Operation Valkyrie: The Plot to Kill Hitler

Many who were critical of the regime in private were from a deeply conservative landed aristocracy who barely disguised their contempt for these urban louts who had so effectively removed them from the levers of power. Muttered dissent at the dinner table and the rumour of plots against the regime were nothing new in the gilded drawing rooms of many a country estate but they rarely came to anything. The triumph of German arms early in the war put to bed the worst fears of the doubters but as the tide of the war began to turn, they soon re-emerged. 

In December 1942, the previously invincible German Army was turned back from the gates of Moscow, and this was followed soon after in February 1943, by a catastrophic defeat on the banks of the River Volga at Stalingrad and the news from other fronts was hardly any better. 

 

In May 1943, the Axis powers were forced to surrender in North Africa, two months later Italy was invaded and forced out of the war, and the attempt to turn the tide of the war in the East had been thwarted at the Battle of Kursk. It was clear to many that the war was lost long before the Allies ever landed on the beaches of Normandy and that to continue it could only end in the destruction of Germany itself. 

 

The opposition to Hitler however was divided and remained uncertain how to respond. 

 

Those in the military rallied around the dignified figure of General Ludwig Beck, the former Chief of the German General Staff, and men such as General Hans Oster, Deputy Head of the Abwehr (German Military Intelligence) and Field Marshal Erwin von Witzleben. 

Conservatives who had found themselves side-lined by the Nazis looked towards the outspoken ex- Gauleiter of Leipzig Carl Goerdeler who had been forced to resign after he criticised the decision to dismantle a statue of the Jewish composer Felix Mendelssohn. 

 

Neither grouping could be considered liberal in their views nor particularly democratic in their aims but rather they sought a return to a more traditional Germany with some wishing to see the return of the Kaiser while others wanted to continue with the exclusion of Jews from German society. 

 

Among a myriad of opposition groups many of which were little more than dinner party dissenters was the Kreisau Circle named after the Country Estate of one of its members Helmuth von Moltke where those who attended its meetings read like a roll call of the old ruling elite with among its leadership such prominent diplomats as Adam von Trott du Solz and Peter Graf Yorck von Wartenburg. 

 

Indeed, some who had studied at Oxford University used their contacts in England to forge links between the resistance in Germany and the Allies but unable to deliver on their promises they were not taken seriously; even though they professed a vision for the new post-Nazi Germany they wished to create, a decentralised country of small communities firmly wedded to Christian values. But despite actively plotting Hitler’s downfall since 1938, they were torn by their personal oath of loyalty to the Fuhrer. As such, they talked but did nothing which only deemed to confirm British scepticism. 

 

The only serious attempt to assassinate Hitler during this time was carried out not by one of the circle or any other opposition group but by an individual Johann Georg Elser, an itinerant carpenter who planted a bomb in the Burgerbraukeller in Munich on 8 November 1938 that killed 8 people and wounded 63 others. Unfortunately for Elser, Hitler had completed his speech in haste due to the inclement weather and the urgent requirement he return to Berlin leaving 30 minutes earlier than had been anticipated. 

 

The Catholic Church in Germany had also spoken out against the Euthanasia Programme forcing its cancellation and certain prominent Churchmen such as Clemens August Graf von Galen and the Lutheran Pastor Dietrich Bonhoeffer continued to be critical of the regime, but neither would countenance murder as a response to its iniquities. 

 

None of the Military, the Conservative opposition or the Kreisau Circle were willing to co-operate with the underground Communist and Trade Union resistance and would certainly not agree to their participation in any future Government. 

 

The early success of Hitler’s military campaigns had also dampened the enthusiasm of the conspirators to take action for not only had the Fuhrer never been more popular it seemed to many as if the war was as good as won but as we have seen by 1943 this had all changed particularly following the Casablanca Conference in February of that year where President Roosevelt announced that the Allies would accept nothing less than the unconditional surrender of Germany. The organised resistance however continued to be embarrassed by others who lacking their influence and resources still actively strove to oppose Hitler. 

 

The White Rose Movement, a small student group consisting of Sophie Scholl, her brother Hans, and Christoph Probst based at the University of Munich distributed anti-Nazi literature before they were betrayed by a fellow student, arrested and guillotined on 18 February 1943. 

