Rommel myth

The book cover of the 1953 edition of The Rommel Papers, edited by B. H. Liddell Hart. It was one of the foundational texts that built and sustained the Rommel myth.[1]

The Rommel myth (German: Mythos Rommel), also known as the Rommel legend, refers to a view that the German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel was an apolitical, brilliant commander and a victim of the Third Reich due to his (now disputed by historians) participation in the 20 July plot against Adolf Hitler. The myth was created, with Rommel's participation, as a component of Nazi propaganda to praise the Wehrmacht and instill optimism in the German public. Starting in 1941, it was picked up and disseminated in the West by the British press as the Allies sought to explain their continued inability to defeat the Axis forces in North Africa.

Following the war, the Western Allies, and particularly the British, depicted Rommel as the "good German" and "our friend Rommel". His reputation for conducting a clean war was used in the interest of the West German rearmament and reconciliation between the former enemies – Britain and the United States on one side and the new Federal Republic of Germany on the other.

The 1950 biography Rommel: The Desert Fox and the 1953 publication of The Rommel Papers laid the foundation of the post-war myth, which was sustained by further uncritical accounts. The myth proved resilient in the face of subsequent attempts to present Rommel in a proper historical context.

Origins

The origins of the myth can be found first in Rommel's drive for success as a young officer in World War I, and then in his popular 1937 book Infantry Attacks, which was written in a style that diverged from the German military literature of the time. The book became a bestseller and was supposedly read by Adolf Hitler.[2][3]

Rommel received a promotion to a general's rank from the Führer ahead of more senior officers, skipping a rank. Rommel was subsequently able, with an intervention from Hitler, to obtain command of a Panzer division despite being earlier turned down by the army's personnel office, which had offered him command of a mountain division. Going against military protocol, this was noted by Rommel's fellow officers and added to Rommel's growing reputation as one of Hitler's favored commanders.[4][5] Historian Antony Beevor places the start of the "Rommel legend" on May 13, 1940, during the Battle of France, when his troops crossed the Meuse under fire and established bridgeheads at Houx and Dinant.[6]

In Nazi and Allied propaganda

Rommel at a Paris victory parade (June 1940). Rommel had access to Reich Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels via Karl Hanke, who served under Rommel during the 1940 campaign in France.[7]

Rommel's victories in France were featured in the German press and in the February 1941 film Victory in the West, in which Rommel personally helped direct a segment reenacting the crossing of the Somme River.[8] Rommel's victories in 1941 were played up by the Nazi propaganda, even though his successes in North Africa were achieved in arguably one of Germany's least strategically important theaters of World War II.[3][n 1] In November 1941 Goebbels wrote about his intention to have Rommel "elevated to a kind of popular hero". Rommel, with his innate abilities as a military commander and love of the spotlight, was a perfect fit for the role Goebbels designed for him.[3]

In North Africa, Rommel received help in cultivating his image from Alfred Ingemar Berndt, a senior official at the Reich Propaganda Ministry who had volunteered for military service.[12] Seconded by Goebbels, Berndt was assigned to Rommel's staff and became one of his closest aides. Bernd often acted as liaison between Rommel, the Propaganda Ministry and the Führer Headquarters. He directed Rommel's photo shoots and filed radio dispatches describing the battles.[13][14]

In the spring of 1941, Rommel's name began to appear in the British media. In the autumn of 1941 and early winter of 1941/1942, he was mentioned in the British press almost daily. Toward the end of the year, the Reich propaganda machine also used Rommel's successes in Africa as a diversion from the Wehrmacht's challenging situation in the Soviet Union with the stall of Operation Barbarossa.[15][16][n 2] The American press soon began to take notice of Rommel as well, following the country's entry into the war on 11 December 1941, writing that "The British (...) admire him because he beat them and were surprised to have beaten in turn such a capable general". To counteract any demoralizing effect such articles might have on the British troops, General Auchinleck distributed a directive to his commanders seeking to dispel the notion that Rommel was a "superman".[17][18]

The attention of the Western and especially the British press thrilled Goebbels, who wrote in his diary in early 1942: "Rommel continues to be the recognized darling of even the enemies' news agencies."[19] The Field Marshal was pleased by the media attention, both domestic and foreign, often discussing it in letters to his wife.[19][n 3] Hitler took note of the British propaganda as well, commenting in the summer of 1942 that Britain's leaders must have hoped "to be able to explain their defeat to their own nation more easily by focusing on Rommel."[20]

