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Part 16: Nazi Germany and the Axis in the Interbellum
"Germany now stands astride the prostrate body of Europe like some dark Colossus, brooding over its success and plotting the perpetration of yet further outrages." Randolph Churchill, speaking in the House of Commons in February 1946 (Note 1) (From 'Germany After the War of 1940' Iosef Tsarnekii, writing in Morskoi Subornik, 1994 volume 4) As 1942 drew to a close the power of Nazi Germany appeared to have reached an unassailable apogee. Hitler's domination of Europe stretched from the Ural Mountains to the Atlantic Ocean but his ambition was not yet sated. Once again one of the principal cause of German aggression was the Nazi's ongoing mismanagement of the German economy and the strain of the vast projects undertaken such as the rebuilding of Berlin and the enlargement of the Kreigsmarine. Switzerland with its large gold reserves (Note 2) looked a prime target, much as Austria and Czechoslovakia had done in 1938 and 1939. The invasion of Switzerland (Operation Tannenbaum) in 1943 was successfully mounted and Hitler's power stretched across the entire continent of Europe with only a supine Sweden, a nervous Portugal and an apparently marginalised Britain not directly under Nazi rule or in the Axis alliance. German was declared the official language of Europe. English and Russian were outlawed while Danish, Dutch, Polish, French, Norwegian and Swedish were to be tolerated for a decade. The fact of the German conquest of Europe served to mask the tremendous problems the Nazis had created for themselves. The Nazification, depopulation and exploitation of the new conquests became Hitler's principal goal, but his sadistic racial policies alienated the subject populations and inspired an insurgency campaign unparalleled in history for both its scale and its viciousness. Partisan activities in the newly created 'protectorates' of Ukraine, Muscovy Gottengau (Kherson and the Crimea) and the Caucasus were widespread and (particularly in the Caucasus) difficult to counter. More and more of the SS and Wehrmacht were embroiled in the hunt for partisans who knew that they had nothing to lose and whose numbers grew with every brutal reprisal. Hitler was inclined to see this as an advantage claiming that it would speed the depopulation of those areas for German colonization, but his generals and political advisors were increasingly dismayed by the casualty lists. Inevitably front line strength suffered and Hitler's refusal to reverse the sharp decrease in war production that occurred after 1942 exacerbated the problem. The newly created German state of Schweizmark (Composed of the German and French speaking areas of Switzerland) was also a hotbed of partisan activity. At first reprisals were limited but as the insurgency dragged on the slaughter of Swiss civilians in revenge for partisan attacks became almost as bad as that of Ukrainians or Poles. The 'Vassalzustand' (Vassal states) of Denmark, Norway, Belgium, Holland and France were less of a problem. In a direct imitation of Bismarck's policy in 1870 Hitler withdrew most of his forces from French territories after one year though limited by treaty the size of the armed forces and compelled France to pay vast 'indemnities' and surrender the most modern ships of their fleet. In all cases the Vassalzustand were allowed to retain their colonies though their foreign policy was dictated from Germania (Note 3). In the case of Holland for instance this carried the beneficial effect of ensuring the Japanese desire to seize the Netherlands East Indies was put in abeyance as long as they did as Hitler ordered and kept the oil flowing, though this bought renewed political conflict with the United States and to a lesser extent Britain. In all cases, the Vassalzustand, pillaged by their German overlords and hemmed in by restrictive trade practices and the decimation of industries that might compete with German manufacturers suffered severe economic decline. Luxembourg was annexed outright by Germany in 1942, Belgium was to be similarly seized in 1944 and Holland, Denmark and Norway in 1945. Hitler believed that the Dutch, the Flemish, the Danes and the Norwegians were Aryans and therefore 'Germanisable' (he also believed the French, Spanish and Italians were Aryans but had a severely diluted gene pool!) nevertheless significant numbers of German soldiers had to be stationed in these territories, lest their populations prove ungrateful for the Third Reich's munificence. Hitler's attitude toward the United Kingdom was characterized by ambivalence and contempt. He believed that Britain and the Commonwealth were defeated foes and would be bound by the Treaty of Greenwich (which had a non-aggression clause). In this he was guided by Rudolph Hess who, upon the cessation of hostilities, once again resumed his frequent trips to England and pursued his many friendships with members of the British aristocracy. Hitler often referred to the war of 1940 as 'Der triumph der Ubermenshen' and his view was reinforced by the inept British showing in that war. The fact of the British government's tacit support for the Soviet Union until its collapse was not lost on Hitler but the support was more moral than material and the very small amount of aid that reached the Soviet Union