There Were No Nazis in the German Army

"There were no Nazis in the German Army" - Siegfried Knappe makes this statement in his book (Soldat: Reflections of a German Soldier) and I find it...intriguing.

He states that Politics was not part of Army life and that as soldiers, they were not allowed to vote. He does point out that a certain General (I will have to look up his name) was a rarity in that he was not only a General, but also a Nazi. After the assassination attempt on Hitler, at his Wolfs Lair, the Nazis implemented the equivalent of the Russian Commissars, where a Nazi political officer would be on hand to observe, to make sure all orders were followed and that there was do dissent towards the party.

So - where do the SS units fall in all of this? Are they not considered part of the Army? The impression I got was that they were not only pro-German (when talking about SS-Nordland and other such units) but were either pro-Nazi or were Nazis, which was the main driving force behind them. My German is terrible, but I do recall that special units were setup to go into the areas after the Army had marched through them to begin extermination of Jews etc and to start moving them to Concentration Camps. I assumed these units were also part of the Army, given that they were armed etc.

Of course, these days, 'ever' German in WWII was a 'Nazi'...so is his statement, a first hand account, accurate or is it more of a "He was covering his own Ass" sort of thing?

 

About 10% of the German population were party members (8 million out of 80 million). Party members got preference for government or political jobs, so it's probably true that your average Wehrmacht guy was unlikely to be a Nazi, or at least not a party member. Whether they drank the Nazi Kool-Aid and were actual believers/supporters becomes ambiguous when the war ended.

And no, the Waffen SS wasn't part of the army (Wehrmacht). They were technically under party control, though the lines are blurred since they were often under the direct command of a greater army group headed by a Wehrmacht officer. Even in the SS, the majority were not party members. I don't know why since they were certainly "true believers" until late in the war when the Waffen SS began conscripting and pressuring ethnic Germans and men from other arms into the Waffen SS. For example, large numbers of Luftwaffe and Navy personnel were simply transferred in as infantry replacements.

In essence, it depends on whether the question is framed as party "members" or party "supporters." I suspect the great majority of soldiers and civilians alike were supporters (until the going got rough), but few were actual members.

 

That is where my confusion comes in, as in many places he was in charge of units fighting alongside or next to the SS units, or even had Hitler Youth directly under his command - the latter being a brainwashed group of young boys, all clearly Nazi's.

According to his beliefs, he supported the jobs and nationalism that Hitler created, and supported taking back the Sedetenland and Austria and the Rhineland, along with Danzig as these were all part of Germany prior to the Treaty of Versailles (or predominantly were German people. I am not sure on the accuracy of his statement, but he stated that roughly 90% of Austrians voted to 'join' Germany during the Anschluss). So, in his mind, they were taking back what was rightfully theres and what should not have been taking away from them.

Invading France was also justified in his mind, as the French and British had declared war on the Germans (and not vice versa). He gets a little murky when it comes to the Russians - he did not see a reason to invade them, especially as they had a treaty that said they were friends - but his job was that of a soldier and he wasn't aware of the 'Bigger Picture' like a politician or Hitler would be. The invasion of Russia is basically the start of where he becomes disenfranchised with Hitler and the Nazi party - especially once it becomes clear that the war was being lost yet all the orders were to 'defend to the last man' when it would make more sense to pull back and regroup etc.

When i get home, I'll pull some quotes from the book that I find to be quite enlightening.

 

Not necessarily part of the Wehrmacht but attached to the rear end of the advance and working side by side.

Info on the Einsatzgruppen:

"The German army provided logistical support to the Einsatzgruppen, including supplies, transportation, housing, and occasionally manpower in the form of units to guard and transport prisoners. At first the Einsatzgruppen shot primarily Jewish men. By late summer 1941, however, wherever the Einsatzgruppen went, they shot Jewish men, women, and children without regard for age or sex, and buried them in mass graves. Often with the help of local informants and interpreters, Jews in a given locality were identified and taken to collection points. Thereafter they were marched or transported by truck to the execution site, where trenches had been prepared. In some cases the captive victims had to dig their own graves. After the victims had handed over their valuables and undressed, men, women, and children were shot, either standing before the open trench, or lying face down in the prepared pit...

The Einsatzgruppen received much assistance from German and Axis soldiers, local collaborators, and other SS units. Einsatzgruppen members were drawn from the SS, Waffen SS (military formations of the SS), SD, Sipo, Order Police, and other police units."