The Field Marshal was the German commander most frequently covered in the German media, and the only one to be given a press conference, which took place in October 1942.[14][21] The press conference was moderated by Goebbels and was attended by both domestic and foreign media. Rommel declared: "Today we (...) have the gates of Egypt in hand, and with the intent to act!" Keeping the focus on Rommel distracted the German public from Wehrmacht losses elsewhere as the tide of the war began to turn. He became a symbol that was used to reinforce the German public's faith in an ultimate Axis victory.[22]

Military reverses

In the wake of the successful British offensive in November 1942 and other military reverses, the Propaganda Ministry directed the media to emphasize Rommel's invincibility. The charade was maintained until the spring of 1943, even as the German situation in Africa became increasingly precarious. To ensure that the inevitable defeat in Africa would not be associated with Rommel's name, Goebbels had the Supreme High Command announce in May 1943 that Rommel was on a two-month leave for health reasons.[23][n 4] Instead, the campaign was presented, by Berndt, who resumed his role in the Propaganda Ministry, as a ruse to tie down the British Empire while Germany was turning Europe into an impenetrable fortress, with Rommel at the helm of this success. After the radio program ran in May 1943, Rommel sent Berndt a case of cigars as a sign of his gratitude.[23]

One of the many propaganda photographs of Rommel's inspection tours along the Atlantic Wall.

Although Rommel then entered a period without a significant command,[25] he remained a household name in Germany, synonymous with the aura of invincibility.[26] Hitler then made Rommel part of his defensive strategy for Fortress Europe (Festung Europa) by sending him to the West to inspect fortifications along the Atlantic Wall. Goebbels supported the decision, noting in his diary that Rommel was "undoubtedly the suitable man" for the task. The propaganda minister expected the move to reassure the German public and at the same time to have a negative impact on the Allied forces' morale.[26]

In France, a Wehrmacht propaganda company frequently accompanied Rommel on his inspection trips to document his work for both domestic and foreign audiences.[27][28] In May 1944 the German newsreels reported on Rommel's speech at a Wehrmacht conference, where he stated his conviction that "every single German soldier will make his contribution against the Anglo-American spirit that it deserves for its criminal and bestial air war campaign against our homeland". The speech led to an upswing in morale and sustained confidence in Rommel.[29]

When Rommel was seriously wounded on 17 July 1944, the Propaganda Ministry undertook efforts to conceal the injury so as not to undermine domestic morale. Despite those, the news leaked to the British press. To counteract the rumors of a serious injury and even death, Rommel was required to appear at the 1 August press conference. On 3 August, the German press published an official report that Rommel had been injured in a car accident. Rommel noted in his diary his dismay at this twisting of the truth, belatedly realising how much the Reich propaganda was using him for its own ends.[29]

Post-war

Quoting Correlli Barnett ("The Desert War entered the British folk-memory, a source of legend, endlessly re-written as both history and fiction"), the historian Lucio Ceva argues that even though the myth was of British origin, it found its reflections in post-war West Germany.[30] The historian Peter Caddick-Adams suggests that, following the forced suicide, Rommel emerged as the "acceptable face of German militarism, the 'good' German who stood apart from the Nazi regime".[31] The ground was thus fertile for the myth to be reborn after the war, in the interest of the program of the German rearmament and the Allied–West German reconciliation.[16][32]

After the outbreak of the Korean War in 1950, it became clear to the Americans and the British that a German army would have to be revived to help face off against the Soviet Union. Many former German officers, including Adolf Heusinger and Hans Speidel, who had served on Rommel's staff in France, were convinced that no future West German Army would be possible without the rehabilitation of the Wehrmacht. In October 1950, at the behest of West German chancellor Konrad Adenauer, a group of former senior officers produced the document that later became known as the Himmerod memorandum. Intended as both a planning and a negotiating tool, the document included a key demand for "measures to transform domestic and foreign public opinion" with regards to the German military.[33][34]

Foundational works

Early accounts

Rommel's former enemies, especially the British, played a key role in the manufacture and propagation of the myth.[3][35] The German rearmament was highly dependent on the moral rehabilitation that the Wehrmacht needed. The journalist and historian Basil Liddell Hart, an early proponent of these two interconnected initiatives, provided the first widely available source on Rommel in his 1948 book on Hitler's generals, updated in 1951. Portraying Rommel as an outsider to the Nazi regime in the 1948 edition, Liddell Hart concluded the 1951 text with comments on Rommel's "gifts and performance" that "qualified him for a place in the role [sic] of the 'Great Captains' of history".[36]

