Assassination Hitler

From: Ricski (Ricski@poland.freeserve.co.uk)
Subject: Re: why didn't they try?
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Date: 1999/10/08

Labas <labas@polbox.com> wrote in message
news:gIkL3.21285$F5.339733@news.tpnet.pl...
> I was wondering why the allies never tried to assassinate Hitler?

There's a book out at the moment:

Operation Foxley: the British Plan to Kill Hitler
By Ian Kershaw and Mark Seaman
ISBN: 1873162723

I haven't read it but it is in print and seems to be in most bookshops. However I suppose that in the first two years of the war, the efforts to plan an assassination would have been at their peak. Poland, France, Norway etc had been easy German victories and there looked to be no stopping Hitler on the ground. After the invasion of the Soviet Union though, I imagine that keeping Hitler in power would have become more of a priority. His conduct of the Eastern Front and its effect on the strength of the Wehrmacht probably contributed more to the eventual Allied Victory than his immediate death
would have. If Hitler had been assassinated then there would definitely have been another leading Nazi to take his place, and most probably one who would have run the war much better i.e. at letting the generals conduct the campaigns. (Compare the difference in Russian fortunes once Stalin started
listening to Zhukov, Antonov et al ) Hitler at Stalingrad is a prime example. Firstly there was his fascination to strike Stalin's City (Yes it also had some strategic value). His refusal to allow an immediate breakout, his conviction that the 6th army could be resupplied by air, and the general
"no retreat" policy led to great German losses there. I have not studied the "what-ifs" of Stalingrad, but the general opinion of authors seems to be that the situation there could have been better for the Germans had Hitler not been in charge.

Also if the British had assassinated him then they would still be faced with a Nazi Germany. The July Plotters would not have been informed of the attempt on his life and thus would be in no position to seize power immediately after his death. Any attempt on Hitler's life would therefore probably be best planned and carried out by anti-Nazi Germans.

Richard Leszczynski

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From: Connolly (tac555@erols.com)
Subject: Re: why didn't they try?
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Date: 1999/10/11

> (clipped) After the invasion of the Soviet Union though, I imagine that
> keeping Hitler in power would have become more of a priority. His conduct of
> the Eastern Front and its effect on the strength of the Wehrmacht probably
> contributed more to the eventual Allied Victory than his immediate death
> would have. If Hitler had been assassinated then there would definitely have
> been another leading Nazi to take his place, and most probably one who would
> have run the war much better i.e. at letting the generals conduct the
> campaigns.(clipped)

Agreed, but in the closing months of the war, say by Jan '45 when all was
clearly lost, this good logic would no longer apply would it? Perhaps, Hitler
was essentially ensconced in an impregnable bunker by then and all chance had
been lost. The war had become an effort almost solely to remove him at that
point. Excepting the genuine fear of a Nazi atomic program, wasn't Hitler's
demise and unconditional surrender the point? If a 'competent' replacement
emerged, one imagines that he would have faced the facts, surrendered, saved a
few hundred thousand lives on each side, and salvaged what was left of Berlin,
Dresden, etc. For example, General von Choltitz was a brilliant defensive
tactician and could have turned Paris into another Stalingrad - having the
longer view he chose not to (to our collective good fortune).

> Also if the British had assassinated him then they would still be faced with
> a Nazi Germany. The July Plotters would not have been informed of the
> attempt on his life and thus would be in no position to seize power
> immediately after his death. Any attempt on Hitler's life would therefore
> probably be best planned and carried out by anti-Nazi Germans.

Prior to late '44 I would definitely agree. After Mortain I would submit that
taking Hitler out could have achieved all the war aims (unconditional German
surrender) without leaving Nazi's in power, or enduring much of the death and
destruction that was to follow. Otherwise, what does unconditional mean?

By insisting on unconditional surrender, the Allies had signed Hitler's death
warrant and given anti-Nazi's all possible incentive as the July plot showed.
Hitler's actions like the Bulge assault seem consistent with that 'cornered rat'mentality. Given the success of the Manhattan project & fear of similar Nazi
progress, seems conceivable that assassination would have been of even keener
interest by then. I'd have to assume that realistic opportunities simply did
not materialize.

