The Last Prussian by Messenger Charles;

Author:Messenger, Charles;
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 1718493
Publisher: Pen and Sword

One can only presume that von Trott mentioned von Rundstedt’s name in the hope that it would impress the Allies and that he might be able to win him round through the family connection.

In contrast, Rommel was prepared to do something. According to his chief of staff, Hans Speidel, von Stülpnagel and he met at a country house near St Germain on 15 May 1944. Von Stülpnagel deplored von Rundstedt’s resigned attitude to the situation and said that Rommel was now the only officer of sufficient standing to act as the figurehead for the ‘autonomous army’ concept. Rommel agreed to this and brought his subordinate commanders into the secret. He had a further meeting with von Falkenhausen on 2 June, but the Normandy landings took place before the plans for opening negotiations with the Western Allies could be completed.87

The waiting for the invasion to take place was probably getting on von Rundstedt’s nerves, as it had done before Dieppe. With the waiting, the uncertainty as to where the Allies would land also increased. On 8 May, he produced a lengthy appreciation of the situation. He noted that most agents forecast the invasion for the first half of May. He considered that the Allied preparations were complete and that the first wave would comprise 20 divisions. The main force concentrations were between Southampton and Portsmouth and landings could be anywhere between the Scheldt and the tip of Brittany, although the most likely area was Boulogne-Normandy.88 The Allies were not, of course, as advanced in their preparations as von Rundstedt and his staff believed, and he himself relaxed a little once the danger time had past. There are several indicators of this.

On 19 May the Field Marshal visited Pétain at the Chateau Voisons at Rambouillet, not far from Paris. He brought with him an invitation to the French Marshal to accompany Rommel and himself on a tour of the Atlantic Wall on the following Sunday, the 21st. Martin du Gard:

‘Military curiosity uppermost, Pétain accepted; he would have also inspected the last English dispositions before the landing! The political aspect of the trip escaped him. When Tracou pointed out to him the meal that Nazi propaganda would make of his visit, the confusion that it had provoked among his followers, he realised his heedlessness. It was necessary to cancel the engagement. The danger must be emphasised, the possible bombardment. And von Rundstedt, who himself had thought only of the pleasure of discussing military art with a “colleague”, did not insist’.89

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