from the UK through the port of Murmansk and across the Iranian border consisting as it did largely of humanitarian supplies was seen by the Germans as insignificant. It is not unfair to say that the Labour Government in Britain was inclined to vocal backing of the Russian war effort rather than more concrete support to assuage its own conscience. Astonishing as it may seem today it is certainly true that many elements of Britain's Labour movement - not only the most radical - held common cause with Stalin's regime. Hitler's attempts to export Nazism were not as successful as he hoped, the Finns for instance, though valuable allies in the war against the Soviet Union declined to join the Axis Pact. Spain on the other hand eventually did become a member after the disintegration of the USSR (Note 4). Franco, having resisted bringing Spain into full membership of the pact essentially succumbed to bribery. Though both the British and the Germans made extravagant promises to win his support it was the proximity of The Third Reich and the tempting prospect of a return to the days of Spanish glory at what seemed a low cost held out by an alliance with Germany that persuaded him. Encouraged by his Foreign Minister Serrano Suňer, it is certain that he had little idea of the consequences of his actions, believing in 1943 that the peace would continue for at least a decade. Italy too was a not entirely content member of the Pact. Il Duce's appetite for conquest had been left unsated by the Treaty of Greenwich. He had gained very little at the expense of the British and his ambitions in Egypt, The Red Sea, East Africa and the Western Indian Ocean were unsatisfied. Mussolini also made plans to offset the power of Germany and his erstwhile partner Adolf Hitler by forming a 'Latin Axis' - an alliance of nations under Italian guidance which would include Spain, Portugal, Romania, Hungary and even France. But before Italy could use the resources of client states to become a major industrial and military power it would first need to become a much greater imperial and colonial power. (From 'The Nazi Religion' Larry Ledbetter, writing in The Anglican Journal, May 4th 1986) The Nazi ideology was an amalgam of German ultra-nationalism and a neo-Germanic heathenism. From its earliest expression in the völkisch clubs and wandervogel groups and its development via eugenics and race-theory, it was permeated with an obsessive sense of national/racial superiority that inspired a revival of a romanticized Teutonic paganism. Hitler himself said: "Those who see in National Socialism as nothing more than a political movement know scarcely anything of it...It is more even than a religion. It is the will to create mankind anew. The old beliefs will be brought back to honour again. The whole secret knowledge of nature, of the divine, the demonic. We will wash off the Christian veneer and bring out a religion peculiar to our race." The Nazis favourite cultural expression - the operas of Wagner - fitted this idea well. The Ring Cycle, can be seen as an idolization of Teutonic paganism while Parsifal, with its mixture of magic, occultism and Christian symbolism is more ambiguous but fundamentally apostate in its outlook. (Note 5) The Chief architect of this blasphemous usurpation of Christian imagery was Heinrich Himmler. One of the methods designed to help convert the German population (who generally thought of themselves as Christian) to the new Nazi religion, was to arrogate Christian concepts, beliefs and symbols and incorporate a twisted version of them into it. In the Nazi iconography Hitler was a kind of Messiah, the thousand year rule of the Third Reich a sick parody of the Messianic Era on earth mentioned in the book of Revelation; the Aryan race took the place of the Jews as the Chosen People; and racial purity - blood purity - assumed the place of the holy blood of Christ as the means of salvation. Religion is often an expression of the desire of individual human beings to find peace, yet the leaders of the Nazi party, despite their success found no peace at all. The deaths of Heinrich Himmler and Joseph Goebbels in the purge of 1943 meant that plans to displace Christianity with the new Aryan religion were slow to be implemented. Martin Bormann, the victor of the political infighting within the Nazi party, was certainly anti-Christian and the Kirchenkampf - his war on Christianity within The Third Reich - continued, leaving a spiritual void in the hearts of the German people that can scarcely have been any better than the regressive heathenism the Nazis were intent upon foisting upon them. (From 'The Economy of the Third Reich' by Wilhelm Offenbach, Macmillan 1962) Prior to 1939 the Nazis had made a series of decisions that reduced Germany's engagement with the global economy preferring autarky and bilateral agreements to trade. German industry experienced difficulties in obtaining many raw materials that could only be sourced outside Europe and in many ways could be considered as living hand to mouth. The situation was not helped by the Nazis habit of allowing manufacturers to pursue too many technically difficult projects simultaneously. A good example of this is the development of aircraft engines which was catastrophically mismanaged and failed to produce results as good as those of Britain or Japan. Albert