Five Days That Shocked the World: Eyewitness Accounts from Europe at the End of World War II (29 page)

Dönitz was stunned. “Will now in force.” That could mean only one thing. Hitler was dead. Something had happened to him in Berlin, and now Dönitz was the new Führer.

Reaching for the phone, he rang Albert Speer at his trailer near Lake Eutin. One of Speer’s secretaries answered, to be told curtly that the Führer was dead. A few minutes later Speer set out to join Dönitz at Plön. He was with him later when a follow-up cable arrived from the Chancellery
:

Grand Admiral Donitz: (Top Secret. Only via officer)

Fuhrer deceased yesterday at 3.30 pm. Testament of April 29 appoints you Reich President, Minister Gobbels Chancellor, Reichsleiter Bormann Party Minister, Minister Seyss-Inquart Foreign Minister. On the Fuhrer’s instructions the testament sent out of Berlin to you and to Field Marshall Schorner, to assure its preservation for the people.

Reichsleiter Bormann will try to get to you today to orient you on the situation. The form and time of announcement to the troops and public are left to you. Confirm receipt.

Göbbels, Bormann.

So there it was. Hitler was dead: presumably by suicide, since the signal said he had died rather than fallen in battle. Now it was up to Dönitz to hold the German people together and bring the war to an end. Not only that, he would have to do it with Göbbels and Bormann, if the terms of Hitler’s will were to be honored. But Göbbels and Bormann were the last people he wanted around him as he grappled with Germany’s collapse and struggled to secure an acceptable peace. With them around, he would be dead in the water before he even began.

Watching him, Speer sensed the admiral’s irritation at being saddled with Göbbels as Germany’s chancellor and Bormann as Nazi Party minister at a time like this:

“This is utterly impossible!” Dönitz exclaimed, for it made a farce of the powers of his office. “Has anyone else seen the radio message yet?”

Except for the radio man and the admiral’s adjutant, Lüdde-Neurath, who had taken the message directly to his chief, no one had. Dönitz then ordered that the radio man be sworn to silence and the message locked up and kept confidential. “What will we do if Bormann and Göbbels actually arrive here?” Dönitz asked. Then he continued resolutely: “I absolutely will not cooperate with them in any case.”
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Thinking it over, he decided that Bormann and Göbbels would have to be arrested if they showed their faces in Plön. But they would have to get to Plön first. More immediately, Dönitz decided to keep Hitler’s death secret for the next few hours, until he had had time to adjust to the situation. He had already summoned General Jodl and Field Marshal Keitel to Plön to give him an assessment of the military situation. Now, as the new Führer, he summoned other generals and various Nazi officials as well. While Albert Speer drafted an announcement for Dönitz to broadcast to the nation that night, Dönitz spent the rest of the day consulting as many senior people as possible before going public with the news and revealing to the world the death of Germany’s Führer.

*   *   *

FIELD MARSHAL KEITEL
was already well on his way to Plön. He had been on the road since four that morning, moving his headquarters again to keep one step ahead of the Russians. Driving first to Wismar, on the Baltic coast, he had twice had to abandon his car and run for his life as the RAF strafed the long columns of retreating Wehrmacht. Keitel had been shocked to see RAF fighters wheeling freely overhead. It meant that the British were coming, too, closing in on the Germans from one side while the Russians closed in from the other.

Keitel was not a front-line soldier. He was Hitler’s creature, a pompous ass held in deep contempt by real soldiers. He had been promoted far above his natural ceiling, a dim-witted man who should never have risen above colonel. But field marshals held a special position in German society, and Hitler needed to keep his generals close. He had promoted Keitel because he could always be trusted to say “Ja, mein Führer” and do exactly what he was told, instead of seeking to query his orders, as more independent officers sometimes did.

But Hitler was trapped in Berlin, so far as Keitel knew, and Dönitz was the man of the moment. When he got to Wismar, Keitel conferred with General Jodl and General Kurt Student about the need to keep the Baltic ports open for the shiploads of troops and refugees pouring in from East Prussia. Then Keitel and Jodl drove separately to the naval barracks at Neustadt, north of Lübeck, where they expected to find Dönitz. Learning that he was at Plön, Keitel continued there that afternoon to find the admiral already in conference with another officer about the coastal defenses along the North Sea.

