Читаем Soldaten полностью

ANNACKER: Yes, that’s what I keep on saying. It’s all over if we don’t succeed.

HAUCK: That would be the end.

ANNACKER: If we were to succeed in halting this invasion, GERMANY would have a basis for negotiation.⁴⁵⁶

A Captain Gundlach, who had defended his bunker in the small coastal town of Ouistreham to the very last, shared similar hopes:

In this statement, we can observe the convergence of faith in final victory and faith in the Führer.

Yet no matter how much energy the Nazi leadership or German soldiers themselves put into mobilizing their last reserves of confidence, the massive material advantage of Allied troops, and especially their aerial and artillery dominance, crushed any remaining hopes. Soldiers no longer talked about setbacks on the front or battles that had been lost; their entire world collapsed like a house of cards. The path was freed for the sort of fundamental criticism that had previously been lacking—a Private First Class Hirst even opined, “I’ll do anything I can to end the war and see that Germany is completely defeated”⁴⁵⁸—and not just among foot soldiers, but officers as well.

Typical in this regard was a conversation between Majors Arnold Kuhle and Sylvester von Saldern, both of whom had fought on the front lines as infantry commanders and had been taken prisoner in June 1944 on the Cotentin Peninsula: