Hitler's Generals on Trial
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''Hitler's Generals on Trial: The Last War Crimes Tribunal at Nuremberg'' is a 2010 book by Canadian historian Valerie Hébert dealing with the High Command Trial of 19471948. The book covers the criminal case against the defendants, all high-ranking officers of the armed forces of
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
, as well as the wider societal and historical implications of the trial. The book received generally positive reviews for its mastery of the subject and thorough assessment of the legacy of the trial.


Contents


Premise

''Hitler's Generals on Trial'' details the High Command Trial, officially known as "War Criminals before the Nuremberg Military Tribunals", which was part of the
Subsequent Nuremberg trials The subsequent Nuremberg trials were a series of 12 military tribunals for war crimes against members of the leadership of Nazi Germany between December 1946 and April 1949. They followed the first and best-known Nuremberg trial before the Int ...
. ''Hitler's Generals on Trial'' focuses on two goals set out for the trials. The first, a
didactic Didacticism is a philosophy that emphasizes instructional and informative qualities in literature, art, and design. In art, design, architecture, and landscape, didacticism is an emerging conceptual approach that is driven by the urgent need to ...
goal, which attempted to use the trials as a learning experience for the German nation regarding the depth of the complicity of their armed forces, the
Wehrmacht The ''Wehrmacht'' (, ) were the unified armed forces of Nazi Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the ''Heer'' (army), the ''Kriegsmarine'' (navy) and the ''Luftwaffe'' (air force). The designation "''Wehrmacht''" replaced the previous ...
, in the criminality of the Nazi regime. The second goal involved obtaining justice for the victims by punishing those involved. Handling the subject from an interdisciplinary perspective, Hebert addresses the issues of international
military justice Military justice (also military law) is the legal system (bodies of law and procedure) that governs the conduct of the active-duty personnel of the armed forces of a country. In some nation-states, civil law and military law are distinct bodie ...
, post-war developments in
West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...
, and how political considerations superseded the quest for justice. In this atmosphere the myth of the "
clean Wehrmacht The myth of the clean ''Wehrmacht'' is the negationist notion that the regular German armed forces (the ''Wehrmacht'') were not involved in the Holocaust or other war crimes during World War II. The myth, heavily promoted by German authors ...
" thrived, and in the words of the author, the trial had "virtually no impact on German public consciousness".


Prosecution and defence cases

Using primary and secondary materials, Hébert discusses the proceedings themselves, the evolution of the American judicial policy towards war crimes, the preceding trials, and the post-conviction developments. Hébert focuses in particular on the cases against senior field commanders Hermann Hoth, Georg von Küchler, and Georg-Hans Reinhardt, who led armies and army groups on the Eastern Front and were responsible for mass war crimes and
crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are widespread or systemic acts committed by or on behalf of a ''de facto'' authority, usually a state, that grossly violate human rights. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity do not have to take place within the ...
. She also details the cases against two key members of the OKW, German military's supreme command:
Walter Warlimont Walter Warlimont (3 October 1894 – 9 October 1976) was a German staff officer during World War II. He served as deputy chief of the Operations Staff, one of departments in the ''Oberkommando der Wehrmacht'' (OKW), the Armed Forces High Comman ...
, who composed the Barbarossa Jurisdiction Order, and
Hermann Reinecke Karl Rudolf Ernst Auguste Hermann Reinecke (14 February 1888 – 10 October 1973) generally known as Hermann Reinecke was a German general and war criminal during the Nazi era. As head of the General Office of the Armed Forces in the OKW (Supre ...
, in charge of the prisoner of war regulations, which led to the deaths of millions of Soviet POWs. In covering one tactic shared by defence counsels from different trials, Hébert reviewed a memorandum put forth at the
Nuremberg Trial The Nuremberg trials were held by the Allies against representatives of the defeated Nazi Germany, for plotting and carrying out invasions of other countries, and other crimes, in World War II. Between 1939 and 1945, Nazi Germany invaded m ...
in 1945–1946. Co-authored by former chief of staff of the
OKH The (; abbreviated OKH) was the high command of the Army of Nazi Germany. It was founded in 1935 as part of Adolf Hitler's rearmament of Germany. OKH was ''de facto'' the most important unit within the German war planning until the defeat at ...
(German Army High Command)
Franz Halder Franz Halder (30 June 1884 – 2 April 1972) was a German general and the chief of staff of the Oberkommando des Heeres, Army High Command (OKH) in Nazi Germany from 1938 until September 1942. During World War II, he directed the planning and i ...
and former field marshals
Walter von Brauchitsch Walther Heinrich Alfred Hermann von Brauchitsch (4 October 1881 – 18 October 1948) was a German field marshal and the Commander-in-Chief (''Oberbefehlshaber'') of the German Army during World War II. Born into an aristocratic military famil ...
and Erich von Manstein, along with other senior military figures, the document aimed to portray the German armed forces as apolitical and largely innocent of the crimes committed by the Nazi regime. Hébert shows how that strategy was also adopted by the lead counsel for the defence in the High Command trial,
Hans Laternser Hans Laternser (3 August 1908 in Diedenhofen – 21 July 1969 in Frankfurt am Main) was a German lawyer who specialised in Anglo-Saxon law. In the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, this made him especially qualified to defend Germans pro ...
.


