The Wehrmacht: History, Myth, Reality

by Wolfram Wette, Deborah Lucas Schneider (Translator)

This book is a profound reexamination of the role of the German army, the Wehrmacht, in World War II. Until very recently, the standard story avowed that the ordinary German soldier in World War II was a good soldier, distinct from Hitler's rapacious SS troops, and not an accomplice to the massacres of civilians. Wolfram Wette, a preeminent German military historian, explodes the myth of a "clean" Wehrmacht with devastating clarity.

This book reveals the Wehrmacht's long-standing prejudices against Jews, Slavs, and Bolsheviks, beliefs that predated the prophecies of "Mein Kampf" and the paranoia of National Socialism. Though the sixteen-million-member German army is often portrayed as a victim of Nazi mania, we come to see that from 1941 to 1944 these soldiers were thoroughly involved in the horrific cleansing of Russia and Eastern Europe. Wette compellingly documents Germany's long-term preparation of its army for a race war deemed necessary to safeguard the country's future; World War II was merely the fulfillment of these plans, on a previously unimaginable scale.

This sober indictment of millions of German soldiers reaches beyond the Wehrmacht's complicity to examine how German academics and ordinary citizens avoided confronting this difficult truth at war's end. Wette shows how atrocities against Jews and others were concealed and sanitized, and history rewritten. Only recently has the German public undertaken a reevaluation of this respected national institution--a painful but necessary process if we are to truly comprehend how the Holocaust was carried out and how we have come to understand it.

Genres: History, World War II, Nonfiction, Military Fiction, Germany, Military History, European History

400 pages, Hardcover

First published May 15, 2002

Reviews

[Bonnie · Rating 4 out of 5]

One of the most educational books on World War II I have read. It was so frightening to know that the violent prejudice and hate could be translated to the army. We are used to thinking of that only took orders and that the SS was the worst violators of human life. But it was not and how cheaply these generals considered the jewish and Russian populace was nightmarish.

[JerryDeanHalleck · Rating 2 out of 5]

OK for what it is. I need to start examining Book covers and dust jackets more closely. I picked it up, saw the title, and opened to a discussion of German soldiers and their letters home from the Eastern Front. I jumped to the conclusion, this would be an examination of the average German soldier's WW II experience.

Wrong. Instead, its another "Well, you thought there were good Germans? Well, think again!" books. We've gotten a lot of those published in the last 25 years. We get 100 pages on Antisemitsm, another 100 page on why the German army didn't have "Clean Hands", and a 100 pages on everything else.

Not what I was looking for.

[Santiago Granados · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesante como relato histórico de un tema que, como muy bien lo explica el autor, solo hasta ahora ha sido indagado gracias a la voluntad de las nuevas generaciones en Alemania de saber la verdad. Sin embargo, en algunos de los apartes parece volverse repetitivo y eso, sumado al gran número de nombres mencionados, hace que la lectura a veces se velva pesada y tediosa.

[Karen (Living Unabridged) · Rating 4 out of 5]

Highly educational, dispelling the myth of the Wehrmacht's "good war". Recommended for anyone interested in the era.

[FellowBibliophile KvK · Rating 1 out of 5]

Narrow-minded Germanist who did not read many of the books he condemns.

He says that Halder told German officers who survived the war to "not criticise the leadership," which shows he never read Guderian or Manstein's books. Both Guderian and Manstein, far from "not criticising" Halder, make him out to be an effete, limp-writed REMF. Guderian also reports that Manstein habitually licked Hitler's boots like Milley habitually kissed Biden's ass.

Moreover, he acts as if Halder and other German Generals were exceptional in denying any wrongdoing and in blaming Hitler for what went wrong. In reality, both Westmoreland and Andrew Bacevich said of their time in Vietnam "I was minimally involved." Ira Augustus Hunt's history of the 9th Infantry Division in the Delta makes zero mention of the massacres Hunt ordered. And Ricardo Sanchez, Daniel Bolger, Andrew Bacevich, Douglas Porch, Gian Gentile and Kevin Tillman ALL blame the politicians instead of the officers for what went wrong in Iraq.

Wette also thinks that the "anti-Communism" of German officers before and during 1941-1945 was somehow exceptional, which shows the problems that being a narrow-minded Germanist get you. Whatever German officers said or wrote before 1941, not a single one of them assassinated a Chancellor or other cabinet member in the 1930s on the grounds of "insufficient anti-Communism," and not a single German General in 1939 tried to smash the "halt" line with the aim of obliterating the oncoming Red Army--in stark contrast to the Kodo-Ha in Japan on 26 February 1936 and to the Japanese Kwangtug Army in Mongolia in May 1939.

Wette whinges about what the Bundeswehr thought about the Wehrmacht--completely ignoring the fact that, at the time of writing, the Bundeswehr was a garrison army where every command has to be ratified by the soldiers' union.

