The Hitler Book by Henrik Eberle

Author:Henrik Eberle
Language: eng
Format: epub, mobi
Publisher: PublicAffairs
Published: 2011-02-28T16:00:00+00:00

14

March 1945

At the beginning of March 1945 Hitler ordered a powerful force to be assembled under the command of General Wöhler1 in the area of Army Group South. This would include Sepp Dietrich’s Sixth Tank Army, which itself comprised such elite SS divisions as the Leibstandarte ‘Adolf Hitler’, ‘Das Reich’, ‘Totenkopf’, ‘Wiking’, ‘Hohenstauffen’, ‘Frundsberg’, ‘Hitlerjugend’ and others.gt Hitler was preparing a counter-offensive on Lake Balaton. The strategic objective was to destroy the great Russian bridgehead between the Danube and the Drau, south-west of Budapest, drive the Russian army back over the Danube and retake Budapest. Hitler planned the operation to eliminate the danger to southern Germany and the oil wells of Lake Balaton. This was the last important source of oil available to Germany, leaving aside the small amounts that came from Austria and Germany.gu Hitler therefore gave orders that the Balaton operation was to be planned with particular care. With this in view he summoned Sepp Dietrich and asked him to lead the operation with total commitment and to crown it with victory, whatever the cost.

The counter-offensive on Lake Balaton was a failure. A few days after the start of the attack the Russians brought the German army to a standstill by delivering heavy blows to the flank, before forcing it back to its points of departure and beyond, even pushing them further to the north-west in the direction of the Austro-Hungarian border and inflicting grievous losses. Hitler instantly dismissed General Wöhler and replaced himgv with General Rendulic,2 an Austrian who had served in that country’s army before the Anschluss. Hitler had given him the Gold Party Badge for his unstinting loyalty to National Socialism.

The failure of the Balaton counter-offensive shook Hitler deeply. The hopes he had invested in the SS divisions were now gone. The briefing was conducted for the first time by General Krebs, who reported on the retreat of Dietrich’s army. Stunned, Hitler sat at the table with his head hanging, staring into the middle distance. When a report about Dietrich was given at a later meeting, and reference was made to the fact that his army had lost an enormous number of men and tanks in the bloody fray, Hitler sat up and thundered, ‘My SS divisions have forgotten how to fight! They have become cowards!’ He fell back into his seat and once more stared dully into the distance, his face twitching. His SS divisions of all people, which he had presented as a model to the whole Wehrmacht and which had been honoured with particular names, now he had to accuse them of cowardice.

After the briefing Hitler called Günsche into his study and asked him whether Dietrich had spoken to him before the Balaton counter-offensive. Günsche said yes. He reported to Hitler that Dietrich had expressed his confidence in the coming operation; he had regretted only that his army was fighting in Hungary and not in Pomerania, as he wanted to fight not for Hungary, but for Germany. Hitler growled, ‘Guderian told him to say that.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.