Cheers,
Tom Connolly

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From: Ricski (Ricski@poland.freeserve.co.uk)
Subject: Re: why didn't they try?
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Date: 1999/10/12

I have just looked up more about Operation Foxley (having previously only
read the jacket of the book in a bookshop, I think I might buy it now). The
quote at the end of the first article that follows is perfect proof of Tom's
argument and shows the flaws in my train of thought. I hope that no-one
objects that the articles are from a newspaper but I'm sure they are backed
up in the book I'd seen. The Telegraph is no "National Enquirer", it is a
high quality English broadsheet.

------------------
The Daily Telegraph
Thursday 23 July 1998
Issue 1154

BRITAIN'S Special Operations Executive prepared plans to "liquidate" Adolf
Hitler by sending in a lone agent to impregnate his clothing with anthrax,
according to wartime files released to the Public Record Office at Kew
today.
The scheme was one of a number put forward as part of Operation Foxley, "a
deliberate and continuous effort to try to liquidate Hitler" devised in the
last months of the war. Operation Foxley was never carried out for fear that
it would turn Hitler into a martyr and a rallying point for widespread
resistance once the Allies occupied Germany. But the files of the SOE, set
up by Churchill with orders to "set Europe ablaze", show that the plan had
the Prime Minister's backing.

A British Army officer, Captain Edmund Hailey Bennett, volunteered to
undertake the mission. Suggestions for hiding the minute dose of anthrax
required included using a fountain pen, hollowed-out spectacles or false
teeth. One official said that if the would-be assassin did not wear
dentures, his real teeth might have to be extracted.

The idea of assassinating Hitler originated on June 19, 1944, two weeks
after D-Day, from the SOE's Algiers station and was originally intended to
take place during a supposed visit by Hitler to France. Gen Colin Gubbins,
the head of the SOE, issued a highly restricted Top Secret memo marked:
"Please destroy after reading."

It concluded: "It may be argued that to kill Hitler would turn him in the
eyes of the Germans into a martyr. On the other hand, I feel that his
removal would certainly shorten the war considerably."

Churchill approved the plan despite being told by the Chiefs of Staff that
Hitler's military blunders made him an asset to the Allies. "But on the
wider point of view, the sooner he is out of the way the better," he said.

Gubbins set up a team to examine the various possibilities. Stewart Menzies,
the head of MI6, had reluctantly agreed to help.

MI6's scepticism was shared among some of the SOE's old hands. Major
Field-Robertson, the head of the SOE's German section, argued that using
such "low methods" to kill Hitler could be disastrous. He said: "It would
almost certainly canonise him and give birth to the myth that Germany would
have been saved if he had lived."

He agreed with the Chiefs of Staff that Hitler's incompetence as a military
strategist was invaluable to the Allies. "Hitler has been of the greatest
possible assistance to the war effort," he said. "His value to us has been
the equivalent to an almost unlimited number of first class SOE agents
strategically placed inside Germany."

But Air Vice Marshal A P Ritchie, the SOE's air adviser, strongly backed the
plan. Hitler was held by the Germans to be "something more than human", he
said. "It is this mystical hold which he exercises over the German people
that is largely responsible for keeping the country together at the present
time," he said. "Remove Hitler and there is nothing left."
-------------------------
Here is the link to the graphic that accompanies the article. It comprises
of 2 maps illustrating quite well the level of detail to which the SOE knew
of Hitler's movements around the Berghof.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/graphics/98/7/23/nhit23.gif

Now, there is also evidence of an attempt on Hitler's life before the war.
Because it involves a character and an organisation that later played a part
in WW2 - I do not consider it off-topic. It too is from "The Daily
Telegraph":
-----------------------------
The Daily Telegraph
ISSUE 1276
Sunday 22 November 1998

A DARING pre-war plot to assassinate Adolf Hitler using a brilliant RAF
pilot on a low-level bombing raid has been discovered.

Arthur Clouston was offered гг1 million in the spring of 1938 - worth гг30
million today - by an unidentified Jewish businessman at a meeting at a
remote English airfield, according to his memoirs.

Mr Clouston was asked to fly across the North Sea to bomb a military parade
being inspected by the Nazi leader in Berlin. After carrying out the
mission, he was expected to fly to Sweden before being spirited to safety
and a new life abroad.

The plot came when Jews were already being persecuted by Hitler. If
successful, the mission would have changed the course of history and could
have saved millions from the death camps.

Mr Clouston's memoirs, which have been found by his daughter, Susan
Clouston-Cohu, disclose that he turned down the offer because he could not
have lived with himself for conducting a contract killing. He also feared
that he would have to spend the rest of his life fleeing the Nazis.