(USHMM)

 

The most frightening aspect of this is that roughly 10% of a well educated industrialized country could not only take control of it but cause more horror, death, destruction, and mayhem than in any event in the history of mankind. That to be is scary.

Gaines

 

Thats another thing he pointed out - that a lot of the 'worst Nazis' were highly educated, with college degrees, doctorates, and even one who had two doctorates.

 

Is Model the general you refer to?

 

Need to be careful of that particular statement, I've seen those sentiments used too many times in an attempt to excuse the excesses of the Nazis - "If they were such enlightened, educated people...surely what they did can't have been THAT wrong..."

As mentioned above, from a slightly different angle, it's clear that some elements of the Wehrmacht saw themselves as the front leaders, the forward wave of National Socialism....the movement rather than the Party membership Thinking here of Student's FJ in the early war years, and other elements like that.So there would have been plenty of Nazi sentiment in the ranks, while maybe not so much actual Party membership.

I'm also tempted to guess that as the war progressed, and German society became far more militarized...or maybe paramilitarized might be a more accurate term?...the many and various organisations' hierarchies and command structures took the place of "mere" party membership for men and women in uniform, whatever the uniform might be?

Another factor would be, countering any "natural wastage" in war winnowing out full Party pin carriers, would be as the six years of the war progressed....and callup ages both dropped AND more and more recruits came into uniform that had been through the full indoctrination process I.E. the HJ...then the Wehrmacht would become, by definition, more full of little brainwashed National Socialists from the bottom up. Not party members...but certainly legions of little Adolf lovers educated as such from their earliest days. HJ membership was by no means universal as we might think - anything up to a third of German youths of eligible age actually missed being in the Hitler Youth for various reasons - but I mean that as a subset of the population as a whole, the Wehrmacht would draw more and more from that subset of indoctrinated young males as the war progressed

 

Nope, I believe his name was 'Scharne' or something similar. Gave a big rallying speech before the defense of somewhere, also enforced a rule where any German soldiers found behind the front line were hanged for 'desertion' - Knappe, with his red lined pants, was okay (you needed a written order/permission to be behind the front) but noted that the restaurant he was in was virtually empty because of this rule, but it did instill discipline and order in the troops.

 

"Boys being 'clearly' Nazis"? Being under the command of a dictator makes you his weapon, not his ideological child.

 

Was it Schoerner?

 

Schoerner - sounds about right. Yes, Wiki confirms it to be him - "German veterans particularly criticized Schörner for a 1945 order that all soldiers found behind the front lines, who did not possess written orders to be in that particular area, were to be court-martialed on the spot and hanged if found guilty of desertion.[5] This is mentioned in the writings of Siegfried Knappe, Hans von Luck, and Joseph Goebbels." (The part I was referring to).

 

Does it make them any less "believers"...?

 

It was Field Marshal von Schörner that Knapp referenced. He had various encounters with him. It was a mutual agreement that any Waffen SS units fighting at the front would follow Heere directives but would always be under the direct authority of the party. Now interestingly enough, Sepp Dietrich always wanted to model his units on the Army and instead of following the SS order of organization (ie schar, truppe, sturm) used regular army designations. Sepp had no problems working with the commanders from the army.

 

I'm sure that would be very different if the study compared 1939-1942 vs 1943-1945.

 

Utter tripe.

In 1938, with the storms of war gathering, with Germany bluffing on Czechoslavakia, many officers waffled on the wisdom of their leadership, but not on the policies, opinions, or direction the Nazi state had taken.

In 1941, after the successful invasion of France, Nazi policies were natural, accepted, expected, and definitely not questioned.

Then in 1946, those same policies were unacceptable, and (it was claimed) had never really been acccepted by anyone outside Hitler's most immediate and intimate circle, all which were dead, imprisoned, awaiting trial, or fleeing justice.

The time for expressing disgust with the twisted, self-glorifying, nationalistic, and xenophobic directions and policies was not in retrospect after they were defeated, nor when the sheer madness of murdering Jews in their millions (which the army also partook of) was going on, but well before.

As in years before; basic humanity requires it.

Just because the army weren't card-carrying hard cases every last man-jack of them, does not mean they get a "get-out-of-jail-free" card. Quite the opposite.

Face it; there was no other organisation that could've forced a change of direction post 1933. That this was not the culture in the German army, does not remove their moral obligation towards civilisation, humanity, and common, decent morality.

The Wehrmacht failed. Repeatedly. By not taking a stand against the Nazi inhumanity and immorality, they gave their quiet acquiesence.

 

Well stated.