After Hitler: The Last Ten Days of World War II in Europe (34 page)

By the 6th of May General Antonov had been fully informed of the course of the previous day’s negotiations, in particular that General Eisenhower had flatly rejected Friedeburg’s offer to surrender only the remaining German forces on the Western Front. That day, two documents were sent to Antonov. The first, entitled ‘An agreement between the Allied High Commands and German emissaries’, specified that the Germans were to appear at a time and place to be designated to sign an unconditional surrender. The second, named ‘Act of Military Surrender’, gave the terms to be used for the surrender, providing for a simultaneous surrender on both Eastern and Western Fronts.

Eisenhower’s behaviour was both transparent and correct. Yet it contained a number of assumptions. The first was that – in the interests of speed and saving lives – the location of the surrender at the Supreme Allied Headquarters in Rheims would be acceptable to the Soviets. The second was that the text of the agreement, which the Russians had never seen before and had had no part in drawing up, would also be acceptable. The third was that as Major General Susloparov had been permitted to represent the Soviet High Command in the negotiations leading up to the surrender, it would also be permissible for him to sign for the Soviet Union in the actual ceremony itself. These were made in good faith – but would prove to be seriously flawed.

At 6.00 p.m. Dönitz’s new emissary, General Alfred Jodl, chief of staff of the German armed forces, arrived at Supreme Headquarters.

That evening, a ninety-minute conference took place between the German delegation and Bedell Smith; then a meeting between Bedell Smith and Eisenhower, followed by further consultations with the Russian representative at Rheims, Major General Susloparov. Eisenhower remained firm that he would accept nothing less than a general capitulation. At 9.00 p.m. the Germans pleaded for another forty-eight hours to make up their minds. Eisenhower was having none of it. ‘You tell them,’ he ordered General Strong, his senior British staff officer, ‘that forty-eight hours from midnight tonight I will close my lines on the Western Front so no more Germans can get through, whether they sign or not.’ He then abruptly left the room.

General Eisenhower summarised the stand-off in an important document:

General Jodl appeared at my headquarters this evening and together with Admiral Friedeburg continued negotiating with my chief of staff and his assistants. It was obvious from the beginning of the discussion that the Germans are stalling for time, their purpose being to evacuate the largest number of German soldiers and civilians from the Russian front to within our lines.

They continued the effort to surrender this front separately, even stating that no matter what my answer was, they were going to order all German forces remaining on the western front to cease firing and to refuse to fire against either British or American troops. They asked for a meeting on Tuesday morning [the 8th] for signing final surrender terms with a 48 hour interval thereafter in order to get the necessary instructions to all their outlying units. Their actual purpose was merely to gain time.

I finally had to inform them that I would break off all negotiations and seal the western front, preventing by force any further westward movement of German soldiers and civilians unless they agreed to my terms of surrender. When faced with this ultimatum they immediately drafted a telegram to Dönitz asking for authority to make a full and complete surrender, but specifying that the actual fighting would cease 48 hours after the time of signing.

Since this solution obviously placed the decision as to when the fighting would cease in the hands of the Germans I refused to accept it and stated that the fighting would have to cease on both fronts in 48 hours from midnight tonight or I would carry out my threat. I repeat that their purpose is to continue to make a front against the Russians for as long as they possibly can, in order to evacuate the maximum numbers of Germans into our lines.

In any event, for all practical purposes fighting will cease almost immediately on this front, for the reason that with minor exceptions my troops are on the line I have directed them to occupy.

Eisenhower was clear, cogent and on top of his brief. He was going to have no nonsense from the Germans and they understood that. Count Schwerin von Krosigk said simply: ‘With our surrender to Montgomery we were able to call it a truce and get away with it. Those tactics didn’t work with Eisenhower.’

Finally, a suggestion was made that would have preserved a united VE-Day for all members of the Grand Alliance: ‘If the arrangement goes through as above indicated, I suggest that a proclamation should be made on Tuesday by the government naming Wednesday, May 9th as VE Day … We hope to have a formal signing by tomorrow.’

