"This book is about how the German people experienced and sustained the war." The author, a 54-year-old professor at Oxford, attempts to find a middle ground between the Germans as perpetrators and the Germans as victims. His goal is to learn how the Germans were capable of fighting until the Armageddon had totally destroyed their country. This book has been well reviewed and acclaimed.
"When the war broke out in September, 1939, it was deeply unpopular in Germany." "The fear that the disasters of the First World War were about to be repeated was palpable." Food rationing was immediately imposed, as well as limits on leather, shoes and all items of clothing. The expectation was that it would be a short war. The first winter saw a coal shortage. Juvenile delinquency, sexual promiscuity and venereal disease spiked. The Nazi killing machine began at home. Conscientious objectors, many of whom were Jehovah's Witnesses, were sent to the guillotine. Young and old in psychiatry asylums were eliminated. Thousands were killed, and their deaths were withheld from family and the general public. Surprisingly, one group that feared the outbreak of war was spared. No action was taken against the Reich's remaining Jews, because presumably Hitler still hoped for a settlement with the western powers.
The amazingly quick victory in the west transformed the public's view of the war. The result of the first World War had been stunningly reversed. The 'blood enemy' had been defeated and occupied. However, the immediate RAF bombings of German cities was a significant shock to the system. Shelters were constructed and in the course of the next twelve months, 619,000 children were evacuated to rural safety. The home front was buoyed by all of the goods the soldiers were allowed to carry and ship home. The Netherlands, Denmark and in particular, France, were the source of a phenomenal amount of consumer goods that headed home.
The initiation of Barbarossa on June 22, 1941 saw a massive increase in anti-Soviet propaganda. The Germans were now fighting against barbarians, Asiatics and of course, Jews. Both the Catholic and Protestant hierarchies were pleased to be fighting godless communism. The war in the east proceeded with a ferocity unimaginable in enlightened Europe. And here the author establishes one of his major points. There was no ignorance on the home front about what was happening to the Jews and communists. Numerous letters home are quoted at length spelling out the magnitude of the holocaust in the east. Amidst the carnage in the first year of the war, the Germans allowed 2 million Soviet POWs to die of starvation. When the advance on Moscow was pushed back, the men of the Wehrmacht began to write home of their losses and the difficulty of fighting without the proper equipment. The regime realized the crisis of faith it was facing and organized a major civic effort to support the boys. Two million volunteers organized the shipping to the front of 67 million items, ranging from boots to furs to food.
"At the beginning of 1942, most of Europe's Jews were still alive; by the end of the year, most of them were not. The killing of the Jews began in the east, and there principally it stayed..." A vast amount of information, letters, and photographs of the unfolding holocaust were sent home, where Jews were forced to wear yellow stars on their outer clothing. Hitler used the word exterminate four times in 1942, and Jewish goods and apartments were offered at public auction by the SS, after the most of Germany's Jews were sent east. The elimination of the Jews was justified by the fact that they had started the war.
April of 1942 saw the most shocking and demoralizing event up to that point - further cuts in civilian rations. Reductions in food and coal demoralized the nation and brought back fear of the 'turnip winter' of 1916-17. Black market activity increased. Feeding the populace, whether at home, or at the front became an increasing challenge. Ten months later, defeat at Stalingrad further demoralized the Reich. The leadership told the people that the 6th Army fought to the last man. When word leaked out that almost 100,000 had been captured, the families at home entered an endless purgatory that would last another decade.*
In 1943, the RAF rained hell upon western and northern Germany. The Rhineland, in particular the the Ruhr Valley, was pounded. Cologne, Hamburg and Berlin were relentlessly attacked. Goebbels again preached it was because of the Jews that they were being terrorized and tried to focus the nation on the fact that it was a war to the death with Bolshevism and Jewry. When the Katyn massacre was discovered, he warned that this is what would happen to Germans if the Jews won. For the first time in the war, the public began to hear and to use the phrase 'final solution'. Many people began to believe the ferocity of the Allied air attacks were retribution for what Germany did to the Jews. The author addresses the issue of why strategic bombing effectively ran Italy out of the war, but not Germany. The answer is that German society was equipped to fight back and to help those displaced and injured. Germany recruited thousands of teenagers (including a future Foreign Minister and Pope) to effectively man the anti-aircraft guns. There was an active civil defense effort with bunkers and warnings. Of the 6 million displaced civilians, 80% were settled with the help of Nazi social agencies.
As the Allies approached from the east and the west, the people rallied around the Fuhrer, particularly after the attempt on his life. All men from 16-60 were called upon to help and thousands of women contributed to the defense of the Reich. The leadership wanted to avoid at all costs a repeat of the 1918 'stab in the back' and the revolution that followed. The people still believed the propaganda that the war could end well for Germany. And most importantly, they were now defending the homeland and in particular, were defending it from the eastern horde. They fought to the bitter end. When Goebbels and Hitler committed suicide, the people turned on them and began the process of laying it all at the feet of their dictators. Germans shared a collective guilt for their defeat and for what they had done to the Jews. Very quickly though, the war, although not forgotten, was no longer spoken of. The German people suffered from death, starvation , and homelessness. The immediate post-war years were harder than the war itself for the majority of the population. By the time the successor states were set up in 1949, "a sense of victimhood came to overshadow any sense of shared responsibility for the suffering of Germany's victims." "It was clear that most Germans thought they had fought a war of national defense."
This is not an easy book to read. It is 571 pages long, not a narrative but a series of quotes from letters and diaries. That said, it is unique in that it focuses on the German civilian experience and I've learned a great deal, as it covers material I have not seen before.
*Approximately 5,000 men came home in the mid-50's.
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