Speer, the head of the Armaments ministry for much of 1942 wanted to cull the multifarious projects being undertaken by the engine manufacturers but the success of German arms in the east meant that his colleagues were disinclined to interfere with what seemed a highly successful organization. (Note 6) Within Germany itself however money was plentiful, especially after the conquest of Switzerland and the appropriation of Swiss gold and foreign currency reserves. These amounted to the sum of 2.5 billion Reichsmarks but this enormous quantity of money paled into insignificance next to the Nazis spending plans. These included the reconstruction of the five 'Fuhrer' cities - Berlin, Munchen, Nuremberg, Linz and Hamburg. The plans for rebuilding Berlin alone were estimated at 5 billion Reichsmarks! The expansion of the Kreigsmarine was due to absorb almost as much, while the fifth iteration of 'Generalplan Ost' - the German plan for the subjugation of eastern Europe and its transformation into a settler area - dated 28th May 1942 was extraordinarily ambitious and was estimated at costing 67 billion Reichsmarks! (The scheme included the construction of many new highways, large hydroelectric projects and a new train system, the Breitspurbahn a broad gage railway which required the complete replacement of much of central Europe's rail lines with a new 3 metre gauge track.) In addition to this the Germans were lending money to their allies - most notably Spain where it was used to fund Franco's large program of naval construction. Hitler up to this time showed a marked reluctance to place too heavy a tax burden on the German economy, this was less a product of any financial orthodoxy but rather due to his paranoid fear that the German people were 'soft' and unable to tolerate hardship. Only in 1942 was the task of matching the German economy to the demands of the war undertaken seriously, but with the peace, military spending (particularly on the army and Luftwaffe) was severely curtailed so even this delayed expansion was not as far reaching or as successful as it might have been had the war continued into 1943. Due also to the entry of Swiss gold into the German economy inflation began to grow, indeed, like Phillip II's Spain Nazi Germany found the economic adjustment necessitated by the influx of new wealth caused many difficulties. The Nazis response - price fixing by decree - caused shortages, sharp growth in the Black Market and sharp decline everywhere else. Corruption was rampant at every level of the Nazi administration and the Reichsmark began to devalue steadily against both the Pound and the Dollar. The deportation and murder of vast numbers of persons the Nazis considered undesirable caused shrinkage in the overall size of the German economy and unlike the regime in the Soviet Union - which in economic terms the government of Germany began to resemble - the Nazis mounted direct and efficient attacks upon the German education system. In general Communist regimes have tended to fund and encourage education whereas fascist ones have tended to undermine it. In the German case the educational malaise was much deeper and more significant than the burning of books by the SA in the late 1930s. Germany underwent a severe brain drain prior to the war of 1940 and by 1942 graduates were emerging from German universities knowing much about eugenics, the mathematics of artillery and the Nazi version of history but next to nothing of the skills that we useful in building a modern diversified economy. Germany was able to continue economically for three reasons; firstly it had an enormous reserve of talent built up over many years because of its strong tradition in science and research. Although this tradition was being deliberately eroded by the Nazis in their search for a racially pure German science it represented intellectual capital, a wasting asset certainly, but a considerable one nonetheless. Secondly the enormous territories that Germany had conquered provided both economies of scale and primary resources that cushioned the impact of educational and economic decline. Thirdly the widespread use of slavery which caused general economic shrinkage but gave the impression to those not enslaved that they were wealthier. The prospects for Germany's economic future however were extremely bleak (From 'The Madagascar Plan' by Chanoch Cohen writing on jewhist.com) (Note 7) Initial Nazi plans to address what they so euphemistically called 'The Jewish Question' consisted of the establishment of a 'Jewish reservation' for all Jews from Poland and the other conquered territories. It was to be located in the Lublin district of Poland and was a part of an extensive resettlement project that Hitler had selected Heinrich Himmler to oversee. Hundreds of thousands of Jews were expelled from eastern Europe to make way for German settlers, but the plans for an 'ethnic new order' in Poland were unworkable and in June 1940 were supplanted by the 'Madagascar Plan' under which all Jews were to be deported to the French colony of Madagascar, a large arid island off the west coast of southern Africa. The idea of evacuating the Jews of Europe to Madagascar was not a concept that originated with the Nazis. The German scholar Paul de Lagarde put forward the idea in 1885 and in 1926 the Polish government investigated using