Schwerpunkt: From D-Day to the Fall of the Third Reich (46 page)

The Yalta Conference had been held in November, 1944, ostensibly carving out boundaries because trusting the Soviets was not something either the British or Americans wanted the post war world to depend on. At the end of the war, the focus was on which country would take control of Germany’s defeat. Germany was partitioned and occupied by the United States, England, France, and Russia. The Cold War of the late 1940s, which lasted until the 1980s, was a direct result of how World War II ended. Exhausted Western politicians considered alternative post war scenarios but with no more men, materiel, equipment or energy to spend, the surviving democracies let Russia literally get away with post war murder.

This disastrous war, begun in 1939, officially ended at midnight on 8. May. 1945. By 4. May, we surrendered unconditionally to General Montgomery. By 7. May, we surrendered unconditionally to General Eisenhower and Joseph Stalin. By 8. May, we came hobbling back to Germany to see what kind of a country we had fought for. But it is 28. April. 45 that is the date that will always be momentous for me. This is the date that the bastard Hitler gave up and while I heard he intended for all his followers to obey his order to decimate the country, calmer heads prevailed and Germany was spared a Valhalla-type destruction. I heard that just before he died, Hitler said the surviving Germans weren’t worthy of living and so he wanted the whole country destroyed. All I could think of was my mother who survived all the hardships this war brought her and how she could not survive much more deprivation.

When the war first started, Adolph Hitler rained down destruction on other countries but that just made me proud we were superior in force to them. When the war ended and he ordered destruction to be rained down on his own people, I saw that all I had been fighting for was nothing but a mirage. I thank God Admiral Dönitz was appointed as Hitler’s successor and that he could countermand those vicious orders. I cannot for a minute believe my mother and aunt and cousins did anything warranting their death and destruction by our own government. How could we all have been so blind? Was Hitler always a madman or had it come about lately? And I’m sorry I was part of it now. Then I ask myself if I would be as sorry if we had won…

Knowing that we were defeated, we’ve fought but not very heartily through the last couple of weeks. We walked and walked and I had my eyes peeled for anything that looked like food or shelter the whole time. More than once, I saw that some retreating columns of other German soldiers were strafed by Jabos. We would try to go to the nearest farmhouse to wait it out and try to avoid being killed. I was so close to saying I survived this war that the thought of dying after it was all but over was too cruel to contemplate. Thousands of other meandering German soldiers were all trying to be captured by anyone except the Russians. I was one of the lucky ones and was finally captured by a group of American soldiers.

My unit was walking north from near Bavaria as there were no trains or buses available for returning defeated soldiers when we encountered American soldiers trying to clear a small town of all remaining “Krauts” as they call us. When my entire unit approached them with our hands up, one of our guys spoke very slowly and very loudly presumably so the Americans could understand him better. The Amis finally motioned us to come with them. They took me and about 100 others into their custody and guarded us with a single soldier to our right and a single soldier to our left. They knew as well as we did that we weren’t going anywhere except to where the Amis told us to go. Frankly I was happy to surrender even though I kept thinking about defending my homeland and protecting our women and children from the invaders. I had no choice in the matter though as our unit was completely surrounded and we had no more working weapons and more importantly, no ammunition for them even if they did work. I said a prayer of thanksgiving that the war was over for me and I would be making it home under American protection.

We were put into a fenced in area with too few toilets and too little food and we slept outside under the sky. The Americans were gruff with us and it seemed to me that they blamed each one of us individually for all the suffering they’ve gone through. I wish I could make them understand that I now see we were fools to believe in Hitler.

One day, we were allowed to take a shower but I was late getting there. I found myself waiting alone to take my shower when an American soldier walked by and dropped a piece of bread and a slice of spam by me telling me not to say a word, probably because of rules against fraternization between the conquerors and the vanquished, I suppose. I saw on his jacket his name: H. Greathouse. I said an extra prayer that night asking God to make the world a place of such acts of kindness once again.

