Joachim Fest - Plotting Hitler's Death

But from this point on, things began to go awry. Helldorf received no further instructions. Major Jakob succeeded in occupying the broadcasting center on Masurenallee, but the signal officer failed to appear because General Thiele had vanished. In his absence, Jakob relied for technical information on the station manager, who assured him that broadcasting had stopped when, in fact, it was continuing. Back on Bendlerstrasse, Beck urgently awaited news that the station had been occupied. The units that seized the Nauen and Tegel trans­mitters on the outskirts of Berlin had experiences similar to that at Masurenallee. At 5:42 p.m., and in quick succession thereafter, a series of communiqués was broadcast from Führer headquarters an­nouncing the attack and the serious injuries suffered by Schmundt, Brandt, and the stenographer, Berger, but also reporting that Hitler himself had escaped injury and “resumed his work” immediately.

At the conspiracy’s headquarters on Bendlerstrasse, signs of uncertainty were beginning to appear. When SS Oberführer Humbert Pifrader arrived, on Himmler’s orders, at 5:00 p.m., demanding to see Stauffenberg, he was arrested with no fuss. But when the commander of the Berlin military district, General Kortzfleisch, appeared shortly thereafter and was similarly arrested after flatly refusing to join the coup, he was belligerent, roaring at Hammerstein, who was standing guard over him, that he wanted to know to whom exactly he had sworn his oath of loyalty. Kortzfleisch eventually calmed down and complained that he just wasn’t prepared to participate in a coup; he had always considered himself nothing but a soldier and was now “interested only in one thing: going home and pulling weeds in my garden.” The conspirators replaced him with General Karl von Thüngen, but even the new man hesitated, feeling that the situation was still far too murky. He lingered for a long time at Bendlerstrasse talking things over before finally proceeding reluctantly to his com­mand post on Hohenzollerndamm, where the chief of staff, General Otto Herfurth, ruminated over the onerous decisions that had fallen to him. Herfurth repeatedly requested more information and delayed the implementation of the orders he was receiving. Finally he sank down onto his field cot and declared himself ill. 14

Although the inner circle of conspirators still held firm, Major Remer, who commanded a guard battalion in Berlin, had figured out by this time that he was risking his neck. Urged on by a suspicious propaganda officer, but in defiance of explicit orders from his superior officer, General Hase, he decided to seek the advice of Goebbels. Remer arrived al Goebbels’s apartment at about 7:00 p.m. to find Major Martin Korff of the explosives school attempting to arrest Goebbels. The minister was clever enough to recognize that Remer felt torn between his oath of allegiance and his orders, and he quickly telephoned Führer headquarters in Rastenburg.

Hitler himself came on the line and asked Remer if he recognized his voice. When Remer said he did, the Führer conferred on him plenary powers to put down the uprising. Remer scarcely had time to think. Overwhelmed by the discovery that Hitler was still alive and by the magnitude of his new responsibilities, he immediately removed the cordon that had been set up around the government quarter and gradually took command of the units and task forces already in the city center and those arriving there. When Colonel Jäger came to take Goebbels away, the sentries on duty already had orders to protect the minister. The uprising had begun to collapse.

Those conspirators who had insisted that killing Hitler was the crucial prerequisite for a coup were proved right, though now it was too late. The decisive importance of the Führer was most powerfully evinced by Remer’s actions but could also be seen in the reactions of Fromm, Thüngen, Herfurth, and others and in the endless, para­lyzing debates that took place in many barracks after the initial radio broadcasts reported Hitler as alive. The fact that Olbricht and Stauffenberg were issuing orders that exceeded their authority-a fact cer­tainly noted with suspicion by some officers-did not itself jeopardize the coup, because the Wehrmacht command structure was confusing to begin with and, in any case, all power was finally centralized in the hands of Adolf Hitler. It did, however, mean the chain of command would not function automatically.

But by this time it was not just the chain of command that was coming apart. Already that afternoon Fellgiebel had despondently refused to speak with Olbricht, informing him in a message that “there’s no reason for all that anymore.” Perhaps Fellgiebel realized what a horrendous error he had made in reporting that the assassina­tion had failed. He saw that the only chance the conspirators had ever really possessed was to forge ahead single-mindedly and to play the one card they had held from the outset In any case, on hearing that Thiele had disappeared (it later turned out that he had gone to see Walter Schellenberg at Reich Security Headquarters), Fellgiebel re­marked that Thiele was “making a big mistake if he thinks he can intricate himself like this.” 15Stieff, too, tried to defect. Meanwhile Hoepner sat in his office and stared darkly and irresolutely ahead, responding lamely to requests for information. If Hitler really was alive, he told Beck, then “everything that we’re doing is senseless.” It would all come down, he added, “to a test of strength.” To which Beck replied acidly, “That’s for sure.” 16But where was Witzleben, his fellow conspirators wondered, and where, for that matter, was Gen­eral Lindemann, who was supposed to read the conspirators’ grand proclamation over the radio?

Only a few of the plotters refused to give up: Mertz, Olbricht, Heck, Schulenburg, Haeften, Schwerin, Yorck, and Gerstenmaier, who had by now arrived at army headquarters. And then, of course, there was Stauffenberg, hurrying back and forth through crowded offices and hallways from one incessantly ringing telephone to the next, convincing skeptical callers, issuing orders, coaxing, pressuring, reassuring. Even Gisevius, who had always disliked him, was forced to admit that Stauffenberg was the only person “on top of the situation.” Gisevius overheard Stauffenberg tell callers that Hitler was dead. The operation is in full swing, he insisted, the panzers are on their way… Fromm is not available… Of course Keitel is lying… Orders must be obeyed… Everything depends on holding firm… The officers’ time has come.

Away from the maelstrom sat Beck, asking time and again when news would arrive that the broadcasting center had been occupied. Since Lindemann had the only copy of the proclamation, Beck began working on a new version. Then he spoke with Kluge in France, but Clever Hans, true to form, refused to commit himself. Beck also made contact with the chief of staff of the army group that had been nearly cut off by the advancing Red Army in Courland and issued an order to withdraw the troops; he took the time to write a small note to this effect at the top of the proclamation “for future historians.” The order was to be the only one he would issue in his new position.

At about 8:00 p.m. Witzleben appeared at Bendlerstrasse. Everyone realized that the moment of decision had come. Witzleben had just paid General Wagner a visit and knew that the assassination attempt had failed. His cap in one hand and his marshal’s baton in the other, he strode into the cluster of waiting conspirators. Stauffenberg rushed up to deliver a status report but Witzleben brushed him aside, barking, “What a mess!” and proceeded with Beck into Fromm’s office. Beck attempted to calm the furious Witzleben and to give him some idea of the difficulties that had arisen; the field marshal was not, however, in a forgiving mood. Stauffenberg and Schwerin were sum­moned, and one witness was able to discern through the glass of the sliding door that an angry debate had broken out, with Witzleben periodically banging his fist on the table.