Wehrmacht

The Wehrmacht (German pronunciation: [ˈveːɐ̯maxt] ( listen) (Armed Forces)—from German: wehren, to defend and Macht, power, force, cognate to English might) was the unified armed forces of Germany from 1935 to 1945. It consisted of the Heer (army), the Kriegsmarine (navy) and the Luftwaffe (air force). {| class="toc" id="toc"

Contents
[hide] *1 Origin and use of the term
 * 2 Waffen-SS and Wehrmacht
 * 3 History
 * 3.1 Hitler and reinstatement of conscription
 * 4 Numbers
 * 5 Command structure
 * 6 War years
 * 6.1 Army
 * 6.2 Air Force
 * 6.3 Air Force units in a ground role
 * 6.4 Navy
 * 6.5 Theaters and campaigns
 * 6.5.1 Eastern theatre
 * 6.5.2 Western theatre
 * 6.6 Casualties
 * 6.7 War crimes
 * 6.8 Resistance to the Nazi regime
 * 7 Prominent members
 * 8 After World War II
 * 9 Gallery
 * 10 See also
 * 11 Notes
 * 12 References
 * 13 External links
 * }

Origin and use of the term
The term Wehrmacht generically describes or used to describe a nation's Armed Forces, thus, Britische Wehrmacht denoted “British Armed Forces.” The term Wehrmacht is in Article 47 of the 1919 Weimar Constitution, establishing that: Der Reichspräsident hat den Oberbefehl über die gesamte Wehrmacht des Reiches (“The National President holds supreme command of all armed forces of the nation”). From 1919, Germany’s national defence force was known as the Reichswehr, which name was dropped in favor of Wehrmacht on 16 March 1935. The name Wehrmacht even in Germany is by large considered a proper noun of the 1935-45 armed forces, being replaced by Streitkräfte in its original meaning; however, this was not so even some decades after 1945.

After World War II (1939–45), the Allies abolished the Wehrmacht. In 1955, when the western Federal Republic of Germany (FRG) remilitarized, its armed forces were named the Bundeswehr ("Federal Defence"). In 1956, upon formal establishment, the armed forces of the Communist, east German Democratic Republic (known for short in English as the GDR, or for short in German as the DDR) were named the Nationale Volksarmee (National People's Army), some of whom, with matériel, were incorporated to the Bundeswehr when the German reunification consolidated the two Germanies in 1990.[1]

In German usage, Wehrmacht denotes all of the armed forces of Nazi Germany. Nevertheless, in English writing Wehrmacht is often used to refer specifically to the land forces (army); the correct German for this is Heer.

For branch-of-service identification, Wehrmacht vehicles bore alphanumeric-prefixed identity licence plates: WH for the Heer, WL for the Luftwaffe, WM for the Kriegsmarine. SS vehicles bore the identity licence prefix SS, always depicted with the double Sigrunen of the force.

[edit] Waffen-SS and Wehrmacht
The Waffen-SS, the combat branch of the SS (the Nazi Party's paramilitary organization), became the de facto fourth branch of the Wehrmacht, as it expanded from three regiments to 38 divisions by 1945. Although the SS was autonomous and existed in parallel to the Wehrmacht, the Waffen-SS field units were placed under the operational control of the Supreme High Command of the Armed Forces (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, OKW) or the Supreme High Command of the Army (Oberkommando des Heeres, OKH).

Competence struggles hampered organization in the German armed forces, as OKW, OKH, OKL (Luftwaffe had its own ground forces, including tank divisions) and Waffen-SS often worked concurrently and not as a joint command.

[edit] History
After World War I ended with the armistice of 11 November 1918, the armed forces were dubbed Friedensheer (peace army) in January 1919. In March 1919, the national assembly passed a law founding a 420,000 strong preliminary army as Vorläufige Reichswehr. The terms of the Treaty of Versailles were announced in May, and in June Germany was forced to sign the treaty which, among other terms, imposed severe constraints on the size of Germany's armed forces. The army was limited to one hundred thousand men with an additional fifteen thousand in the navy. The fleet was to consist of at most six battleships, six cruisers, and twelve destroyers. Submarines, tanks and heavy artillery were forbidden and the air force was dissolved. A new post-war military (the Reichswehr) was established on 23 March 1921. General conscription was abolished under another mandate of the Versailles treaty.

The limitions imposed by Versailles turned out to be a blessing in disguise for the military. That the Reichswehr was limited to 100, 000 men ensured that under the new leadership of Hans von Seeckt that the Reichswehr kept only the very best officers. The American historians Alan Millet and Williamson Murray wrote "In reducing the officers corps, Seeckt chose the new leadership from the best men of the general staff with ruthless disregard for other constituencies, such as war heroes and the nobility".[2] Seeckt's determination that the Reichswehr be an elite cadre force that would serve as the nucleus of an expanded military when the chance for restoring conscription came essentially led to the creation of a new army, based upon, but very different from the army that existed in World War I.[2] Through Seeckt retired in 1926, the army that went to war in 1939 was largely his creation.[3] In the 1920s, Seeckt and his officers developed new doctrines emphasizing speed, aggression, combined arms and initiative on the part of lower officers to take advantage of momentary opportunities.[2] Germany was forbidden to have an air force by Versailles, but Seeckt who saw the advantages of air warfare created a clandestine cadre of air force officers in the early 1920s.[4] Seeckt's cadre of secret air officers saw the role of an air force as winning air superiority, tactical and strategic bombing and providing ground support.[4] That the Luftwaffe did not develop a strategic bombing force in the 1930s was not due to a lack of interest, but because of economic limitations.[4] The leadership of the Navy led by Grand Admiral Erich Raeder, a close protégé of Alfred von Tirpitz was dedicated to the idea of reviving Tirpitz's High Seas Fleet.[5] Officers who believed in submarine warfare led by Admiral Karl Dönitz were in a minority before 1939.[5] Naval officers saw war almost entirely in tactical and technological terms, and had almost no interest in operational matters.[6]

By 1922, Germany had begun covertly circumventing these conditions. A secret collaboration with the Soviet Union began after the treaty of Rapallo. Major-General Otto Hasse traveled to Moscow in 1923 to further negotiate the terms. Germany helped the Soviet Union with industrialization and Soviet officers were to be trained in Germany. German tank and air force specialists could exercise in the Soviet Union and German chemical weapons research and manufacture would be carried out there along with other projects. Around 300 German pilots received training at Lipetsk, some tank training took place near Kazan and toxic gas was developed at Saratov for the German army.

