0:00

Hey everyone, this is Gary. I thought my voice

0:02

was getting better, but today it actually got a

0:04

lot worse. So with

0:07

that, here's another Encore episode.

0:13

Adolf Hitler single-handedly started the Second World

0:15

War. While the Allies were

0:17

desperately trying to end the Third Reich and Hitler

0:19

personally, they weren't the only ones trying to bring

0:21

Hitler's reign to an end. Inside

0:24

Nazi Germany, a small but committed group

0:26

sought to remove Hitler from power, and

0:28

they finally took action in July of

0:30

1944. Learn more about Operation Valkyrie

0:33

and the plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler

0:35

on this episode of Everything Everywhere Daily.

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the summer of 1944, things were not looking

3:01

good for Nazi Germany. The Western

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Allies had finally landed in France, opening up

3:05

a second front for the war. And on

3:07

the Eastern Front, things weren't looking very good

3:09

either. The Soviets were on the march, and

3:11

German forces were retreating. While

3:13

Hitler managed to lay all the blame for Germany's

3:15

problems on the feet of his many generals, those

3:18

in the know realized the problem was

3:20

not with Germany's generals, the problem was

3:22

with Hitler himself. Like

3:25

success early in the war, Hitler was

3:27

not a brilliant military strategist. The

3:29

higher-ups in the German Wehrmacht saw Hitler as

3:31

the problem, and the only way to avoid

3:34

a complete defeat for Germany was to eliminate

3:36

Hitler. I should note that

3:38

while we tend to paint history with a very

3:40

broad brush, there were many officers in the German

3:43

military who were not members of the Nazi Party.

3:45

The German officer corps had traditionally been made

3:48

up of aristocrats who viewed themselves as being

3:50

professional. Plans to remove Hitler

3:52

from within the German military had been around since at

3:54

least 1938. All of the plots and

3:57

plans eventually went nowhere for a variety of things.

4:00

reasons. Some plotters were indecisive,

4:02

some plans were leaked out, and some

4:04

plans just failed. For example,

4:06

there was a bomb placed in Hitler's plane in 1943 that

4:08

just didn't detonate.

4:10

Another attempt, weeks later in Berlin,

4:12

also failed. Just

4:14

finding other conspirators was difficult given the

4:16

pervasive presence of the Gestapo in the

4:19

SS. By 1944, a

4:21

new plot to eliminate Hitler started coalescing.

4:24

The plotters in the new plan were united only

4:26

in their desire to see Hitler gone. They

4:29

all had different visions for Germany after

4:31

the war. But regardless of what they

4:33

wanted for Germany, step one was removing

4:35

Hitler. The general consensus

4:37

was that with Hitler gone it would be

4:39

possible to negotiate with the Allies, hopefully

4:41

to preserve their pre-1939 boundaries and avoid the

4:45

punishing reparations which were handed down after the

4:47

First World War. The

4:49

initial organizers of the plot were Major

4:52

General Henning von Treskow and General Friedrich

4:54

Ulbricht. Field Marshal Erwin von

4:56

Witzelben was also part of the plot.

4:59

But in August of 1943, Treskow met

5:01

a young Lieutenant Colonel by the name of

5:03

Klaus von Stauffenberg. Stauffenberg had

5:05

been severely wounded in Tunisia in April

5:07

of 1943 when his car was strafed

5:10

by a British fighter plane. He lost

5:12

his left eye, right hand, and two

5:14

fingers on his left hand. Stauffenberg

5:17

was a German Nationalist and a Catholic.

5:19

He had very ambivalent views of Hitler.

5:21

He supported the Nationalistic part of Hitler's

5:23

program but abhorred the treatment of Jews

5:25

and other minority groups. Eventually

5:28

he came to the conclusion that eliminating Hitler

5:30

was for the greater good. That

5:32

if Hitler were killed, millions would be saved.