Rommel: The Desert Fox

The other foundational text was the influential and laudatory biography 1950 Rommel: The Desert Fox by Brigadier Desmond Young.[37][38][n 5] Young had served in North Africa in the Indian Army in a public relations capacity, and was once taken prisoner by Rommel's troops.[37] Young extensively interviewed Rommel's widow and collaborated with several individuals who had been close to Rommel, including Hans Speidel, with Liddell Hart also supporting the project. Speidel had already written in 1946 that he planned to turn Rommel into "the hero of the German people", to give them a positive role model. Rommel was a suitable candidate, since the manner of his death had led to the assumption that he had not been a supporter of Nazism. Young subscribed to this view, subtly conveying that Rommel served the regime, but was not part of it.[32][39] The result was predictably positive, "bordering on hagiography", according to the historian Patrick Major.[39][n 6]

The reception of The Desert Fox in Britain was enthusiastic, with the book going through eight editions in a year.[40] Young's biography was another step in the development of the Rommel myth – with Rommel emerging as an active, if not a leading, plotter. Speidel contributed as well, starting, from the early 1950s, to bring up Rommel's and his own role in the plot, thus boosting his [Speidel's] suitability for a future role in the new military force of the Federal Republic, the Bundeswehr, and then in NATO.[41]

The book was not without its detractors. The review in Time magazine noted the legendary status Rommel had achieved in his lifetime and quoted another review that described Rommel as "the British army's favorite German general". The Time reviewer concluded that the book was "just this side of hero worship" and, quoting Ernest Bevin, a noted Labour politician, alluded to it being an example of the "trade union of generals" in action: Field Marshal Claude Auchinleck, in a foreword to the book, honoured Rommel "as a soldier and a man", and Field Marshal Archibald Wavell included him "among the chosen few, among the very brave, the very true." The reviewer noted the obvious admiration Young had for the German generals, and that the book may well "have been written by [one]".[42]

Writing in The Daily Telegraph, under the title "Rommel: A Flattering and Unconvincing Portrait", the conservative journalist Malcolm Muggeridge wrote that the 1951 movie based on the book represented "a tendency towards collective schizophrenia whereas (...) 'chivalry' towards a captured brigadier is in no wise incompatible with a foreign policy of perfidy and the brutal disregard for all the elementary decencies of civilised behaviour". Richard Grossman, a Labour MP, objected to the portrayal of Rommel as an anti-Nazi, writing (quotation marks and emphasis in the original):[43]

As a nation, we deceive ourselves into believing that there are two sorts of Germans—the Good German and the Bad German. The "Bad Germans" are Nazis, militarists, anti-democratic, and perpetrators of atrocities. The "Good Germans" are peace-loving democrats and real gentlemen. Ergo, since Rommel was a clean fighter, he must have been anti-Nazi, and men like him would make good allies of democracy against the Russians.

The historian Hugh Trevor-Roper commented that "the danger now is not that 'our friend Rommel' is becoming not a magician or a bogy-man, but too much of a hero" (quotations in the original). He pointed out Rommel's early proximity to Hitler and presented Rommel as representative of the support that the Wehrmacht officer corps offered for "Hitler's politics and Hitler's war".[44]

The Desert Fox film

The 1951 movie The Desert Fox: The Story of Rommel, based on Young's biography, portrayed Rommel in a sympathetic way, as a loyal, humane soldier and a firm opponent to Hitler's policies.[45] The movie played up Rommel's disputed role in the conspiracy against Hitler,[46] while omitting Rommel's early association with the dictator.[45] Critical and public reception in the U.S. was muted, but the movie was a success in Britain, along with a less known 1953 movie The Desert Rats, where Mason reprised his portrayal of Rommel.[47]

Partick Major argues that the desert war indeed proved a suitable space to effect the reconciliation among the former enemies. The British popular history focused on the reconstruction of the fighting in that theatre of war, almost to the exclusion of all others. He states that The Desert Fox had a "catalytic effect" in creating an image of the German Army that would be acceptable to the British public.[40] The film received nearly universally positive reviews in Britain, while protests at the movie theatres broke out in Vienna and Milan. Liddell Hart watched the movie with a group of high-ranking British officers and reported being "pleasantly surprised".[48][n 7]

The Rommel Papers

1953 saw the publication of Rommel's writings of the war period as The Rommel Papers, edited by Liddell Hart, the former Wehrmacht officer Fritz Bayerlein, and Rommel's widow and son, with an introduction by Liddell Hart. The historian Mark Connelly argues that The Rommel Papers was one of the two foundational works that lead to a "Rommel renaissance", the other being Young's biography.[1][n 8] The book contributed to the perception of Rommel as a brilliant commander; in an introduction, Liddell Hart drew comparisons between Rommel and Lawrence of Arabia, "two masters of desert warfare", according to Liddel Hart.[49]

