On the 24th General Montgomery launched his great offensive on the lower Rhine and the Luftwaffe's attempts to prevent the crossing proved hopelessly ineffective. When the news came through Hitler sent for the unfortunate Koller, and so lashed him with his tongue for an hour without stopping that when the poor old man emerged from the Fьhrer’s sanctum he was white, shaking and in tears.
By then the Remagen bridgehead was thirty miles deep, and further north the British and Americans were streaming over the new crossings in their tens of thousands. In a frantic effort to stave off complete defeat another spate of murderous decrees was rushed out. That issued by Keitel read:
In the name of the Fьhrer.
Any officer who aids a subordinate to leave the combat zone unlawfully, by carelessly issuing him a pass or other leave papers citing a simulated reason, is to be considered a saboteur and will suffer death. Any subordinate who deceitfully obtains leave papers or who travels with false leave papers will, as a matter of principle, suffer death.
And General Blaskowitz, the Commander of Army Group H, in Holland, supplemented it by issuing a decree of his own, announcing that any soldier found away from his unit who declared himself to be a straggler looking for it should be summarily tried and shot.
The Replacement Army was scraped to the bottom of the barrel and new units of teenagers or sexagenarians, for whom it had not yet been possible even to find uniforms, were sent up to the front. Their pleas that if captured while still in civilian clothes they would shot as franc-tireurs were ignored, and they were being driven into battle by S.D. men threatening to mow them down with machine guns from behind.
From von Below Gregory learned that Hitler had sent for Speer and in a demonic spate of words that had gone on for hours poured out his reaction to the Minister of Armament's letter. The Fьhrer had said, 'If the war is to be lost, the nation will also perish. This fate is inevitable. There is no need to consider the basis of even the most primitive existence any longer. On the contrary, it is better to destroy even that, and to destroy it ourselves. The nation has proved itself weak, and those who remain after the battle are of little value; for the good have fallen.' In vain Speer pleaded that, for humanity's sake, those who survived should at least be left the material means by which they could sustain life. Hitler would not listen and ordered Speer to go away on permanent leave. Speer had refused, saying that it was his duty to remain at his post.
When he had gone Hitler, trembling and purple in the face, issued further orders through Bormann. As the Allies advanced, everything in their path was to be destroyed: factories, railway junctions, power stations, houses; everything was to be blown up or burnt down. Nothing was to be left. Since the German people had betrayed him they were not entitled even to the means to continue to exist after Germany 's defeat.
Next day, March 3oth, as so often happened the storm was succeeded by calm. After the daily conference Hitler sent for Gregory and told him that he wished him to accompany him on his late afternoon walk round the Chancellery garden. Together they ascended the stairs at the far end of the bunker and emerged into the spring sunlight. Immediately they began their promenade Hitler said, `Tell me your reasons for believing in reincarnation.'
`?Mein Fuhrer, they are quite simple,' Gregory replied, and proceeded to produce the arguments he had thought out as most likely to appeal to his megalomaniac companion.
`No sensible person can believe in the Christian God or, for that matter, any personal God. The very conception of a universal resurrection followed by a judgement, awarding all of us either perpetual bliss or consigning us to eternal torment, on our conduct during one short span of life, is absurd. One has only to think of those who are born half-witted or as the children of criminal parents. What chance in life have they? To condemn such unfortunates because they had led evil lives would be a travesty of justice. And what of young people who die when still in their teens? Are they to be held fully responsible for their actions? Were you or I brought before such a tribunal we should feel only contempt for a God who had given life to men on such arbitrary terms; so the teaching that He exists must be false.'
`I agree. I agree,' Hitler said huskily.
`Yet,' Gregory went on, `that the spirit which animates man continues to exist after death none of us who knows anything about the occult can doubt. If, therefore, there is no personal God to whom our spirits are accountable, it follows that we are our own masters and responsible only to ourselves for our acts down here. But nothing stands still. The declaration of Gautama Buddha, when he said that everything of which we are aware is in a state of either growth or decay, cannot be challenged. It applies not only to vegetable and animal life, but also to mountains, the earth itself and every heavenly body in the universe. Since it is a universal law our personalities must also be subject to it. This could not be more clearly demonstrated, mein Fuhrer, than by giving only a moment's consideration to your own personality. One thinks of your wisdom as a law giver, your great abilities as a strategist, your extraordinary flair for creating beautiful buildings, your immense knowledge of every aspect of life of the people over whom you rule. All these abilities could not conceivably have been accumulated in the short space of fifty odd years.'
`I see that. Yes, you are right.'
`Between your mind and that of an Australian aborigine there lies an immense gulf; and the explanation of that is simple. Such a man can have lived only a few lives whereas, in different bodies, as men or women, rich or poor, healthy or crippled, you have had many hundreds; and in each you have progressed, learning some lesson which is stored up in your subconscious. It is rarely given to people to be able to recall their former lives, but the lessons they have learned remain. How can one doubt that it is owing- to this vast experience that in your present incarnation you have emerged as the genius that everyone acknowledges you to be?'
At that moment Bormann came hurrying across the garden, a piece of paper in his hand. Having given his `Heil Hitler!' he said, "Mein Fuhrer, only my duty and my devotion to you give me the courage to make this report. But it would be wrong to conceal even the worst news from you. This signal has just come in from Field Marshal Model. His entire army has been cut off in the Ruhr, and he asks permission to fight his way out.'
The blotches on Hitler's face stood out more clearly as it drained of blood. Suddenly he screamed, `Abandon the Ruhr! Never! Never! Dolts! Fools! Traitors! These Generals should be burnt over a slow fire for their cowardice and crimes. Model is to hold the Ruhr to the last man. If they are driven in, as the circle narrows they are to destroy everything. Everything. What good will Krupps be to us if we lose the war?
The plants must be blown up-not one brick or girder left upon another.'
Ignoring Gregory, he trudged off with Bormann, still shouting at the top of his, voice and wildly waving his good arm.
Speer was again summoned, but remained in the outer bunker for some time before Hitler would see him. He told the officers there that nothing would induce him to carry out the Fьhrer’s orders for the destruction of everything in Germany which could help those of the German people who survived to carry on their lives somehow and, eventually, enjoy prosperity again. On the contrary, he was using his own immense powers as the Controller of German. Industry and Labour to ensure that everything possible should be saved from thee wreck. He had ordered that no more explosives were to be made and that as the Allies advanced every piece of undamaged plant was to be handed over to them intact. To check the fanatical S.S. in attempts to enforce the orgy of destruction the Fьhrer had decreed, he was now issuing hand grenades and sub-machine guns to the staffs of all factories and installations, so that they could prevent the sabotaging of the plants on which their future would depend.