 

A month earlier the Conservative opposition and the Kreisau Circle had met for the first time in a tense atmosphere that soon turned acrimonious as it seemed they were as implacably opposed to each other as they were the Nazis. The Kreisau Circle wanted to see Hitler arrested and put on trial for his crimes so that he along with the other leading Nazi’s could be condemned as individuals while Germany would be cleared of any blame in the eyes of the world – a guilt free Germany they deemed a moral imperative. As far as Carl Goerdeler, spokesman for the Conservatives was concerned this was absurd the Kreisau Circle were utopian dreamers and totally unrealistic – Hitler had to die. Many within the Kreisau Circle believed the Conservative opposition to be political reactionaries little better than the Nazi’s but it was Goerdeler who won the day. 

The opposition to Hitler was led by General Henning von Tresckow, the man the Nazi’s would later accuse of being the prime mover behind the various plots to remove the Fuhrer who had told his cousin Fabian von Schlabrendorff as early as 1939 that: 

 

“Both duty and honour demand from us that we should do our best to bring about the downfall of Adolf Hitler and National Socialism.” 

 

In March 1943, the conspirators at last made a serious attempt upon Hitler’s life when they planted a bomb on his plane as he travelled to a conference in Smolensk, but it failed to go off due to the freezing temperature in the planes baggage department. The bomb later had to be hastily retrieved so as not to reveal the plotter’s identity. 

 

It seemed yet another example of the Fuhrer’s apparent invulnerability and some began to believe as Hitler himself did that he was protected by destiny. But then, he had always been a difficult man to get close to, constantly under guard, often changing his routine at very short notice, and rarely punctual. 

 

In early 1944, General Friedrich Olbricht, Chief of the Armed Forces Replacement Office, approached Tresckow with the idea of using the Reserve Army in the event of Hitler’s assassination to seize control of Berlin, and other major cities. The Reserve Army existed to maintain order on the Home Front and would be mobilised in the event of a break down in law and order as a result of Allied bombing, or any uprising among the millions of slave labourers present in Germany - the plan to mobilise the Reserve Army would be known as Valkyrie. 

 

Tresckow seized upon the idea of using the Reserve Army in what would become known to history as the July Bomb Plot to take control of the levers of power once Hitler had been killed and he got to work right away putting the building blocks of the plan in place, recruiting people he could trust, and informing the members of the Opposition of his intentions. There was a problem however, as a front-line Officer he was liable to be re-assigned and called away at any moment so he handed over the implementation of Valkyrie to the 36 year old Staff Officer Count Claus von Stauffenberg, a man only recently recruited to the cause but one in which he had absolute faith. 

Claus Philipp Maria Justinian Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg was every bit as aristocratic as the other conspirators within the Kreisau Circle and he likewise shared many of their views. 

 

He agreed that the war in the East against Bolshevism must continue but he no less agreed that the ideology of Nazism was evil to its core. His devout Catholicism and lifelong interest in philosophy had taught him to consider issues of morality in all things and he had long ago decided that the Concentration Camps and the murder of the Jews was an affront to God. 

 

Though he had been in the army since the age of 18 his rise through the ranks had been steady rather than spectacular and deeply patriotic, he had like many been happy to follow Hitler as long as it appeared that he would win the war. He had previously expressed his support for the policy of Lebensraum and of Germany’s further expansion East, to achieve it. 

 

He also believed in the inferiority of the Slav races and did not oppose the use of them and other subjugated peoples as slave labour if by doing so it guaranteed German prosperity. 

 

These are not the views we would expect from a man who would later try to assassinate Hitler. 

 

On 26 September 1933, he married Nina Lerchenfeld by whom he was to have 5 children who would later say in defence of opinions he expressed that he was often deliberately provocative in conversation: “Claus really loved playing devil’s advocate. Conservatives were convinced he was a ferocious Nazi and ferocious Nazi’s were convinced he was an unreconstructed conservative. In fact, he was neither”. 

 

Having been promoted to Lieutenant-Colonel he was serving in Tunisia when on 7 April 1943, his staff car was strafed by Allied planes and seriously wounded he was evacuated back to Germany where he spent three months recuperating in a Munich hospital. He had lost his left eye, his right hand, and two fingers on his left hand. In truth he had been lucky to survive. 

 

Stauffenberg had become disillusioned with Hitler’s Germany and had expressed his discontent with the course of the war and the atrocities he had witnessed in the Occupied Territories saying that: “The war had become monstrous with the killing of the Jews”. 