Events, however, were to intervene. At 9.00 p.m that evening, when Bailey made another visit to the Lion d’Or, Susloparov had still not received an answer from Moscow to his request for empowerment.

The Germans realised the delaying tactics were not working. Jodl cabled Dönitz: ‘General Eisenhower insists we sign today … I see no alternative – it is either chaos or signature. I ask you to confirm to me immediately by wireless that I have full powers to sign capitulation.’

At 1.30 a.m. on 7 May all was at last ready. A pool of seventeen pressmen had been chosen to cover proceedings. General Bedell Smith would preside over the event – Eisenhower wished to remain aloof from the German delegation. George Bailey remembered: ‘I was the duty officer for General Bedell Smith that night. The long-awaited signal from Dönitz’s headquarters had come in empowering Jodl to sign. But I was filled with apprehension because I was sure that Susloparov had still not heard from Moscow, and would be unable to sign, and was equally sure that the job of producing him in the War Room would fall to me. It did not. To my astonishment, in half an hour all the signatories – including Susloparov – were assembled in front of me.’

Captain Butcher remembered how matter-of-fact everything was: ‘Major General Kenneth Strong placed the documents for signature in front of General Bedell Smith … Smith spoke briefly to the Germans (interpreted by Strong). It was merely that the surrender documents awaited signature. Were they ready and prepared to sign? Jodl indicated assent with a slight nod.’

The signatories were General Jodl ‘on behalf of the German High Command’, General Bedell Smith ‘on behalf of the commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force’ and Major General Susloparov ‘on behalf of the Soviet High Command’. Brigadier General François Sevez added his name as witness.

Butcher continued: ‘At the conclusion of the signing, General Jodl stood to attention, and said, in English: “I want to say a word”. Then he lapsed into German, later translated as:

‘With this signature the German people and the German armed forces are for better or worse delivered into the victor’s hands. In this war, which has lasted more than five years, both have achieved and suffered more than perhaps any other people in the world. In this hour I can only express the hope that the victor will treat them with generosity.’

The phrase ‘later translated’ is significant, as George Bailey acknowledged:

Jodl’s speech was left in the air. Nobody translated his words or even moved to inquire whether a translation was desired. Major General Oxenius, Jodl’s adjutant, who had been a schoolteacher in Wales before the war, did not do so: neither did General Strong, neither did George Reinhardt, the American interpreter in German, neither did I. For my part, the statement struck me as somehow improper, particularly the reference to the sufferings and achievements of the German armed forces. These, as the instruments of the Nazis, had inflicted and caused untellable suffering on hundreds of millions of non-Germans.

With the official ceremony over, General Eisenhower spoke briefly and privately to the German in his office. The supreme commander related:

‘After the necessary papers had been signed … General Jodl was brought to my room. I asked him through the interpreter if he thoroughly understood all the provisions of the document he had signed. He said that he did. I told him: “You will, officially and personally, be held responsible if the terms of this surrender are violated. That is all.” He saluted and left.’

George Bailey recalled:

This was the only time I ever saw Eisenhower. Perhaps because of the drama and significance of the event, I experienced a kind of optical illusion. Eisenhower was seated at a table in an alcove, whose floor was a step higher than that of the room. He appeared to be of gigantic stature. The impression of massive size was increased when he turned his head and shoulders to face Jodl, who stood forward on the lower floor like a truant schoolboy about to be disciplined.

Eisenhower posed for photographers, holding up the signing pens in a ‘V for Victory’. He then dictated a cable to the Combined Chiefs of Staff in the simple and direct manner that came naturally to him: ‘the mission of this allied force was fulfilled at 0241 local time, May 7, 1945’. Joan Bernard, one of the junior staff at Allied Command, said: ‘It was the deliberate use of understatement that made the announcement so powerful.’ However, the drama of the day was just beginning.