Meanwhile, Liddell Hart had a personal interest in the work: by having coaxed Rommel's widow to include material favorable to himself, he could present Rommel as his "pupil". The controversy was described by the political scientist John Mearsheimer in his work The Weight of History, who concluded that, by "putting words in the mouths of German Generals and manipulating history", Liddell Hart was in a position to show that he was at the root of the dramatic German success in 1940.[50][51]

Uncritical accounts

The trend continued with other uncritical biographies, such as Rommel as Military Commander (1968) by the former Desert Rat and author Ronald Lewin and Knight's Cross: A Life of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel (1994) by the high-ranking British officer David Fraser.[52][53] These works focused on the military career of Rommel, depoliticising it and presenting Rommel strictly as a soldier.[54]

In another work on the North African campaign, the 1977 The Life and Death of the Africa Korps, Lewin wrote that it was "necessary to assert that (...) the purity of the desert purified the desert war", while Frasure focused on Rommel's battlefield performance and described him as a hero.[54] According to the historian Mark Connelly, Fraser's work "encapsulates the post-1945 hagiographic approach". Connelly offers the example of Fraser writing about Rommel as one of the "great masters of manoeuvre in war", whose personalities "transcend time" and "cut like [a] sabre through the curtains of history".[55]

The historian Patrick Major points out a recent work, the 2002 book Alamein: War without Hate by Colin Smith and John Bierman that borrowed the name of Rommel's posthumous memoirs for its subtitle.[54] Connelly includes works by Sir John Squire and General Sir John Hackett in the uncritical tradition.[56] In contrast, German biographies, such as by the military historian Wolf Heckmann, were far less sympathetic.[56]

Elements of the myth

According to the historian Mark Connelly, Young and Liddell Hart laid the foundation for the Anglo-American myth, which consisted of three themes: Rommel's ambivalence towards Nazism; his military genius; and the emphasis of the chivalrous nature of the fighting in North Africa.[1] Their works lent support to the image of the "clean Wehrmacht" and were generally not questioned, since they came from British authors, rather than German revisionists.[57][n 9]

Historian Bruce Allen Watson offers his interpretation of the myth, encompassing the foundation laid down by the Nazi propaganda machine. According to Watson, the most dominant element is Rommel the Superior Soldier; the second being Rommel the Common Man; and the last one Rommel the Martyr.[59] The leading German news magazine Der Spiegel describes the myth as "Gentleman warrior, military genius".[60][n 10]

Reevaluation

Recent scholarship examined Rommel's attitude towards National Socialism, his performance as a military commander, his role in the 20 July plot and his motivations, leading to a different interpretations of the elements of the myth.

Relationship with National Socialism

Rommel, as other Wehrmacht officers, welcomed Nazis' rise to power.[61][4] Numerous historians, such as Reuth, Zabecki, Watson and Caddick-Adam, state that Rommel was one of Hitler's favorite generals and that his close relationship with the dictator benefited both his inter-war and war-time career.[5][62][4] Historian Robert Citino describes Rommel as "not apolitical" and writes that his owed his career to Hitler, to whom Rommel's attitude was "worshipful", while the historian Charles Messenger describes Rommel's "growing admiration" towards Hitler following the invasion of Poland.[14][63][n 11]

The historian Alaric Searle recasts Rommel's early involvement with the Nazi regime, including his role as a liaison between Hitler Youth and the Wehrmacht. Young's biography had described Rommel's role in strictly military terms and alluded to a falling out between him and the Hitler Youth leader Baldur von Schirach on ideological grounds. In fact, Rommel had proposed a plan (twice) that would have subordinated Hitler Youth to the army, removing it from the NSDAP control. That went against Schirach's wishes, resulting in Rommel's quiet removal from the project. Searle describes another of Young's assertions, that Rommel first became close to Hitler in the fall of 1938, as "patently untrue", casting doubts on the rest of Young's narrative as it pertains to Rommel's relationship with the dictator.[65]

The close relationship between Rommel and Hitler continued following the Western campaign; after Rommel sent to him a specially prepared diary on the 7th Division, he received a letter of thanks from the dictator.[66][n 12] Searle argues that Rommel not only "found favor with the Nazi regime, but (...) was delighted with the preferential treatment he was receiving". In a sign that he "lost touch with reality", as Searle puts it, Rommel wrote to his wife in October 1939 from the devastated Warsaw, where he was organising a victory parade: "The inhabitants drew a breath of relief that we have arrived and rescued them."[67]

When Rommel was being considered for appointment as Commander-in-Chief of the Army in the summer of 1942, Goebbels wrote in his diary Rommel "is ideologically sound, is not just sympathetic to the National Socialists. He is a National Socialist; his is a troop leader with a gift for improvisation, personally courageous and extraordinarily inventive. These are the kinds of soldiers we need".[62]