Madagascar to settle its Jewish population. The commission set up to investigate the possibility found that it would be feasible to settle 40,000 to 60,000 people in Madagascar but Leon Alter, the director of the Jewish immigration Association in Warsaw believed the island could only handle 2000. The idea was considered again in Germany in 1931 but it wasn't until 3rd June 1940 that an ambitious bureaucrat named Franz Rademacher, head of the Judenreferat der Abteilung Deutschland, (Jewish Department of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs) set the plan in motion with a memorandum to his superior Martin Luther. Rademacher advocated the separation of eastern and western Jews. The eastern Jews, he felt, were principally responsible for the "militant Jewish intelligentsia", and should be kept in a specially constructed ghetto in Lublin to be "used as hostages to keep American Jews in check." The western Jews, he went on, should be expelled from Europe entirely, "to Madagascar, for example." On receiving this memorandum, Luther brought the subject up with the Foreign Minister, Ribbentrop. By 20th June, Hitler spoke of the Plan with Grand Admiral Erich Raeder and had mentioned it to Mussolini on the 18th. The plan was turned over to the RSHA (Reich Central Security Office) and Adolf Eichmann (who was in charge of the Office of Jewish Evacuation within it) became involved. With the surrender of France on 21st June one of the principal obstacles to the plan was removed and on 15th August, Eichmann released a draft titled Reichssicherheitshauptamt: Madagaskar Projekt, which intended the forced resettlement of one million Jewish people per year over four years and relinquished the idea of retaining any Jews in Europe at all. Most of the Nazi hierarchy viewed the forced relocation of four million Jews to Madagascar as being better than the gradual extradition to Poland. As of 10th September, all deportations were cancelled and construction of the Warsaw ghetto was stopped. Rademacher proposed the setting up of a special bank tasked with overseeing the liquidation of all Jewish assets in Europe to pay for the Plan. This bank would then play the role of financial intermediary between Madagascar and the rest of the world, Jewish people would not be permitted to have monetary transactions with anyone outside the island and they would only be allowed to take their money out of Germany in the form of German goods. The desired perception of the outside world would be that Germany had given "autonomy" to the Jewish settlement in Madagascar. However, Eichmann made it clear in his draft that the SS would manage and regulate every Jewish organization that was created to govern the island. With some modifications the plan was approved by Hitler in October 1940 but was not put into operation until February of the following year. The first deportation, 'transportation' as the Nazis described it, took place in March 1941. A group of 7000 Moravian Jews who had been deported to Lublin were forced to board trains bound for Danzig where they were herded onto a 12,600 ton German steamer the Sonderburg which then set sail for Madagascar. Conditions on board were indescribable. the Sonderburg had been launched in 1899 as the Potsdam, a passenger liner for the Holland America Line but had been operating as a Norwegian whaling ship when taken as a prize in 1940. She had been designed to carry 2500 passengers and the overcrowding on the ship was appalling. Little provision had been made to feed the ship's 'cargo' and none of them were allowed on deck during the 26 day voyage. One of the survivors, Mordechai Bronfman estimates that 65% of the people who boarded the Sonderburg died on the journey from a combination of malnutrition, disease and general abuse. The bodies of the dead were simply tossed overboard. The Sonderburg made five voyages to Madagascar in the following year, inevitablythe cruelty and barbarism that attended these 'voyages of death' became known throughout the world and sparked international outrage. In February 1942 the Sonderburg was intercepted in the Mozambique Channel by the cruiser USS Wichita and the disposal of bodies, was observed by her crew. Her captain contemplated sending a boarding party to the Sonderburg but she was flying the yellow quarantine flag and he was reluctant to cause an international incident. Once the survivors of the Sonderburg's voyages disembarked inMadagascar life was scarcely any better than it had been on the ship. Housed in camps, without money or resources, the Jews were expected to grow or procure their own food but they were given no tools, no seeds, no livestock and no assistance of any kind. Furthermore the goods that they were supposed to receive in exchange for their money were usually pilfered by the SS before they ever left Germany. The plan was suspended in April 1942 by directive of Adolf Eichmann, not for any reasons of human decency but simply that the Nazis decided that there were simpler and less expensive ways to kill Jewish people. The Madagascar Plan was deliberately under resourced, haphazardly implemented and showed unequivocally that the Nazi 'territorial solutions to the Jewish Problem' were not only conceived to bring about the end of the Jewish presence in Europe but to kill as many Jews as possible in the process. The failure