George Bailey wondered about Susloparov and whether he had authority to sign. He speculated that ‘roused early in the morning by the call of history, and finding himself still without a reply from Moscow, he was overcome by the magnitude of the moment and decided to sign on the strength of his accreditation as the chief Soviet representative to SHAEF’. Major General Susloparov was in an impossible situation. If he did not sign, he would be allowing Germany to make peace with Britain, America and France while leaving the Soviet Union at war. Importantly, he insisted on the insertion of a clause stating that a new surrender ceremony could take place elsewhere, as follow-up, if any of the Allies requested it.

Early on 7 May at Breslau, the surrender complete, German general Hermann Niehoff was invited to join his Soviet counterpart at the Villa Colonia in a banquet. ‘A sliding door was suddenly opened,’ Niehoff recalled, ‘flanked by two Red Army soldiers dressed in white. A decorated table filled the room – candles cast light on mountains of cold dishes, seafood, meat pies and bottles of vodka everywhere. The victor wanted to celebrate – and I was politely asked to join him.’

Niehoff was exhausted and the scene unfolding before him appeared quite surreal. The battle for Breslau had been savage and uncompromising. But the German sensed genuine Russian respect for the way his soldiers had fought. Even in this most fanatical of wars, common ground between opposing soldiers could still sometimes be forged.

‘Herr General, please have the best seat.’ Niehoff was placed next to Gluzdovski, flanked by an interpreter. The Soviet commander proposed a toast. ‘The fight is over. To the heroism of the Breslau garrison.’ Niehoff, inculcated with Nazi doctrine of a race war against the inferior Slavs, wondered whether he was dreaming.

At Rheims, it was now a question of timing. The formal announcement of the surrender would be dependent on an agreement jointly reached by the heads of the Grand Alliance, Truman, Churchill and Stalin.

But that morning it was clear something was very wrong. Kay Summersby remembered:

It was the worst day I ever put in at the Supreme Commander’s office. One glance at the messages awaiting the General [Eisenhower] indicated that there would be no parties that day. Everything was in a muddle. One message stated that the Germans in Czechoslovakia refused to surrender to the Russians opposite their lines … A second message noted that the German radio had announced the Nazis had made a separate peace with the Western allies, not with the Russians. The latter not only complained bitterly at this report, but advised SHAEF they no longer felt General Susloparov had been an acceptable Soviet representative at the Rheims ceremony.

Around 3.00pm the final blow fell. Beetle [Bedell Smith] roared into the office like a madman: Ed Kennedy of the Associated Press had smuggled into America a story of the Rheims surrender. The ‘scoop’ already hummed over AP wires in the United States, leaving a pack of angry correspondents in France, a group of very upset gentlemen in the Kremlin, 10 Downing Street and the White House – and a very irate Supreme Commander in Rheims …

The rest of 7 May was all like that. Even the Prime Minister added to the general chaos in our office by telephoning a total of eight times from London … We all went home that night agreeing it was the most harrowing day SHAEF ever experienced.

The response from the Soviet High Command to Eisenhower was robust – and also, to Supreme Allied Headquarters, surprising and shocking. They now made clear their opposition to any agreement with Dönitz. Unfortunately their letter – dispatched early on the morning of 7 May – arrived after the surrender at Rheims was actually signed.

The Soviet chief of staff, General Antonov, stressed the following:

In spite of the negotiations being conducted with the German command for the unconditional surrender of their troops in the west and also on the eastern fronts, Admiral Dönitz is continuing his announcements over the radio, calling upon German troops to continue the war against Soviet forces on the one hand, and not to resist the allied forces in the west on the other.

Dönitz made such an announcement on 5 May, the same day that General Eisenhower was conducting negotiations with Admiral Friedeburg on all fronts. Such conduct creates public opinion that Dönitz already has a separate truce in the west and is continuing the war in the east.

The task is not to give public opinion in Europe the chance to claim that there is a separate truce between the allies and the Germans.