30. May 45

Liebe Mutti,

I cannot begin to tell you how happy and filled with joy I am that I am alive. I am safe within a POW camp run by the Americans. I pray every night that I will soon be allowed to leave this camp so I can see you and embrace you as a loving son. The war is over and I pray it hasn’t been too hard on you and Tante Ilse, Peter and Werner. I have no words to tell you how much I’ve missed you and how sorry I was that I had to leave you to endure these past years on your own. I trust having your sister and nephews with you eased the burden a bit. I will come home soon and I will stay by you and help you with whatever you need.

Your loving son,

Rudi

The Americans were questioning each one of us before turning us loose. They checked for tattoos which would have indicated our membership in the S.S. Rumors were flying but I didn’t think I had anything to worry about. I was finally questioned after being held for about three months. The Americans wanted to know about my unit, what I did all the time during the war, whether I was a Nazi, and things of that sort. When I told them I had worked for General Rommel, the questioning intensified and I answered questions for about another month. The questioners became soldiers of higher and higher rank and I was proud to tell them about Herr General Rommel. I confirmed that neither he nor I were ever Nazis and neither of us had ever joined the Nazi Party. I was then informed that he had been forced to commit suicide by the Nazis since I didn’t believe for a minute that story of him dying because of a brain hemorrhage, especially since it followed by hours his visit by two of Hitler’s Nazi henchmen.

This is all making sense now. I remember last summer, just after the enemy invasion of the Normandy beaches, that General Rommel had been approached by several men and though he clearly did not know I was around and overheard their conversation, I was and I did. Only now that Herr General Rommel is dead, can I even write about what happened.

General Rommel was a faithful officer in der Führer’s military and served his Commander-in-chief with more than just a dutiful obedience. He trusted Hitler and revered Hitler’s vision of a strong and militarily powerful Germany, now able to stand up and rule the lesser countries of the world after our defeat in the last War of 1914. I have already reported how General Rommel actually became a friend of der Führer to the extent Hitler allowed himself to have any “friends.” Der Führer allowed Herr General Rommel even to telephone him directly without having to go through the various layers of personnel who surrounded der Führer to protect him from distractions that would take away from his time he could otherwise be spending, brilliantly planning the path that was going to lead us to victory. But I noticed a difference in General Rommel’s appreciation of Hitler’s genius after Afrika. I sensed a very real resentment that der Führer insisted on interfering with General Rommel’s plans for how to defeat the English General Montgomery. Virtually everything General Rommel requested was denied or rejected. Every time we received one of der Führer’s irrational “Sieg oder Todt” orders, General Rommel recognized that his Panzer Army was being senselessly wasted. It was just about this time that I sensed the General was becoming disenchanted with Hitler’s proclaimed genius in commanding battles. But I swear, Herr General was still 100% loyal to der Führer, maybe only just a little bit disillusioned.

Then, just before he was sent to France, there was news of camps where Jews were being worked too hard to survive. I heard there were camps that actually killed some Jews outright but I thought at the time that this was nothing more than hateful rumor. Though I never saw any official documents on this point, it was pretty clear after Kristall Nacht that the Third Reich intended to live in a world free of Jews. Don’t get me wrong, I think all of the world’s problems have been created by the Jews just like every other right thinking man but I have to say I don’t necessarily think the race had to be eradicated in atonement for our economic woes. But with news that concentrations of German people were being terrorized, I think General Rommel maybe started to question just where der Führer was leading us. I’m not sure he felt so concerned when he found out that other concentrations of people such as Slavs, Gypsies, and homosexuals were also being terrorized but I don’t know this for a fact.