[edit] Hitler and reinstatement of conscription
After the death of President Paul von Hindenburg on 2 August 1934, Hitler assumed the office of Reichspräsident, and thus became commander in chief. All officers and soldiers of the German armed forces had to swear a personal oath of loyalty to the Führer, as Adolf Hitler was called. By 1935, Germany was openly flouting the military restrictions set forth in the Versailles Treaty, and conscription was reintroduced on 16 March 1935.

While the size of the standing army was to remain at about the 100,000-man mark decreed by the treaty, a new group of conscripts equal to this size would receive training each year. The conscription law introduced the name Wehrmacht, so not only can this be regarded as its founding date, but the organization and authority of the Wehrmacht can be viewed as Nazi creations regardless of the political affiliations of its high command (who nevertheless all swore the same personal oath of loyalty to Hitler). The insignia was a simpler version of the Iron Cross (the straight-armed so-called Balkenkreuz or beamed cross) that had been used as an aircraft and tank marking in late World War I, beginning in March and April 1918. The existence of the Wehrmacht was officially announced on 15 October 1935.[''[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:Avoid_weasel_words by whom? ]'']

[edit] Numbers
The total number of soldiers who served in the Wehrmacht during its existence from 1935–1945 is believed to have approached 18.2 million. This figure was put forward by historian Rüdiger Overmans and represents the total number of people who ever served in the Wehrmacht, and not the force strength of the Wehrmacht at any point.

[edit] Command structure
Further information: Wehrmacht and National SocialismLegally, the Commander-in-Chief of the Wehrmacht was Adolf Hitler in his capacity as Germany's head of state, a position he gained after the death of President Paul von Hindenburg in August 1934. In the reshuffle in 1938, Hitler became the Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces and retained that position until his suicide on 30 April 1945. Administration and military authority initially lay with the war ministry under Generalfeldmarschall Werner von Blomberg. After von Blomberg resigned in the course of the Blomberg-Fritsch Affair (1938), the ministry was dissolved and the Armed Forces High Command (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht or OKW) under Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel was put in its place. It was headquartered in Wünsdorf near Zossen, and a field echelon (Feldstaffel) was stationed wherever the Führer ' s headquarters were situated at a given time. Army work was also coordinated by the German General Staff, an institution that had been developing for more than a century and which had sought to institutionalize military perfection.

The OKW coordinated all military activities but Keitel's sway over the three branches of service (army, air force, and navy) was rather limited. Each had its own High Command, known as Oberkommando des Heeres (OKH, army), Oberkommando der Marine (OKM, navy), and Oberkommando der Luftwaffe(OKL, air force). Each of these high commands had its own general staff. In practice the OKW had operational authority over the Western Front whereas the Eastern Front was under the operational authority of the OKH. Flag for the Commander-in-Chief of the German Armed Forces (1935–1938).*Supreme High Command of the Armed Forces (OKW) (!) Promotion to field marshal was considered as something which is only done in wartime.
 * Supreme Commander of the Armed Forces
 * Führer and Reichskanzler Adolf Hitler (1935–1945)
 * Großadmiral Karl Dönitz (1945)
 * Commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces
 * Generalfeldmarschall Paul von Hindenburg (1933–1934), President of the Reich
 * Führer and Reichskanzler Adolf Hitler (1934–1935)
 * Generaloberst Werner von Blomberg (1935–1938), Minister for War, promoted Generalfeldmarschall (1936)
 * vested into the Supreme Commander (theoretically) and the Chief of the Supreme High Command (practically)
 * Vice Commander-in-chief of the Armed Forces
 * General Werner von Blomberg (1933–1935), promoted Generaloberst 1933
 * Chief of the Armed Forces Supreme High Command—Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel (1938–1945)
 * Chief of the Operations Staff (Wehrmachtführungsstab)—Generaloberst Alfred Jodl
 * Supreme High Command of the Army (OKH)
 * Army Commanders-in-Chief
 * Generaloberst Werner von Fritsch (1935–1938)
 * Generaloberst Walther von Brauchitsch (1938–1941), promoted to Generalfeldmarschall 1940
 * Führer and Reichskanzler Adolf Hitler (1941–1945)
 * Generalfeldmarschall Ferdinand Schörner (1945)
 * Chiefs of Staff of the German Army
 * General Ludwig Beck (1935–1938)
 * General Franz Halder (1938–1942)
 * General Kurt Zeitzler (1942–1944)
 * Generaloberst Heinz Guderian (1944–1945)
 * General Hans Krebs (1945, committed suicide in the Führerbunker)
 * Supreme High Command of the Navy (OKM)
 * War Navy Commanders-in-Chief
 * Admiral Erich Raeder (1928–1943), promoted to Generaladmiral 1936, Großadmiral 1940
 * Großadmiral Karl Dönitz (1943–1945)
 * Generaladmiral Hans-Georg von Friedeburg (1945)
 * "Admiral Inspector": Großadmiral Erich Raeder (1943–1945) (sinecure)
 * Supreme High Command of the Air Force (OKL)
 * Air Force Commanders-in-Chief
 * General Hermann Göring (1935–1945), promoted Generaloberst 1936, Generalfeldmarschall 1938 (!), Reichsmarschall (singularily) 1940
 * Generalfeldmarschall Robert Ritter von Greim (1945)

The OKW was also given the task of central economic planning and procurement, but the authority and influence of the OKW's war economy office (Wehrwirtschaftsamt) was challenged by the procurement offices (Waffenämter) of the single branches of service as well as by the Ministry for Armament and Munitions (Reichsministerium für Bewaffnung und Munition), into which it was merged after the ministry was taken over by Albert Speer in early 1942.

