The last surviving member of the officer’s plot to kill Hitler has just died at 90.
I’m stunned, frankly, that there was a surviving participant. The plot was by Prussian army officers, culminating in a brief case of explosives that failed to kill Hitler. After that, anyone remotely rumored to be connected was quickly executed, which is part of why I was surprised about the death of a survivor. His account, as told in this AP story, is truly remarkable:
As a 22-year-old German army lieutenant, Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist volunteered to wear a suicide vest to a meeting with Adolf Hitler and to blow himself up along with the Nazi dictator.
The assassination didn’t come to pass, but von Kleist went on to play a key role in the most famous attempt on Hitler later that same year, and was the last surviving member of the group of German officers who tried and failed to kill the Fuehrer on July 20, 1944. …
The von Kleist family was a long line of Prussian landowners, who had served the state for centuries in high-ranking military and administrative positions.
Von Kleist’s father, Ewald von Kleist, was an early opponent of Hitler even before he came to power, and was arrested many times after the Nazi dictator took control in 1933. The elder von Kleist famously traveled to England in 1938, the year before World War II broke out, to try and determine whether other Western nations would support a coup attempt against Hitler, but failed to get the British government to change its policy of appeasement.
Despite his family’s opposition to the Nazis, younger von Kleist joined the German army in 1940, and was wounded in 1943 in fighting on the Eastern Front.
During his convalescence, he was approached in January 1944 by Col. Claus von Stauffenberg, another officer from an aristocratic family, and presented with a plan to kill Hitler. Von Kleist had been chosen as the officer to model a new uniform for Hitler, and von Stauffenberg proposed that he wear a suicide vest underneath, and detonate it when he stood next to the dictator.
Years later von Kleist remembered explaining the suicide plot to his father, who paused only briefly before telling his 22-year-old son: “Yes, you have to do this.”
“He got up from his chair,” von Kleist remembered, according to an account by The New York Times, “went to the window, looked out of the window for a moment, and then he turned and said: ‘Yes, you have to do that. A man who doesn’t take such a chance will never be happy again in his life.’”
“Fathers love their sons and mine certainly did, and I had been quite sure he would say no,” von Kleist recalled. “But, as always, I had underestimated him.”
The suicide attack plan never came to fruition.
Months later, however, von Kleist was approached again by von Stauffenberg to take part in what would become known as the July 20 plot…. Von Kleist was supposed to play a key role as the person who was to carry a briefcase packed with explosives to a meeting with Hitler. In a change of plans, however, von Stauffenberg decided to plant the bomb himself.
Von Stauffenberg placed the bomb in a conference room where Hitler was meeting with his aides and military advisers at his East Prussian headquarters. Hitler escaped the full force of the blast when someone moved the briefcase next to a table leg, deflecting much of the explosive force.
Von Kleist remained in Berlin, charged with overseeing the arrest of officers and officials loyal to Hitler in the city.
But when news spread that Hitler had survived, the plot crumbled and von Stauffenberg, von Kleist’s father, and scores of others were arrested and executed in an orgy of revenge killings. Some were hanged by the neck with piano wire. Von Stauffenberg was shot by firing squad.
Von Kleist himself was arrested, questioned at length by the Gestapo, and sent to a concentration camp, but then inexplicably let go and returned to combat duty.
The von Kleist family was a long line of Prussian landowners, who had served the state for centuries in high-ranking military and administrative positions.
I trust that there were many, many Prussians and many, many other German nationals who had considerable wealth at the outset of WWII. Those who had the ways and means probably took as much of their treasures as they could to Switzerland and holed up for the duration. What became of those fortunes and those people?
I have never read any history of German family empires that survived the war. Do any of our readers have suggested books on this topic?
Likewise, shocked to learn that any of the plotters were still alive
None of my books on Nazi Germany mentions why young von Kleist wasn’t executed. It gets a bit tricky: he was Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist-Schmenzin, not to be confused, apparently, with the Ewald von Kleist who was a field marshal. Ewald-Heinrich’s dad was Ewald von Kleist-Schmenzin, a civilian conspirator who was executed. This family tree sort of explains the Schmenzin branch’s relation to the field marshal, himself a descendant of some famous German authors.
Field-Marshal von Kleist was fired by Hitler in March 1944 for having ordered his army to retreat rather than be overrun by the Red Army, but he may have still been able to exert enough pull to save his young relation; that would be my first guess, anyway.
Erk … where did my comment from earlier this morning go?
The von Kleist family was a long line of Prussian landowners, who had served the state for centuries in high-ranking military and administrative positions.
I’ve read at different places in the past that it was a particular stroke of genius by Hitler to require the officers of the Wehrmacht to swear an oath of loyalty not just to Germany, but to Hitler himself. Under the psychology of these people at the time, it became unthinkable to break this oath, even though, objectively, they could see Hitler was leading the nation to destruction. It is remarkable that some people were able to think outside of this prevailing mindset and plot to kill Hitler.
It is also too tempting to judge people in history with contemporary standards without regard to the then prevailing conditions those people found themselves confronting.
