Document 10
CSDIC (UK), SR REPORT, SRGG 156 [TNA, WO 208/4165]
LUDWIG CRÜWELL – General der Panzertruppe – Captured 29 May 42 in North Africa.
HEINRICH-HERMANN VON HÜLSEN – Oberst (OC 21st Panzer Division) – Captured 12 May 43 in Tunisia.
Information received: 26 June 43
CRÜWELL: I believe ARNIM (PW) is frightfully well-meaning, frightfully nice. I haven’t said anything to him yet, but I certainly must speak to him, he really ought to realise it for himself – but to me this eternal grumbling is terrible.
HÜLSEN: I’ve made up my mind, too, that if it happens again I shall have something to say about it.
CRÜWELL: Well, we can put it like this: either one says to oneself, ‘Hullo, things are going wrong,’ then it is not the right thing to throw all the blame on the FÜHRER, especially for those people who always used to cheer him the loudest.
HÜLSEN: And who have got the most to thank him for, because if a man jumps from Oberst to General der Panzertruppen in a single year, then he ought to mind his step; but I mean indulging in nothing but negative criticism and malicious grins—[26]
CRÜWELL: I mean, what happens if one adopts the attitude, as we have done, of saying that we are bound to believe in victory? I find it so unseemly to paint everything in its worst colours now. The worst one can say is that we are pursuing an ostrich policy.
HÜLSEN: Yes, of course that’s what they do say, but things haven’t gone as far as that yet.
CRÜWELL: It isn’t like that, and besides, if things turn out differently, I shan’t care a damn, but it would be shameful for me, as a General, if I had thrown in the sponge and started grumbling.
HÜLSEN: Before, when they were still there, they talked in quite a different way. I should just like to know whether those people who talk the loudest really acted according to their principles when they were in a tight corner – or whether they didn’t just carry out their orders and say, ‘My superiors can take the responsibility for that.’
CRÜWELL: I so often think about that at night; in the first place I don’t think that things are as serious or as desperate as all that, and secondly I consider it so completely unsoldierly and unworthy.
HÜLSEN: Above all there’s one thing which we must not forget, that we have given our oath. After all, he is my ‘FÜHRER’. And here they are every day sitting down and pulling him to pieces.
CRÜWELL: I won’t do that. I won’t do that – whatever they say. But today everything now happening—
HÜLSEN: ‘It’s the fault of the German Reich,’ … ‘the English are all charming fellows.’ There’s one thing I should like to say, Sir, that, if the pessimists here are not controlled in time, we shall get two factions here. Then they will always be digging at one another, and one clique will be formed here and another clique there. In my opinion it is the Generaloberst’s job to stop that, before the matter has gone past repair. It’s only natural that a thing like that can gather momentum very quickly.
CRÜWELL: It would be my business to tell him, if I saw that the situation had become so serious. I have already spoken to him about it.
HÜLSEN: I believe that in general it is not so serious yet. We must try first of all to curb that among our friends, and I have decided to speak to some of them privately. Next time I’m with BROICH (PW) I shall say to him: ‘Listen, BROICH, all this running down of the FÜHRER and all that won’t make the slightest difference to our fate. If we adopt that attitude, then in time we shall become great friends of ENGLAND and enemies of GERMANY and after all that is our Fatherland!’ CRAMER (PW) also adopts the attitude of negative criticism.
CRÜWELL: We must do something about that. Let us stick together.
HÜLSEN: Yes.
CRÜWELL: That is the only right thing to do – that is the Prussian attitude – the attitude of gentlemen. […]
Document 11
CSDIC (UK), SR REPORT, SRGG 161 [TNA, WO 208/4165]
DR PAUL MEIXNER – Kapitän (N.O. i/c LA GOULETTE, TUNIS) – Captured 11 May 43 in Tunis.
GOTTHART FRANTZ – Generalleutnant (GOC 19th Flak Division) – Captured 12 May 43 in Tunisia.
Information received: 27 June 43
FRANTZ: I should like to tell you one thing. When one hears the radio here, or reads the newspaper, one always hears such critical remarks. The circle of grumblers here is fairly large. Above all General THOMA (PW) makes such remarks. We have the misfortune to have three GOC’s from AFRICA here as PW. We must see to it that these critical remarks are ignored, and that one does not become involved in discussion about them. General CRÜWELL (PW) and several others are against it. We must strengthen this circle of anti-grumblers and make a stand against these people. […]
Document 12
CSDIC (UK), SR REPORT, SRGG 204 [TNA, WO 208/4165]
HANS-JÜRGEN VON ARNIM – Generaloberst (GOC Army Group Africa) – Captured 12 May 43 in Tunisia.
Information received: 9 July 43
ARNIM: Recently morale has been fluctuating somewhat here. I know under what tremendous strain you, as commanders, and your forces were placed, and the fact that you and your men were able to carry out your duties is certainly no reason to strike a note of depression or to be sad; on the contrary, you should be proud of your troops, proud of your own achievements; it would be difficult for any other nation, any other army, to do what our troops did there. Whether the time which we were given to held out there achieved its purpose or not, is no longer a matter for discussion – I am convinced that it did. Gentlemen, the TUNIS affair cannot be looked upon as a debit but as a moral credit for us. A real ground for depression is the fact that we are now out of it and can no longer take an active part as soldiers and fighters in arms. In spite of that, we are and we remain part of the nation even if we are PW, and in spirit we are intimately bound up with the decisive battle of our Fatherland. We have perhaps more time to think things over than people at home, but we are and we remain soldiers as long as we live.
It is obvious, gentlemen, that we are still in harness as far as the war of nerves is concerned and it is clear that each one of us is worried and starts thinking: ‘What will happen now? Have we sufficient means? Have we sufficient men?’ It is also obvious that we ask ourselves these questions with the best will in the world, but we must consider one thing, and that is that when we continue to discuss, I might almost say ‘thrash out’, those problems, the fact that in our present position we are occasionally inclined to take a gloomy view of things doesn’t help our people and doesn’t help us to bear our lot. We must be content with the fate which is ours. Then each one of us has his own private troubles to bear, no matter what they are, and from a purely human standpoint I do not think it right for us to aggravate those by talking about them too much, although it is quite understandable. Each one of us has quite enough to bear. Quite apart from that, it is catching, and the only thing we can do to help our Fatherland is to see that our letters from here are happy, confident and optimistic, especially as we are PW. The people at home must say: ‘Good Heavens, the PW have such confidence in us and in our Fatherland, and so the devil take us if we don’t win!’ We must not unload our troubles, whether they are justified or not, either onto our comrades here or onto our friends at home. The question of whether any particular anxiety is genuine or not, is justified or not, doesn’t come into the question and should not be discussed. I do not want to talk about it at all. All that matters is how we can best help each other to bear our lot and help the people at home by improving their morale rather than by undermining it.
26
This observation was most probably aimed at General von Thoma, who took four and a half years to progress from Oberst to General der Panzertruppe, although the last promotion from Generalleutnant to General der Panzertruppe took only four months.