[edit] Army
Main article: Heer (1935–1945)A Heeresadler ("Army Eagle") decal for the helmets of the Wehrmacht Heer (model 1942).The German Army furthered concepts pioneered during World War I, combining ground (Heer) and Air Force (Luftwaffe) assets into combined arms teams. Coupled with traditional war fighting methods such as encirclements and the "battle of annihilation", the German military managed many lightning quick victories in the first year of World War II, prompting foreign journalists to create a new word for what they witnessed: Blitzkrieg.

The Heer entered the war with a minority of its formations motorized; infantry remained approximately 90% foot-borne throughout the war, and artillery was primarily horse-drawn. The motorized formations received much attention in the world press in the opening years of the war, and were cited as the reason for the success of the invasions of Poland (September 1939), Norway and Denmark (April 1940), Belgium, France and Netherlands (May 1940), Yugoslavia and Greece (April 1941) and the early campaigns in the Soviet Union (June 1941).

After Hitler declared war on the United States in December 1941, Germany and other Axis powers found themselves engaged in campaigns against three major industrial powers. At this critical juncture, Hitler assumed personal control of the Wehrmacht high command, and his personal failings as a military commander arguably contributed to major defeats in early 1943, at Stalingrad and Tunis in North Africa. The Panzerjäger-Abteilung 39 ('Tank-hunter battalion 39', part of "Kampfgruppe Gräf", part of the 21. Panzer Division) of the Afrika Korps on the move.The Germans' military strength was managed through mission-based tactics (rather than order-based tactics) and an almost proverbial discipline. In public opinion, the German Army was, and sometimes still is, seen as a high-tech army. However, such advanced equipment, while featured much in propaganda, was often only available in small numbers or late in the war, as overall supplies of raw materials and armaments ran low. For example, only 40% of all units were motorized, baggage trains often relied on horse-drawn trailers and many soldiers went by foot or used bicycles (Radfahrtruppen).

Some historians, such as British author and ex-newspaper editor Max Hastings, consider that "... there's no doubt that man for man, the German army was the greatest fighting force of the second world war". Similar views were also expressed in his book Overlord: D-Day and the battle for Normandy, while in the book World War II: An Illustrated Miscellany, Anthony Evans writes: "The German soldier was very professional and well trained, aggressive in attack and stubborn in defence. He was always adaptable, particularly in the later years when shortages of equipment were being felt". However, their integrity was compromised by war crimes, especially those committed on the eastern front. They were overextended and outmaneuvered before Moscow in 1941, and in North Africa and Stalingrad in 1942, and from 1942 to 1943 onward, were in constant retreat. Other Axis powers fought with them, especially Hungary and Romania, as well as many volunteers from other nations. Wehrmacht infantrymen marching across Russia's vast steppes, 1942.Among the foreign volunteers who served in the Heer during World War II were ethnic Germans, Dutch, and Scandinavians along with people from the Baltic states and the Balkans. Russians fought in the Russian Liberation Army or as Hilfswilliger. Non-Russians from the Soviet Union formed the Ostlegionen. These units were all commanded by General Ernst August Köstring and represented about five percent of the forces under the OKH.

[edit] Air Force
Main article: LuftwaffeThe Luftwaffe (German Air Force), led by Hermann Göring, was a key element in the early Blitzkrieg campaigns (Poland, France 1940, USSR 1941). The Luftwaffe concentrated on fighters and (small) tactical bombers, like the Messerschmitt Bf 109 fighter and the Junkers Ju 87 (Stuka) dive bomber.

The planes cooperated closely with the ground forces. Massive numbers of fighters assured air supremacy, and the bombers would attack command- and supply lines, depots, and other support targets close to the front. They soon achieved an aura of invincibility and terror, where both civilians and soldiers were struck with fear, and started fleeing as soon as the planes were spotted. This caused confusion and disorganisation behind enemy lines, and in conjunction with the "ghost" Panzer Divisions that seemed to be able to appear anywhere, made the Blitzkrieg campaigns highly effective.

As the war progressed, Germany's enemies drastically increased their aircraft production, air supremacy was lost and allied forces gradually gained air superiority, particularly in the West of the theatre of operations. In the second half of the war, the Luftwaffe was reduced to insignificance. As the Western allies started a strategic bombing campaign against German industrial targets they established air supremacy over Germany which the Luftwaffewas unable to contest, leaving German cities open to Allied carpet bombing and massive destruction. German paratroopers (Fallschirmjäger) landing on Crete.===[edit] Air Force units in a ground role=== The Luftwaffe contributed many units of ground forces to the war in Russia as well as the Normandy front. In 1940, the Fallschirmjäger (paratroops) conquered the vital Belgian Fort Eben-Emael and took part in the airborne invasion of Norway, but after suffering heavy losses in the Battle of Crete, large scale airdrops were discontinued. Operating as crack infantry, the 1st Fallschirmjäger Division fought in all the theatres of the war. Notable actions include the bloody Monte Cassino, the last-ditch defence of Tunisia and numerous key battles on the eastern front. A Fallschirmjäger armored division—the Fallschirm-Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring—was also formed and was heavily engaged in Sicily and at Salerno.

Separate from the elite Fallschirmjäger, the Luftwaffe also fielded regular infantry in the Luftwaffe Field Divisions. These units were basic infantry formations formed from Luftwaffe personnel. Due to a lack of competent officers and unhappiness by the recruits at having been forced into an infantry role, morale was low in these units. By Göring's personal order they were intended to be restricted to defensive duties in quieter sectors to free up front line troops for combat.

