Authors: Japanese Reaping the Whirlwind: Personal Accounts of the German,Italian Experiences of WW II
Nigel Cawthorne (6 page)
In May 1944, the Germans retreated across the River Dniester into Romania, then still a German ally. Winckelmann was due some leave and managed to hitch a ride on a plane back to Berlin. It was the first time he had flown. Flying without a radio, the plane barely missed a mountain when landing at Krakow in cloud. At Berlin it touched down during an air raid. He spent a week at Kaufbeuren in Bavaria with his mother, wife and newborn daughter, then he travelled back to the front by train via Vienna.
It was no longer the city I had loved before the war. There were no more
sacher torte
or Grinzing wine. The opera and the Burgtheater had also been closed … At the front all was quiet … It was so relaxing to see the beautiful countryside, still so peaceful while we were preparing to destroy it with everything our factories could supply in just a short period of time and the human race would kill each other again in senseless war.
By 1944, the Germans were expecting an invasion in the west, and in preparation Hitler had ordered the construction of an impregnable ‘Atlantic Wall’. One of those defending it was Gotthard Leibich. He and his comrades knew the Allied landing was coming:
It was talked about quite a bit and we felt ‘well, we are ready for it’, so to speak, because Rommel came in February if I remember. [It was March.] I was right on the beach in a place called Vierville. It’s one end of what was, later on, Omaha. He came there and he organized that the fortifications should be much more improved, you see, and they worked on it like the clappers, but they didn’t finish it because, you know, it was too late.
And Leibich’s impression of Rommel?
Big-wigs like that, they just walk around a little bit and then they shoot off again. But he did inspect the coastal defences. Rommel was a very good man and he was a decent man and everybody liked him. Even the British in Africa spoke highly of him. But Rommel had problems. As you know, he later had to take his life. It was very sad. My feeling is that he didn’t really want to know about this rotten chap Hitler. But he said: ‘Well, if you need me, I am there.’
Generally Leibich respected his officers, who were especially scrupulous about their behaviour towards the French.
We had to treat the French with kid gloves. We weren’t allowed to do anything that you do to hurt them. I was just seventeen years old and I went with my friend Walter Holland – he was higher up and a bit older than me – to have a meal or a drink in a French pub one evening and he started talking to a Frenchman. He spoke a bit of French I think, and he got in a real heated argument with him and told him off and I said: ‘God, what are you doing?’ I was so – Why did he have this violent argument? He nearly came to blows with the Frenchman.
Alfred Mertens was also manning the defences in Normandy on 6 June 1944 – known, by the Allies, as D-Day.
Around 14 days before 6 June our company had received 24 new machine-guns … Four wouldn’t shoot at all and a number of them could only produce single shot fire … All at once 12 English fighter-bombers flew over … I ran to the anti-aircraft gun and was able to aim and fire, but it was a great disappointment … we’d only got off 42 rounds.
Then came the big day itself.
Around midnight on 5–6 June we received a telephone call raising security to level two. The deafening noise of aircraft engines confirmed that the invasion had begun. As our company assembled early that morning our area was carpet bombed. I was on my way to a meeting and found myself on the edge of the attack. Five soldiers of our company were buried in their foxholes and killed …
Mertens retired to the system of trenches built to defend the beach there.
It wasn’t long before we met machine-gun fire in front of us. We carried on in the trench that ran along there. Going over to the left side of the trench I could see to the enemy on the other side of the field. All at once I got a blow on the right side of my head. I dived to the left of the bank and ducked down under cover. I shouted: ‘Sniper, to the right!’ I took off my helmet and saw on its edge a deep indentation which caused a massive swelling right up to my right temple. My captain, who was near me, sent me straight away with a colleague who was slightly wounded in the neck, along with an English straggler, to the main first-aid post.
We ran like hares – fighter bombers above us and a ship’s battery bombarded our path. The shells would fall first on one side, then the other, then there would be a new salvo. We finally reached the first-aid post, but, because we were only slightly wounded, were transferred to the next unit engaging the enemy.
But the Germans were forced back and Mertens and his comrade became detached from their unit. On 7 June they were taken prisoner.