Mr Clouston wrote: "No matter where I settled, there would always be the
threat of the unexpected bullet or knife in the back. More dissuasive,
however, was the question of my conscience, the fact that I would have to
live for the rest of my life with the knowledge that I murdered a man for
money. I have thought about it a lot since. I have never been really sure
how much I was held back by my conscience and how much by my fear of being
caught."

New Zealand-born Mr Clouston, who had been married to his British wife Elsie
for just a year in 1938, did not reveal the identify of the Jewish
businessman in his memoirs. He described the man only as "a brilliant figure
both in industry and national affairs".

He recalled the гг1 million offer in vivid detail and said that it was made
after he returned from a test flight in Farnborough, Hants. The wealthy
businessman took him into the middle of the airfield to ensure their
conversation was not overheard.

Mr Clouston wrote: "The sun was shining, the surrounding countryside was
green, tranquil, at peace. In the distance, an engine in one of the test
sheds droned like a swarm of bees. This was not real. At any moment I would
wake up. I looked back at my visitor. If only he had been some sort of
crank. But there was no question of his sanity or his seriousness."

The plot was to fly Mr Clouston in a disguised de Havilland aircraft from an
airfield in the north-east of Britain. He would follow the Baltic coast and
head inland to Berlin, a route later followed by Allied bombers during the
Second World War. Mr Clouston had two bombs which he had to drop on the
leading two cars in the parade, one of which would have been carrying
Hitler. Afterwards, he had to fly north-eastwards to make it appear as if
the attack had come from Russia.

According to the memoirs, the businessman told him: "This is not a case of
murder. It is an execution as just and warranted as any in history. Hitler
already has the blood of many innocent men, women and children on his hands.
He is evil."

In the Second World War, Mr Clouston won two Distinguished Service Orders.
Later he rose to the rank of air commodore. He later retired to Cornwall and
died in 1984, aged 75.

Last week Mrs Clouston-Cohu, a widow, agreed to talk about the assassination
plot for the first time. "With hindsight, perhaps my father should have done
it," she said. "It would have avoided so much more suffering but I accept
why he came to the decision he did at the time. He could never have killed
anyone in cold blood. I am sure he would have carried it out if he had been
ordered to do so."

Mrs Clouston-Cohu said the assassination offer was never discussed. "It was
mentioned once but my father quickly curtailed the conversation and none of
the details emerged. It makes the hairs on the back of my next stand up just
thinking about how, for a few moments, he held the future in his hands.
Hitler's assassination would have been a momentous event."

William Rubinstein, professor of modern history at the University of Wales,
Aberystwyth, said that the disclosures about the plot were fascinating and
plausible. He speculated that any one of half a dozen Jewish families,
including the Rothschilds, might have put up a bounty on Hitler's life. "The
Jewish people would have known by 1938 that Hitler was the world's greatest
anti-Semite," he said.

Mark Almond, a modern history lecturer at Oriel College, Oxford University,
believes the death of Hitler could have saved the lives of up to six million
Jews. "Without Hitler, the expulsion might have continued but without the
mass murder," he said. And John Charmley, professor of modern history at the
University of East Anglia, said that an assassination might even have
prevented war. "There would have been no Munich crisis because Hitler, the
driving force behind German aggression, would have been out of the way."
--------------------

There are several other articles in The Daily Telegraph, if you want to find
them go to their website www.telegraph.co.uk and search under "Hitler" I
cannot recommend "assassination" or even "assassination of Hitler"as a
search item because too many articles concerning JFK and Martin Luther King
are returned and this is BAD because they are off-topic.

Richard

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From: Rich Rostrom (rrostrom@mcs.net)
Subject: Re: why didn't they try?
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Date: 1999/10/13
jasoaelios@aol.comnospam (Jason Ehlers) wrote:

> Since the western allies seemed to want Hitler
> alive and in charge, if their intelligence had got
> wind of a german assassination plot against
> Hitler, if they would have warned him about it.

Absolutely not. The Allies recognized perfectly
well that Hitler was the driving force behind Germany,
that his will kept Germany fighting long after the
war was lost.

The July 20 plotters announced Hitler's presumed
death. (Von Stauffenberg saw the bomb go off, with
bodies flung out of the windows of the bunker.)

This message was picked up by Allied monitors and
deciphered at Bletchley Park. Ewen Montagu, one of
the _very_ few people cleared for both ULTRA and
"Double-cross", wrote in _Beyond Top Secret ULTRA_

"It was, perhaps, our biggest thrill of the war when
we got the premature message... that Hitler was dead."

