The End: The Defiance and Destruction of Hitler’s Germany, 1944–1945

43. DRZW, 9/1 (Rass), pp. 686–90; Christoph Rass, ‘Menschenmaterial’: Deutsche Soldaten an der Ostfront. Innenansichten einer Infanteriedivision 1939–1945, Paderborn, 2003, pp. 121–34, esp. pp. 122–3; also Andreas Kunz, Wehrmacht und Niederlage: Die bewaffnete Macht in der Endphase der nationalsozialistischen Herrschaft 1944 bis 1945, Munich, 2007, p. 114. Omer Bartov, The Eastern Front, 1941–45: German Troops and the Barbarisation of Warfare, New York, 1986, p. 49, estimates that around 30 per cent of officers had been members of the Nazi Party.

44. NAL, WO219/4713, fos. 907–8, SHAEF report, 4.9.44.

45. NAL, WO219/4713, fos. 906–7, SHAEF report, 11.9.44.

46. BAB, R55/601, fo. 104, Tätigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda report, 4.9.44.

47. ‘Wollt Ihr den totalen Krieg?’ Die geheimen Goebbels-Konferenzen 1939–1943, ed. Willi A. Boelcke, Munich, 1969, p. 452; Marlis Steinert, Hitlers Krieg und die Deutschen, Düsseldorf and Vienna, 1970, p. 43.

48. BAB, R55/601, fo. 113, Tätigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda report, 11.9.44.

49. TBJG, II/13, p. 388 (2.9.44).

50. MadR, vol. 17, p. 6708 (17.8.44); BHStA, MA 106695, report of RPvOB, 6.9.44. The first V2 rocket attack on London on 8 September, causing only a few casualties, was not publicized in the German press. When eventually, two months later, news of the V2 attacks was broadcast, there was a mixed reaction. Satisfaction, revived hopes and an upturn in mood were reported, though Berliners were said to have been ‘not specially impressed’.—Steinert, pp. 511–12; Das letzte halbe Jahr: Stimmungsberichte der Wehrmachtpropaganda 1944/45, ed. Wolfram Wette, Ricarda Bremer and Detlef Vogel, Essen, 2001, p. 147 (7–12.11.44).

51. BAB, R55/601, fos. 78–9, Tätigkeitsbericht, weekly propaganda report, 14.8.44.

52. Robert Gellately, Backing Hitler: Consent and Coercion in Nazi Germany, Oxford, 2001, pp. 226–30.

53. BAB, R55/623, fos. 56–9, Wochenübersicht über Zuschriften zum totalen Kriegseinsatz, 28.8.44.

54. MadR, 17, pp. 6697–8 (10.8.44).

55. Michael Kater, The Nazi Party: A Social Profile of Members and Leaders, 1919–1945, Oxford, 1983, p. 263 (figure 1).

56. Figures from Pätzold and Weißbecker, pp. 354, 375, 419 n. 17.

57. TBJG, II/13, p. 389 (2.9.44); Eleanor Hancock, National Socialist Leadership and Total War 1941–45, New York, 1991, p. 164.

58. On 31 August Bormann ordered schools and universities to continue until their pupils, students or teachers were conscripted for work in armaments, in accordance with the restrictions laid down by Goebbels.—BHStA, Reichsstatthalter Epp 644/2, unfoliated, Party Chancellery circular 209/44, 31.8.44.

59. DZW, 6, pp. 230–31; Hancock, p. 148.

60. Dieter Rebentisch, Führerstaat und Verwaltung im Zweiten Weltkrieg, Stuttgart, 1989, pp. 520–21.

61. Goebbels decided, however, having gained Hitler’s agreement, not to proceed with this further increase of the age limit for women’s labour duty.—TBJG, II/14, p. 218 (16.11.44).

62. TBJG, II/13, pp. 307–9 (24.8.44).

63. BAB, R43II/680a, fos. 135–7, Spende des Führers (Eierkognak) an die NSV, costs of supplying the liqueur, 12–18.8.44.

64. BHStA, Reichsstatthalter Epp 681/6, unfoliated, Stuckart to RVKs, 3.9.44; BAB, R43II/1648, Lammers to RVK, 4.9.44.

65. Rebentisch, p. 522.

66. Hancock, pp. 155, 158.

67. Hancock, pp. 151, 156. Goebbels was well aware that 70 per cent of the exempted occupations were in the armaments industry.—TBJG, II/13, p. 239 (10.8.44).

68. DRZW, 5/2 (Müller), pp. 750, 752, 762, 767; DZW, 6, p. 229.

69. TBJG, II/13, p. 397 (3.9.44).

70. TBJG, II/13, pp. 196–7 (2.8.44).

71. DZW, 6, p. 231; TBJG, II/13, p. 239 (10.8.44); BAB, R3/1740, fos. 38–9, Speer-Chronik.

72. DRZW, 5/2 (Müller), p. 761.

73. Von Oven, p. 124 (1.9.44).

74. Hancock, pp. 162–4; Dietrich Orlow, The History of the Nazi Party, vol. 2: 1933–1945, Newton Abbot, 1973, pp. 470–72; BAB, R3/1740, fos. 43, 81, Speer-Chronik.

75. BAB, R3/1740, fos. 103–4, Speer-Chronik; TBJG, II/13, pp. 370 (31.8.44), 378 (1.9.44), 388–9 (2.9.44), 452 (10.9.44), 490 (16.9.44), 525–7 (20.9.44), 568 (26.9.44); von Oven, pp. 127–9 (3.9.44), 134 (10.9.44).