The Luftwaffe—being in charge of Germany's anti-aircraft defences—also used thousands of teenage Luftwaffenhelfer to support the Flak units.[7]

[edit] Navy
Main article: KriegsmarineThe German Navy (Kriegsmarine) played a major role in World War II as control over the commerce routes in the Atlantic was crucial for Germany, Britain and later the Soviet Union. In the Battle of the Atlantic, the initially successful German U-boat fleet arm was eventually defeated due to Allied technological innovations like sonar, radar, and the breaking of the Enigma code. Large surface vessels were few in number due to construction limitations by international treaties prior to 1935. The "pocket battleships"  Admiral Graf Spee  and  Admiral Scheer  were important as commerce raiders only in the opening year of the war. No aircraft carrier was operational, as German leadership lost interest in the  Graf Zeppelin  which had been launched in 1938. Following the loss of the German battleship Bismarck in 1941, with Allied air superiority threatening the remaining battlecruisers in French Atlantic harbors, the ships were ordered to make the Channel Dash back to German ports. Operating from fjords of Norway, which had been occupied in 1940, convoys from the U.S. to the Soviet port of Murmansk could be intercepted even though the  Tirpitz  spent most of her career as fleet in being. After the appointment of Karl Doenitz as Grand Admiral of the Kriegsmarine (in the aftermath of the Battle of the Barents Sea), Germany stopped constructing battleships and cruisers in favor of U-boats.[citation needed]

[edit] Theaters and campaigns
German cavalry and motorized units entering Poland from East Prussia during the Invasion of Poland of 1939.The Wehrmacht directed combat operations during World War II (from 1 September 1939 – 8 May 1945) as the German Reich's Armed Forces umbrella command organization. After 1941 the OKH became the de facto Eastern Theatre higher echelon command organization for the Wehrmacht, excluding Waffen-SS except for operational and tactical combat purposes. The OKW conducted operations in the Western Theater.

For a time, the Axis Mediterranean Theater and the North African Campaign was conducted as a joint campaign with the Italian Army, and may be considered a separate theatre. The operations by the Kriegsmarine in the North and Mid-Atlantic can also be considered as separate theaters considering the size of the area of operations and their remoteness from other theaters.
 * North African Campaign in Libya, Tunisia and Egypt between the UK and Commonwealth (and later, U.S.) forces and the Axis forces.
 * The Italian "Theater" (1943–45) was in fact a continuation of the Axis defeat in North Africa, and was a Campaign for defence of Italy.

[edit] Eastern theatre
Soviet Union, October 1941.The Eastern Wehrmacht campaigns included: However, Hitler demanded that the Wehrmacht had to fight on other fronts, sometimes three simultaneously, thus stretching its resources too thin. By 1944, even the defence of Germany became impossible.
 * Czechoslovakian campaign
 * Austrian Anschluss campaign
 * Battle of Poland campaign (Fall Weiss)—a joint invasion by Germany, the Soviet Union and Slovakia.
 * Balkans and Greece (Operation Marita)
 * Operation Barbarossa Campaign, also known as the Eastern Front, was the largest and most lethal campaign that the Wehrmacht Heer fought in during World War II. The Campaign against the Soviet Union was strategically the most crucial for Germany and its allies during World War II because of the economic and political repercussions defeat of the Soviet Union would have had on the outcome of the war, including that of the conflict with the UK and the U.S. in the Western Theater. The Eastern Front was also the Theater that demanded more resources than any other Theater throughout the war. The large area covered by the Eastern Front necessitated the division of the Theatre in to four separate Strategic Directions overseen by the Army Group North, Army Group Centre, Army Group South, and the Army Norway. These commands would conduct their own interdependent strategic campaigns within the theater.
 * Battle of the Caucasus.
 * A subset of the Eastern Front was a number of anti-partisan operations against guerrilla units and counter-insurgency operations largely by Waffen-SS units behind Axis lines.

[edit] Western theatre
German soldiers marching past the Arc de Triomphe.*Phony War (Sitzkrieg).
 * The Denmark campaign as Operation Weserübung
 * The Norwegian Campaign.
 * The largest campaign in the Western Theatre involving combat was conducted against the Netherlands, Belgium, etc. and France (Fall Gelb) in 1940. This predominantly land campaign evolved into two subsequent campaigns, one by the  Luftwaffe  against the UK, and the other by the Kriegsmarine against the strategic supply routes linking the UK to the rest of the World.
 * The Western Front resumed in 1944 against the Allied forces with the Battle of Normandy.
 * The strategic air campaigns the Luftwaffe won in 1939 and 1940 in Poland and France ended with the Battle of Britain. From 1941 to the end of 1943, the Luftwaffe entered a long and bloody air battle with the Red Air Force that affected its participation in the campaign against the RAF. Allied air forces enjoyed aerial superiority on all three Theaters by the summer of 1944. In respect to the Battle of Britain, had the Luftwaffe pursued its early goal of bombing the RAF airfields and fighting a war of attrition, it is likely they would have been victorious. However, in response to a string of events beginning with a small-scale air raid on Berlin by British bombers, Hitler ordered the Luftwaffe bomber forces to attack British cities. These reprisal attacks shifted the weight of the Luftwaffe away from the RAF and onto British civilians, allowing the RAF to rebuild its fighting strength and, within a few short months, turn the tide against the Luftwaffe in the skies above England.
 * The Battle of the Atlantic resulted in early Kriegsmarine successes that forced Winston Churchill to confide after the war that the only real threat he felt to Britain's survival was the "U-Boat peril".