 

It was around now that he was now approached by members of the Conservative opposition many of whom he knew personally. He was finally recruited to the cause by Friedrich Olbricht who had him posted to the General Staff of the Reserve Army where he would be under his direct command and in a position that might in the future give him access to Hitler. 

 

Stauffenberg believed that Valkyrie was the means by which not only would Hitler be assassinated but a new Government could be installed but it had to be re-written to enable it to respond to any coup attempt. This he proceeded to do: Hitler would be assassinated at his Headquarters the Wolf’s Lair in East Prussia; all communications would then be cut and an announcement of the Fuhrer’s death made public. The Reserve Army would then be mobilised to prevent an SS coup, all major communication centres and Government buildings occupied, and the leading Nazis arrested. 

 

Similar was to happen in other German cities and in those centres of control in areas under occupation. The formation of a new Government would then be broadcast to the people. 

 

But while General Olbricht could mobilise the Reserve Army only it’s Commander General Friedrich Fromm or Adolf Hitler himself could initiate Valkyrie. Fromm would have to be persuaded to join the conspiracy. 

Friedrich Fromm was an ambitious career soldier who was neither much liked nor trusted but the conspirators had little choice but to approach him and so he was made aware of a plot but denied the details. He vacillated sometimes appearing to support the conspirators on other occasions seeming to threaten them with the Gestapo, but most of the time he simply remained silent. When he was offered a leading role in any future Government, he did not decline it and so as far as the conspirators were concerned he was with them, but they could not be sure. 

 

On 1 July 1944, Stauffenberg was appointed Chief-of-Staff to the Reserve Army and so he was one of the few among the conspirators who had direct access to Hitler. In fact, he was due to present a report to him on the military preparedness of the Reserve Army, but he did not want to carry out the assassination himself as he feared the consequences of his absence from Berlin at a pivotal time. But he was to have little choice. 

 

Once in Hitler’s inner-sanctum he would place a bomb he carried in his briefcase beneath the table where Hitler was standing before being called away to answer a telephone call by his Adjutant Werner von Haeften. In his absence the bomb would explode killing all inside and amid the confusion that followed he would make his way to the airfield and fly back to Berlin. In the meantime, General Erich Fellgiebel, Head of Communications at the Wolf’s Lair, would inform Army High Command that the Fuhrer was dead before cutting the phone lines. 

 

In Berlin Carl Goerdeler would take over as the leader of a new Civil Administration working alongside General Fromm while Field-Marshal Erwin von Witzleben would take over the Army. This was a role that would almost certainly have gone to Field-Marshal Erwin Rommel had fate not taken a hand. Although never a Nazi he was a long-time admirer of Hitler but the irrational behaviour of the Fuhrer at their most recent meetings had convinced him the Fuhrer had gone insane. The recruitment of Rommel was a great coup for the plotters – here was a man the army would follow; but on 17 July 1944, just three days before the plot was due to begin his staff car was strafed leaving him hospitalised with serious head injuries. His loss was deeply felt but the plot would go on regardless. 

 

On 20 July, Stauffenberg flew to the Wolf’s Lair as expected with the bomb in his briefcase sat upon his lap. The Conference was due to start at 12.00 pm and upon his arrival he asked to use Field-Marshal Keitel’s bathroom where he began priming the bombs but with only three fingers on his one available hand this took time. It wasn’t long before a guard was knocking on the door telling him to hurry because the meeting was about to begin and unable to keep the Fuhrer waiting, he was able to prime only one the bombs. 

 

Once in the meeting room Stauffenberg placed the briefcase under the table near where Hitler was standing reviewing some maps. He was then informed that he had an urgent phone call, made his excuses, and left. He was on his way to the airfield when at 12.40 pm the bomb exploded. Hearing the explosion, he looked back to see the bunker shattered and in flames and as far as he was concerned no one could have survived the devastation. But unknown to him just prior to the bomb detonating Colonel Heinz Brandt had moved the briefcase up against the other side of the table leg cushioning its effect. 

Six men had been killed and more were severely injured but Hitler despite his blackened face and torn clothes had survived shaken but physically unharmed – destiny had once again intervened to save the Fuhrer. 