There too was Hanna Reitsch, Hitler’s favorite lady pilot. After escaping from Berlin with Robert von Greim, she had flown the new head of the Luftwaffe to Plön for a meeting with Dönitz. Talking to her as he waited his turn to see the admiral, Keitel was shocked to hear of Fegelein’s death at the bunker, shot on Hitler’s orders without even the pretense of a trial. The situation had obviously reached a pretty pass if officers that close to Hitler were being taken outside and executed on a whim.

Keitel was shown in to Dönitz. The admiral was polite enough, but he wasn’t particularly pleased to see the field marshal. He shared the Wehrmacht’s view of Keitel as a “golden pheasant,” one of those useless officers in glittering uniforms who strutted about behind the lines while the real men got on with the war. He had given orders for Keitel to be replaced as chief of staff by Field Marshal von Manstein. But Manstein couldn’t be found for the moment, so Dönitz was stuck with Keitel until he could be relieved. He would have preferred an officer with a better grasp of the conditions at the front.

They had a long discussion, mostly about the hopelessness of the situation. Without revealing its significance, Dönitz showed Keitel the first signal from Bormann and told him that Hitler’s last will and testament was apparently on its way to Plön as they spoke. It was obvious to both of them that Berlin couldn’t hold out much longer. Dönitz wanted the German army in Czechoslovakia to begin an immediate withdrawal toward the west, so that it could surrender to the Americans in due course. Keitel disagreed, arguing that any withdrawal would rapidly turn into a rout as the Germans fled and the Russians chased after them. Against his better judgment, Dönitz agreed to postpone the decision until he had discussed it with Field Marshal Schörner, commanding the troops in Czechoslovakia.

Keitel drove back to Neustadt after the meeting. He was delayed again by the RAF, attacking the villages around the naval headquarters just before dark. He called for General Jodl when he got back and they compared notes over their meetings with Dönitz. Jodl shared his view that Germany should keep fighting until everyone had been evacuated from the Russian front and could safely surrender to the Allies in the west. It seemed to Jodl that the British and Americans were bound to fall out with the Russians in due course. If the Germans could hold on for another few days, they just might be able to force the issue and drive a wedge between the democratic countries and the Bolsheviks. It could only be to Germany’s advantage if they succeeded, because the western Allies would surely want the Germans in their camp, if it ever came to a standoff between them and the Russians.

*   *   *

AT HIS NEW HEADQUARTERS
near Travemünde, Heinrich Himmler was in despair as he sat down to breakfast after returning from his midnight meeting with Dönitz. He had been bitterly disappointed to learn not only that he was not to be the new Führer, but that there was to be no place at all for him in the new government. He had been suicidal when he reached his headquarters and was little better after a few hours’ sleep. Joining him after a brief trip to Copenhagen, Walter Schellenberg found Himmler very nervous and distracted as they discussed the situation in Scandinavia and Count Bernadotte’s proposals for a peaceful German withdrawal from Norway and Denmark.

Himmler decided to visit Dönitz again after breakfast. He had been so long at the center of the Nazi web that he didn’t know what else to do, now that he no longer had a job. He had convinced himself that he would still be needed in some capacity or other, if only because the Allies would depend on the SS to keep order after the war. Eisenhower and Montgomery would surely need Police Chief Himmler’s services as “an indispensable factor for law and order” as they grappled with the chaos of postwar Germany. In his wilder moments, he even saw himself as the minister of the interior in a postwar world, not just of Germany, but of the whole of Europe.

Taking Schellenberg with him, Himmler set off at eleven. They traveled via Lübeck, but the roads were so congested that even with an SS escort clearing the way, they didn’t reach Plön until two. Unexpected and uninvited, Himmler had no appointment with Dönitz. With so many other people waiting to see the admiral, he was forced to cool his heels while he waited his turn, wandering disconsolately around the headquarters with nothing to do. Keitel saw him and wondered what his game was. “I have no idea what his real intentions were, but it seemed to me that he wanted to put himself at our disposal for further duties and keep himself briefed on the situation.”
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Others saw him, too, and wondered if the radio reports were true, that Himmler had been negotiating with the Allies behind their backs.