The Allies quickly established a significant beachhead. But heavy rain in July bogged down the advance, and the Germans managed to confine them to northeast Normandy. The US VII Corps would eventually break out southwards along the Avranches corridor, where medical sergeant Walter Klein was stationed:
On the morning of 24 July 1944, I just came back from the dressing station to the position when we were attacked by artillery. Our anti-aircraft platoon had two dead, three severely wounded. My own company, the heavy company of
Kampfgruppe
Heintz, lost only one man. With the help of two stretcher-bearers and the medical unit of the neighbouring company, we went back to the dressing station, to bring the wounded there. We arrived there at about 0900 hours. At 0915 hours there was such strong air activity over the combat line that we had to take the St-Lô–Vire road to get back from the dressing station to the position. We had the prescribed insignia, and knew that the American aviators would not fire on us.
Over the sector held by my company were approximately 18 to 25 Lightnings, which were firing systematically on every hedge. Our position was situated in a wooded sector. We left the road to reach the position and took a sunken road. It was 1100 hours. According to orders I had to report back to the company command post, but on the sunken road I found five wounded parachute gunners of the 5th Para Division, injured by a splinter bomb …
What happened during the following hours was terrific. By our calculation, 1,000 to 1,200 bombers took part in the attack … The effect was devastating; all our anti-aircraft guns and artillery were destroyed. Tanks that tried to get away were destroyed by pursuit planes. When a wave of planes had passed, one could hear the crying of the wounded and shouting for help of medical personnel. I had just the time to carry one of my comrades, who had been wounded badly in the thigh, into the dugout when a second wave started bombing. It was impossible to give help as long as the air raid lasted. Several companies of the 5th Para Division who tried to withdraw to the north in the direction of Marigny were entirely destroyed by Lightnings, pursuit planes and bombers. On that day my company lost one officer, and 34 non-commissioned officers and enlisted men. The attack lasted approximately three hours …
At 1930 I brought the last wounded to the dressing station. The unit had moved to another position. The general opinion of my comrades and even the officers was that, if the enemy made another attack, it would be our end. Only one heavy weapon was left and it only had six rounds of ammunition. Of our heavy trench mortars only two were left. The St-Lô front had suffered very much from this attack. Worse than the loss of weapons was the effect that the attack had made on our morale.
On 25 July, the Americans started to make the breakthrough. At daybreak, as on the day before, innumerable pursuit planes and artillery-spotting planes were over the battlefield. Almost every rifle pit was shelled. At 1400 hours, when I accompanied some wounded to the dressing station, I found that American tanks were already driving along the St-Lô–Vire road. Canisy was taken at 1500 hours by assault detachments of the infantry, but could not be held because the enemy pressure was too strong. An observation post on a tree reported a big concentration of tanks north of Canisy. When our assault detachments withdrew, they were fired on by tanks moving up behind them. At 1900 hours the enemy had advanced on the right and on the left side past Canisy. Parachute units that were situated on our left were captured by the enemy, and we were in great danger if we did not try to withdraw. But not until 26 July at 2115 hours, a lieutenant of the 302 Infantry Regiment brought the order to withdraw in the direction of Vire. We managed to withdraw at the beginning of the night, harassed by enemy trench mortars. However, we had to leave the dressing station with 75 severely wounded in the hands of the Americans. Two stretcher-bearers who were slightly wounded, one medical officer, one surgeon and half of the medical equipment of the troop were left with the wounded. I was ordered to follow the rest of the combat group with 14 wounded who were able to walk.
On the morning of 27 July we occupied a new position northwest of Vire … The morale of the wounded comrades who were recovered from the combat sector was, when they were not too badly wounded, good. Most of them gave vent to their feelings, declaring the whole resistance, the whole war is a ‘cramp’. A corporal, who was decorated with the Deutsche Kraus in gold for having destroyed five tanks with anti-tank mines on the eastern front, said to me: ‘I tell you one thing, medic, this is no longer a war here in Normandy. The enemy is superior in men and material. We are simply sent to our deaths with insufficient arms. Our Highest Command doesn’t do anything to help us. No aeroplanes, insufficient ammunition for our artillery.’ And he concluded: ‘Well, for me the war is over.’
An infantryman of my company, who was severely wounded in his shoulder, said: ‘This piece of iron that hit me should have hit the Führer’s head on 20 July, and the war would be over already.’
On 20 July 1944, Count Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg, a Panzer officer, and others had attempted to assassinate Hitler by planting a bomb in his headquarters, the Wolf’s Lair, in Rastenburg, East Prussia. A heavy table had shielded Hitler, and Stauffenberg and many of his co-conspirators suffered a painful death.