of the Madagascar Plan, and the general logistical problems of deportation in general, would ultimately lead to the conception of the Holocaust as the "Final Solution of the Jewish Question." (From 'The Night of the Jagged Lance' Gunter Schmidt, writing in Der Spiegel, June 1951) It was perhaps inevitable, given the predatory character of the regime, that once victory had been achieved and a kind of peace once more held sway in Europe that the Nazis would begin to turn on one another. In the early spring of 1943, shortly after the collapse of the last organised Soviet resistance Himmler began pressing for the founding of the new state of Burgundy which conformed roughly to the outline of the medieval kingdom of the same name. It was to be carved out of parts of France, Belgium, Luxembourg and Switzerland. The capital city was to be either Ghent or Dijon and its chancellor was to be Léon Degrelle, the Belgian Fascist leader. Although Himmler was certainly blindly loyal to Hitler by 1943 the SS was beginning to resemble a private army with eight motorized divisions and more forming including several Panzer divisions. Himmler wanted the status of the SS within the German Reich to become that of a kind of new nobility, ruling it as a military-religious order, like the Teutonic Knights who had their own fiefdom in Prussia. The State of Burgundy, was to be governed by a Reichsverweser (Regent), who would also be the Reichsfuehrer SS (Himmler's position). He was supported in this aim by Joseph Goebbles but both men were aware that to achieve this goal they would have to weaken the influence of the party bureaucracy, which bought them into direct conflict with Martin Bormann. In fact the main reason for Goebbles support of Himmler was to marginalise Bormann. By this time Bormann had skilfully turned himself into the second most powerful man in the Third Reich, he was effectively Hitler's deputy and closest confidant. Disparagingly referred to by other members of the regime as the 'Brown Eminence' his brutality, crudeness and apparent insignificance led many of them to misjudge his subtle perseverance and ability to make himself indispensable. He had an uncanny knack of exploiting the Fuhrer's weaknesses and idiosyncrasies and thus increasing his own power. He seemed always to be in attendance on Hitler, taking care of tedious administrative detail and expertly steering him into approving his own schemes. As a result of his machinations Hitler had dismissed Rudolf Hess in 1942. Hess' increasing distraction with high living and the trappings of authority enabled Bormann to present him to the Fuhrer as too flippant and superficial to be trusted with power. This opened the way for his 'transfer' from head of the Parteikanzlei (Party Council) to that of Germany's ambassador to Britain and Bormann's appointment in his place. Hitler's trust now resided in Bormann, whom he once called 'my most loyal Party comrade' but Bormann did not cease his Machiavellian intrigues against his rivals. He began to gather the reins of the Party into his own hands and progressively undermined all his competitors for power. Working in the anonymity of his modest office, the diminutive, thickset Bormann showed himself to be a master of intrigue, manipulation and political in-fighting. Always the guardian of Nazi orthodoxy, fanatically anti Semitic and a keen exponent of the Kirchenkampf (the Nazis attempts to destroy Christianity in Europe), he increased his grip on domestic policy until he decided most issues concerning the security of the regime. The rising power of the SS concerned him greatly and he viewed the notion of a separate SS fiefdom in Burgundy as an intolerable schism within the party that would undermine his own authority. Himmler and Goebbles, frustrated by the waning of their own influence over Hitler began to make clumsy attempts to sideline Bormann. The leaders of the armed services, Goering, Keitel and Doenitz (heads of the Luftwaffe, Army and Navy respectively) already felt that the SS was becoming an over-powerful state within the state. There were hundreds of SS-controlled corporations and large numbers of its members in political posts (Note 8 ), even the Gestapo was an SS organisation and the growth of the SS was not only a potentially destabilising influence but could be seen as an attempt at a 'slow coup'. Bormann had little difficulty persuading Doenitz that action would have to be taken, (Doenitz was not really a political animal, whereas Bormann was a shrewd and wily plotter.) Goering on the other hand was more ambivalent while lesser members of the party saw which way the wind was blowing and made their alliances accordingly. The example of Albert Speer, Hitler's chief architect is illustrative of this trend, he simply opted for the faction he felt was most likely to win. In implementing his plans against the SS leadership, Bormann enlisted Admiral Wilhelm Canaris (head of the German intelligence service, the Abwher) whom he found most helpful. There was little love lost between Himmler and Canaris, the Reichsfuhrer SS distrusted the spymaster and believed him to be in contact with the MI6 branch of the British intelligence service (Note 9). Both Reinhard Heydrich and Heinrich Himmler, had done a detailed investigation of Canaris' sources of information on Operation Barbarossa and had arrived