 

Arriving back in Berlin around 3.00 pm Stauffenberg found the conspirators in a state of confusion and was furious that nothing had been done to advance the coup. He confirmed to them that Hitler was dead, but the rumour had already begun to circulate that the Fuhrer was in fact alive and still in charge. 

 

Erich Fellgeibel had only been partially successful in initiating a blackout and some lines of communication from the Wolf’s Lair to Berlin were still open and they had earlier received a panic-stricken phone call from him during which he told them something awful has happened, the Fuhrer Lives! 

 

If this was indeed the case, then it was more urgent than ever that they act before these rumours spread to the Officers and men of the Reserve Army. Even so, it wasn’t until 4.00 pm that Hans Olbricht at last ordered the Reserve Army to mobilise. He addressed them thus: “The Fuhrer Adolf Hitler is dead! A treacherous group of party leaders has attempted to exploit the situation by attacking our embattled soldiers from the rear to seize power for themselves”. Olbricht had mobilised the Reserve Army but only Friedrich Fromm could authorise its use and he now lost his nerve. He had earlier called Field-Marshal Keitel at the Wolf’s Lair who had confirmed to him that Hitler was indeed alive. It was the conspirators who were now in mortal danger. 

 

Meanwhile in Paris, General Carl-Heinrich von Stulpnagel had already carried out his part of the coup and arrested the local SS and Gestapo. With the city secured he now visited the Headquarters of his Commanding Officer Field-Marshal Gunther von Kluge, a fellow conspirator, and suggested he open negotiations with the Allies. Instead, Kluge informed him that the coup in Berlin had failed and had him placed under arrest. 

 

Back in Berlin Stauffenberg arrived at the conspirators Bendlerblock Headquarters demanding to know why the Reserve Army had not been, mobilised? Informed that Fromm had refused to initiate Valkyrie he hastened to the General’s office to confront him. When Fromm refused to co-operate and instead demanded that he and the others should place themselves in his custody Stauffenberg had him restrained at gun point. 

 

He now appointed General Erich Hoepner to replace Fromm and ordered General Paul von Hase to secure the Wilhelmstrasse and arrest the Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels. This duty fell to Major Otto Remer, an Officer for whom an oath of loyalty could not be broken under any circumstances and that obedience to orders without question far outweighed all other considerations. By now the rumour that Hitler was in fact alive had become widespread and many of those Officers and troops of the Reserve Army summoned to the Bendlerblock were refusing to obey orders. 

 

The need to broadcast to the nation the news of the Fuhrer’s death and the formation of a new Government was now paramount but General Fritz Lindermann, the man assigned to capture Berlin Radio and make the announcement had disappeared taking the only copy of the proclamation with him so General Beck now frantically began working on a new one. 

 

At the Wilhelmstrasse, Otto Remer had arrested the propaganda minister as ordered but a surprisingly calm Goebbels reminded Remer that his personal oath of obedience to the Fuhrer was paramount. Remer replied that the Fuhrer was dead. Goebbels insisted that he was not, and should he wait a while he could speak to the Fuhrer in person. 

 

At 5.00 pm Hitler spoke to Remer on the telephone: “Remer do you recognise my voice, do you know who I am? Remer stiffened up, replied that he did, and gave the Nazi salute. Hitler ordered him to obey only Goebbels commands - Remer was to regain control of the city and surround the Bendlerblock. Meanwhile, inside the conspirators were arguing among themselves. General Witzleben shouted at Stauffenberg that the coup had failed and that they must make their escape as best they could, but Stauffenberg refused to give up – too much was at stake, he said. 

 

By this time the forces surrounding the Bendlerblock had forced their way in and in an exchange of fire Stauffenberg was wounded. 

 

General Fromm having escaped custody now took charge and ordered Remer to round up those remaining in the Bendlerblock. With no forces at their disposal the conspirators knew that any further resistance was futile and so surrendered themselves to Fromm with Stauffenberg still hoping to persuade him to change his mind and join them, But the General would give them little time. At 11.00 pm he established a hastily convened court-martial and sentenced the conspirators to death despite Hitler’s express orders that they should be kept alive. 

 

General Beck now requested that he be allowed to take his own life to which Fromm consented providing the General with a pistol but with his hand shaking he fired twice and missed only grazing his skull. In the end Fromm ordered a corporal to administer him the coup-de-grace. 

 

The remaining conspirators, Stauffenberg, Olbricht, von Haeften, and Albrecht von Quirnheim were then led out into the courtyard of the Bendlerblock and shot by firing squad. 