While I was away interviewing witnesses, Anderson, your comment dropped into my spam filter. I have no idea how or why, but it’s now back. Sorry about that.
Just glad I’m not crazy. In this instance, at least. I suppose the link did it. Thanks!pppp
… I might have added to my 1st comment that being sent to fight the Russians in 1945 was like, shall we say, Russian roulette.9′poh
On gz
“being sent to fight the Russians in 1945 was like, shall we say, Russian roulette”
with all kinds of fun additional fates in addition to getting hit with a live round– death as a POW, frostbite, etc.
Field-Marshal von Kleist was fired by Hitler in March 1944 for having ordered his army to retreat rather than be overrun by the Red Army, …
Compared with Stalingrad, where the German commander would not disobey Hitler’s orders, which allowed 250,000 Germans to be surrounded by the Red Army. Eventually, approx. 100,000 surviving Germans surrendered. Within weeks, three- quarters – 75,000 – of these were dead. Ultimately, approximately 5-6,000 returned home after the war.
Speaking of those who never returned from the war, almost 25 percent – 1 person in 4 – of the Soviet population died in the war.
Reminds me, Observer: you can zoom in on Stalingrad (Volgograd) with Google maps … the extensive tank traps that ringed the city still go on for miles and miles and miles … just about all dug by human beings with nothing more than shovels, hoes, whatever was available. The Eastern Front campaign was cruel and dehumanizing beyond comprehension. Everything about it staggers the imagination.
Well … we’re wandering off the topic … no intention of hijacking this thread. Interesting topic and interesting comments.
Another comment eaten. I was responding to Observer:
Hitler didn’t give a flip about the Stalingrad prisoners: they had failed him and thus deserved their fate, just as did all Germany in 1945. Remember he promoted Paulus to field marshal via radio in the last days, to encourage him to kill himself rather than be captured; Hitler was enraged at Paulus’s “betrayal” when he gave himself up to the Russians.
Hitler was the best thing that ever happened to Napoleon – even that Corsican tyrant looked relatively good next to Hitler.
Good observation by TBA, both Russian and German armies had so called “penal units” that were made up of offenders who were still required to fight. BTW it is of note how many Russians fought for the Germans in the war.
TBA, my comments were not about what Hitler thought about his commanders. My comments were focused upon the sad fact that most German officers continued to obey Hitler even when they recognized following Hitler’s orders would lead to disaster.
Speaking of German and Russian soldiers, if you have not seen it, I would recommend the movie Europa Europa, which tells the true tale of the life of Solomon Perel. Perel’s Jewish family left Germany for Poland in the 1930s. When Germany invaded Poland in 1939, Perel and his brother fled east to Russia. Perel was placed in a Soviet orphanage. He was 13-14.
When Germany invaded Russia, Perel, then 15-16, was captured by the German Army but Perel convinced them he was an ethnic German. He served as a Russian translator for the Germans until he was sent to an elite Adolph Hitler School (probably a Napola) in Berlin where he continued to hide his Jewish ethnicity until the end of the war.
The story is based upon the actual life of Perel. Of course, being a movie, there are “Hollywood” moments and liberties taken with actual events.
Europa Europe (and some other such movies) have really disturbed me by accentuating the group-think mentality and hatred demonstrated toward the Jews — as well as the fact that, yes, it could all happen again in a different place with different names and different minorities.
Observer, I don’t think we disagree here. I’m just stressing Hitler’s sad contempt for his own soldiers.
“Group-think mentality and hatred,” huh? Like calling a young female activist a “slut” and your followers describe it as “hysterically funny”? Like that?
Ya’ gotta love this about all things Hitler: he always brings out the best in people.
Aw, P.B., we were kinda havin’ a moment here.
Sorry, but some things are permanently disqualifying. Observer deserves to be re-flayed with that whip, of his own making, every time.
P.B., had you lived in Germany in the 1930s, I have no doubt that you would have been a solid member of the National Socialist Party and would have expended great energy to round up people you disagreed with to ship them off on cattle cars to be “re-located.” Your fixation on my comment about the flaky Sandra Fluke controversy is unbalanced. If you are looking for a sick minded person, go look in a mirror.
You’re the right-winger, Observer, and I’m the gay collectivist. I think the historical record is clear which roles you and I’d have fallen into.
Y’all take it out back ….
“…Hitler was the best thing that ever happened to Napoleon – even that Corsican tyrant looked relatively good next to Hitler.”
And Stalin was the best thing that ever happened to Khrushchev, the architect of that defense of Stalingrad.
Khruschev *wished* he could take credit for that. I think Chuikov might have something to say there.
TBA is correct Khruschev was there to handle political issues. Chuikov ran the military.
P.B., I have read and understand what you said about your felt need to call bullshit when Observer speaks. I still find it annoying that a thread that had no content that justified a shot at Observer was hijacked to start another dustup with Observer. (And, as a matter of critique of the arguments: They are a lot more compelling when they arise out of the context of the discussion).
I am speaking here as a reader of comments, which is to say I am not saying (as listowner) to P.B. don’t say what you feel, or to Observer, don’t respond. My personal preference would be to save this for threads in which it has less of the appearance of random drive-by shootings.
