WILDERMUTH: What do you mean by ‘holding out’ now?
HEYKING: We don’t know that a revolution won’t break out among the enemy, because they have no desire to fight any longer. What are the Americans fighting for? They’re bound to ask themselves that some time.
WILDERMUTH: All right then we’ll wait for the enemy to make a peace offer, the return of the colonies, FRANCE, CHERBOURG—
HEYKING: No, not that, but to enter into negotiations—
WILDERMUTH: But no one will negotiate with that government, nobody could negotiate with them.
HEYKING: It’s no use talking to you. I’ve just told you that even if our government did resign now, there would be no peace in spite of that. We shall still hold out, and the German people will go through thick and thin and won’t give in at all, and then when the enemy can’t get any further they’ll come to us to arrange terms.
MEYER: We can see that in GREECE now;[122] don’t you think that the ordinary English people and the French and the Dutch and the Swiss etc. will gradually open their eyes – damn it all, what will happen if we have communist activity all over EUROPE?
WILDERMUTH: Don’t you think that the English or Swiss man-in-the-street sees that we have been the most active pacemaker of communism in EUROPE?
MEYER: EISENHOWER now has broadcast daily: ‘The German churches will be opened.’ Where is the German church closed?
WILDERMUTH: They didn’t close any churches, but that the church has been persecuted with every means – it’s a question of the elimination of a country in the heart of EUROPE, which has carried Russian methods right into that heart.
HEYKING: Herr WILDERMUTH, you’ve still got one man here who thinks as a German!
WILDERMUTH: But so do I.
HEYKING: After what you’ve said I can no longer credit you with that.
WILDERMUTH: I was speaking from the other people’s point of view, and those things are the trump card which we ourselves have given them.
HEYKING: We were discussing what would happen if our government resigned. Do you think the German soldiers would lay down their arms and accept the conditions?
WILDERMUTH: No, we were speaking at cross-purposes.
HEYKING: No, we’ve experienced the ‘fourteen points’ once, we either die or—
WILDERMUTH: We shan’t be able to agree on that point.
HEYKING: Either we shall die, or they will collapse in the process too.
WILDERMUTH: The thing that I’m concerned about is that we shall no longer have a chance to rise.
MEYER: Whether we capitulate or not—
HEYKING: We shall never rise again, you can depend on that. They’ve drawn up quite different peace terms from those after the last World War, I’m convinced of that.
WILDERMUTH: You may be right there. But we finally destroy all chance of rising again if we continue the actual fighting too long.
HEYKING: No, no, I’m for sticking it out because I say the fellows wont stay for ever on a given frontier – the Americans no longer know what they’re fighting for, and if they suffer heavy casualties they’ll say: ‘Well, what am I really doing here?’
WILDERMUTH: It will be over in the spring, they will get through in the spring at the latest. Then it’s all over.
HEYKING: Really, Herr WILDERMUTH, opinions like that!
MEYER: For shame!
HEYKING: I mean, after all, we’re still German officers.
WILDERMUTH: Well, probably I’m the person here who has suffered most for GERMANY, and for that reason I have a right to expect people to listen to my point of view.
HEYKING: I don’t dispute it, but all the same, one shouldn’t take that as the only possibility.
Document 52
CSDIC (UK), GRGG 234
Report on information obtained from Senior Officers (PW) on 18 Dec. 44 [TNA, WO 208/4364]
BROICH: That is the last attempt. If that comes to nothing, then it is all up. If they are attacking on a 50 km front, that can never develop into a big break-through, besides here are the ARDENNES and you can’t get any further there – I don’t know what the Americans there are like – perhaps if they are taken by surprise they may be able to capture 20,000 Americans, if all goes well, but all I would say is that it will cause great inconvenience but I don’t think that it will make much odds in the long run.[123]
Document 53
CSDIC (UK), GRGG 235
Report on information obtained from Senior Officers (PW) on 21–2 Dec. 44 [TNA, WO 208/4364]
HEIM: It will be like this: as with all his other illusions HITLER has really put his heart and soul into this affair and has done everything to this end. Perhaps it will be the last.
