Twenty-One

Von Kluge, who had taken over the command of Army Group B from General Rommel, had left his headquarters in St. Germain, where he was Commander of the Armies in the West, to his Chief of Staff, General Gunther von Blumentritt, and had retained Rommel’s Chief of Staff, General Dr. Hans Speidel, at La Roche Guyon. When Kluge had taken over the command of the West from Rundstedt on July 6th, he had immediately sent word to General Beck that if the Fuehrer died he would support the army putsch. This had also been conveyed to Rommel, but he neither trusted nor respected Kluge and informed Stuelpnagel that he was going to take independent action if Kluge failed to keep his word. Unfortunately, on July 17th Rommel was severely injured in an automobile accident, and Kluge took over his group.

Army Group B headquarters was in a château built against the cliffs on the north bank of the Seine, between Mantes la Jolie and Vernon. Rommel had fashioned himself a modest apartment on the ground floor, adjoining a rose garden. His study was a recreation of French culture; it had splendid tapestries and an inlaid Renaissance desk on which Louvois had signed the revocation of the Edict of Nantes in 1685. The Field Marshal’s staff was purposely kept small: eleven officers, including two historians. Contrary to regulations, there was no National Socialist political officer—a position which had been introduced into the Wehrmacht in 1943 to whip discontented spirits into line.

Early on the morning of July 20th, at eight-ten A.M., Field Marshal von Kluge was driven to the Fifth Panzer Army headquarters where he ordered all army and corps commanders to meet him. The briefing was to make clear the Field Marshal’s instructions concerning the battle then being waged in the critical Caen and St. Lô areas. No political matters were discussed.

At five-o-three P.M. General Blumentritt reached the Field Marshal by telephone to tell him that the Fuehrer was dead. One hour later, when von Kluge had returned to La Roche Guyon, the radio was announcing that the assassination attempt had failed, and that the Fuehrer himself would broadcast later that evening. As Kluge shifted this information from hand to hand like a hot bullet, General Beck telephoned from Berlin.

“You have the news, Kluge, that Hitler is still alive?”

“Yes. Quite a surprise.”

“Nonetheless, Kluge—” Beck’s tone was grim and ominous.

“My God, Beck! I have orders pouring in from the Bendlerstrasse and from Fuehrer headquarters, and each tell different stories.”

“Listen to me. So much depends on you. So much. There is still a very good chance that we will carry the day.”

“Things are happening too fast, Beck. I need time to think.”

“You must proceed as we have agreed.”

“What is the position of the navy?”

“If you contact General Eisenhower instantly, they will come along with us. We are the leaders. What is your answer?”

“How badly hurt is Hitler, Beck?”

“Kluge, I am going to put this question to you plainly. Do you approve of what has happened here and are you ready to place yourself under my command?”

Kluge did not answer.

“Kluge! We must go forward now whatever happens! I Let us be firm at this moment. Let us be strong for Germany!”

“I am perfectly aware of all of our conversations and agreements, Beck. However, they were concerned with a situation which greatly differs from this one. The Fuehrer is still alive. That presents an unforeseen circumstance, and it calls for renewed conversations with my staff officers.”

“Renewed conversations? How much time do you think has been given to us?”

“I—I’m sorry, Beck. I will call you back in a half-hour.” Kluge put down the telephone.

It was all slipping away from them by seven P.M. Fellgiebel had failed to cut off the Fuehrer’s headquarters from the outside world; other plotters had failed to take possession of the radio facilities in Berlin and other major cities; the conspirators’ maps of the SS disposition in Berlin were faulty; the Panzer units on which so much reliance had been placed had not appeared; the crack Guards regiment, Wachbattallion Grossdeutschland, had been persuaded by Dr. Goebbels to begin operations to capture the conspirators’ headquarters at the Bendlerstrasse, where they had not even posted a sentry to warn them against attack. The conspiracy had been corrupted by corrosive fear of the Fuehrer and of his supreme authority.

General von Stuelpnagel arrived at Kluge’s headquarters at La Roche Guyon at seven twenty-eight P.M. in the company of Veelee and his aide-de-camp, Lieutenant-Colonel von Hofacker, a tall calm man who had been a hero of the resistance movement.

The three men met Kluge briefly in his office. “In such a short time everything has changed, has it not, gentlemen?” the Field Marshal said.

“It may seem that way, sir,” Stuelpnagel answered blandly, “but nothing has changed much. One man who was supposed to be dead is still alive. One man. You hold all the cards. You are the hero of this great victory.”

“Hero?” the Field Marshal said with asperity. “Victory?”

“As soon as you surrender to the enemy commanders, Hitler will fall.”

“No, no. The Fuehrer is still alive, sir. That changes everything.”

“Kluge, do you or do you not want to save the Reich and to save the army? Only you can do it. The Allies will not deal with him. They will deal with you. Surrender to them, Kluge. Now—tonight.”

“The attempt has failed. Everything is over. Why, if the Fuehrer knew that I—”

“You must act. You have given your word. This must be done. It must be done. To help you make up your mind, I should tell you, sir, that before I left Paris to meet you here I issued an order for the arrest of the SS and SD.”

Von Kluge stared at him, the jaw in his weak face dropping. He reached for the telephone and asked for General von Blumentritt, staring steadily and unseeingly at Stuelpnagel as his tongue licked his lips.

“Blumentritt? General von Stuelpnagel has just reported to me an unparalleled act of insubordination. He has ordered the arrest of the SS in Paris without consulting me. You will telephone von Linstow at once and order him, in my name, to stop the action immediately.” He hung up. He glared at Veelee and von Hofacker.

“It cannot be stopped, sir,” Stuelpnagel said silkily. “It is too late. And when I made the decision to do it, so much became clear. The revolt in Berlin was unnecessary, and so was the attempt on Hitler’s life. We won the revolt, in Paris, when the order was given to arrest the SS. Kluge, I hand victory to you on a golden platter. Make the telephone call to General Eisenhower’s headquarters now and you will be the savior of Germany and the German Army. Establish the liaison. Act, Kluge!”

Kluge hesitated. He gripped the desk and for an instant half turned and faced in the direction of the Wolf’s Lair, his head cocked, as if he were listening to that terrible voice. His frightened face was green and silver in the half-light as he looked over at Stuelpnagel and then at Veelee.

Veelee drew himself up to his great height and put the monocle firmly in his right eye socket. His stare radiated arrogance and contempt for von Kluge. Though Veelee was fifteen years younger than either man, his silver hair and paralyzed face made him seem their contemporary. In his hereditary allegiance to the German Army he was two hundred years older than either of them, and his voice had the force of a mace. “Our major cities are all destroyed, sir,” he said to von Kluge slowly, “and all of the genius of Germany has been destroyed. And what this upstart politician has done has changed Germany from a nation of poets, builders, and thinkers into a den of murderers and hangmen. The army has never been in greater peril. Count our dead, sir, as if that could be done. One million, two million or five million—all wasted by a guttersnipe. Why did it happen, sir? It happened because of the cowardice of people like us, the opportunism of people like us. We, the German Army could have struck him down in any twenty-minute period of any hour of the clock from 1933 until this day, sir. Hear the dead! Deliver our country and our army. Pull him down, sir!”

Von Kluge’s face had grown colder and colder as he had listened. “You must shoulder your own responsibility,” he said, “but I should advise the three of you to change into civilian clothes and go into hiding.”