The July Plot was not the first attempt on Hitler’s life. Lieutenant Colonel Rudolf von Gersdorff claimed that he had been involved in several other attempts. From April 1941 to September 1943, he had been an intelligence officer with Army Group Centre in Russia. It was there that he met Colonel Henning von Tresckow, who was with the general staff and later recruited von Stauffenberg for his bomb plot. Witnessing the ‘cruel methods used in Russia’ that had been advocated by Hitler, von Gersdorff said, it became ‘clear to all that this man deserved death a thousand times’.
We – the circle around Tresckow – had already made up our minds in 1942 to kill Hitler and if possible to remove Goering and Himmler. At other places different plans were being considered, as, for example, the proposal to kidnap Hitler and then to force a change in the top military leadership. However, it was always clear to Tresckow that such a half-way measure would only lead to civil war, and that only the shock of the death of the ‘mystic Führer’ to the entire German people would make it possible for a coup d’état to proceed according to plan … It was clear from the beginning that the attempt had to be made in such a manner as to assure absolute certainty of success. And it was axiomatic that the attempt must be carried out as soon as possible …
An assassination by pistol was ruled out because it was generally believed that Hitler always wore a bullet-proof vest. Tresckow finally decided on a bombing attempt. Requesting me to prepare the explosive and fuses, he set up the following requirements:
1. An explosive about the size of a book or bundle of documents with sufficient force to destroy a small house and its occupants.
2. A time fuse which would function with absolute certainty but without any audible ticking.
I decided on English plastic explosive, an English magnetic mine, and an English chemical fuse. These devices had been dropped by enemy aircraft over Germany for use in sabotage by agents and foreign workers, and had been systematically collected by us. None of the available German devices were suitable, being either too large or too conspicuous.
Tresckow made many tests with these devices. The power of the explosive seemed quite satisfactory, although naturally it was impossible to make tests with living beings. The fuse was especially suitable because of its rod form and its simple operation – the crushing of a foil cap. There were fuses with a time delay of 10, 30, 120 and 360 minutes. Experiments showed that the surrounding air temperature affected the time delay: at less than room temperature the time delay could be increased by as much as 100 per cent …
The first assassination attempt was carried out by Tresckow on the occasion of Hitler’s visit to the Army Group headquarters in Smolensk. Tresckow was to personally bring Hitler from the airfield and had planned to place a bomb in the side pocket of the automobile, next to the place Hitler was to occupy. But it was not possible to plant the bomb in advance since, although Hitler himself travelled by train, he always had his personal car and driver sent on ahead. He never sat in anyone else’s automobile. Even though, to avoid attention, Hitler had only a few SS men present, the attempt failed because of their ceaseless vigilance. It proved impossible for Tresckow to approach the car unwatched. Several subsequent attempts were undertaken but most were disrupted in their early stages …
Then came von Gersdorff’s chance.
Army Group Centre had prepared in the Armoury in Berlin an exhibition of captured Russian arms and equipment, war pictures, models, etc. A few days before 15 March 1943, General Schmundt [Hitler’s adjutant] gave out information that Hitler would personally open the exhibition on the occasion of Heroes’ Memorial Day. Since Goering and Himmler, as commanders of their respective organizations, were always present at this celebration, this was an opportunity that might never repeat itself. Upon Tresckow’s request, I declared myself ready to make the assassination attempt.
Before flying to Berlin, I had asked Tresckow to tell me whether the coup d’état could be successfully carried out once Hitler had been assassinated. Since I did not expect to survive, I wanted to know if my act would be justified in the eyes of history. At that time Tresckow told me that the organization already existed and would go into action immediately; that arrangements had already been made with the Western Powers; and that the enterprise was the only chance to save Germany from complete destruction. Other than this, I knew only that Tresckow was in close contact with various branch chiefs in the Army High Command …
Together with Field Marshal Model, I was flown to Berlin where I learned from General Schmundt that, after Hitler’s address in the glass-roofed court of the arsenal, he would spend about half an hour going around the exhibition, accompanied by Goering, Himmler, Dönitz and several aides, and would then carry out the traditional review of the honour guard …
After investigating the layout of the arsenal, I concluded that the actual attempt could only be made during the time that Hitler’s party was going through the exhibition … That the tour through the exhibition would last at least 20 minutes was a fact of decisive importance, since in the unheated rooms of the arsenal the temperature was only a few degrees above zero and I was therefore forced to calculate on the basis of a fuse time of 15 to 20 minutes …
Tresckow had asked me to use any favourable opportunity which promised absolute success. Since everyone involved in the conspiracy was to be forewarned … I told him that I intended to set off a bomb in each of my coat pockets during the time that Hitler passed through the exhibition.