EBERBACH: It won’t be his last. This man will never stop having illusions. When he is standing under the gallows he will still be under the illusion that he’s not going to be hanged.
MEYER: I just hope that our offensive will succeed in finally splitting the British and Americans.
EBERBACH: I fear the opposite will be the case.
MEYER: I don’t consider the offensive strong enough to bring about the decision in the West, and I consider an offensive in the West which is not strong enough to undermine all the Western partnerships to be very dangerous for us.
EBERBACH: Of course.
RAMCKE (to CHOLTITZ): This offensive is enormous. The German people will not be defeated. You watch, we will pursue the Allies right across France and hurl them into the Bay of Biscay.
Document 54
CSDIC (UK), GRGG 237
Report on information obtained from Senior Officers (PW) on 21–2 Dec. 44 [TNA, WO 208/4364]
MEYER: It is like this with the FÜHRER: I was with him and he began talking: one had to watch like a lynx in order to get a word in, and at that moment he began again and talked and talked and talked until – for half an hour, three-quarters of an hour – he brings up problems and shows you that things are not right after all. You go away and say to yourself: ‘That’s all right, he knows better.’
CHOLTITZ: No. I went away saying: ‘I’m afraid he is mad.’ (Laughter).[124]
MEYER: Then I found out one thing, that KEITEL and all the people there said on principle: ‘Yes, my FÜHRER!’ ‘Yes, my FÜHRER!’ ‘Yes, my FÜHRER!’ No matter what he said, they replied: ‘Yes, my FÜHRER!’ The moment a man arrived from the front – I don’t know how it was with Generals – but KEITEL and the rest tried to influence the man as to what he should say.
CHOLTITZ: No, that didn’t happen to me, of course I think I would have told him where he got off. (Laughter).
MEYER: I can truthfully say that I told the FÜHRER what I considered to be right. The last time I was there was in 1943. A great part of the blame lies with the FÜHRER’s immediate entourage.[125]
CHOLTITZ: My dear fellow, I know a little too much about that to be able to agree with you and I must tell you of an excellent proverb which says: ‘Every man gets what he deserves.’ If I dismiss seven field-marshals because they tell me the truth, if I dismiss about thirty commanding generals because they tell me the truth – that’s asking too much – If I dismiss all those who tell me the truth – and who afterwards turn out to be right, and I still won’t admit – When civilians at home say to me: ‘You Generals are to blame,’ I say: ‘We? We didn’t vote for him, it’s you who always voted for him. We can’t do anything about it if he’s become legally Supreme Commander. We can’t mutiny, you know!’ ‘Well then, who is to mutiny?’ The Army knew it wouldn’t work that way. This ‘Putsch’ of 20 July will be regarded as an event of historic significance. Those 1,500 men, hanged by these criminals, will all get a memorial dedicated to them, for they were the only patriotic, resolute and ‘ready to act’ men that we had. For they foresaw the utter desolation we were being led into, if things went on as they were.
122
After the withdrawal of German forces from Greece, the Greek Government in exile took over the running of affairs. The Communist EAM left the government on 1.12.1944. In December 1944 and January 1945 heavy fighting occurred with British forces. After three years of civil war, in 1949 the pro-monarchists gained control of Greece. Tim Jones, ‘British Army’; Smith, ‘Victory of a Sort’.
123
During the Ardennes offensive from 16.12.1944 to 24.12.1944 US forces lost 8,497 dead, 46,170 wounded, 15,000 prisoners and 5,900 missing. ‘Das Deutsche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg’, Vol. 9/1, p. 632.
125
There are no documents relating to Meyer’s visits to Hitler. In his memoirs he only mentions receiving the Oak Leaves from Hitler at FHQ Winniza, Ukraine, at the end of February 1943. Kurt Meyer, ‘Grenadiere’, p. 185f.