[edit] Casualties
Main article: German casualties in World War IIToila war cemetery in Estonia. There are 2,132 graves of German soldiers whose names are carved on these memorial stones.More than 6,000,000 soldiers were wounded during the conflict, while more than 11,000,000 became prisoners. In all, approximately 5,533,000 soldiers from Germany and other nationalities fighting for the German armed forces—including the Waffen-SS—are estimated to have been killed in action, died of wounds, died in custody or gone missing in World War II. Included in this number are 215,000 Soviet citizens conscripted by Germany.[8]

According to Frank Biess, German casualties took a sudden jump with the defeat of the Sixth Army at Stalingrad in January 1943, when 180,310 soldiers were killed in one month. Among the 5.3 million Wehrmacht casualties during the Second World War, more than 80 percent died during the last two years of the war. Approximately three-quarters of these losses occurred on the Eastern front (2.7 million) and during the final stages of the war between January and May 1945 (1.2 million).[9] Jeffrey Herfwrote that: Whereas German deaths between 1941 and 1943 on the western front had not exceeded 3 percent of the total from all fronts, in 1944 the figure jumped to about 14 percent. Yet even in the months following D-day, about 68.5 percent of all German battlefield deaths occurred on the eastern front, as a Soviet blitzkrieg in response devastated the retreating Wehrmacht.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-9">[10] ===[edit] War crimes=== Main article: War crimes of the WehrmachtMain article: Consequences of German NazismA mass execution of Polish hostages in Palmiry—the German execution of 51 Polish hostages in retaliation for an attack on a Nazi police station by the underground organization "White Eagle"In World War II, the Wehrmacht was involved in a number of war crimes. While the principal perpetrators of the civil suppression behind the front lines amongst German armed forces were the Nazi German "political" armies (the SS-Totenkopfverbände and particularly the Einsatzgruppen), the traditional armed forces represented by the Wehrmacht committed and ordered (e.g. the Commissar Order) war crimes of their own, particularly during the invasion of Poland in 1939 <sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-B.C3.B6hler_10-0">[11] and later in the war against the Soviet Union. The Army's Chief of Staff General Franz Halder in a directive declared that in the event of guerrila attacks, German troops were to impose "collective measures of force" by massacring entire villages.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-11">[12] Hundreds of thousands, perhaps millions, of Soviet civilians died from starvation as the Germans requisitioned food for their armies and fodder for their draft horses.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-12">[13] According to Thomas Kühne, "An estimated 300,000–500,000 people were killed during the Wehrmacht's anti-partisan war in the Soviet Union."<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-13">[14]

While the Wehrmacht's prisoner-of-war camps for inmates from the west generally satisfied the humanitarian requirement prescribed by international law, prisoners from Poland (which never capitulated) and the USSR were incarcerated under significantly worse conditions. Between the launching of Operation Barbarossa in the summer of 1941 and the following spring, 2.8 million of the 3.2 million Soviet prisoners taken died while in German hands.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-14">[15] Sixteen blindfolded Partisan youth await execution by German forces in Serbia, 20 August 1941. Executed with this group was a German soldier, who refused to take part in the action.<sup class="Template-Fact" style="white-space: nowrap;">[citation needed] The Nuremberg Trials of the major war criminals at the end of World War II found that the Wehrmacht was not an inherently criminal organization, but that it had committed crimes in the course of the war. Several high-ranked members of the Wehrmacht like Wilhelm Keitel and Alfred Jodl were convicted for their involvement in war crimes. Among German historians, the view that the Wehrmacht had participated in war time atrocities, particularly on the Eastern Front, grew in the late 1970s and the 1980s. In the 1990s, public conception in Germany was influenced by controversial reactions and debates about the exhibition of war crime issues.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-15">[16] More recently, the judgement of Nuremberg has come under question. The Israeli historian Omer Bartov, a leading expert on the Wehrmacht<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-Leitz.2C_Bartov_16-0">[17] wrote in 2003 that the Wehrmacht was a willing instrument of genocide, and that it is untrue that the Wehrmacht was an apolitical, professional fighting force that had only a few "bad apples".<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-17">[18] Bartov argues that far from being the "untarnished shield", as successive German apologists stated after the war, the Wehrmacht was a criminal organization.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-18">[19] Likewise, the British historian Richard J. Evans, a leading expert on modern German history wrote that the Wehrmacht was a genocidal organization.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-19">[20] British historian Ian Kershawwrote that: The Nazi revolution was broader than just the Holocaust. Its second goal was to eliminate Slavs from central and eastern Europe and to create a Lebensraum for Aryans. ... As Bartov (The Eastern Front; Hitler's Army) shows, it barbarised the German armies on the eastern front. Most of their three million men, from generals to ordinary soldiers, helped exterminate captured Slav soldiers and civilians. This was sometimes cold and deliberate murder of individuals (as with Jews), sometimes generalised brutality and neglect. ... German soldiers' letters and memoirs reveal their terrible reasoning: Slavs were 'the Asiatic-Bolshevik' horde, an inferior but threatening race. Only a minority of officers and men were Nazi members.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-20">[21] ===[edit] Resistance to the Nazi regime=== Main article: German ResistanceMajor General Henning von TresckowFrom all groups of German Resistance, those within the Wehrmacht were the most condemned by the NSDAP. There were several attempts by resistance members like Henning von Tresckow, Erich Hoepner or Friedrich Olbricht to assassinate Hitler as an ignition of a coup d'état. Rudolf Christoph Freiherr von Gersdorff and Axel Freiherr von dem Bussche-Streithorst even tried to do so by suicide bombing. Those and many other officers in the Heer and Kriegsmarine such as Erwin Rommel, Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg and Wilhelm Canaris opposed the atrocities of the Hitler regime. Combined with Hitler's problematic military leadership, this also culminated in the famous 20 July plot (1944), when a group of German Army officers led by von Stauffenberg tried again to kill Hitler and overthrow his regime. Following this attempt, every officer who approached Hitler was searched from head to foot by his SS guards. As a special degradation all German military personnel were ordered to replace the standard military salute with the Hitler salute from this date on. To what extent the German military forces opposed or supported the Hitler regime is nevertheless highly disputed amongst historians up to the present day.

