldier…
When, after a bit more discussion, I conceded that it was pointless to carry on, I remembered a modest proposal that Kluge had asked me to convey.
ME: Field Marshal Kluge also asked me to inquire whether you would agree to become chief of the army general staff after a successful coup.
Manstein bowed slightly and said, “Tell Field Marshal Kluge that I appreciate the confidence he shows in me. Field Marshal Manstein will always be the loyal servant of a legally constituted government.43
As it turned out, Manstein had had a similar conversation just a little earlier, in the days following the capitulation in Stalingrad. Visiting Count Lehndorff at his castle in East Prussia, Tresckow had met a lieutenant colonel on the general staff named Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg and had described to him several vain attempts to win Manstein over. Stauffenberg himself wanted to give it a try, and Tresckow arranged for him to meet Manstein. But then, too, the field marshal merely dodged the issue. In response to Stauffenberg’s reproaches about the impending disaster and the responsibility of highly placed officers to consider the entire picture, Manstein recommended only that Stauffenberg have himself transferred to a general staff position at the front, in order to escape “the unpleasant atmosphere at Fuhrer headquarters.” Manstein subsequently told close associates that he had had a “very brilliant conversation” with Stauffenberg, “but he wanted me to believe that the war was lost.”
Of their meeting, Stauffenberg remarked that, whatever Manstein’s answers were, they “were not the answers of a field marshal.”44
7. STAUFFENBERG
By 1943 the situation had grown more ominous-and not just at the battle fronts. Almost all the resistance groups sensed a gathering storm. Rumor had it that another Night of the Long Knives was in the offing.1 Both Ulrich von Hassell and Hans von Dohnanyi were tipped off that they were being shadowed everywhere they went. In early March Colonel Fritz Jager, who played a key role in Olbricht’s coup plans, was arrested on allegations that he was “conspiring.” Schulenburg also found himself in difficulty after he was reported to have said that he was on the lookout for reliable, young officers for a putsch. Admiral Canaris, too, was feeling the pressure, and when he was asked by a friend from his Freikorps days to save a Dutch Jew from deportation by claiming the man was needed by Military Intelligence-a favor he had occasionally extended in the past-he felt compelled to refuse. Himmler, he said, had informed him that “he knew full well that leading circles in the army were considering plans for a coup. But it would never come to that. He would intervene.” Furthermore, Himmler professed to know who was “actually behind it”—and mentioned Beck and Goerdeler.2 When the first blow fell, however, it was not on these men.
On April 5, 1943, senior judge advocate Manfred Roeder suddenly turned up at Military Intelligence on Tirpitzufer, accompanied by criminal secretary and SS UntersturmFuhrer Franz Xaver Sonderegger. They asked to be taken to Canaris, to whom they presented papers authorizing both the arrest of special officer Hans von Dohnanyi and a search of his office. He was suspected, they informed Canaris, of numerous currency violations, corruption, and even treason. Stunned, Canaris neither objected nor contacted his superior officer, Wilhelm Keitel, though the search order violated all Military Intelligence secrecy regulations. Without a word he led the two
