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Authors: Roger Moorhouse
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writers alike. It is tempting to speculate not only on the number of lives that could have been saved, the conflict that might have been avoided, and the suffering that perhaps would have been spared, but also on how differently European, and especially German, history might have played out in the twentieth century had Hitler been successfully felled by an assassin’s bullet. Surely here, if nowhere else, is a case where an assassination might actually have brought the benefits intended by the assassin.
The majority of modern readers would probably agree, instinctively at least, with that statement. But it is interesting to note that unanimity on this issue was much harder to find during Hitler’s lifetime. Then, discussions raged over the propriety of “playing God,” the setting of dangerous precedents, the thorny concepts of “principled treachery” and “state-sanctioned terrorism,” and the question of what further horrors might have followed Hitler’s premature demise. Surprisingly, perhaps, the proposal to assassinate Hitler was never anything less than highly controversial.
Yet, for all these concerns, Hitler’s would-be assassins were not dissuaded. Few leaders, of any century, can have been the target of so many assassination attempts: no fewer than forty-two separate plots on Hitler’s life have been identified by German historians, and even that list is far from complete. 3 Of these, around twenty can be considered serious enough to warrant the attention given to them here.
Hitler was probably the most influential individual of the twentieth century. His name has become synonymous with brutality, intolerance, and racial hatred. His face, perhaps the most instantly recognizable and iconic image of the modern era, is onethat few—even those blessed with living in peaceful times—will ever forget. Yet what of his would-be assassins?
In some cases, the assassin and his victim are bound together in perpetuity by their moment of shared history. Thus John F. Kennedy has his Lee Harvey Oswald, Abraham Lincoln has his John Wilkes Booth, and Franz Ferdinand has his Gavrilo Princip. The assassins of history are sometimes lauded as heroes and are often vilified as the most bestial of criminals, but they are rarely forgotten.
Yet Hitler’s would-be assassins are, for the most part, unknown. Of them, only the name Claus von Stauffenberg might expect to register any reaction from the reading public. For all of them, of course, their greatest failing was that they were unable to carry out their allotted task—that of ridding the world of Adolf Hitler—but they nonetheless deserve greater recognition. They deserve better than to exist only in the footnotes of history, better than the obscurity to which they have been condemned by time and fashion, and in many cases by their Nazi executioners.
Hitler’s assassins ranged from simple craftsmen to high-ranking soldiers, from the apolitical to the ideologically obsessed, and from enemy agents to his closest associates. Inexplicably, few of these men are known beyond the narrow confines of academic history. Their deeds would elicit scarcely a flicker of recognition from the general reader. This is their story. It is the story of their plans, their motives, and—inevitably—their failures. But it is also an account of the remarkable survival of a tyrant.
Selected Bibliography
Archives
British Library Newspaper Archive, London
Bundesarchiv, Berlin
Bundesarchiv Militärarchiv, Freiburg
Fundacja Archiwum Muzeum Pomorskie Armii Krajowej, Toru’n, Poland
National Archives, London
RTsKhIDNI (Russian Center for Historical Documents), Moscow
RGVA (Russian State Military Archive), Moscow
Studium Polski Podziemnej, London
TsAMO (Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense), Moscow
Wiener Library, London
Published Works
Christopher Andrew and Oleg Gordievsky, KGB: The Inside Story of Its Foreign Operations from Lenin to Gorbachev (London, 1990)
Christopher Andrew and
The majority of modern readers would probably agree, instinctively at least, with that statement. But it is interesting to note that unanimity on this issue was much harder to find during Hitler’s lifetime. Then, discussions raged over the propriety of “playing God,” the setting of dangerous precedents, the thorny concepts of “principled treachery” and “state-sanctioned terrorism,” and the question of what further horrors might have followed Hitler’s premature demise. Surprisingly, perhaps, the proposal to assassinate Hitler was never anything less than highly controversial.
Yet, for all these concerns, Hitler’s would-be assassins were not dissuaded. Few leaders, of any century, can have been the target of so many assassination attempts: no fewer than forty-two separate plots on Hitler’s life have been identified by German historians, and even that list is far from complete. 3 Of these, around twenty can be considered serious enough to warrant the attention given to them here.
Hitler was probably the most influential individual of the twentieth century. His name has become synonymous with brutality, intolerance, and racial hatred. His face, perhaps the most instantly recognizable and iconic image of the modern era, is onethat few—even those blessed with living in peaceful times—will ever forget. Yet what of his would-be assassins?
In some cases, the assassin and his victim are bound together in perpetuity by their moment of shared history. Thus John F. Kennedy has his Lee Harvey Oswald, Abraham Lincoln has his John Wilkes Booth, and Franz Ferdinand has his Gavrilo Princip. The assassins of history are sometimes lauded as heroes and are often vilified as the most bestial of criminals, but they are rarely forgotten.
Yet Hitler’s would-be assassins are, for the most part, unknown. Of them, only the name Claus von Stauffenberg might expect to register any reaction from the reading public. For all of them, of course, their greatest failing was that they were unable to carry out their allotted task—that of ridding the world of Adolf Hitler—but they nonetheless deserve greater recognition. They deserve better than to exist only in the footnotes of history, better than the obscurity to which they have been condemned by time and fashion, and in many cases by their Nazi executioners.
Hitler’s assassins ranged from simple craftsmen to high-ranking soldiers, from the apolitical to the ideologically obsessed, and from enemy agents to his closest associates. Inexplicably, few of these men are known beyond the narrow confines of academic history. Their deeds would elicit scarcely a flicker of recognition from the general reader. This is their story. It is the story of their plans, their motives, and—inevitably—their failures. But it is also an account of the remarkable survival of a tyrant.
Selected Bibliography
Archives
British Library Newspaper Archive, London
Bundesarchiv, Berlin
Bundesarchiv Militärarchiv, Freiburg
Fundacja Archiwum Muzeum Pomorskie Armii Krajowej, Toru’n, Poland
National Archives, London
RTsKhIDNI (Russian Center for Historical Documents), Moscow
RGVA (Russian State Military Archive), Moscow
Studium Polski Podziemnej, London
TsAMO (Central Archive of the Ministry of Defense), Moscow
Wiener Library, London
Published Works
Christopher Andrew and Oleg Gordievsky, KGB: The Inside Story of Its Foreign Operations from Lenin to Gorbachev (London, 1990)
Christopher Andrew and
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