Some members of the Wehrmacht did save Jews and non-Jews from the concentration camps and/or mass executions. Anton Schmid—a sergeant in the army—helped 250 Jewish men, women, and children escape from the Vilnius ghetto and provided them with forged passports so that they could get to safety. He was court-martialed and executed as a consequence. Albert Battel, a reserve officer stationed near the Przemysl ghetto, blocked an SS detachment from entering it. He then evacuated up to 100 Jews and their families to the barracks of the local military command, and placed them under his protection. Wilm Hosenfeld—an army captain in Warsaw—helped, hid, or rescued several Poles, including Jews, in occupied Poland. Most notably, he helped the Polish Jewish composer Władysław Szpilman, who was hiding among the city's ruins, by supplying him with food and water, and did not betray him to the Nazi authorities. Hosenfeld later died in a Soviet POW camp.

[edit] Prominent members
Prominent German officers from the Wehrmacht era include:
 * Hans-Jürgen von Arnim—Commander of Army Group Africa after Erwin Rommel
 * Ludwig Beck—Chief of the General Staff of the Heer from 1933 to 1938
 * Fedor von Bock—Commander of the failed Operation Typhoon
 * Walther von Brauchitsch—Commander-in-Chief of the Heer from 1938 to 1941
 * Wilhelm Franz Canaris—Head of the Abwehr, a Wehrmacht intelligence service
 * Otto Carius—Panzer ace
 * Karl Dönitz—Grand Admiral of the Kriegsmarine and architect of the U-boat force; last President of the Third Reich following Hitler's suicide
 * Nikolaus von Falkenhorst—Commander of German ground forces during Operation Weserübung
 * Adolf Galland, the longest-serving General der Jagdflieger in the Luftwaffe, supporter of the Messerschmitt Me 262's primary use as a jet fighter
 * Reinhard Gehlen—Chief of military intelligence on the Eastern Front; first head of the postwar Federal Intelligence Service (BND)
 * Hermann Göring—Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe, Hitler's designated successor until April 1945
 * Heinz Guderian—Panzer commander and architect of the Blitzkrieg strategy
 * Franz Halder—Chief of the General Staff of the Heer from 1938 to 1942
 * Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord—Commander-in-Chief of the Reichswehr and opponent of Hitler
 * Erich Hartmann—Highest-scoring fighter ace of World War II, and of all time (352 victories)
 * Hermann Hoth—Panzer commander on the Eastern Front
 * Alfred Jodl—Chief of the Operations Staff of the OKW
 * Wilhelm Keitel—Commander-in-Chief of the OKW
 * Albert Kesselring—An Air Marshal of the Luftwaffe; overall commander of the Mediterranean theater
 * Ewald von Kleist—A Field Marshal of the Heer
 * Hans Günther von Kluge—Field Marshal and Commander of Oberbefehlshaber West
 * Otto Kretschmer—Highest-scoring U-Boat ace (sank 274 223 tons of Allied shipping)
 * Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb—Commander of Army Group C during the Battle of France
 * Hans von Luck—Panzer commander
 * Günther Lütjens—Admiral and Fleet Commander of the Bismarck flotilla
 * Erich von Manstein—Field Marshal, military strategist, and prominent proponent of the Blitzkrieg
 * Walter Model—Field Marshal, Commanded the defence of the Eastern Front from the Soviet counterattack
 * Friedrich Paulus—Commander of German forces at Stalingrad
 * Erich Raeder—Grand Admiral of the Kriegsmarine, credited with building the Kriegsmarine
 * Walther von Reichenau—Commander of the 6th Army
 * Wolfram Freiherr von Richthofen—Field Marshal in command of the Stuka forces of the Luftwaffe for a time during the war, relative of the The Red Baron of World War I
 * Robert Ritter von Greim—Field Marshal, Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe in the last days of the war
 * Erwin Rommel—Field Marshal, the "Desert Fox", commander of the Afrikakorps
 * Hans-Ulrich Rudel—Stuka dive bomber pilot and most decorated German serviceman
 * Gerd von Rundstedt—Generalfeldmarschall, held amongst the highest commands throughout World War II
 * Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg—generally recognized as the leader of the 20 July plot
 * Kurt Student—founder and commander of Germany's Fallschirmjäger airborne troops
 * Walther Wever—the prime exponent of strategic bombing in the pre-war Luftwaffe, died in June 1936
 * Michael Wittman—Panzer ace
 * Erwin von Witzleben—prominent conspirator of the 20 July plot

[edit] After World War II
Following the unconditional surrender of the Wehrmacht, which went into effect on 8 May 1945, some Wehrmacht units remained active, either independently (e.g. in Norway), or under Allied command as police forces.<sup class="reference" id="cite_ref-21">[22] By the end of August 1945, these units were dissolved, and a year later on 20 August 1946, the Allied Control Council declared the Wehrmacht as officially abolished (Kontrollratsgesetz No. 34). While Germany was forbidden to have an army, Allied forces took advantage of the knowledge of Wehrmacht members like Reinhard Gehlen.

It was over ten years before the tensions of the Cold War led to the creation of separate military forces in the Federal Republic of Germany and the socialist German Democratic Republic. The West German military, officially created on 5 May 1955, took the name Bundeswehr, meaning Federal Defence Forces, which pointed back to the old Reichswehr. Its East German counterpart—created on 1 March 1956—took the name National People's Army (Nationale Volksarmee). Both organizations employed many former Wehrmacht members, particularly in their formative years, though neither organization considered themselves to be successors to the Wehrmacht, and in the case of the Bundeswehr rejected the traditional grey of the Wehrmacht in order to show discontituity.

