Enemy at the Gates

Carl Rodenburg, Gottlieb Slotta, and Hubert Wirkner. Also statements by Wilhelm Plass and Rudi Pothmann; Selle’s The Tragedy of Stalingrad; and Third Motorized; Twenty-ninth Motorized, and 384th Division histories. Also Ninth Flak Division war diaries; and Valeriu Campianu’s The Stalingrad Siege, written in Bucharest in 1945; N. N. Voronov article in Krasnaya Zvezda, Feb. 1, 1963.

MALINOVSKY

From The New York Times dispatch. Also The Red Army by Walter Kerr and Alexander Werth’s The Year of Stalingrad.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

EAST PRUSSIA MEETINGS

From interview with Winrich Behr and statement by Coelestin von Zitzewitz. Also Carell’s Hitler Moves East, and Goerlitz’ Paulus and Stalingrad.

LOSS OF PITOMNIK AND GUMRAK

From interviews with Wilhelm Alter, Franz Deifel, Ottmar Kohler, Emil Metzger, Josef Metzler, Gerhard Meunch, Heinz Neist, Albert Pfliiger, Gottlieb Slotta, and Hubert Widmer. Also SeIle’s The Tragedy of Stalingrad; Joachim Wieder’s Stalingrad: How It Really Was. Sixth Army radio traffic (see Documents for appropriate dates).

The Luftwaffe lost 488 planes on the shuttle to the Kessel. A pilot named Wieser was the last to fly from the pocket (January 25).

In his book, Colonel Adam mentions the wide-spread rumor among Sixth Army officers that General Schmidt kept a light plane at the airport for an escape from the Kessel. In my conversations with Schmidt, he admits that he planned to fly out, but only long enough to plead for more help from Hitler.

Paulus refused to let him go.

Chapter Twenty-Nine

SURRENDER AND AFTERMATH

From interviews with Wilhelm Alter, Helmut Bangert, Eugen Baumann, Ginter von Below, Karl Binder, Hans Braunlein, Friedrich Breining, Franz Brkider, Horst Caspari, Franz Deifel, Gregori Denisov, Pyotr Deriabin, Fritz Dieckmann, Gerhard Dietzel, Karl Englehardt, Paul Epple, Isabella Feige, Karl Floeck, George Frey, Karl Geist, Wilhelm Giebeler, Werner Gerlach, Heinz Giessel, Adolf Heusinger, Hans Mich, Dionys Kaiser, Anton Kappler, Hermann Kastle, Herbert Kreiner, Heinrich Klotz, Ottmar Kohler, Heinz Lieber, Josef Linden, Emil Metzger, Josef Metzler, Heinz Neist, Hans Oettl, Alexei Petrov, Ernst Paulus, Albert Pfliiger, Mesten Pover, Herbert Rentsch, Carl Rodenburg, Arthur Schmidt, Albert Schon, Kurt Siol, Gottlieb Slotta, Oscar Stange, Eugen Steinhilber, Friedrich Syndicus, Rudolf Taufer, Siegfried Wendt, Hubert Wirkner, Ernst Wohlfahrt, and Pyotr Zabavskikh. Also statements by Franz Brendgen, Berthold Englert, August Kronmiiller, Xaver Marx, Hans Schiller and unpublished monograph by Arthur Schmidt on last days. Also Professor Jay Baird’s “The Myth of Stalingrad” in Institute of Contemporary History, vol. 4, no. 3, July 1969.

German works dealing extensively with the end of the battle include: Wilhelm Adam’s The Hard Decision; Hans Dibold’s Doctor at Stalingrad; Philip Humbert’s article in Der Spiegel, no. 5, 1949; Theodor Plievier’s Stalingrad and Wieder’s Stalingrad. (see Ludwig affidavit). Among many Russian books and periodicals on the surrender are P. Batov’s In Campaigns and Battles; V. Grinevsky’s “The Last Days,” Krasnaya Zvezda, Feb. 2, 1963; I. Laskin’s “Once More on the Capture of General Field Marshal Paulus,” V.I.Z. 1961; I. Morozov’s The Fight for the Volga; K. K. Rokossovsky’s “The Morning of Our Victory,” Izvestia, Feb. 1, 1968: M. S. Shumilov in Komsomolskaya Pravda, Feb. 1, 1963; L. A. Vinokur’s “In Those Days,” Sovetskaya Rossiya, Feb. 2, 1958; P. Vladimirov’s “The Encounter,” Krasnaya Zvezda, Feb. 2, 1963. Also: Rokossovsky, Shumilov and Voronov in Samsonov’s Stalingrad Epopeya.

Others: Agapov’s After the Battle; Chuikov’s The Battle for Stalingrad; Druzhinin’s Two Hundred Fiery Days; A. Werth’s Russia At War, 1941–1945.

Chapter Thirty

THE WRECKAGE OF WAR

From interviews with Ignacy Changar, Tania Chemova, Hersch Gurewicz. Also A. S. Chuyanov’s Stalingrad Is Reviving, written in 1944; and A. M. Samsonov’s The Stalingrad Battle, the best analysis of destruction in the city.

PRISON CAMPS AND CANNIBALISM

From interviews with Germans listed in preceding chapter and with Felice Bracci and Cristoforo Capone. Also Bracci’s diary; Reginato’s Twelve Years of Prison in the USSR; Don Guido Tuna’s Seven Rubles to the Chaplain; and a report by Guiseppe Aleandri on the treatment accorded the Axis POWs in Russia.

After Twelve Years

In September 1955, Konrad Adenauer, Chancellor of the new West German government, flew to Moscow to meet the leaders of the USSR. During their discussions, Adenauer broached a sensitive topic:

“…Let me start with the question of the release of those Germans who are still imprisoned within the area or sphere of influence of the Soviet Union, or who are otherwise prevented from leaving this area. It is on purpose that I put this problem at the beginning, as this is a question that leaves no German family unconcerned. I wish with all my heart that you do understand in which spirit I want to treat this problem. For me only the human point is at stake. The thought is unbearable that—more than ten years after the end of the war—there are still men who are separated from their families, homeland, and their normal, peaceful work-men who were involved—in whatever way—in the maelstrom of war. You must not find any provocation in my saying: It is out of the question to establish ‘normal’ relations between our states as long as this question is unsolved. It is normalization itself of which I am talking. Let us make a clean break with a matter which is a daily source of remembrance of sorrowful and separating past.”

Mr. Bulganin answered:

“The Federal Chancellor, Mr. Adenauer, raised as first question that of the prisoners of war. In our opinion there is a definite misunderstanding. There are no German prisoners of war at all in the Soviet Union. All German prisoners of war were released and repatriated. In the Soviet Union there are only war criminals of the former Hitler armies—criminals that were convicted by a Soviet court for especially grave crimes against the Soviet people, against peace and against humanity. In fact, 9,626 men have been retained up to September 1. (Some 2,000