Operational and strategic level commander

The British military and political figures contributed to the heroic image of the man as Rommel resumed offensive operations in January 1942 against the British forces weakened by redeployments to the Far East. Speaking before the Parliament, Churchill addressed the British defeats and described Rommel as a "extraordinary bold and clever opponent" and a "great field commander".[68][69] The trend continued after the war, following the publication of The Desert Fox. Former military opponents in Britain described Rommel as a brilliant commander and a resistance fighter, the "good German", with one senior military figure comparing Rommel to legendary military leader Belisarius. The praise led Brian Horrocks, Montgomery's former deputy, to publish an article "The Rommel Myth Debunked" in April 1950 in which he argued that the 8th Army beat Rommel's Africa Corps "fair and square".[70]

Certain contemporary historians, such as Larry T. Addington, Niall Barr and Robert Citino, are skeptical of Rommel as an operational, let alone strategic, level commander. They point out to Rommel's lack of appreciation for Germany's strategic situation, his misunderstanding of the relative importance of his theatre to the German High Command, his poor grasp of logistical realities, and, according to the historian Ian Beckett, his "penchant for glory hunting".[71][14] Citino credits Rommel's limitations as an operational level commander as "materially contributing" to the eventual demise of the Axis forces in North Africa,[14][n 13] while Addington focuses on Rommel's disobedience and struggle over the North Africa strategy, whereby his initial brilliant success resulted in "catastrophic effects" for Germany in this theatre of war.[72]

The historian Geoffrey P. Megargee refers to Rommel as a "talented tactical leader", but points out his playing the German and Italian command structures against each other to his advantage. Rommel used the confused structure (the OKW (Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht), the OKH (Supreme High Command of the Army) and the Italian Supreme Command) to disregard orders that he disagreed with or to appeal to whatever authority he felt would be most sympathetic to his requests.[73] Rommel often went directly to Hitler with his needs and concerns, taking advantage of the favoritism that the Führer displayed towards him and adding to the distrust that the German High Command already had of him.[74]

Military practitioners have also questioned Rommel's abilities at the operational level. While nearly all acknowledge Rommel's excellent tactical skills and personal bravery, many officers came to accept that Rommel was "possibly the most overrated commander of an army in world history", writes U.S. Major General and military historian David T. Zabecki of the United States Naval Institute, quoting the opinion of Wolf Heckmann. Zabecki notes that Rommel's brilliant tactical moves were logistically unsustainable, which eventually led to a strategic defeat.[5][n 14] General Klaus Naumann, who served as Chief of Staff of the Bundeswehr, agrees with Charles Messenger that Rommel had challenges on the operational level, and states that Rommel's violation of the unity of command principle, bypassing the chain of command in Africa, was unacceptable.[75][n 15]

Some historians, such as Zabecki and Peter Lieb, also take issue with Rommel's absence from Normandy on the day of the Allied invasion, 6 June 1944. He had left France on 5 June and was at home on the 6th celebrating his wife's birthday. Rommel either planned or claimed to have planned to proceed to see Hitler the next day to discuss the situation in Normandy.[76][77] Zabecki calls his decision to leave the theatre in view of an imminent invasion "an incredible lapse of command responsibility".[76]

Role in 20 July plot

Main article: 20 July plot

The extent of Rommel's involvement in the military's resistance against Hitler or the 20 July plot is difficult to ascertain, as people most directly involved did not survive and limited documentation on the conspirators' plans and preparations exists. Thus, Rommel's participation remains ambiguous and the perception of it largely has its source in the subsequent events (especially Rommel's forced suicide) and the post-war accounts by surviving participants.[78]

According to a post-war account by Karl Strölin, the Oberbürgermeister of Stuttgart at that time, he and two other conspirators, Alexander von Falkenhausen and Carl Heinrich von Stülpnagel began efforts to bring Rommel into the anti-Hitler conspiracy in early 1944.[79] On 15 April 1944 Rommel's new chief of staff, Hans Speidel, arrived in Normandy and reintroduced Rommel to Stülpnagel.[80] Speidel had previously been connected to Carl Goerdeler, the civilian leader of the resistance, but not to the plotters led by Stauffenberg, and only came to the attention of Stauffenberg due to his appointment to Rommel's headquarters. The conspirators felt they needed the support of a field marshal on active duty, and gave instructions to Speidel to bring Rommel into their circle.[81]

