Announcement

**redline09** · 12-04-2009, 05:27 PM

Originally posted by PlaceOfBayonets View Post

2. Had he gotten Hitler out, then what?

i cant remember exactly but i did her on a documentary towards the end of the war in Europe, the US high command was worried that hitler was going to head to the mountains (sorry cant remember where) and he could of quite easily continued the war for a while.

sorry dont want to hijack your thread but.. one thing ive never understood is that, Surely if the TR was on its knees and just about to die why didnt they use poison gas to defend them self?

**von Olsson** · 12-05-2009, 04:18 AM

Originally posted by redline09 View Post

sorry dont want to hijack your thread but.. one thing ive never understood is that, Surely if the TR was on its knees and just about to die why didnt they use poison gas to defend them self?

Because Hitler didn´t want to use gas, he hated it since his experience from WWI.

I don´t think Hitler himself wanted to be saved, he saw Wencks army as a last chance to turn (!) the battle.

**Steve P** · 12-05-2009, 04:27 AM

Originally posted by PlaceOfBayonets View Post

Very late War General Wenck with a newly raised army had orders to reach Berlin and save Hitler and the troops who garrisoned Berlin.

Instead he turned and fought a final offensive to link with the surrouned 9th Army near Halbe and saved a large number of them from Soviet Gulags in Siberia.

Had Wenck followed his orders and attacked on the path to Berlin,

1. Could he have been successful?

2. Had he gotten Hitler out, then what?

William

PS, was it lawful under international law to keep Germans POW's in Siberia as long as ten years as many were held? Was the high death rate by design?

Interesting question! And, creates a few questions for me...Did Wenck turn or wa she acting in the only way that was militarily possible at the time?

It may be argued that while far under establishment Wenck's 12th Army maintained the combat power such that is was capable of fighting its way to Berlin, depending on the timing. From his location to the west of Berlin he certainly had the ability to reach the city and attempted to do so when he was so ordered. However, his and other units including a number from the 9th Army were repulsed in this attempt by soviet forces determined to link up and encircle the city under command of Georgi Zhukov. By the time Keitel delivered the message to continue the offensive no further window of opportunity to break through realistically existed.

The question may be asked, how hard did Wenck try in his attempt to relieve Berlin, but I would think that the young, newly appointed Army commander would have done his utmost for the fatherland in this instance and so simply did not have the capability or resources to do anything, but turn and execute a holding action that enabled many German soldiers and units to surrender to that allies in the west. The devil's alternative in Wenck's case was perhaps to do this or, as Keitel would have had it at the 11th hour, execute a desperate and futile action, hurling of the remainder of the battered 12th Army and other ancillary units into a solid wall of soviet fronts at far greater cost in German life for no gain.

Another question, moot though it may be, is whether a successful relief of Berlin by Wenck would have led anything more than a greater swell of POWs and KIA in the city than was the case in the final analysis. Despite the fact that Goring and others (including von Greim and Hannah Reitsch in the final days) tried to convince Hitler to leave Berlin and fly to the Bavarian Alps it was not to be. The allies had been concerned that Hitler and a number of the National Socialist elite, along with some remianing fanatical SS units would attempt to flee into the mountains and continue the war in a geurilla context. However, IMO this was never likely and thus geater loss of life and carnage (one Hitler would likely have supported given his state of mind and view on social Darwinism in the final days) would have ensued. The Fuhrer had to have his grand gotterdammerung and if they could not bring him victory the German soldier and people deserved to die and the coubtry to be completely destroyed" in his view. I would argue that this is what was likely to have happened if Wenck had been successful, merely delaying the inevitable conclusion.

As for the soviet POW situation, International Law is difficult to adjudicate and enforce at the best of times and the laws of armed conflict had not been as tested or evolved as they are today. While the Hague and Geneva Conventions existed with special consideration to the laws of armed conflict and occupying powers, the UN and International Court of Justice were in their infancy and the 'Iron Curtain' had fallen. Could it be proven that the treatment of German POWs and their length of imprisonment (and their absolutely unlawful forced labour in the Gulags) was in accordance with the pertaining laws. Perhaps but it would have been extremely difficult. So, was it lawful? ...Hard to say, but one thinks that the sentiment of the Soviets and Stalin himself (a vindictive, ruthless individual) was not one of magnanimity, more one of exacting vengance in any and all ways. So it may certainly be argued that it was not moral, or ethical or in the spirit of the existing covenants or the latter Universal Declaration on Human Rights (1948).

Pictured below: Signed Photograph of Walther Wenck from my collection.

Attached Files

GdPz Wenck.jpg (38.6 KB, 222 views)

**PlaceOfBayonets** · 12-05-2009, 05:38 AM

Interesting to note that the un conditional surrender mandate prolonged the war, I have to think that the Soviet policy to basically kid nap every German who surrendered also caused German resistance to prolong as long as possible.

If I was a German on the eastern front and knew the odds of coming back home alive I've have fought till I was killed.

W.

**hucks216** · 12-05-2009, 06:04 AM

Let's bear in mind that if things had of gone Hitler's way all those Soviet PoW's that the Germans captured would NEVER of been returned home.

**PlaceOfBayonets** · 12-05-2009, 01:54 PM

Originally posted by hucks216 View Post

Let's bear in mind that if things had of gone Hitler's way all those Soviet PoW's that the Germans captured would NEVER of been returned home.

What of the Soviet POW's who joined in the German cuase and fought for Hitler?

W.

**hucks216** · 12-05-2009, 02:50 PM

I expect that once they had outlived their usefulness they would of gone the same way as the others, either executed in the field, gassed or worked to death as slave labour building the planned German empire in the east.

**PlaceOfBayonets** · 12-05-2009, 02:59 PM

So far as I know there was no plan to exterminate the whole world of non Germans.
Back to the topic, I was not aware Wenk tried to get into Berlin as ordered. I only saw a documentary and it did not address those details.
I just find the history on this case very interesting. So why didn't Hitler fly out of Berlin under cover of darkness?

W.

**hucks216** · 12-05-2009, 04:00 PM

Originally posted by PlaceOfBayonets View Post

So far as I know there was no plan to exterminate the whole world of non Germans.

No, just the so called 'untermensch'.

**hucks216** · 12-05-2009, 04:04 PM

Originally posted by PlaceOfBayonets View Post

So why didn't Hitler fly out of Berlin under cover of darkness?
W.

He didn't want to. He believed that Germany & it's people had failed him and that they no longer deserved a leader such as him and that he would rather take his own life rather than end up on a gallows.

Announcement

Wenck's Army to save Hitler

Wenck's Army to save Hitler

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Comment

Users Viewing this Thread