Then one day, Dr. Karl Strölin, the Mayor of the general’s neighboring city of Stuttgart and an old acquaintance of his, came to see him and I overheard that it was to discuss the need to have der Führer killed. Next der Burgermeister said that Hitler should be replaced by General Rommel himself. The part I overheard was that it was only by replacing der Führer with General Rommel that civil war in Germany could be avoided, such was the love of the General by the German people. I’ve said it before but he truly was our national hero, second only, of course, to der Führer himself at that time. Obviously, Herr General Rommel flatly refused such overtures but I did hear him finally say that he knew it was his duty to come to the rescue of Germany. Then I noticed that it was about this time that the General became the subject of several more of these types of visits. (Please do not worry. All of the men who I am identifying have been arrested, tried and executed for their so called crimes so I am not imperiling anyone other than myself with this recitation of what I think happened.)

Eventually, I came to find out (I admit I did nothing but sneak around to find out all I could about what was now becoming a conspiracy to rid Germany of der Führer) that many well recognized men, men I would have never suspected, were involved. I determined that the former Chief of the Abwehr, Admiral Wilhem Canaris; General Beck, the former Chief of the General Staff; the General of Infantry, Alexander von Falkenhausen; the Military Governor of Belgium and Northern France; the Military Governor of the rest of France, General von Stülpnagel; the General of Artillery, General Wagner; the Chief of Staff to the Commander in Chief of the Replacement Army, General Claus von Stauffenberg; and even our own Chief of Staff, Dr. Speidel plus dozens more, were all participating in these discussions in some degree or another. I determined that even Sepp Dietrich and General Hausser both told General Rommel that they would obey his orders even if those orders contradicted Hitler’s.

I have now learned that General von Stauffenburg left a bomb in his briefcase on 20.July. 44 which went off in der Führer’s bunker but did not kill him. It went off as General Rommel was being treated for his wounds from his auto accident in a French hospital. I knew none of this at the time, of course, and it is only now that General Rommel is dead and buried that I have put two and two together. And what I can also report is that General Rommel did not want der Führer assassinated. He wanted Hitler to be tried for whatever crimes he may have committed and not just for the obvious altruistic reason that every man deserves a fair trial but more for the important reason that an assassination would have turned Hitler into an immediate martyr and no one would have been able to govern Germany under those circumstances. How different millions of lives would have been if the plot had succeeded. I’m sure that when Hitler survived the bombing, his survival gave him even more confidence in himself and his brilliance for masterminding the Thousand Year Reich. Pity, isn’t it?

We are hearing much from our captors about der Führer and about how he was a madman because who but a madman would think he could kill millions of Jews and Slavs all to preserve our master Aryan race. (Did anyone besides me notice that Hitler had neither blonde hair nor blue eyes?) We heard he was mad for thinking he could win a war involving the whole world by giving orders to his generals. And we heard he was beyond mad when it came to light he wanted the whole world to go down in flames with him if he couldn’t lead the Third Reich to victory. I see now that he was mad and I was mad for having had to fight for him.

A couple of months after I wrote the letter to my mother, I was handed a letter by an American soldier. No one received packages here. I don’t know if they were being pillaged as our army officers used to do when we were in battle or if there simply was not anything that could be sent. But letters came through, although very infrequently.

13. August. 45

Lieber Rudi,

It is with deepest sadness that I must tell you that your mother, my sister, is dead. She died about three months ago on 4. May. 45 under the bombs of our enemy, now our liberators. The siren went off but then it stopped so we weren’t sure what was happening. I took no chances and grabbed Peter and Werner and we went to a bomb shelter to wait to see what happened. I knew Frieda was out looking for onions so I went first to our garden to take her along with me. There were several other women there and they were all yelling. I think they were trying to steal the baby onions that Frieda was growing and I’m sure she didn’t want to leave the garden with those nasty women ready to take the food out of our mouths so she stayed. I begged her (and the other women too) to leave and get to the shelter but no one would make the first move. Rudi, believe me when I tell you I tried but I had my two little boys to protect so I left her. It was not even a half hour later when we left the shelter and when I returned to the garden, I saw nothing but rubble from the neighboring house in piles there. Your mother was dead as were the other women. I dug and dug, trying to save her until soldiers from the Home Guard arrived and told me there was nothing that could be done as she was already dead.