[edit] Gallery

 * German Military Medic providing first aid to a wounded soldier in France, June 1940
 * Afrika Korps in North Africa, March 1941
 * Execution of partisans by German soldiers, Soviet Union, September 1941
 * Soviet Union, November 1941
 * Soviet Union, June 1942
 * Captured Soviet soldiers of Turkestani backgrounds were drafted in large numbers into the Ostlegionen of the Wehrmacht.
 * German infantry marching, Soviet Union, June 1943
 * Foreign volunteer battalion in the Wehrmacht. Soldiers of the Free Arabian Legion in Greece, September 1943.
 * France, 1944
 * German prisoners march to rear as Americans move forward, December 1944

[edit] See also

 * Afrika Korps
 * German General Staff (Großer Generalstab)
 * German Resistance
 * Glossary of German military terms
 * Glossary of Nazi Germany
 * History of Germany during World War II
 * List of Nazi Party leaders and officials
 * Military of Germany
 * Panzer Army Africa
 * Third Reich
 * World War II German Army Ranks and Insignia
 * World War II German uniform—covers the uniforms worn by the Wehrmacht ' s three services
 * Uniforms and insignia of the Kriegsmarine
 * Wehrbauer

[edit] Notes

 * 1) ^ The predecessor army of the eastern National People’s Army was the Kasernierte Volkspolizei (KVP; Barracked People's Police, est. 1952), which disguised its military nature in postwar demilitarised Germany—hence the police name.
 * 2) ^ a b c Millet, Alan & Murray, Williamson A War To Be Won, Belknap Press: Cambridge, MA, 2000 page 22.
 * 3) ^ Wheeler-Bennett, John The Nemesis of Power, page 22.
 * 4) ^ a b c Millet, Alan & Murray, Williamson A War To Be Won, Belknap Press: Cambridge, MA, 2000 page 33.
 * 5) ^ a b Millet, Alan & Murray, Williamson A War To Be Won, Belknap Press: Cambridge, MA, 2000 page 37.
 * 6) ^ Millet, Alan & Murray, Williamson A War To Be Won, Belknap Press: Cambridge, MA, 2000 page 38.
 * 7) ^ One of whom was Josef Ratzinger, the future Pope Benedict XVI.
 * 8) ^ Rűdiger Overmans (2000).  Deutsche militärische Verluste im Zweiten Weltkrieg . Wikipedia. p. 335. ISBN 3-486-56531-1. http://books.google.com/books?.
 * 9) ^ Frank Biess (2006). Homecomings: returning POWs and the legacies of defeat in postwar Germany. Princeton University Press. p.19. ISBN 0-691-12502-3.
 * 10) ^ Jeffrey Herf (2006). The Jewish enemy: Nazi propaganda during World War II and the Holocaust. Harvard University Press. p.252. ISBN 0-674-02175-4
 * 11) ^ Böhler, Jochen (2006) (in German). Auftakt zum Vernichtungskrieg. Die Wehrmacht in Polen 1939. Frankfurt: Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag. ISBN 3-596-16307-2.
 * 12) ^ Förster, Jürgen "The Wehrmacht and the War of Extermination Against the Soviet Union", page 501
 * 13) ^ Geoffrey P. Megargee (2007). "War of Annihilation: Combat and Genocide on the Eastern Front, 1941". Rowman & Littlefield. p.121. ISBN 0-7425-4482-6
 * 14) ^ Helmut Walser Smith (2011). "The Oxford Handbook of Modern German History". Oxford University Press. p.542. ISBN 0-19-923739-5
 * 15) ^ Davies, Norman (2006). Europe at War 1939–1945: No Simple Victory. London: Pan Books. p. 271. ISBN 978-0-330-35212-3.
 * 16) ^ "Crimes of the German Wehrmacht" (PDF). Hamburg Institute for Social Research. 2004. http://www.verbrechen-der-wehrmacht.de/pdf/vdw_en.pdf. Retrieved 2008-11-28.
 * 17) ^ Leitz, Christian "Editor's Introduction" pages 131–132 from "Army: Soldiers, Nazis and War in the Third Reich" by Omer Bartov; pages 129–150 from The Third Reich The Essential Readings edited by Christian Leitz, London: Blackwell, 1999
 * 18) ^ Bartov, Omer Germany's War and the Holocaust: Disputed Histories, Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 2003 page xiii
 * 19) ^ Bartov, 1999 page 146.
 * 20) ^ Evans, Richard In Hitler's Shadow 1989 pages 58–60.
 * 21) ^ Ian Kershaw. Stalinism and Nazism: dictatorships in comparison. Cambridge University Press, 1997, p.150 ISBN 0-521-56521-9
 * 22) ^ Alexander Fischer: „Teheran – Jalta – Potsdam“, Die sowjetischen Protokolle von den Kriegskonferenzen der „Großen Drei“, mit Fußnoten aus den Aufzeichnungen des US Department of State, Köln 1968, S.322 und 324

