Randall Hansen

Disobeying Hitler – Some did!

Disobeying Hitler by Randall Hansen is an excellently researched and written account of those few senior German officers who disobeyed Hitler’s orders and could have faced execution themselves. This book accounts for the German resistance in the final years of the war after the executions of von Stauffenberg and Rommel in July 1944.

When the Russians started turning the tide of the war and pushing back the German Army Hitler gave orders that not an inch of ground was not to be given and a scorched earth policy was placed up on the command and mayors. Nowhere was this example truer than the destruction of Warsaw after the uprising when not a building was left standing and human suffering was the highest.

Some officers and citizens saw that this plan was utter madness and this book gives their account. Some of the opposition was to save some of the cities of Germany from complete destruction with the withdrawal of the army and the coming allies. A common sense approach one could say.

There are three chapters given over to General Choltitz and his actions in saving Paris from being levelled to the ground. Hansen makes it clear that was not due to ideological difference he was as anti-Semitic as other German officers. He did put up some sort of resistance towards the defence of Paris, enough to convince Hitler he was doing all he could to hold the city. More practically Choltitz did not have the men or equipment to hold or destroy Paris.

Hansen also examines the German Army’s willingness in the murder of Jews that it was not all down to the SS. He is trying to make people understand that the SS were not alone in anti-Semite actions.

We also see Albert Speer’s actions examined, the munitions minister who wanted to preserve as much as he could. Hansen also points out that this was probably more down to his own self-preservation.

Disobeying Hitler has been well researched and highlights the much forgotten story of the very few who actually ignored Hitler’s ranting orders. He does show that there were fanatics in both in the SS and army who were willing to destroy everything and everyone as the pulled back to Berlin. This is about those who for varying reasons did the opposite. Hopefully this book will remind people that there were others who opposed Hitler other than the participants in the July plot of 1944.

This is an excellent history well written and well researched giving us a glimpse at some of the morally hazy individuals who were making decisions to save what they could for after the war. This book brings their stories to life and is a reminder that it is sometimes the decisions we make not to do something can be as important as what we decide to do.… (más)

This is a scholarly yet very readable chronicle of German resistance to Hitler's oppressive rule during the later years of the war in 1944 and 1945. After World War II ended many Germans tried to disassociate themselves from or to lessen their involvement in the Nazi regime and it's atrocities. The author, Randall Hansen, has sifted through this quagmire of self effacement to find the true stories of German disobedience. After the failed attempt by a few members of the German military to assassinate Hitler on 20 July 1944, there were no other organized attempts on his life, but the strength of his personal aura faded. Some military and civilian leaders as well as individual citizens became more animated in their defiance of his orders. In these latter years some people started to look beyond the inevitable end of the war toward what they wanted for Germany and its people after the end of the Nazi regime. They could not and would not follow orders to scorch and burn their homeland merely to deny it to the enemy. Some Germans saw the Western Allies as saviors from not only the Nazis, but also from the Soviets. Stories are recorded of military commanders and civilian leaders who openly defied Hitler's orders to destroy their own cities rather than to surrender. Following these orders would have meant the total destruction of cities and their infrastructures leaving tens or even hundreds of thousands with even less than had already been taken from them by years of war. Not following these orders often meant death for the individual. A very interesting look at a little talked about view of some of the German people in World War II. Book provided for review by Amazon Vine.… (más)

Randall Hansen writes clearly and vividly, describing the British and American bombing campaigns against Germany in World War II. The plural in the previous sentence is one of his points: that the British and Americans conducted two separate and uncoordinated strategic bombing campaigns against Germany. His focus is on the bombing of Germany, so he does not cover in much detail other bombing campaigns where the British and Americans cooperated more effectively, such as the campaign against the French transport system before D-Day.

One of his examples of this lack of cooperation was that after the American daytime raid on Schweinfurt, the Germans feared that RAF bombers would show up that night and disrupt their recovery efforts by plastering the area with incendiary bombs, and that such an attack might prevent them from resuming production there at all. According to Hansen, the Germans were amazed that the RAF never showed up at Schweinfurt, and that the Americans did not follow up there, either.

The person who emerges as the big villain in Hansen's account is Arthur "Bomber" Harris. The British bombing campaign, in particular, was calculated terror bombing aimed specifically at civilians. Harris conceived this campaign and continued to press it home throughout the war, even when it became clear that this was not breaking German morale, that concentrating on other targets (such as oil and transportation) would more materially damage the German war effort, that improved technology and techniques removed the need for blanket area bombing, and even when Churchill gave him a more or less direct order to cease area bombing and concentrate on assigned targets. Amazingly, when Harris pushed back against this directive, Churchill did not reprimand him but caved in and praised Harris for his service to the country.… (más)