en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blomberg%E2%80%93Fritsch_affair
1 correction found
After the German defeat at the Battle of Moscow in December 1941, Hitler took personal command of the Wehrmacht through the OKW
This is chronologically wrong: Hitler had already assumed direct personal command of the entire Wehrmacht in February 1938. In December 1941 he newly took over the Army (OKH), not the Wehrmacht as a whole.
Full reasoning
The claim says Hitler only took personal command of the Wehrmacht after the Battle of Moscow in December 1941. But the documentary record shows he had already done that almost four years earlier.
On 4 February 1938, Hitler's decree on the command of the Wehrmacht stated: "Die Befehlsgewalt über die gesamte Wehrmacht übe ich von jetzt an unmittelbar persönlich aus" (“I shall exercise command authority over the entire Wehrmacht personally and directly from now on”). That was the decree that created the OKW and made Hitler the direct commander of the armed forces.
The United States Holocaust Memorial Museum likewise distinguishes between two dates:
- Hitler was Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces from February 1938; and
- Hitler became Commander in Chief of the Army only after December 1941.
So December 1941 marks Hitler's takeover of the Army/OKH after Brauchitsch's removal, not a new takeover of the Wehrmacht through the OKW. The article's wording collapses those two different steps into one and places the Wehrmacht takeover at the wrong date.
2 sources
- German Armed Forces High Command | Holocaust Encyclopedia
Hitler occupied the top of the hierarchy. He was not just the Führer of Germany, but also Commander in Chief of the Armed Forces (after February 1938) and Commander in Chief of the Army (after December, 1941).
- Akten der Reichskanzlei. Regierung Hitler, Nr. 29: Erlaß über die Führung der Wehrmacht (4 February 1938)
Die Befehlsgewalt über die gesamte Wehrmacht übe ich von jetzt an unmittelbar persönlich aus. Das bisherige Wehrmachtamt im Reichskriegsministerium tritt mit seinen Aufgaben als „Oberkommando der Wehrmacht“ ... unmittelbar unter meinen Befehl.