at the conclusion that there had indeed been contact between him and the British. Canaris wanted to protect himself from Himmler and in collusion with Bormann he manufactured evidence that Himmler and Goebbles were planning to murder the Fuhrer. (He was also very careful to cover his trail, the forgers and even the typist who created the documents, three Abwher operatives altogether, were killed in a car crash as soon as they were complete.) Bormann acted quickly to present this 'evidence' not only to Doenitz, Kietel and Goering but also to several of the more fanatical and impetuous middle ranking officers of the Liebstandarte 1st SS Panzer Division. The division was reforming at Warschau (formerly Warsaw) but the decline in munitions manufacture in Germany after 1942 meant that this was a slow process. Originally constituted in 1933 as Hitler's bodyguard the formation had grown into a motorised division and had distinguished itself in the fighting between 1939 and 1942. It drew the most fervent and bloodthirsty soldiers in Germany to its ranks and was responsible for many war crimes and atrocities. After meeting with Kietel and Doenitz on the afternoon of 19th November 1943, Bormann took a scheduled overnight train to Warsaw (some 500 kilometres from Berlin) and met with Major Kurt Meyer, Captain Gerhard Bremer and Major Wilhelm Mohnke the following day (Note 10). He had consulted Kietel and chosen the men he wished to carry out his plan carefully, they were ruthless, fanatically loyal to Adolf Hitler, would obey orders without question and could be relied on to be discrete. It is also worth noting that in any state other than Nazi Germany they might well have been considered to be criminally deranged and Mohnke was actually a morphine addict. The resulting operation took place just after midnight on the 23rd November when units under the command of Meyer, Bremer and Mohnke arrested most of the senior leadership of the SS. The incident was to become known as 'Die Nacht der gezackten Lanze' (The night of the Jagged Lance), Keitel had mobilised all Wehrmacht formations within Germany in case the SS rank and file decided to oppose the arrests of their senior officers, but while there was some fighting the basic loyalty to the person of Hitler of most of the junior and middle ranks of the SS meant that it quickly ceased. Nevertheless more than 300 SS men were killed, Bormann, Doenitz, Keitel and Goering (Note 11) presented the 'evidence' of the plot to Hitler at his alpine retreat on the following morning while the operation was still taking place. At first Hitler did not believe that his trusted lieutenants were capable of treason but Bormann was persuasive and explained his unilateral action with the reason that he had acted only to protect his Fuhrer and the need to act quickly was pressing. Hitler was swayed by the deception and had thirteen of the implicated SS officers - including Himmler, Goebbles and Heydrich - tortured to death. Meyer, Bremer and Mohnke were all decorated and promoted, the idea of a separate SS state in Burgundy was dropped. While Bormann's actions on Gezackten Lanze Nacht were certainly risky, his daring paid off. Crucially he had used SS officers as the instruments of his plan making the coup seem a matter of internal SS house cleaning. If he had used Wehrmacht or Luftwaffe troops the outcome might have been civil war. Having dispensed with his most dangerous opponents and consolidated his power and influence, Bormann continued to 'rule from behind the throne' through management of the Party administration. This inevitably led to an increase of the authority of the Gauleiters, who remained an important prop for Bormann and unsurprisingly in the fallout from the neutering of the SS as a political force, they were quickly purged of elements Bormann deemed to be disloyal. The Reich became more and more bureaucratised and in that respect became even more like the regime in the USSR that the Nazis claimed to despise and had so recently destroyed. What can best be described as a reshuffle followed the violence of 23rd November and many SS men were removed from important posts, for instance SS Obergruppenfuhrer Dr. Hans Kammler who had taken over from Albert Speer at the Armaments ministry in late 1942 was replaced by his deputy Karl-Otto Saur. Those that remained in important offices (like all holders of the Party's most eminent posts) became members of the Reichsenat, Germany's newly formed Senate which was a legislature that wielded very little real power, it's main function was to enable Bormann to keep an eye on any potential rivals. The Reichstag was preserved, though it too was little more than a rubber stamp assembly. Bormann as head of the party bureaucracy was in many ways the most powerful man in Germany. Notes Note 1 This is Winston's son, in OTL he was something of a disappointment to his father, he was irascible, bad-tempered, spoilt and had a serious drinking problem. In TTL his father would have died when he was 20 years old, it is possible that not having lived in the shadow of such an overwhelming personality he might have turned out very differently. The quote is not genuine. Note 2 Over US$1 billion OTL and TTL - roughly RM 2.5 billion at the 1938 exchange rate and current (i.e. 1938) prices. To put this in context; after the Anschluss and the