[edit] References

 * Bartov, Omer "Soldiers, Nazis and War in the Third Reich" pages 129–150 from The Third Reich: The Essential Readings by Christian Leitz, London: Blackwell, 1999, ISBN 0-631-20700-7.
 * Bartov, Omer Hitler’s Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich, New York: Oxford University Press, 1991, ISBN 0-19-506879-3.
 * Bartov, Omer The Eastern Front, 1941–45: German Troops and the Barbarisation of Warfare, New York: St. Martin’s Press, 1986, ISBN 0-312-22486-9.
 * Bergen, Doris "'Germany Is Our Mission: Christ Is Our Strength!' The Wehrmacht Chaplaincy and the 'German Christian' Movement" pages 522–536 from Church History, Volume 66, Issue #, September 1997.
 * Bergen, Doris "Between God and Hitler: German Military Chaplains and the Crimes of the Third Reich" pages 123–138 from In God's Name: Genocide and Religion in the Twentieth Century edited by Omer Bartov and Phyllis Mack, New York: Berghahn Books, 2001, ISBN 1571813020.
 * Böhler, Jochen (2006) (in German). Auftakt zum Vernichtungskrieg. Die Wehrmacht in Polen 1939. Frankfurt: Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag. ISBN 3-596-16307-2.
 * Davies, W. German Army Handbook, 1973, Ian Allen Ltd., Shepperton, Surrey, ISBN 0-7110-0290-8
 * Evans, Anthony A., World War II: An Illustrated Miscellany, 2005, Worth Press, ISBN 1-84567-681-5
 * Evans, Richard J. In Hitler's Shadow West German Historians and the Attempt to Escape the Nazi Past. New York: Pantheon, 1989, ISBN 0-394-57686-1.
 * Fest, Joachim; Plotting Hitler's Death—The Story of the German Resistance, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 1996. ISBN 0-8050-4213-X
 * Förster, Jürgen "The Wehrmacht and the War of Extermination Against the Soviet Union" pages 494–520 from The Nazi Holocaust Part 3 The "Final Solution": The Implementation of Mass Murder Volume 2 edited by Michael Marrus, Westpoint: Meckler Press, 1989 ISBN 0-88736-255-9.
 * Förster, Jürgen "Complicity or Entanglement? The Wehrmact, the War and the Holocaust" pages 266–283 from The Holocaust and History The Known, the Unknown, the Disputed and the Reexamiend edited by Michael Berenbaum & Abraham Peck, Bloomington: Indian University Press, 1998, ISBN 0-253-33374-1.
 * Förster, Jürgen "The German Military’s Image of Russia" pages 117–129 from Russia War, Peace and Diplomacy edited by Ljubica & Mark Erickson, London: Weidenfeld & Nicolson, 2004 ISBN 978-0-297-84913-1.
 * Geyer, Michael ”Etudes in Political History: Reichswehr, NSDAP and the Seizure of Power” pages 101–123 from The Nazi Machtergreifung edited by Peter Stachura, London: Allen & Unwin, 1983, ISBN 0-04-943026-2.\
 * Geyer, Michael "Professionals and Junkers: German Rearmament and Politics in the Weimar Republic" pages 77–133 from Social Change and Political Development in Weimar Germany edited by Richard Bessel & Edgar Feuchtwanger, London: Croom Helm, 1981, ISBN 0-389-20176-6.
 * Goda, Norman "Black Marks: Hitler's Bribery of his Senior Officers During World War II" pages 413–452 from The Journal of Modern History, Volume 72, Issue # 2, June 2000; reprinted pages 96–137 in Corrupt Histories edited by Emmanuel Kreike and William Chester Jordan, Toronto: Hushion House, 2005, ISBN 1-58046-173-5.
 * Hastings, Max, Overlord: D-Day and the Battle for Normandy 1944, 1985, reissued 1999, Pan, ISBN 0-330-39012-0
 * Hastings, Max Armageddon: The Battle for Germany 1945, 2004, Macmillan, ISBN 0-333-90836-8
 * Heer, Hannes & Naumann, Klaus (editors) War of Extermination: the German Military in World War II, 1941–1944, New York: Berghahn Books, ISBN 1-57181-493-0.
 * Kershaw, Ian (2008). Hitler: A Biography. New York: W. W. Norton & Company. ISBN 0-393-06757-2.
 * Kitterman, David "The Justice of the Wehrmacht Legal System: Servant or Opponent of National Socialism?" pages 450–469 from Central European History, Volume 24, Issue #4, 1991.
 * Lubbeck, William; Hurt, David B. At Leningrad's Gates: The Story of a Soldier with Army Group North. Philadelphia, PA: Casemate, 2006 (hardcover, ISBN 1-932033-55-6).
 * Geoffrey P. Megargee, War of Annihilation. Combat and Genocide on the Eastern Front, 1941, 2006, Rowman & Littelefield, ISBN 0-7425-4481
 * Megargee, Geoffrey, Inside Hitler's High Command, 2000, University Press of Kansas, ISBN 978-0-7006-1187-4
 * Messerschmidt, Manfred "The Wehrmacht and the Volksgemeinschaft" pages 719–744 from Journal of Contemporary History, Volume 18, Issue # 4, October 1983.
 * Müller, Klaus-Jürgen The Army, Politics and Society in Germany 1933–1945: Studies in the Army’s Relation to Nazism, Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1987, ISBN 0-7190-1071-3
 * O’Neill, Robert The German Army and the Nazi Party, 1933–39, London: Corgi, 1966, ISBN 0-552-07910-3.
 * Schulte, Theo The German Army and Nazi Policies in Occupied Russia, Oxford: Berg, 1989, ISBN 0-85496-160-7.
 * Shepard, Ben War in the Wild East: the German Army and Soviet Partisans, Cambridge, Mass: Harvard University Press, 2004, ISBN 0-674-01296-8.
 * Smelser, Ronald & Davies, Edward The Myth of the Eastern Front: the Nazi-Soviet War in American Popular Culture, New York: Cambridge University Press, 2008, ISBN 978-0-521-83365-3
 * Former Waffen-SS soldiers, Wenn alle Brueder schweigen (When All Our Brothers Are Silent), Munin Verlag GmbH, Osnabrueck, 3rd revised edition 1981, ISBN 3-921242-21-5
 * Wallach, Jehuda The Dogma of the Battle Of Annihilation: The Theories of Clausewitz and Schlieffen and Their Impact On the German Conduct of Two World Wars, Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 1986, ISBN 0-313-24438-3.
 * Wette, Wolfram The Wehrmacht: History, Myth, Reality, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 2006, ISBN 978-0-674-02213-3.
 * .Wheeler-Bennett, John The Nemesis of Power The German Army in Politics 1918–1945, London: Macmillan, 1967, ISBN 1-4039-1812-0.
 * U.S. National Archives, Captured German Records Microfilmed at Alexandria, Virginia, Microfilm publications T-77 and T-78, 2,680 rolls
 * U.S. War Department, Handbook on German Military Forces, 15 March 1945, Technical Manual TM-E 30-451