The story of Stauffenberg and the attempt to kill Hitler is full of inconsistencies and misunderstandings which this book serves to correct out. The German Officer Corps had very mixed feelings towards Hitler and the Nazis. This comes out clearly from the Operation Valkyrie. – Highly Recommended
NAME: Stauffenberg Symbol of Resistance, The Man Who Almost Killed Hitler FILE: R2885 AUTHOR: Wolfgang Venohr PUBLISHER: Pen and Sword, frontline Books BINDING: hard back PAGES: 222 PRICE: £25.00 GENRE: Non Fiction SUBJECT: German officer corps, WWII, World War II, World War Two, World War 2, Second World War, Afrika Korps, Wolf's Lair, Adolf Hitler, SS, High Command, Eastern Front, assassination attempts, Nazis, German Resistance
ISBN: 1-47385-683-7
IMAGE: B2885.jpg BUYNOW: tinyurl.com/y5fhjsnu LINKS: DESCRIPTION: The story of Stauffenberg and the attempt to kill Hitler is full of inconsistencies and misunderstandings which this book serves to correct out. The German Officer Corps had very mixed feelings towards Hitler and the Nazis. This comes out clearly from the Operation Valkyrie. – Highly Recommended Adolf Hitler was widely regarded as a joke within the Wehrmacht's Officer Corps as he struggled to power. Hindenburg regarded him as a nobody corporal and that was typical of the perception of German officers. However, they seriously underestimated him at their cost and walked into the trap he set them in requiring their oath to him as their Leader. Even the most sceptical officers were very reluctant to take any action that broke that oath. Stauffenberg had served in the Africa Korps before receiving serious wounds that forced him to accept duties away from direct fighting. By then only the most committed Nazis believed Hitler could win the war he had caused. Most officers expected eventual defeat, unless they could find some way of placating the Allies sufficiently to allow a negotiated armistice. This became a most difficult situation for them. They felt honour would not allow them to break their oath to Hitler and they held surprisingly naive views about the Allies and their reaction to post-Hitler conditions. Many felt that the British were a Germanic people who must have a similar hatred of the Bolsheviks and would be prepared to forgive much to end the war and join with Germany against the Soviets. It was an extremely confused situation that does much to explain why Operation Valkyrie was started and why it so quickly ended in terrible disaster. Stauffenberg has been seen variously as an incompetent, a traitor, a patriot, a decorated officer, a brave man, a coward. In reality he may have been none of these things and still a composite of them. A fair assessment of him is very difficult because he was subject to pressures and constraints that are difficult to understand outside the German officer corps. In planting a bomb at Hitler's Eastern Headquarters, the coup conspirators faced formidable risks and variables that were very difficult to plan for adequately. By planting the bomb and then leaving, Stauffenberg had to assume the obvious explosion had worked and that he had to reach Berlin quickly to activate Valkyrie. We know now that Hitler was very lucky to survive but his survival meant that the conspirators had to move very quickly and seize all the levers of power. In the event, many of them dithered, momentum was lost and Hitler had the time to mobilize his supporters. This book paints a graphic picture of the assassination attempt and its aftermath. What might have unfolded, had it succeeded, is unlikely to have shared the aspirations and assumptions of the conspirators because what they did not understand was the agreement between Britain, America, and the Soviets to accept only unconditional surrender.