subsequent seizure of Austria's gold reserves, Germany roughly doubled its gold reserves to just under US$90 million using the 1938 exchange rate and current prices. Note 3 Hitler planned to change the name of Berlin to this. Note 4 In OTL the advice of Admiral Canaris, the head of the Abwher - the German intelligence service - was one of the principal causes of Franco's refusal to be drawn further into alliance with Hitler who wanted to pressure Franco into one. However, Canaris had long-standing ties to Spain going back to his espionage exploits in WWI. In OTL he was part of the July bomb plot against Hitler. His personal relationship with Franco meant that even as Nazi Germany's official position was being presented, Canaris was whispering cautionary words in Franco's ear. In OTL Canaris was eventually exposed and Hitler indulged in his usual excessive revenge, he was hung with wire and the Nazis even guillotined his wife. In TTL his opposition to the Nazis is less marked because of Germany's greater success. Note 5 It is also possible to view Parsifal as an allegorical expression of Christianity. Wagner's commentary on the opera is contradictory but this very ambiguity suited the Nazis' plan. Note 6 In OTL the dismay at defeats on the Eastern Front caused wide reaching re-appraisal of the armaments industry, here success leaves its inadequacies entrenched. Note 7 There is no such website as jewhist.com, there is however a website called jewfaq.org which would appear to be a dating site for Jewish people and a jewfaqs.com which appears to be a commercial website selling various services. There is no relation between this passage and any of those sites or any others with a similar name. Note 8 This happened in OTL as well for instance SS-Obergruppenfuehrer Dr. Werner Best became the Reich's Plenipotentiary in Denmark, SS-Brigadefuehrer Professor Dr. Franz Alfred Six worked in the Foreign Office in the Cultural Department training the new generation of diplomats, SS-Gruppenfuehrer Dr. Stuckart was State Secretary in the Interior Ministry, SS-Gruppenfuehrer Otto Ohlendorf was Undersecretary of State in the Economics Ministry etc.. Note 9 As he was in OTL Note 10 These charmers were three of the five SS officers responsible for the murder of more than 100 surrendered Canadian soldiers in Normandy OTL. Note 11 It's important to note here that Herman Goering is not the marginalised buffoon of our timeline. The German victory in 1940 has largely disguised the poor showing by the Luftwaffe in the Battle of Britain and their shortcomings have been largely forgotten in the general rejoicing over victory. Furthermore there is no night bombing campaign by the British and Germany has been victorious on the Eastern front further enhancing Goering's prestige.
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PMN1 |
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Posts: 3562 (22-Jun-2008 01:47:17) |
Obergruppenfuhrer Dr. Hans Kammler
Oooooh Hans Kammler, now what do you have planned for him? 
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 NoOneFamous |
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Posts: 1291 (22-Jun-2008 07:49:19) |
Very good
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P3D |
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Posts: 835 (22-Jun-2008 10:30:16) |
What about Japan? With oil continuing to flow from Indonesia, what is is the status of their campaign?
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JNiemczyk |
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Posts: 6527 (22-Jun-2008 16:50:51) |
The invasion of Switzerland (Operation Tannenbaum) in 1943 was successfully mounted and Hitler's power stretched across the entire continent of
Europe
The Germans would have taken pretty serious casualties in such an invasion and the Swiss would have continued to fight even if the Field Army was defeated. In fact Swiss orders to the militia were to disregard any orders to surrender and keep fighting. IMVHO Switzerland would probably turn into a running sore as a surrender would not happen, and the Swiss were pretty anti-German, which it does seem to have done. A good source for Switzerland during WW2 is 'Target Switzerland' by Stephen Halbrook. A nice couple of chapters, and interesting to see the RN getting helicopters ahead of time.
Scotland - Land of the deep fried Mars Bar.
Last Edited By: JNiemczyk
22-Jun-2008 16:57:55.
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trekaddict |
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Posts: 987 (22-Jun-2008 18:18:15) |
This timeline gives me the creeps for several reasons. Nevertheless I shall be following.
Bond: Do you expect me to talk? Goldfinger: No, Mr Bond, I expect you to die! There's nothing about you that I don't already know!
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borys68 |
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Posts: 2598 (22-Jun-2008 18:36:55) |
Ahoj!
I've seen photocopies of the Swiss Army order on surrender. It boils down to: "Any order to surrender will be faked or under duress, and is to be ignored." Borys |
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trekaddict |
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Posts: 988 (22-Jun-2008 19:21:57) |
borys68 wrote: Wasn't something similar issued for the Home Guard in WW2 Britain?
