Hitler’s soldiers the German army in the Third Reich

838 Pages·2016·7.78 MB·English

by  Ben H. Shepherd

Copyright © 2016 Ben H. Shepherd
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Publication Data
Names: Shepherd, Ben (Ben H.)
Title: Hitler’s soldiers : the German army in the Third Reich / Ben H. Shepherd.
Description: New Haven : Yale University Press, 2016. | Includes bibliographical references.
LCCN 2016003731 | ISBN 9780300179033 (cloth : alkaline paper) LCSH: Germany. Heer—History—
World War, 1939–1945. | Soldiers—Germany—History—20th century. | Germany. Heer—Military life
—History—20th century. | World War, 1939–1945—Germany. | Command of troops—History—20th
century. | World War, 1939–1945—Campaigns. | World War, 1939–1945—Occupied territories. | World
War, 1939–1945—Atrocities. | War crimes—Germany—History—20th century. | BISAC: HISTORY /
Military World War II. | HISTORY Europe Germany. | HISTORY Military / Strategy.
Classification: LCC D757.1 .S54 2016 | DDC 940.54/1343—dc23
LC record available at http://lccn.loc.gov/2016003731
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
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CONTENTS
Preface
Introduction
Part I: Military Ascent, Moral Decline
1 The Army in the New Reich, 1933–36
2 The Road to War, 1936–39
Part II: Triumph and Hubris
3 Poland, 1939–40
4 ‘Sitzkrieg’, 1939–40
5 The Greatest Victory, 1940
6 Occupying the West, 1940–41
7 Planning Operation Barbarossa, 1940–41
8 Barbarossa Unleashed, 1941
Part III: Losing the Initiative
9 Barbarossa Undone, 1941
10 Resistance and Reaction, 1941: Western Europe and Southeast Europe
11 Winter Crisis, 1941–42
12 The Desert War, 1941–42
13 Southern Russia and Stalingrad, 1942–43
14 Faces of Occupation, 1942–43: The Soviet Union
15 Faces of Occupation, 1942–43: Western Europe and Southeast Europe
16 The Initiative Lost, 1943
Part IV: Beleaguered
17 Takeover in Southern Europe, 1943–44
18 The Eastern Front, 1943–44: The Ostheer Retreats
19 The Eastern Front, 1943–44: The Frontsoldat Endures
20 Italy, 1943–44
21 Fortress Europe Breached, 1943–44
Part V: Defeat, Destruction and Self-Destruction
22 The Greatest Defeat, 1944
23 The Army ‘Recovers’, 1944–45
24 The Army Self-Destructs, 1945
Conclusion

Acknowledgements
Appendices
Appendix I: Table of Acronyms
Appendix II: Glossary of German Phrases
Appendix III: Table of Equivalent Ranks
Appendix IV: Figures
Appendix V: Maps
Notes
Bibliography
Index
Notes on Illustrations
PREFACE
Structure
THIS BOOK TELLS the story of the German army under the Third Reich. It
examines the army’s military performance, its relationship with the Nazi
regime, its role in military occupation, and its culpability in war crimes. The end
of the Cold War saw the release of a vast range of primary sources. This more
comprehensive base of information, now made available to western historians,
enabled better informed debate in this area, creating an outpouring of new
scholarly literature on many aspects of the second World War. The present book
is the first general history of the German army under the Third Reich to draw
upon this new literature and the new perspectives it provides.
The book takes a narrative approach to its subject. The first two chapters deal
with the period 1933 to 1939. These chapters primarily consider the context of,
and build-up to, the main period on which the book focuses, that of the Second
World War itself, during which all four of the book’s concerns play central roles.
Literature and sources
In keeping with its broad-based approach, the book draws primarily upon
English-language and German-language secondary literature. For illustrative
purposes, it also draws upon select primary sources: official German army
documents, drawn from the Bundesarchiv-Militärarchiv (BA-MA) in Freiburg-
im-Breisgau; excerpts from soldiers’ letters (Feldpostbriefe) from the Bibliothek
für Zeitgeschichte (BFZ), excerpts of both from various published collections,
and various former officers’ memoirs. The selection of official documents
consists largely of i) material produced by the German high command, and by
larger field formations, concerned with the troops ideological and ‘national-
political’ instruction, and ii) material produced by a selection of German army
divisions, together with the corps and army-level commands to which they were
subordinate, covering issues such as combat, logistics, and the determinants of
troop morale. Divisions were selected on the basis of the comprehensiveness of
archival material pertaining to them, be they official sources or Feldpostbriefe.
The divisions were also selected with a view to assembling a small
representative sample of different types of army division. Hence a small number
of divisions frequently appear at various points in the text. The division that
combines the most extensive sample of Feldpostbriefe with extensive official
material is the 12th Panzer Division. Most of the letter excerpts that the book
utilises are drawn from the Sterz collection at the BfZ. The main reason for this
was accessibility, for an extensive series of excerpts from the letters has been
selected, type up and listed by division, all for the benefit of researchers.
Excerpts from the Schnepf collection, which the BfZ acquired only recently,
have also been used. This is the first book to utilise material from this particular
collection.
Use of terms
The book refers to the German army as ‘the German army’ and not as the
Wehrmacht. Whilst many works emply the term ‘Wehrmacht’ to denote the
German army, this is actually incorrect. ‘Wehrmacht’ directly translates as
Armed Forces, and technically speaking the Wehrmacht comprised not just the
army, but also the air force (Luftwaffe), navy (Kriegsmarine), and, from 1944,
the Waffen-SS. The term ‘Wehrmacht’ is thus used to denote Armed Forces
throughout the book. Other branches of the Armed Forces do receive attention
throughout the book, however. This is particularly the case with the Waffen-SS,
which fought and operated alongside the army but also rivalled it for resources;
and also with the Luftwaffe. The Luftwaffe features in the story in three
respects. Like the Waffen-SS, it was both a fellow armed service for the army
but also a rival for manpower and resources. In addition, high-ranking Luftwaffe
officers frequently acted as commanders of ground forces at army group level
and above. In this capacity, they commanded large numbers of army troops.