Doctor Goebbels: His Life & Death

nonchalantly againsthis desk, a quarter of a million soldiers had suffered. But in the Ruhr seven or eightmillion ordinary people were facing sudden death each night. ‘Hats off to them all,’he said. ‘Magnificent!’ And he snapped a flawless imaginary salute to the unseenheroes.78JUNE 1943 was nearly over. Hitler was about to return to the Wolf’s Lair in EastPrussia for Citadel, his tank battle against the Russians at Kursk. Before leaving hecalled Goebbels down to the Berghof. Comfortably surrounded by his friends andhis favourite oil paintings he listened sympathetically to Goebbels’ nightmarish descriptionsof the air raids and assured him that he was going to speak his mind to theReichsmarschall the next day. The damage that mattered, he continued, was that tothe arms factories; the human casualties were regrettable, but inevitable. He actuallywelcomed the destruction of the cities; after the war Germany would have fifteenmillion motor cars, most of them the new Volkswagens, and the fusty and ill-brickedcities of old would never sustain the load.79 He spoke to Goebbels of their coming‘revenge weapons’—mysterious missiles which would soon rain down on London.He admitted that their U-boats had been thwarted, but soon they would return totheir hunting grounds, equipped with noise-making decoys and top-secret torpedoes.80776 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICHTurning to the eastern front Hitler told him he was going to make ‘a few necessaryadjustments’ to the line which might well cost the Russians several armies. Stalin hadnothing to match the new Panther and Tiger tanks. But, he admitted, he had beenforced by the winter disasters to abandon his old plans to occupy the Caucasus andmarch into the Middle East. If the Italians deserted the Axis, Germany would fighton alone—on Italian soil. ‘He no longer trusts them out of his sight,’ commentedGoebbels afterwards. It was because of the Italian factor that he was determined notto get too embroiled at Kursk. After supper that evening he found Hitler quiet andpensive as they chatted around the open fire. Bormann’s teleprinter network reportedthat the British had delivered another raid on Wuppertal—2,750 more peoplehad been burned alive.‘When I see the Führer in the middle of the night on the Obersalzberg,’ dictatedGoebbels to his faithful scribe Otte, ‘bowed down by all his cares, my love and venerationof him just grow stronger.’1 See unpubl. diary, Apr 3, 1943: ‘Both antisemitism and anti-bolshevism are currently ourbest propaganda weapons.’ (NA film T84, roll 265).2 Fritzsche interrogation, Sep 29, 1947 (StA Nuremberg, F86).3 Diary, Feb 17, 1943.4 Ibid., Mar 1, 3–6, 20, Apr 1, 1943; for further sources see David Irving, Accident. TheDeath of General Sikorski (London, 1967), which draws on the Polish records of the SikorskiInstitute in London.5 Diary, Apr 9, 1943 (from French files, on NA film T84, roll 272).6 Tel from Smolensk to RSHA dept III C, Apr 4, 1943; forwarded to Gutterer (BA fileR.55/115).7 Ibid., Apr 16, 1943; the former NKVD officer Petr Soprunenko, who signed the Katyndeath warrant, lives in Moscow as an old age pensioner (1994).8 MinConf., Apr 8, 1943 (B file R.55/115).9 Diary, Apr 14; Semer, ‘Apr 12, 1943’. For MinConf’s and further RMVP documents onKatyn see BA file R.55/115.10 Unpubl. diary, Apr 16, 1943.11 Ibid., Apr 17, 1943. On the Soviets’ insistence Katyn was added into the indictment atthe Nuremberg trials and they executed several German officers after a trial in Leningrad in1945.GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH 77712 Ibid., Apr 17, 28; Dittmar records on Apr 19, 1943 a ‘very good Goebbels speech’ onKatyn at a conference in the ministry.13 Unpubl. diary, Apr 9, 1943.14 Dittmar entered in his Jul 5, 1943 diary: ‘To the propaganda ministry. Big event of theday: Polish emigré leader Sikorski killed at Gibraltar—by [British] Secret Service?’ (Author’sfilm DI–60).15 SD report No.377, Apr 19, 1943.16 JG ordered it kept secret (diary, May 8, 1943).17 SD report, Jul 26, 1943 (NA film T175, roll 265, 9996ff.)18 Schmidt-Leonhardt report, Nov 11, 1942 (Yivo, Occ E2-107); the draft of an agreementbetween JG and Frank was ready on Jan 25, 1943.—Report to JG, Apr 10, 1943 (NAfilm T81, roll 671, 9447ff).19 Diary, May 10; Hans Junge diary and Bormann diary, May 9, and note of May 11 (BA,Schumacher collection, 371).20 Diary, May 22.—Himmler to Frank, May 26 (NA film T175, roll 128, 4157ff); seeHimmler note, Jun 19 (NA film T175, roll 94, 0506f), and the final report of the SS andpolice chief (HSSuPf) in Galicia, Jun 30, 1943 (Hoover Libr., MS DS.135 G2G37).21 Unpubl. diary, Jun 25, 1943 (Author’s film DI–52; IfZ).22 Ibid., Apr 15, 17, 1943.23 For the statistics on Jews in the Russian communist party see Korherr to Himmler, Apr28, 1943 (NA film T175, roll 54, 6439).24 JG, ‘Der Krieg und die Juden,’ in Das Reich, May 9, previewed in Frankfurter Zeitung andother journals on May 8, issued by the RPL to all party orators and propagandists on May 4,and as a special edition by the AO, the party’s overseas organisation, in Jun 1943 (NA filmT81, roll 134, 8933a).—See Berndt’s Propaganda Parole on this, Apr 30, 1943 (NA filmT81, roll 672, 0754ff).25 Diary, May 8; Times, May 8, and NYT, May 9, 1943.26 Semler, ‘Jan 10, 1944.’27 Bormann circular No.33/43, Jul 11, 1943 (BDC file 238/II); it is pertinent to note thatthis was classified only geheim (secret), not gRs (top state secret).28 Actually: 31,283. See the table in Kempner, 186.29 Heinz Lorenz interrogation, Dec 3, 1947 (IfZ, ZS.266)30 Fritzsche interrogation, Nov 1, 1946 (StA Nuremberg, F86).31 See unpubl. diary, Sep 27, 1942; and the JG/Rosenberg correspondence, Feb 1943–Feb1944 (Yivo, Occ E.19).32 Diary, Apr 6, 16, May 19, 20, 1943.33 Ibid., Jan 14, 21, Feb 10, 14, 16, Mar 2, 8, 9, and passim, 1943.34 Ibid., Feb 10, 1943.35 Ibid., Jan 7, Mar 2, Apr 16, 1943.36 E.g., ibid.Jan 21, 1943.37 Correspondence in Yivo file Occ E.12.38 JG submission to Hitler, May 22 ‘1942’ (read: 1943) (Yivo, Occ E.18–19).39 Naumann to Bormann, Jun 12, 1943 (Yivo, Occ E.12).778 GOEBBELS. MASTERMIND OF THE THIRD REICH40 Unpubl. diary, Jun 25; Führer decree of Aug 15 (Yivo, Occ E.19; BA file R.55/799);and see Taubert (Leiter