Bond: Do you expect me to talk? Goldfinger: No, Mr Bond, I expect you to die! There's nothing about you that I don't already know!
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borys68 |
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Posts: 2599 (22-Jun-2008 19:29:28) |
Ahoj!
My knowledge of the Home Guard is comparable to what I understand of wimmin 
Borys |
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JNiemczyk |
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Posts: 6529 (22-Jun-2008 23:41:18) |
trekaddict wrote: To be honest I don't know. However the Auxiliary Units (Auxunits) were supposed to fight on no matter what. WSC certainly intended to go down fighting,
he joked about him and Anthony Eden manning a Vickers gun in Downing Street in a last stand.
Scotland - Land of the deep fried Mars Bar.
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Nick Sumner |
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Posts: 592 (23-Jun-2008 03:25:30) |
NoOneFamous wrote: Thanks!
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Nick Sumner |
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Posts: 593 (23-Jun-2008 03:26:44) |
P3D wrote: There will be more detail on Japan in the next couple of chapters.
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Nick Sumner |
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Posts: 594 (23-Jun-2008 03:29:27) |
Jan, Borys, not to give too much away but trying to subjugate Switzerland will be nightmarishly difficult for the Germans,
I think it is probably going to make the problems the Germans had in the Balkans OTL (and TTL) look minor by comparison.
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P3D |
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Posts: 836 (23-Jun-2008 21:45:06) |
Nick Sumner wrote: After the second phase of the campaign, not sure. If the resistance insist, I'd expect the Nazis to relocate the population of Switzerland to once Polish/Ukrainian lands. |
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trekaddict |
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Posts: 989 (23-Jun-2008 22:08:01) |
JNiemczyk wrote: Sounds liek Winston allright. I will also try to put that in my AAR at some point
Bond: Do you expect me to talk? Goldfinger: No, Mr Bond, I expect you to die! There's nothing about you that I don't already know!
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Phill 5 5 3 |
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Posts: 310 (26-Jun-2008 20:57:08) |
I'm not that up on 1930 and 40's international finance and banking but if all those nations who were starring Germanic absorption saw the wighting
on the wall. Why did they not try and put there gold reserves beyond reach of the Germans.
Last Edited By: Phill 5 5 3
27-Jun-2008 00:22:20.
Edited 1 times.
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Nick Sumner |
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Posts: 595 (28-Jun-2008 02:46:24) |
Phill 5 5 3 wrote: Many nations did try to put their gold out of the Nazis way but remember in OTL WW2 governments in exile continued in a state of war whereas in TTL the war is over and no power is still actively engaged fighting the Germans. In this case formal surrenders and treaties will come into effect (dictated from Berlin) and like France in 1870 they will just have to pay up whatever the victor demands - only unlike France in 1870 German victory TTL is more complete with the Wehrmacht being in physical occupation of the countries concerned. In the case of Switzerland, like Austria they have been absorbed by Germany so the Germans get their gold. Gold is heavy and difficult hide and Switzerland is surrounded by hostile territory. If they hide it down a mineshaft then the Germans will simply start executing the families of the employees of the Swiss Central Bank until someone talks. Or the swiss central gold repository could have been Eben Emaeled… That might make a good story actually…
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Pengolodh |
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Posts: 1716 (28-Jun-2008 13:09:23) |
In TTL, what happened to the Norwegian government in exile and the Norwegian gold reserves (the majority had been desposited with British and US banks in
1936-38, but a smaller portion of 48.8 tons, which served to back the Norwegian currency, remained in Norway - historically it was evacuated from Norway to
Britain in April-May 1940, and then in June and July moved on to USA and Canada (with the exception of 5715 oz remaining in Britain)). Does Vidkun Quisling
have a position in the Norwegian government in TTL? Historically his attempted take-over created so much resentment in the Norwegian population that the
Germans decided to sideline him already on April 15th 1940 (and they'd have preferred to get a negotiated solution with the presidium of the Norwegian
parliament creating a (sort of) legitimate government), and he didn't get a formal position again until 1942. Historically Vidkun Quisling was made an
honorary Commander of the Order of the British Empire in 1929 - he didn't loose his CBE until 1944.
The fact that you needed to know was not known at the time that the now known need to know was known, therefore those that needed to advise and inform the Home Secretary perhaps felt the information he needed as to whether to inform the highest authority of the known information was not yet known and therefore there was no authority for the authority to be informed because the need to know was not, at that time, known or needed.
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