Posted on 06/29/2014 5:53:58 PM PDT by nickcarraway
The '20 July plot', as it came to be known, saw German army officers from Hitler's inner circle team up with members of the resistance to try to blow up the Nazi leader at his headquarters in Rastenburg, Eastern Prussia, now part of Poland
German Chancellor Angela Merkel paid tribute on Saturday, June 28, to the army officers who attempted to assassinate Adolf Hitler towards the end of the Second World War.
Speaking ahead of the 70th anniversary of the failed plot, Merkel said those responsible had acted "in accordance with their conscience."
(Excerpt) Read more at rappler.com ...
Too bad her government doesn’t allow homeschooling parents to act upon their consciences.
If Hitler was assassinated the generals would have taken over and the Allies would really have had a war on their hands. With Hitler everything was going wrong with his ideas.
Didn’t Hitler outlaw homeschooling too? I’m not sure.
Yes, the Nazis and Hitler did. That doesn’t speak well for Germany keeping that law, not that it’s good from any perspective.
Seems they got rid of the “National” part of the National Socialists, but retained the “socialist.”
probably would have been to late but their tactics would have probably improved.
The allies were hoping Canaris could be maneuvered into leadership, and he would end the war.
I thought they wanted a conditional surrender to the Western Allies, so they could escape the Soviets taking over.
Had one of the earlier plots against Hitler succeeded, I agree but by July 1944, I'm not sure what the generals could have been done to materially change the outcome.
In fact, I expect that understanding the military situation, the generals would have immediately moved to limit casualties and suffering by seeking an armistice... at least with the western allies.
Arguably, Adi was the best ally the Allies had!
So true.
You said it so true. Only some consciences are followable.....pc ones
The generals were set to offer surrender terms in Paris the next day. That was aborted when they found out Hitler survived.
Wasn’t there a movie made during that time about some guy parachuting into Germany to kill Hitler? But yeah, I bet the generals would have surrendered but I’m thinking they’re thinking what of the Russians?
Everything I’ve read said that at least by the latter plots, the plotters were trying to assassinate Hitler specifically to end the war.
PIUS XII AND THE RESISTANCE
Pius XII, a man of great personal courage dared to be involved in a high risk venture that could even endanger the very existence of The Church-the support of the internal resistance to the Nazis inside the German Armed Forces. The French and the British governments were deaf to the pleas of the Vatican to assist the German internal resistance to the Nazi government. From the very beginning Pius XII tried to persuade the Allies to support the inside German opposition, but they did not heed the Pope.
German admiral Wilhelm Franz Canaris was the chief of the Abwehr, the German military intelligence service, from 1935 to 1944. During the Second World War, he was among the military officers involved in the clandestine opposition to Adolf Hitler and the Nazi regime. He was executed in the Flossenbürg concentration camp for the act of high treason. Canaris traveled under different disguises to Italy and Spain to keep informed Pope Pius XII and the Spanish dictator, Francisco Franco of Hitler’s war plans. Canaris traveled under different disguises to Italy and Spain to keep informed Pope Pius XII and the Spanish dictator, Francisco Franco of Hitler’s war plans.
Canaris had already planned a ‘coup’ against the entire Nazi regime in which many Nazi officials would be accused for known crimes, while Hitler would be arrested as an insane person based on his exposure to mustard gas in World War I, then imprisoned for life.
A number of anti-Nazi plotters inside the Abwehr, the intelligence branch of the armed forces, made repeated, and ultimately futile attempts through the Holy See to reach and persuade the British to back, or even to talk with the German resistance. They were all killed in the July 20, 1944; plot to assassinate Hitler, the last in a long line of foiled attempts to get rid of the dictator. The leader, a Roman Catholic officer, Count Claus Schenk von Stauffenberg was shot on he spot. Other conspirators, mostly Protestants, were not so lucky; they were hung by using piano strings from butchers’ hooks and filmed on Hitler’s orders so that he could watch it himself later.
According to historian O’Carroll, in 1983 the Italian magazine Gente, published the testimony of General Wolff, the commander of the German forces in Italy during WWII. He revealed that in 1943 Pius XII had invited him to the Vatican and tried to persuade him to end the war in Italy on his own initiative. General Wolff was impressed and gave the matter thought; he finally decided against the Pope’s plea. But he recorded the immense personal impression that Pius XII made on him. We already mentioned how the whole leadership of the Italian resistance found refugee in the Church’s facilities in Rome.
Pius XII also served as a conduit for an offer made by a group of anti-Nazi German generals to topple Hitler from power. They wanted to know if the British would make peace with Germany if they succeeded in arresting Hitler and removing him from power. The proposal was made by Colonel-General Ludwig Beck (four star general), who latter was made chief of the German General Staff, but who resigned in 1938 convinced that Hitler was a criminal. Pius XII had known Beck when he was Nuncio in Berlin and “highly esteemed his honesty and integrity.”
The Pope also allowed the Vatican diplomatic corps, which was protected by diplomatic immunity, to carry messages between the Allied powers. There was a close collaboration between the Vatican and the Allies’ intelligence services. In fact, the Vatican forewarned Holland and Belgium of the upcoming German invasion.
Yep. The oil of the Caucasus slipped away, molybdenum of the Ukraine was gone, the chromium from Turkey was gone, the tungsten from Spain was gone, the disasters of 1943 at Stalingrad, Kursk and Tripoli had turned into the catastrophe of 1944 with the loss of Army Group Center.
Pressed from the south, east and west, it was only a matter of time before the Third Reich was overrun.
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