Dönitz had little to say to Himmler when at last he found time to see him. He disliked the man and feared him, because Himmler still had the SS at his disposal, but he repeated, beyond any shadow of doubt, that there was no room for him in the new administration. Himmler still didn’t believe it. Convinced that he would be needed sooner or later, he decided to stick close to Dönitz’s headquarters for the next few days, so that he could be there at a moment’s notice, if required. Hans Prützmann was his liaison officer at Dönitz’s headquarters. Leaving strict instructions for Prützmann to keep him posted, Himmler returned to his motorcade at the end of a most unsatisfactory day and set off back to his own headquarters to bide his time and await developments.

*   *   *

RIBBENTROP WAS IN PLÖN,
too. After several days on the road, he had finally arrived from Berlin and established a headquarters of his own just outside the town. In common with Himmler, he was convinced that Dönitz would need a man of his experience in the new administration. He had sat by the telephone ever since his arrival, waiting for the call that was certain to come. He was sure the admiral would want to give him an important job, in all probability the same job of foreign minister that he had held under Hitler.

The telephone did ring, in due course, but not with the offer that Ribbentrop wanted. Dönitz had decided to reappoint Ribbentrop’s predecessor, Konstantin von Neurath, as both foreign and prime minister in his new government. But Neurath couldn’t be found, so Dönitz’s aide rang Ribbentrop to ask if he knew where he was.

Ribbentrop didn’t. Furthermore, he was outraged to hear that Neurath was going to be offered his job. He went round to see Dönitz at once, probably on the evening of May 1, arguing that he was still legally foreign minister and should be allowed to remain in the position, particularly as he had been ordered by Hitler to make an approach to the British. He pointed out that he had been the ambassador in London before the war and knew the British well. They liked and respected him. If there were to be negotiations with the British in the days and weeks ahead, he was the right man for the task.

But Dönitz shared London’s assessment of Ribbentrop as a posturing ninny. He wasn’t about to give the job of foreign minister to the man who had assured Hitler that the British would never fight. He brought the interview to a close by pretending to seek Ribbentrop’s help in choosing a new foreign minister. If Neurath couldn’t be found, someone else would have to take his place. Dönitz was thinking of Count Schwerin von Krosigk, a former Rhodes Scholar at Oxford, but he was open to other suggestions. He asked Ribbentrop to go away and think of some other candidates overnight. Ribbentrop did so, promising to report back with a list of names the following day.

*   *   *

AT MAUTERNDORF,
the SS detachment guarding Hermann Göring in his castle had just received orders to kill him. The orders had come from Martin Bormann in the bunker. After sending a signal to Dönitz to say that Hitler’s will was in force, he had sent another to Mauterndorf, couched in equally cryptic language: “The situation in Berlin is increasingly tense. If we should fall in Berlin, the traitors of 23 April must be exterminated. Men, do your duty! Your life and honour depend on it!”

That was clear enough. Without actually saying so in print, Bormann was telling them to shoot Göring for his telegram of April 23, asking if he was supposed to take over as Führer. Bormann had always hated Göring. Now was his chance to eliminate his rival once and for all.

But the SS weren’t so sure. For one thing, they heartily despised Bormann. For another, they wanted to be on the winning side when the dust settled. Shooting Göring might not be a good idea if they were called to account for it later. They decided to cover their backs instead.

A copy of the telegram was delivered to Berchtesgaden and shown to General Karl Koller, the Luftwaffe’s chief of staff. He had just sent a Luftwaffe signal unit to Mauterndorf to establish a force loyal to Göring in the town. The unit was small, but its numbers had been greatly exaggerated to the SS, making it clear to them that they would not escape unscathed if they tried to murder the Luftwaffe’s former chief.

Koller’s first thought on seeing the telegram was that perhaps he was one of the traitors to be exterminated, since he had helped draft Göring’s signal of April 23. He was relieved to learn from the SS officer who brought it that they had no intention of carrying out their orders. They weren’t in a position to let Göring go, but they weren’t prepared to kill him, either.

Later, another SS officer arrived from Mauterndorf. Standartenführer Krause shared the general reluctance to kill Göring, but wouldn’t set him free without proper authority. He wanted the Luftwaffe to take the decision out of his hands.