 

If Fromm believed that his duplicity would save his own skin, then he was to be mistaken. Expecting to be lauded as the man who had crushed the coup he was instead greeted ominously by Goebbels with the words: “So how quickly you have put the witnesses underground”. He was arrested two days later and though there was no direct evidence to link him to the plot, Fromm was stripped of his rank and imprisoned. In a further purge of the conspirators on 12 March 1945, he was tried, sentenced to death, and executed. 

 

Those who had lost their lives in the coup attempt were the fortunate ones, and many of those under suspicion of supporting it committed suicide rather than face Nazi justice for being brought to trial was to endure a terrible ordeal as horribly tortured they were then dragged before the People’s Court to endure a public humiliation, harangued and abused by its President, the fanatical Nazi Roland Freisler. 

The trials began on 7 August 1944, with the first to appear the 62-year-old Field-Marshal Erwin von Witzleben. Dressed in the clothes of a vagrant without either buttons or braces he was made to stand contrite before his accusers’ head bowed and holding up his trousers throughout in a vain attempt to preserve some semblance of dignity. When he tried to speak in his own defence, he was shouted down by the increasingly hysterical Freisler. When he objected being referred to as a schweinhund, Freisler demanded to know what zoological category he thought he fitted into? 

 

Even his own defence team, for what it was, declared him guilty and joined in the abuse. 

 

Witzleben’s treatment set the template for future proceedings and the trials of the conspirators were filmed for public consumption but despite the conspirators being widely viewed as traitors so rabid were Freisler’s tirades and so horrid the humiliations they were forced to endure that the film was hastily withdrawn from circulation should it elicit sympathy for the conspirators. 

 

All those who were brought before the People’s Court were found guilty and sentenced to death. The executions that were carried out at Plotzensee Prison were to be by slow strangulation with piano wire. With the prisoners hanging on meat hooks the executions were filmed for Hitler’s private viewing. The film was later destroyed. 

 

Among those killed in this way were Erich Hoepner, Erich Fellgiebel, Paul von Hasse, Helmuth von Moltke, Carl Goerdeler, Erwin von Witzleben, Carl-Heinrich von Stulpnagel, and Stauffenberg’s brother, Bernd. 

 

Under torture Stulpnagel, who had blinded himself in a failed suicide attempt had blurted out the name Rommel. Lauded as a national hero this presented the Nazi’s with a dilemma; to humiliate him in the manner they had the others would cause outrage and undermine morale so it was decided to offer him the opportunity of an honourable death. On 14 October 1944, he was visited at his home by General Wilhelm Burgdorf and General Ernst Maisel who told him that he was to be arrested and charged with treason but that if he took his own life he would be granted a State Funeral and his family would remain unmolested and be provided with full pension rights. If not then he would be dragged before the People’s Court with his family charged as co-conspirators alongside him. 

 

Rommel was at first inclined to contest the charges but realising his position was hopeless he soon relented. A few hours later he said his farewells to his wife and son before being driven away from his home. The car was then parked a mile or so away and the Field-Marshall was left alone to take a cyanide tablet. 

 

It was announced to the public that Field-Marshal Erwin Rommel had succumbed to wounds suffered in the line of duty and he was to be buried with full military honours. The centrepiece of the funeral which was used to great propaganda effect was a wreath from Adolf Hitler expressing his deep sense of regret and loss. 

 

Henning von Tresckow was serving on the Russian Front when he learned that the coup had failed. He had been the prime mover in Operation Valkyrie and the man who had convinced so many that Hitler must die but much to his frustration his duties as a front-line soldier had removed him from any operational involvement with the plot itself. When he learned of the fate of his co-conspirators, he told his Adjutant that Hitler was not just the enemy of Germany but of the whole world: 

 

 

A few hours after speaking these words he walked out into no-man’s-land and blew himself up with a hand-grenade. 

 

In the immediate aftermath of the failed coup more than 7,000 people were arrested of whom 4,980 were executed. It was the moment when the Nazi Regime turned on itself and the paranoia that it induced now seeped into every aspect of German society and conspiracy, treason, and cowardice were to be seen and denounced everywhere. In the few remaining months of the war more than 30,000 German soldiers and civilians were to be charged with treason and executed for disobedience, expressing a desire for peace, or merely seeming to speak out of turn.