Point taken, NMC. However, this is hardly the first, second or fiftieth time a regular to this blog has committed such a drive-by. Nor was the thread hijacked, insofar as it returned quickly to the subject at hand, or something close to it. I don’t think my comment was wholly unrelated, since Observer reported his disturbance at a political psychology of religio-nationalism in Europe in the 1930s that is frequently on parade right now in this country — though rarely in its lethal form and never genocidal — and of which he is, in my opinion, an unwitting specimen. As for the recurrence of the dust-ups, the slightest recognition that calling a woman a “slut” is not “hysterically funny” would draw them to a quick close — until, that is, another of Limbaugh’s bon mots jogs his id back into action.
All that said, you are a gracious listowner, and I’m sorry you felt annoyed as my host — that is, that I was rude. Your fair point is, again, taken.
And do you think that all of those peasants took up shovels to dig the tank traps by hand and all of those raw “recruits” rush into battle with no weapons because Chuikov asked them to or because Commissar Khrushchev was sent there to, um, “…inspire the Armies and civilian population to fight to the end…”?
Ah, now I take your point. There was certainly some of that.
OTOH, by late 1942, the peasants had plenty of motive to fear and resist the Germans. Hitler’s Top 10 Mistakes would have to include failing to co-opt the population … but then, he wouldn’t have been Hitler, and he wouldn’t have been trying to seize European Russia as a German colony, with the Slavs getting the Herero treatment.
I won’t respond to P.B. again after this, here or anywhere else. But I cannot let this one go by, because it is both hysterically funny and sadly disturbing.
As a response to P.B.’s shot at me, I wrote: P.B., had you lived in Germany in the 1930s, I have no doubt that you would have been a solid member of the National Socialist Party and would have expended great energy to round up people you disagreed with to ship them off on cattle cars to be “re-located.”
P.B. has responded: You’re the right-winger, Observer, and I’m the gay collectivist. I think the historical record is clear which roles you and I’d have fallen into.
P.B. has, unwittingly, agreed and admitted with what I wrote. Sadly, P.B. doesn’t even realize it.
“Collectivists” cannot abide or tolerant dissent. Anyone working against the collective must be identified, isolated, and removed (usually by extermination). Stalin and the Russians communists were “collectivists” and Stalin murdered 14 million people by starvation in the Ukraine alone. Of course, Hitler and the Nazis were socialist collectivists who engineered the slaughter of millions of Jews, political adversaries, and “social undesirables” such as homosexuals, in death camps. Mao Tse-tung was a communist collectivist who starved to death 75 million Chinese. Castro and Che Guevara were communist collectivists who murdered thousands.
P.B., as a collectivists, you would, as I wrote before, be rounding up your political foes and loading them onto cattle cars for “relocation.” Sadly, you don’t understand this about yourself. But it is quite clear.
As a side note, I could care less about your sexuality or anyone else’s. And you have no idea what my sexuality, or the sexuality of any member of my family may be. Injecting your sexuality into the argument was pathetic.
You called me a Nazi. That’s the premise of this spat. It’s your premise, so I took you up on it. I was using the term “collectivist” ironically — that is, as the identifier I might have received from the right-wingers in Germany (“Bolshevik” is more likely, now that I think about it) so they could kill me for expressing my disdain for their party. I identified myself unironically by my sexuality not for your sympathy (ha! me and Ms. Fluke, right?) but because it too would have been a non-stop ticket to execution in the fascist regime to which you said I would’ve belonged. No matter how intolerant you think I am, I would have been their automatic enemy, on at least two objective grounds. I took you up on your terms, and now you have flown all over the map with a brief history of misery in the 20th century, all of which I apparently would have supported because I reminded people that you liked the vile “slut” comment. You’ve missed the point — your own point — entirely.
Your little historical sketch is a tired one that American right-wingers have bought from their thought leaders to explain how all leftists are evil while all conservatives are gentle and pure. This embarrassing non-history describes different versions of totalitarianism as variants of a single phenomenon called “collectivism,” or some other term too vague to describe any actual government, present or past. A dull narrative, it can only pierce the most over-plump target, i.e. the old and frightened: it’s vague yet pitched as menacing, so it plausibly applies to anything Fox News tells them is scary. To wit, Obama is a Kenyan collectivist. It’s all false, every word of it, yet it’s almost all familiar.
Your argument, then, is that political violence is by definition committed by “collectivists.” There is no other kind of atrocity. The Rwandan genocide? Not tribal, but collectivist. I suppose you think Israeli kibbutzes are breeding grounds for murderers too? How about the national health care systems of Europe and Canada? Collectivist fronts for en masse euthanasia, I suppose
And it’s “could *not* care less.” What you wrote means the opposite of what you intended.
Anyway, let the record show that I quoted your opinion on the “slut” flap back to you, and you responded by accusing me of being the type who would ship people off to concentration camps in Nazi Germany. Yet I am the “unbalanced,” “unwitting” and “pathetic” one who has no tolerance for dissent, who lacks all shred of self-awareness, and it’s all very clear.
Apologies to NMC. Again. I agree this is ludicrous.