Speidel met with former foreign minister Konstantin von Neurath and Strölin on 27 May in Germany, ostensibly at Rommel's request, although the latter was not present. Neurath and Strölin suggested opening immediate surrender negotiations in the West, and, according to Speidel, Rommel agreed to further discussions and preparations.[82] Around the same time, however, the plotters in Berlin were not aware that Rommel had reportedly decided to take part in the conspiracy. On 16 May, they informed Allen Dulles, through whom they hoped to negotiate with the Western Allies, that Rommel could not be counted on for support.[83]

Rommel opposed assassinating Hitler. After the war, his widow maintained that Rommel believed an assassination attempt would spark a civil war.[84] Historian Ian Beckett argues that "there is no credible evidence that Rommel had more than limited and superficial knowledge of the plot" and concludes that Rommel would not have acted to aid the plotters on 20 July,[85] while Ralf Georg Reuth contends that "there was no indication of any active participation of Rommel in the conspiracy."[86] Historian Richard J. Evans concluded that he knew of a plot, but was not involved.[87]

What is not debated are the results of the failed bomb plot of 20 July. Many conspirators were arrested and the dragnet expanded to thousands.[88] Consequently, it did not take long for Rommel to come under suspicion. Rommel was primarily implicated through his connection to his superior Field Marshal Günther von Kluge, who committed suicide when recalled to Berlin.[85] Rommel's name also came up in forced confessions by Stülpnagel and Stülpnagel's personal adviser, Caesar von Hofacker, and was included in Goerdeler's papers on a list of potential supporters.[89][90]

English works, however, have almost fully ignored new primary sources and the most recent findings in German academia. They link Rommel closer to the 20 July plot. The author and cinematographer Maurice Philip Remy discovered a memo from Martin Bormann dating from 28 September 1944 in which the Chief of the Party Chancellery and Personal Secretary to Hitler stated that "former General Stülpnagel, former Colonel Hofacker, Kluge's meanwhile executed nephew Lieutenant-Colonel Rathgens and other defendants still alive gave all testimony that Field-Marshal Rommel was indeed in the picture; Rommel agreed that he would be at the new government's disposal after a successful plot." [91] In his book "Abgehört" (English translation: "Tapping Hitler's generals") Sönke Neitzel edited the eavesdropped conversations of German generals in British captivity. In a conversation the former commander of 5th Panzer Army, general Heinrich Eberbach, had with his son in September 1944, Eberbach claimed Rommel had told him in Normandy just a few days before the plot that Hitler and his entourage would have to be killed, if there was any chance for Germany to bring this war to a satisfactory end.[92] Summarising the most recent findings on Rommel's role in the 20 July plot, Peter Lieb concludes in an article published in the German journal Contemporary History Quarterly: Rommel "did not play any role in the operational preparations for the plot against Hitler and we do not know which post he was supposed to assume after a successful coup. Hence, the Field-Marshal was definitely not part of the most inner circle of the 20 July plotters. At the same time, however, he was more than just a mere sympathiser and paid for this with his life. He consequently deserves a firm place in the military resistance against Hitler to a greater extent than it has recently been acknowledged in academia and in public."[93] Lieb also stresses that the Nazis did not execute any higher ranking Wehrmacht officer in the aftermath of the 20 July if they had not found enough evidence for a participation in the plot.

Analysis of motivations

Rommel was an ambitious man who took advantage of his proximity to Hitler and willingly accepted the propaganda campaigns designed for him by Goebbels.[61][n 16] Messenger points out that Rommel had many reasons to be grateful to Hitler, including his interference to arrange for Rommel to receive command of an armoured division, his elevation to the status of a national hero, and continued interest and support from the dictator. Messenger argues that Rommel's attitude towards Hitler changed only after the Allied invasion of Normandy, when Rommel came to realise that the war could not be won.[63]

Patrick Major describes Rommel as someone who went along with the regime as long as it served his needs, a "fellow traveler rather than a war criminal".[94] Summing up Rommel's career in a 2012 interview with Reuters, the historian Sönke Neitzel states:[46]

On the one hand he didn't commit war crimes that we know of and ordered a retreat at El Alamein despite Hitler's order. But he took huge German casualties elsewhere and he was a servant of the regime. He was not exactly a shining liberal or Social Democrat. Mostly, he was interested in his career.