Conclusion

Hébert implicates the court's greater pedagogical failure as the cause of its failure to enact justice. While evidence of the specific war crimes and
crimes against humanity Crimes against humanity are widespread or systemic acts committed by or on behalf of a ''de facto'' authority, usually a state, that grossly violate human rights. Unlike war crimes, crimes against humanity do not have to take place within the ...
committed by the accused was damning, the book found that it was the defence that won the case in the court of Germany's public opinion. The German public proved to be too recalcitrant towards the idea of imposing consequences upon their military leaders. In a country where society has long-revered the military, the German public found the concept of punishment for its military leaders as anathema to their own personal sense of a moral, legal culture. Those motivations brought about various campaigns conducted by the German clergy and the government of the new
Federal Republic A federal republic is a federation of states with a republican form of government. At its core, the literal meaning of the word republic when used to reference a form of government means: "a country that is governed by elected representatives ...
on behalf of the convicted, which ultimately impacted the trial's conclusion. Faced with their concerted lobbying efforts, the American sentence review and clemency program reduced or commuted many of the sentences, which according to Hébert, brought failure to both of the trial's goals. Former military officers were the first to be released, including those convicted in the High Command Case. With various areas of German society doing what it could to influence the sentences of those on trial, none of the defendants remained in prison after 1957. Nevertheless, none of those found guilty were ever publicly exonerated of their crimes.


Reception

A review by historian Daniel Segesser in the ''
Journal of Genocide Research The ''Journal of Genocide Research'' is a quarterly peer-reviewed academic journal covering studies of genocide. Established in 1999, for the first six years it was not peer-reviewed. Since December 2005, it is the official journal of the Internat ...
'' finds the book a "welcome addition to this literature,
s it S, or s, is the nineteenth letter in the Latin alphabet, used in the modern English alphabet, the alphabets of other western European languages and others worldwide. Its name in English is ''ess'' (pronounced ), plural ''esses''. History ...
focuses on a trial that has so far been neglected". According to Segasser, if Hébert had provided more information on the German military organization and function, she could have presented a clearer picture the Wehrmacht's inexorable ties to the Nazi regime's goals of conquest and annihilation. The review agrees with Hébert in that Americans did not fully achieve the objectives they had set out before the start of the case:
...but it must be remembered that the trials of German military figures between 1945 and 1949 brought to light many documents of inestimable value to historians (as in the Wehrmacht exhibition of the 1990s). Thus, although most of the crimes of the Wehrmacht were forgotten in the immediate wake of the proceedings, the
didactic Didacticism is a philosophy that emphasizes instructional and informative qualities in literature, art, and design. In art, design, architecture, and landscape, didacticism is an emerging conceptual approach that is driven by the urgent need to ...
value of the High Command Trial was not completely lost.
Reviewing ''Hitler's Generals on Trial'' in '' Military Review'', Mark Montesclaros of the Army Command and General Staff College describes the book's treatment of the political context of the trial and subsequent developments as one of its "greatest insights". He points out that American authorities in Germany were not only seeking justice but, at the same time, trying to rebuild the German society, conduct a de-Nazification program, and recruit West Germany into a military coalition in the face of the looming
Cold war The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...
with the Soviet Union. Faced with these conflicting priorities, the Americans opted for the reconciliation with the former enemy, which included clemency programs for those convicted in war crimes trials. Mark Montesclaros "highly recommends" the book to those interested in international
military justice Military justice (also military law) is the legal system (bodies of law and procedure) that governs the conduct of the active-duty personnel of the armed forces of a country. In some nation-states, civil law and military law are distinct bodie ...
and post-war developments in Germany. Historian Alaric Searle notes the book's "success, with only 208 pages of text, nproviding a readable, accessible, and tightly structured overview of an extremely complex case". He contrasts it with other literature on war crimes trials which he describes as "longwinded affairs, written by lawyers" and recommends ''Hitler's Generals on Trial'' for teaching purposes. American scholar Jonathan Lurie, reviewing the book in '' H-Net'', finds that it "breaks new ground" and is "strongly recommended". Comparing it to the 2008 collection of essays, ''Atrocities on Trial: Historical Perspectives on the Politics of Prosecuting War Crimes'', edited by Patricia Heberer and Jürgen Matthäus, which covered a number of war crimes trials, Lurie notes the strength of Hébert's book in thoroughly analysing a single case and its outcomes and lessons. He goes on to describe the work as an "outstanding contribution" that asks "difficult questions" about justice, retribution, and atonement.


Author

Valerie Hébert is an associate professor of history and interdisciplinary studies at Lakehead University, Canada. Her research and teaching include modern European history,
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
, the
Holocaust The Holocaust, also known as the Shoah, was the genocide of European Jews during World War II. Between 1941 and 1945, Nazi Germany and its collaborators systematically murdered some six million Jews across German-occupied Europe; a ...
, and genocide. Published by the University Press of Kansas in 2010, ''Hitler's Generals on Trial'' was Hébert's first major publication.Valerie Hébert Profile
the Lakehead University web site


See also

*
Clean Wehrmacht The myth of the clean ''Wehrmacht'' is the negationist notion that the regular German armed forces (the ''Wehrmacht'') were not involved in the Holocaust or other war crimes during World War II. The myth, heavily promoted by German authors ...
* Wehrmacht Exhibition *'' The Wehrmacht: History, Myth, Reality''


Notes


References

* * * * * *


External links

* : official page at the University Press of Kansas web site {{DEFAULTSORT:Hitler's Generals on Trial 2010 non-fiction books 21st-century history books University Press of Kansas books History books about Nazi Germany History books about World War II Historiography of World War II