Also, if the Allies wanted Hitler alive, why did they
send my father to Berlin to drop 500lb demolition
bombs on the Fuhrerbunker? (He was a B-17 bombardier,
and on Berlin missions the Fuhrerbunker complex was
his aiming point.)

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From: Nikon98343 (nikon98343@aol.com)
Subject: Re: why didn't they try?
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Date: 1999/10/10
I was wondering why the allies never tried to assasin Hitler?
Responsible nation states don't do that. It is morally repugnant. One
doesnt' fight a war and claim the moral high-ground, then turn around and kill
a national leader.
   Also, it sets a bad precedent. We do that, then others will feel less
constrained when it comes to thier arguments with us.

True killing a national leader is morally repugnant, but I don't think
that would have stopped an assasination attempt. Admiral Yamamoto was in
all reality assasinated, a special mission with one target, him. I doubt
morality was an issue there.

Nathan
                                   *******************************************

From: Rich Rostrom (rrostrom@mcs.net)
Subject: Re: why didn't they try?
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Date: 1999/10/12

"Labas" <labas@polbox.com> wrote:

> I was wondering why the allies never tried to assassinate Hitler?

Because it was never a practical option.

Germany was a totalitarian police state, with everyone under
the constant surveillance of the Gestapo. Allied agents could
infiltrate Germany on a very limited basis and at great risk.

Hitler did not move around in public, he stayed mainly
in military bases and other fortified compounds, always
with an escort of heavily armed SS men. His movements
were kept secret.

To kill him would require one of two things:

1) One or more assassins who somehow infiltrate the security
around Hitler and get into his presence with weapons. This is
almost impossible as no one was allowed near him who was not
well-known to his security men, and almost everyone was subjected
to a body search before entering his presence. The only exceptions
were the other leading Nazis, Eva Braun, a few trusted servants -
and von Stauffenberg, a seriously mutilated war hero.

2) A commando team with enough manpower and weapons to overcome
Hitler's guards, which somehow manages to 'form up' within
striking distance of his known location without being caught
by the Gestapo or the German army.

Neither was ever possible.

Once it _was_ considered, according to OSS research chief
Stanley Lovell. In his memoir _Of Spies and Stratagems_,
he wrote that the OSS learned of a scheduled meeting between
Hitler and Mussolini in a private railroad car in the Brenner
Pass. Someone suggested parachuting in a bunch of their toughest
men to kill everybody. But this would have been a probable
suicide mission. Also, at the last minute, the location was
changed.

                                    ************************************************

From: Dirk Lorek (DiLore@pobox.com)
Subject: Re: why didn't they try?
Newsgroups: soc.history.war.world-war-ii

Date: 1999/10/12

Velovich wrote:

>>I was wondering why the allies never tried to assasin Hitler?
>
> Responsible nation states don't do that. It is morally repugnant. One
>doesnt' fight a war and claim the moral high-ground, then turn around and kill
>a national leader.

Nah. The Allies were receiving Ultra reports from the Gestapo (one of
the first keys that were broken IIRC) about what was going on behind
the front lines in the SU, statistics about killed Jews and partisans
et al. They also received Ultra reports about when Hitler was at the
Berghof. A precision or commando raid in 1943 against the Berghof
would have been worth a try IMHO. Morally it would have been more
justified than killing 50 000 civilians in Hamburg for example.

Actually, such a bombing raid was done, but for some reason not until
two weeks before the German capitulation. 617 sqd was involved, and
it was the second last RAF heavy bomber raid flown in WW2.

>   Also, it sets a bad precedent. We do that, then others will feel less
>constrained when it comes to thier arguments with us. Sorta like Pandora's
>Box. Once open, it's too late.

The Germans had opened the box already. On the night of 31 May/1 June
1943, 3 Bf 110 night fighters attacked a DC-3 over the Bay of Biscay;
it was the regular aircraft passenger liner BOAC Flight 777 (G-AGBB)
plying its route between Algiers, Lisbon and London. The airplane,
also carrying actor Leslie Howard, was shot down, nobody survived. The
motive for this attack was the mistaken belief that Churchill was
aboard the plane. The Germans knew that Churchill had been in North
Africa, and when a German agent in Lisbon turned in a misguided message
that he had seen a man resembling the British Prime Minister (in fact a
man named Alfred Chenfalls) boarding a BOAC plane at the airport,
German fighters were sent out in the hope of killing Churchill.

Dirk
*********