Contradictions and ambiguities

According to recent assessments of Rommel, he was much more complex than the firmly established post-war reputation as a military genius and someone ambivalent towards the Nazi regime.[95] Works, such as the 2002 documentary and book of the same name, Mythos Rommel, by Remy and the 2004 book Rommel: Das Ende einer Legende ("Rommel: The End of a Legend") by German historian Ralf Georg Reuth, started a reevaluation of Rommel's role in history.[38]

Caddick-Adams writes that Rommel was a "complicated man of many contradictions",[96] while Beckett notes that "Rommel's myth (...) has proved remarkably resilient" and that more work is needed to put him in proper historical context.[78] Zabecki concludes that "the blind hero worship (...) only distorts the real lessons to be learned from [his] career and battles",[5] and the historian Bruce Allen Watson notes that the legend has been a "distraction" that obscured the evolution of Rommel as a military commander and his changing attitudes towards the regime that he served.[97]

See also

References

Notes

  1. ↑ Niall Barr: "...came to fame in a theatre which held almost no strategic interest for Hitler whatsoever".[9] Martin Kitchen: "German historians have largely ignored the North African campaign, not only because it was peripheral...".[10] James Robinson: "German thinking was disinterested with an expanded strategic purpose in North Africa and Rommel knew it."[11]
  2. ↑ Peter Caddick-Adams: "Rommel's advances over the winter 1941-42 became a very useful distraction away from Germany's failure before Moscow".[16]
  3. ↑ Quote from one of Rommel's letters, January 1942: "The opinion of me in the world press has improved".[19]
  4. ↑ Peter Lieb: "Hitler was well aware that it would be unwise (...) to link the downfall of Army Group Africa to the name of Rommel, the child of Joseph Goebbel's propaganda machinery".[24]
  5. ↑ Martin Kitchen: "Early biographies, such as that by Desmond Young, were positively adulatory."[10]
  6. ↑ Patrick Major: "Young had relied extensively on interviews with the Field Marshal's surviving widow, son and former comrades so that the positive picture that emerged is perhaps hardly surprising. Yet the overall effect bordered on hagiography".[39]
  7. ↑ Major writes, quoting Liddell Hart: "'went to see it in a very critical frame of mind, from past experience of "Hollywood" handling of history', but 'was pleasantly surprised'."[48]
  8. ↑ Connelly also uses the term "Anglophone rehabilitation".[1]
  9. ↑ Kitchen: "The North African campaign has usually been seen, as in the title of Rommel's account, as 'War without Hate', and thus as further proof that the German army was not involved in any sordid butcheing, which was left to Himmler's SS. While it was perfectly true that the German troops in North Africa fought with great distinction and gallantry, (...) it was fortunate for their subsequent reputation that the SS murderers that followed in their wake did not have an opportunity to get to work." Kitchen further explains that the sparsely populated desert areas did not lend themselves to ethnic cleansing; that the German forces never reached Egypt and Palestine that had large Jewish populations; and that, in the urban areas of Tunisia and Transpolitania, the Italian government constrained the German efforts to discriminate against or eliminate Jews who were Italian citizens.[58]
  10. ↑ Spiegel Online: "Gentleman warrior, military genius. The legend of Erwin Rommel, the German Field Marshal who outfoxed the British in North Africa, lives on."[60]
  11. ↑ Robert Citino: "His career had been based solely on Hitler's favor, and we might reasonably describe his attitude toward the Führer as worshipful."[14] Peter Caddick-Adams: "As is now clear, Rommel had been very close to Hitler and the Third Reich..."[64]
  12. ↑ Charles Messenger: "He [Rommel] did receive one present that pleased him. He had sent Hitler a meticulously prepared diary of his division's exploits and received a letter of thanks just before Christmas. 'You can be proud of your achievements', Hitler wrote."[66]
  13. ↑ Robert Citino: "His disinterest in the dreary science of logistics, his love of action, his tendency to fly off to wherever the fighting was hottest—all of these qualities (...) are problems in a commander under modern conditions, and they all contributed materially to the disaster that ultimately befell him and his army in the desert."[14]
  14. ↑ According to David T. Zabecki, Rommel's insubordination also played a role, leading to a calamitous misuse of resources when Rommel went over the head of his superior, Field Marshal Albert Kesselring, to appeal directly to Hitler to approve an assault on Egypt instead of occupying Malta, as Kesselring and OKW were planning.[5]
  15. ↑ Klaus Naumann: "Rommel's way out in Africa—bypassing the chain of command by seeking direct access to Hitler—must never be taken as an example to be followed." Naumann states that, as "one of the battle-proven principles", "unity of command must be preserved". Rommel did not follow this principle, which allowed him to achieve some tactical victories, but this contributed to eventual operational and strategic failure in North Africa. [75]
  16. ↑ Klaus Naumann: "Rommel was used by the Nazi regime to create a myth. He tolerated this since he had a strong dose of personal ambition and vanity."[61]