5:36

The conspirators faced a problem. First,

5:38

they had to kill Hitler. Capturing

5:40

him and putting him on trial was not an

5:42

option. Members of the SS took

5:45

a personal vow of loyalty to Hitler. And

5:47

the only thing which could break that vow

5:49

was Hitler's death. So long

5:51

as Hitler was alive, they would face active

5:53

resistance from within Germany. The

5:55

next problem was that killing Hitler wasn't

5:58

sufficient. So let's say you

6:00

were... assassinate Hitler? Then what? How

6:02

do you take control of the German government in

6:04

that vacuum that Hitler's death would create? Thankfully,

6:07

the answer to that question was provided

6:09

by Hitler himself. It was

6:11

an emergency plan which was created for the

6:13

continuity of the German government in the event

6:15

of a general civil breakdown. It

6:18

was known as Operation Valkyrie. Operation

6:20

Valkyrie is often thought to be the name

6:22

of the plan to assassinate Hitler, and it

6:25

was not. It was the name

6:27

of the plan which would be implemented after

6:29

the assassination of Hitler. Operation

6:31

Valkyrie would be implemented by the German

6:33

Reserve Army, which was their equivalent of

6:35

the National Guard. The Reserve

6:37

Army would assume control in all the various

6:40

localities after the plotters announced that

6:42

the Nazi party had killed Hitler in an attempted

6:44

coup. This was the mechanism

6:46

that they would use to claim control of the

6:48

country once Hitler was dead. Then

6:51

the question was, how exactly do you

6:53

kill Hitler? There had been other plots

6:55

that had been exposed, so by 1944

6:57

Hitler no longer appeared in public. A

7:00

sniper taking him out at a public appearance wasn't

7:02

an option. Poisoning him also

7:04

wasn't an option because all of his food

7:06

was prepared specially for him and yet a

7:09

food taster. This led the

7:11

conspirators to conclude that the best option to kill

7:13

Hitler would be a bomb. The

7:15

plan developed by Treskow and Stelffenberg was to plant

7:18

a bomb at a meeting that was to be

7:20

held at a venue called the Wolf's Lair. The

7:22

Wolf's Lair was Hitler's military headquarters located

7:25

in what was then East Prussia. Today

7:27

the location is in the Polish town of Kenson.

7:30

There were several reasons why the Wolf's Lair was

7:32

selected. The first was that it

7:35

could be assured that Hitler would be there.

7:37

Hitler often changed his plans at the last

7:39

minute, but he regularly held briefings in a

7:41

reinforced bunker at the Wolf's Lair. The

7:43

other reason was the bunker itself, where the meetings

7:45

were held. The bunker was

7:47

an ideal place for a bomb. It

7:49

was heavily fortified with no windows and

7:51

only one reinforced door. The blast wave

7:53

from a bomb would be contained in

7:55

the bunker amplifying its damage. On

7:58

July 1, 1944, Stauffenberg was

8:00

appointed Chief of Staff to General Friedrich

8:02

Fromm, the head of the German Reserve

8:04

Army, the man who would have

8:07

the authority to initiate Operation Valkyrie. This

8:10

position gave Stauffenberg access to the briefings with

8:12

Hitler at the Wolfslayer. As

8:14

such, Stauffenberg decided that he would deliver the bomb

8:16

himself so he could be sure it was done

8:18

properly. The plan was

8:20

for Stauffenberg to have two explosives in a satchel

8:22

which he would bring to a briefing in the

8:25

bunker. He would get the

8:27

satchel as close to Hitler as possible, then

8:29

excuse himself, step out of the bunker, and

8:31

it would blow up, killing everyone inside. In

8:34

theory, this plan would have worked. It

8:37

was decided to enact a plan on July 20, 1944, when

8:39

both Himmler and Göring would be

8:42

in attendance. Stauffenberg would

8:44

be presenting a status report on the Reserve Army.

