The Times Great Lives. Anna Temkin

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СКАЧАТЬ been bettered; but he had by that time to pay the price of his habitual contempt for truth. In early November he made a speech at Munich, on the anniversary of the Putsch of 1923, in which he said that he had given Göring orders to prepare for a five years’ war. He ended earlier than had been expected and left the Burgerbräu beer cellar in which he made it for Berlin. Shortly afterwards there was an explosion in which six people were killed and over 60 injured. The official German News Agency claimed that the attempt had been inspired by foreign agents and offered a reward of half a million marks for the discovery of the instigators. One George Elsen was arrested. Official Germans were infuriated with The Times for suggesting that the explosion was no surprise to the Führer and that he had left early to avoid it.

      France Crushed

      On New Year’s Day, 1940, Hitler declared that he was fighting for ‘a new Europe’. On March 18 he met Mussolini on the Brenner, a presage, as it was later recognized to be, of great events. In April came the invasions of Norway and Denmark, and in early May he was congratulating his troops on their success and authorizing decorations for them. On May 10 his armies invaded Belgium, Holland, and Luxembourg, and on the same day he went to the Western Front. On the morrow he proclaimed that the hour for the decisive battle for the future of the German nation had come. In less than a month the bells were rung in Germany to celebrate the victorious conclusion of what he called ‘the greatest battle of all time’. A few days later he congratulated Mussolini on the entry of Italy into the war. On June 22 the Armistice with France was signed. At that moment Hitler stood at the zenith of his success and power. Western Europe was his and there remained no one there to crush except Great Britain, weakened by her losses on the Continent and without an effective ally. As usual Goebbels was turned on to prepare the way.

      Battle of Britain

      Victory Promised for 1941

      On July 19, speaking in the Reichstag, Hitler ‘as a victor’ made his final appeal to ‘common sense’ before proceeding with his campaign against her. He spoke with an unusual sobriety, but there was no mistaking his threats. He had his answer from a united and determined Empire. On September 4 he reiterated his menaces. Then he unleashed the Luftwaffe and the Battle of Britain began in earnest. On October 4 after a month of it he was back at the Brenner to talk things over with Mussolini. In a few days his troops entered Rumania. A little later he went to the Spanish frontier for a discussion with General Franco with a view, it was thought, to tightening the blockade of Great Britain. Before the end of the month he was back with Mussolini in Florence. He seemed about this time to understand that Great Britain could not be conquered from the air and to think increasingly in terms of U-boats. He described himself as the ‘hardest man the German people have had for decades and, perhaps, for centuries’.

      In his New Year’s proclamation to the army Hitler promised victory over Great Britain in 1941 and added that every Power which ate of democracy should die of it. He continued, for he always seemed uneasy on this score, to place the blame for unrestricted air warfare on Mr Churchill, and he kept on expressing his confidence in the U-boat. All that spring, indeed, he seemed particularly eager to encourage his followers. In April he invaded Yugoslavia and Greece and went to join his advancing armies. And all the time he kept hammering at Great Britain from the air and striking under water at her supply lines.

      On June 3, 1941, there was another meeting of the dictators on the Brenner Pass, and it was suggested that there would be an immediate start in the organization of a Continental peace; but on June 22 he cast aside his mask and struck at Russia. Once again the Soviet Government became the ‘Jewish-Bolshevist clique’, and once again he was free to indulge his inherent hatred of the Slav. There were the usual lengthy and disingenuous explanations; but they were not calculated to deceive close readers of Mein Kampf. For at least five years, indeed, he had contemplated this particular volte face, for in 1934 he had taken Dr Rauschning into his confidence in regard to his intention if necessary to employ a Russian alliance as a trump card. In August he and Mussolini visited the Eastern Front. As a gage of affection he presented his brother-in-arms with a great astronomical observatory. After a long silence he spoke on October 4 at the opening meeting of the Winter Help Campaign and announced a ‘gigantic operation’ which would help to defeat Russia. A few days later he was boasting that he had smashed her.

      The Supreme Command

      Brauchitsch Dismissed

      After the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbour of December 7 most of the world was in the conflict. In announcing his declaration of war on the United States to the Reichstag Hitler abused President Roosevelt and said that America had planned to attack Germany in 1943. Just before Christmas he dismissed Field Marshal von Brauchitsch, his Commander-in-Chief, and took supreme command himself. A promise which he had made two months before to capture Moscow had not been fulfilled, and his own troops were retiring before the Red Army. He felt, perhaps, that he had to find a culprit for the failure and also to put heart into his own troops. He spent Christmas at his headquarters in Eastern Europe, not as previously, among his front line troops.

      Hitler’s New Year message for 1942 was far less confident than that of 1941. ‘Let us all,’ he said, ‘pray to God that the year 1942 will bring a decision.’ There were rumours of disagreement with his generals and of pressure from the radicals within the Nazi ranks. In March he appointed Bormann to keep the party and the State authorities in close cooperation. He was making strenuous efforts to build up the home front, to increase the number of foreign workers in Germany, and to procure the forces for a spring offensive.

      In April he received from the obedient Reichstag the title of ‘Supreme War Lord’ and measured the duration of the Reich by the mystical number of a thousand years. The tremendous eastward thrust of the summer of 1942 was delivered, reached the Volga, and went deep into the Caucasus. In September he claimed that Germany had vastly extended the living space of the people of Europe and called on his own to do their duty in the fourth winter of the war. On October 1, at the Sportspalast, he taunted, boasted, and promised the capture of Stalingrad. His effort to make good his word in the end cost Germany a tremendous loss of lives and material. He seemed, however, at this period to be more inclined to talk about the inability of the allies to defeat him than to prophesy a German victory. In November, after the allied landings in North Africa, his troops overran unoccupied France and seized Toulon.

      A Chastened Man

      In the New Year order of the day for 1943 he prophesied that the year would perhaps be difficult but not harder than the one before. He was certainly a much chastened Führer. The industrial effort of Germany was being seriously disrupted by air attack, and Russia was pressing perilously hard. On the tenth anniversary of his accession to power he did not speak, but entrusted Goebbels with a proclamation to read for him. His silence gave rise to rumours, some to the effect that he was giving up his command of the army, others that he was dead. On February 25, instead of speaking, he issued another proclamation to celebrate the birthday of the party. It added fresh fuel to the rumours.

      On March 21 Hitler at last broke silence. The manner of his speech was lifeless and almost perfunctory. The matter, even for one as prone as he to endless reiteration, was all too familiar. His only news was that he had started to rearm not in 1936 but in 1933.

      Mussolini’s Fall

      The Italian Capitulation

      Hitler, in his appeal on the anniversary of the Winter Help scheme on May 20, told the German people that the army had faced a crisis during the winter in Russia – a crisis, he said, which would have broken any other army in the world. Soon another crisis faced the Germans. On July 25 Mussolini fell from power, four days after it had been announced that Hitler and Mussolini had met in northern Italy where it was believed Mussolini had demanded more help from Germany in the defence of Italy. But Italy was not to be kept at Germany’s side, and on September 8 Marshal Badoglio, СКАЧАТЬ