Citations

  1. 1 2 3 4 Connelly 2014, pp. 163-163.
  2. ↑ Watson 1999, p. 157-158.
  3. 1 2 3 4 Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 471–472.
  4. 1 2 3 Watson 1999, p. 158.
  5. 1 2 3 4 5 Zabecki 2016.
  6. ↑ Beevor 2012, pp. 89-90.
  7. ↑ Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 210–211.
  8. ↑ Watson1999, p. 158-159.
  9. ↑ Barr 2014, p. 60.
  10. 1 2 Kitchen 2009, p. 9.
  11. ↑ Robinson 1997.
  12. ↑ Watson 1999, p. 159.
  13. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 124.
  14. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 Citino 2012.
  15. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 136-139.
  16. 1 2 3 Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 471.
  17. ↑ Watson 1999, p. 166-167.
  18. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 141-143.
  19. 1 2 3 Reuth 2005, p. 144.
  20. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 148.
  21. ↑ Reuth 2005, pp. 144-146.
  22. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 150-152.
  23. 1 2 Reuth 2005, pp. 154-158.
  24. ↑ Lieb 2014, p. 113.
  25. ↑ Lieb 2014, p. 113-115.
  26. 1 2 Lieb 2014, pp. 117-118.
  27. ↑ Lieb 2014, p. 120.
  28. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 159.
  29. 1 2 Reuth 2005, p. 159–161.
  30. ↑ Ceva 1990, pp. 97-98.
  31. ↑ Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 471–473.
  32. 1 2 Searle 2014, pp. 9.
  33. ↑ Smelser & Davies 2008, pp. 72–73.
  34. ↑ Wette 2007, pp. 236-237.
  35. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 2.
  36. ↑ Searle 2014, pp. 8, 27.
  37. 1 2 Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 478.
  38. 1 2 Beckett 2014, pp. 1-2.
  39. 1 2 3 Major 2008, p. 522.
  40. 1 2 Major 2008, p. 521.
  41. ↑ Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 474.
  42. ↑ Time 1951.
  43. ↑ Major 2008, p. 524.
  44. ↑ Major 2008, p. 524-525.
  45. 1 2 Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 480–481.
  46. 1 2 Chambers 2012.
  47. ↑ Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 481.
  48. 1 2 Major 2008, p. 525.
  49. ↑ Major 2008, p. 526.
  50. ↑ Mearsheimer 1988, pp. 199–200.
  51. ↑ Luvaas 1990, pp. 12-13.
  52. ↑ Fraser 1993.
  53. ↑ Searle 2014, pp. 7, 26.
  54. 1 2 3 Major 2008, p. 527.
  55. ↑ Connelly 2014, pp. 169.
  56. 1 2 Connelly 2014, pp. 162-163.
  57. ↑ Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 483.
  58. ↑ Kitchen 2009, p. 10.
  59. ↑ Watson 1999, pp. 157-161.
  60. 1 2 Friedmann 2007.
  61. 1 2 3 Naumann 2009, p. 190.
  62. 1 2 Reuth 2005, p. 54.
  63. 1 2 Messenger 2009, pp. 185-186.
  64. ↑ Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 472.
  65. ↑ Searle 2014, pp. 19-21.
  66. 1 2 Messenger 2009, p. 60.
  67. ↑ Searle 2014, p. 24.
  68. ↑ Watson 1999, p. 166−167.
  69. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 141−143.
  70. ↑ Major 2008, p. 523.
  71. ↑ Beckett 2014, pp. 4−6.
  72. ↑ Addington 1967.
  73. ↑ Megargee 2000, p. 97.
  74. ↑ Watson 1999, p. 164−165.
  75. 1 2 Naumann 2009, pp. 189−190.
  76. 1 2 Zabecki March 2016.
  77. ↑ Lieb 2014.
  78. 1 2 Beckett 2014, p. 6.
  79. ↑ Shirer 1960, pp. 1031, 1177.
  80. ↑ Hart 2014, pp. 142–150.
  81. ↑ Hart 2014, pp. 139–142.
  82. ↑ Hart 2014, p. 146.
  83. ↑ Hart 2014, pp. 145–146.
  84. ↑ Hart 2014, p. 140: Sourced to Speidel (1950) Invasion 1944: We Defended Normandy, pp. 68, 73.
  85. 1 2 Becket 2014, p. 6.
  86. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. tbd.
  87. ↑ Evans 2009, p. 642.
  88. ↑ Hart 2014, pp. 152.
  89. ↑ Hart 2014, pp. 141, 152.
  90. ↑ Reuth 2005, p. 183.
  91. ↑ Remy 2002, p. 277.
  92. ↑ Neitzel 2005, p. 137.
  93. ↑ Lieb 2013, p. 343.
  94. ↑ Major 2008, p. 534.
  95. ↑ Beckett 2014, pp. 4-6.
  96. ↑ Caddick-Adams 2012, p. 485–486.
  97. ↑ Watson 1999, p. 162-163.

Bibliography

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