8:47

At 11 a.m., Stauffenberg arrived at the

8:49

Wolfslayer along with two of his conspirators,

8:51

Major General Helm of Steiff and First

8:53

Lieutenant Wernher von Haifden. At

8:56

11.35, Stauffenberg excused himself to change his

8:58

shirt, when he armed only one of

9:01

the explosives with the aid of First

9:03

Lieutenant Haifden. This was

9:05

the first thing to go wrong. They were

9:07

supposed to arm two explosives, not one. Then

9:10

at 12.37 p.m., Stauffenberg enters the briefing room

9:13

and meets Hitler. However, it wasn't

9:15

in the bunker. Due to

9:17

extremely warm weather, the meeting was moved to an

9:19

above-ground wooden building with windows and a breeze. This

9:22

was the second major deviation from the plan. Stauffenberg

9:26

placed his satchel with the bomb close to Hitler underneath

9:28

the table. His excuse for getting close

9:30

to Hitler is that his hearing was damaged due to his

9:32

injuries. At

9:34

12.40, Stauffenberg excused himself to make an

9:36

important phone call minutes before the bomb

9:39

was scheduled to detonate. However,

9:41

as soon as he left the room, the satchel

9:43

with the bomb was moved to the other end

9:45

of the table from where Hitler was standing. And

9:48

this was the third major deviation from the

9:50

plan. At 12.42

9:52

p.m., the bomb inside the satchel

9:54

exploded. While everything

9:57

did not go according to plan, this was

9:59

still a bomb. in an enclosed area. The

10:02

walls of the building were blown out as was

10:04

the roof, and part of the wooden structure was

10:06

on fire. Stauffenberg, hearing

10:08

the explosion and assuming that Hitler was

10:10

dead, jumped into a car and headed

10:12

for an airplane waiting to take him

10:14

to Berlin, where Operation Valkyrie would be

10:17

initiated. Hitler, of course,

10:19

was not dead. In fact, other than

10:21

being shaken up, his pants being shredded

10:23

from splinters, and some damage to his

10:26

arm, he survived mostly unscathed. One

10:28

stenographer was killed instantly, and four of the 20

10:31

people in the room later died from their

10:33

wounds, but no other senior officials were killed. Things

10:36

began to unravel for the plotters

10:38

immediately. Stauffenberg, seen fleeing the scene,

10:41

was immediately suspected. General

10:43

Fromm, the man who had to give

10:45

the order to initiate Operation Valkyrie, was

10:47

contacted by General Keitel, who informed him

10:49

that Hitler was very much alive. Fromm,

10:52

who probably knew about the plot but

10:55

wasn't actively involved, now came down hard

10:57

on the suspected conspirators to show his

10:59

loyalty to Hitler. When he

11:01

confronted them in person, they ended up putting him in

11:03

a cell. Meanwhile,

11:05

General Ulbricht had gone around Fromm and

11:08

initiated Valkyrie without him. And this caused

11:10

confusion around the Reich as local officials

11:12

disarmed SS units, thinking that Hitler was

11:14

dead. As the

11:16

chaos died down by the evening, Fromm was

11:19

freed from a cell and commenced to court-martial

11:21

and execute several of the conspirators, including

11:24

General Ulbricht, Colonel Stauffenberg, and

11:26

Lieutenant Hafton. Needless

11:28

to say, Hitler was furious, and now

11:31

even more paranoid. The Gestapo

11:33

began arresting anyone and everyone who

11:35

had any association with the conspirators.

11:38

Their investigations found evidence of past plots,

11:40

which led to even more arrests. The

11:43

Gestapo also used the assassination attempt to pretty

11:45

much arrest anybody that they had any sort

11:47

of issue with. Over 7,000 people

11:50

were arrested in association with the assassination

11:52

attempt, and almost 5,000 were

11:55

executed. Even General

11:57

Fromm, who executed the immediate people responsible for the

11:59

assassination attempt, responsible for the plot, was

12:01

eventually executed. The fact that he

12:03

killed the plotter so quickly was seen as a sign

12:05

that he was trying to get rid of anyone who

12:07

could testify against him. Most

12:10

of the people involved in the plot didn't try to

12:12

escape or even deny their guilt. General

12:14

Truscow, one of the original men behind the plot,

12:16

had been sent to the Eastern Front months before,

12:19

but when news got out that Hitler was still alive, he

12:21

killed himself with a hand

12:23

grenade. The assassination attempt only made Hitler

12:25

more paranoid in the last months of the

12:27

war. He was constantly assuming that his top

12:30

generals were plotting against him, making him unable

12:32

to trust his most competent commanders. So

12:35

in a roundabout way, it probably shortened

12:37

the war by simply making Hitler make

12:39

bad decisions. None of

12:41

the men in the inner circle of the plot to kill

12:43

Hitler seemed to have any regrets for what they tried to

12:46

do. They knew that they

12:48

would be considered traitors, but they also knew

12:50

that posterity would look kindly upon them. And

12:53

in hindsight, they were right. Hitler has

12:55

become the epitome of evil, and now

12:57

they're considered heroes. If

12:59

only one of the three things which went

13:01

wrong had gone right, Hitler probably

13:03

would have been killed, and the trajectory of the

13:05

war and the history of the world would have

13:08

been changed. Before

13:10

he took his own life, General Truscow

13:12

told another member of the German resistance,

13:14

Fabian von Schlebendorf, about his decision. He

13:17

said, quote, The whole world will

13:19

vilify us now, but I am totally convinced that we

13:21

did the right thing. Hitler is the

13:23

arch enemy, not only of Germany, but of the world.

13:26

When in a few hours time I go before God

13:28

to account for what I have done and left undone,

13:30

I know I will be able to justify what I

13:32

did in the struggle against Hitler. None

13:35

of us can be wail his own death. A

13:37

human being's moral integrity begins when he

13:39

is prepared to sacrifice his life for

13:42

his convictions. The

13:47

executive producer of Everything Everywhere Daily is

13:49

Charles Daniel. The associate producers are Benji

13:51

Long and Cameron Kiever. I

13:53

want to give a big shout out to everyone

13:55

who supports the show over on Patreon, including the

13:57

show's producers. Your support helps me put

13:59

out a show every single day. And

14:02

also, Patreon is currently the only place where

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Everything Everywhere daily merchandise is available to the

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top tier of supporters. If

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you'd like to talk to other listeners of the

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show and members of the Completionist Club, you

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can join the Everything Everywhere daily Facebook group or

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Discord server. Links to everything

14:18

are in the show notes.