[Simon Mee]

An interesting overview of the Wehrmacht’s underlying perceptions of Russia/Soviet Union and Judaism, how Hitler harnessed that, and how the myth of a clean war arose (and was finally broken down). There is coverage of certain crimes the Wehrmacht committed, but these feel illustrative rather than a proper accounting.

Despte this, the book is still useful and, on a side note, provides a good reminder of how the myth of German operational/tactical superiority arose:

An essential component of the picture of the Wehrmacht assembled by the former officers had to do with the allegedly outstanding professional skills of the leadership and the unusual courage and endurance of German soldiers.

…but I feel it is getting a little long in the tooth in terms of being an introduction to German military war crimes (the quotations of Fritz Fischer may raise an eyebrow or two these days). You would be better off getting something that did properly delve into particular incidents on a wider basis – the historiography stuff is more a background and I suspect there are better retellings now.

So, fine, good even, but not a must read for an introduction to the Wehrmacht’s war crimes. Perhaps worth reading though as you work your way into the material.

[David Carniglia · Rating 3 out of 5]

A very informative analysis of the Wehrmacht's complicity in the Holocaust. The author explores the latent (and sometimes overt) level of antisemitism in both the Wilhelmine and Weimar Army, which made them willing participants in Hitler's plans.

Most importantly, he shows that there wasn't much difference--with some notable exceptions--between the attitudes and actions of the SS and the regular army. The 'just following orders' excuse becomes rather lame, to say the least.

The writing is quite good, although, possibly because of the translation, there's plenty of repetition.

What I don't understand is the title and subtitle--there's no indication that this isn't strictly an organizational or operational analysis of the Wehrmacht.

[Mischi · Rating 5 out of 5]

Ein Buch, das ich gerne gelesen habe. Es zeigt auf, dass es im dritten Reich bezüglich der Vernichtungspolitik eben nicht den oft behaupteten Unterschied zwischen "sauberer Wehrmacht" und "mordender SS" gab, sondern dass auch die Wehrmacht im Vernichtungskrieg eine tragende Rolle gespielt hat. Mit der Auswahlbibliographie werde ich mich noch lange beschäftigen können.

[Clarke Wood · Rating 4 out of 5]

When I first started learning about world war 2, the common view was that while the Nazis and the SS were bad, the regular Germany Wehrmacht behaved differently. As well, the antisemitism and racism was something Hitler had pushed onto the Germans. At lot of more recent work has managed to pretty much demolish these assumptions. While one might criticize the German generals of WW2 for being Nazis, and over-rated in terms of their abilities, they did run a public relations campaign after the war that was phenomenally successful in remaking their image.

This book does a great job of illustrating how a lot of nazi ideology was anything but new and its precepts had been floating around in nationalist and conservative circles of Germany even before the first world war with respect to hatred of jews, socialists, slavs, as well as the idea that the east was a land of subhumans that would have to be dealt with at some point.

The books spends most of its time detailing how the officer corps of the German army was reactionary, anti-semitic, and hostile to liberal democracy and jewish-bolshevism (Most Germans saw the two terms as synonomous). The officer corps was also quite supportive of Nazism and Hitler's war aims. For example, even Generals Blomberg and Fritsch who were removed from their positions prior to the war by Hitler to secure his control of the army were quite supportive of the Nazi regime. The July plotters against Hitler also do not come out looking very attractive, in that while they were against Hitler, they were pretty far from being liberal pacifists. The bulk of the rank and file of the German army were also shown to be supportive of Nazi war aims as they saw them, and participated and enabled multiple war crimes and crimes against humanity.

The book concludes with a discussion of how the real history of the Wehrmacht was white-washed after the war, due to cold war politics, and the actions of many German veterans and generals.

[Ernst · Rating 5 out of 5]

Because of the Cold War, the Americans wanted to understand their Sovjet foe, and asked German generals to publish their war memoirs. In doing so, they provided unlimited access to German war documentation - far before official historians could get the same access. That enabled these generals, their leader being Halder, the former chief of the German army, to rewrite the legend of the Wehrmacht into an army that only fought bravely, without being involved in the murder of the Jews and other war crimes. They could even have certain documents dissappear, like the involvement of the famous sixth army with the murder of 33,000 Jews in Babi Yar, near Kiev, Ukraine.

[Schopfi · Rating 4 out of 5]

Very concice analysis of the active role of the german army in the nazi crimes against humanity, the history of antisemitism, antidemocratic sentiment and aggressive militarist worldview in the army since imperial times which created a convergence of interest between the armed force and the nazi government, as well as its successful attempt to whitewash its history after the war. It focuses on ideological and systemic aspects. Does illustrate the role of the Wehrmacht in the Holocaust, which has long been overlooked. The mass murder of millions of soviet POWs is discussed however not to the extent the magnitude of the crime would demand.

[Gerald Hickman · Rating 3 out of 5]

Great source of new ideas about the German Army.