Chapter 105:
Chapter 105
“…The opportunity you gave me, it is yours to take back. I have no regrets.”
Rommel said calmly.
He was already in too deep.
His plan to use his troops in the Wolf’s Lair to capture the Chancellor as a hostage, dismantle the SS, and eliminate the war criminals from the high ranks of the military had been leaking from the start.
His chief of staff, Spiedel, had been executed, he heard through the grapevine.
Rommel seemed to have let go of his attachment to life.
The Chancellor glared at Rommel, who spoke calmly with his hands clasped in front of him.
Rommel was still wearing the uniform of a general.
He also wore the many medals and insignia he had received.
He was not handcuffed, only two of his guards were standing by his sides, ready to subdue him at any moment.
The Chancellor’s eyes were bloodshot.
He was furious that he had betrayed his trust.
He was also regretful that he had to do so.
All kinds of emotions that he could not explain himself burst out.
“Why! Why did you have to do that! General Rommel!”
“…You asked me why I did that.”
Rommel asked back, and the Chancellor’s eyes widened in confusion.
Rommel’s eyes seemed to lose their calmness and a strange fire rose in them.
His voice grew louder.
“Why did you do that in Liverpool? They were just civilians who wanted to leave the city. Why did you order them to be mowed down by machine guns on the streets? Why did you massacre and imprison all the unarmed civilians!”
At first it was a question, but later it became a scream.
The guards looked at the Chancellor with an expression of asking if they should restrain him, but he shook his head vehemently.
Rommel’s eyes seemed to see not the Chancellor but the burning city.
The children screaming in pain, the young mothers who tried to shield their children from the bullets.
The oil and fire that piled up on them!
The armed ones were killed, and the unarmed ones were slaughtered.
The SS temporarily arrested Rommel, who resisted the Chancellor’s orders, and faithfully followed the Chancellor’s commands.
“Is that all because of that?”
“Is that all… You said is that all…”
Their conversation went nowhere.
The politician who said it was all just civilian massacre and the soldier who lived his life with the duty to protect the people had no common ground.
Essentially, they were different humans.
“Swear your loyalty now. I can forgive you. Right now, kneel down and swear your loyalty to the German nation and state. General Rommel, you are my best field general.”
“…I will always be loyal to the German nation and state.”
When Rommel said that, the Chancellor’s face brightened with joy and ecstasy.
“Yes, General Rommel. Wait…”
Until he said his next words.
“But loyalty to your regime and loyalty to the German nation and state are completely different matters. Your Majesty, the crimes you order will eventually come back to us.”
“…General Rommel.”
“Stop it now. You have made wise but risky decisions until now. But… But, this is not it. This is not something you can hide even if you win.”
Rommel pleaded with a sincere voice.
“I will kneel down if you want me to. I will do whatever you ask me to do. But please stop these crimes for the sake of the future of the German nation and state. What makes us different from those Bolsheviks in Soviet who slaughter their own people!”
“…Take him away politely.”
“Heil Hitler!”
“Your Majesty…”
The loyal guards grabbed Rommel’s arms.
Rommel muttered in a weak voice as he followed them out of the Chancellor’s office.
As soon as the door slammed shut, the documents on the desk in the office shook.
Erwin Rommel, Walter Model, Erich von Manstein, Wilhelm Canaris… The list of names continued.
The names of almost all of the top generals were written there. Only Wilhelm Canaris, who was in charge of the intelligence agency but only a lieutenant general, had a special underline under his name.
Below that, thousands of names and ranks continued. The list of those ‘exposed’ as involved in the assassination plot against the Chancellor was thick with documents even though only names and ranks were written.
The document gave a tremendous shock to the German army.
The SS ran wild and demanded that they all be arrested.
G?ring and Jodl, chief of staff, suggested that arresting them all would collapse the military command system itself, but most of them were dragged away somewhere in Berlin’s underground interrogation room.
Only generals and high-ranking officers who had been favored by the Chancellor were ‘privileged’ to be confined at home.
For those who had already been confined like Rommel, there was no difference.
Only those who were pushed to the core of the conspiracy, like Canaris, did not receive a single point of mercy.
“…He committed suicide in the end.”
“Is that so?”
Heinrich Müller, the new chief of the Gestapo, submitted the interrogation report of Canaris to the Führer.
The self-proclaimed torture experts of the Third Reich gathered to interrogate the core of the rebellion and extract information.
They said they could break anyone, even those with iron wills, in just three days. But they only achieved half of their success.
Canaris bit his tongue and killed himself.
He left behind only a few confessions and escaped to a place where the truth could never be uncovered.
“How close do you think this result is to the truth?”
“We can’t know for sure now… but we estimate it to be about eighty percent true.”
It was a very defensive answer, but he couldn’t say more.
Walter Schellenberg, who led the purge within Abwehr, also nodded.
Of course, whether it was eighty percent or ninety-nine point nine percent true, one point of falsehood could cause the biggest disaster.
It was not an issue that could be decided lightly.
“So all these people were involved in the rebellion…”
“…”
Even if he excluded twenty percent who might be innocent, it was still too many. And they were important people.
Among the suspects were three field marshals: Rommel, Manstein, and Model. And Speer, a minister.
That made four.
If he subtracted twenty percent mathematically, he would end up with only Manstein, who cried and denied his involvement.
Would he also exclude Speer, who was caught red-handed? What about Rommel and Model? Should he purge them?
The two best generals of the Third Reich?
The intelligence line was literally shattered.
The spies that Abwehr had deployed and managed were all turned into double agents.
The report from the Reich Security Main Office stated that “this is believed to be the cause of the defeat in the Eastern Front”.
It even speculated that the assassination of Reinhard Heydrich by gunfire in broad daylight was related to their operation.
At this point, he couldn’t just ignore it. But he couldn’t cut them all off either.
“For now, arrest them all and interrogate them. But! Treat Model and Rommel with respect.”
“Yes! My Führer!”
“Send me a list of temporary appointments.”
He had already cut off the top brass and promoted some people once, but now it was time to do it again.
Most of the generals who deserved promotion were either gone in the last purge or involved in this one.
Bock, Rundstedt, Repp were purged. Rommel and Model, who he thought would lead the defense forces in the future, were deeply entangled in this incident.
Riecheneau, who he recognized for his loyalty, died in vain.
‘Who should I… who should I appoint?’
He looked at the personnel files over and over again, but there was no familiar name.
Those who had loyalty written on them were either incompetent or poorly rated.
The most capable ones were mostly involved in this incident or openly made anti-Nazi remarks.
“Damn it. Is there no loyalty at all?”
***
Model stared at the eyes of the young investigator from the Security Office who was ‘interrogating’ him.
The investigator laughed awkwardly and offered him a cup of tea.
“The Führer ordered us to treat you with respect, Field Marshal.”
“What about my subordinates? Not them?”
The investigator smiled sadly and scratched his back of his head, but Model knew that it was a tacit affirmation.
He leaned back on his chair and sighed deeply.
His subordinates were capable and honest.
That’s why they participated in raising their flags against this criminal regime.
They didn’t tell Model himself about the conspiracy, but the Reich Security Main Office seemed to be running around with everyone who was related to the conspirators after losing their leader. Model, who had clashed with the SS several times, must have been a good prey for them.
That didn’t mean he loved Hitler’s massacre. Rather, he felt ashamed in his heart.
‘I must have looked like a servant of the Führer to my subordinates…’
He thought of his young son’s face.
How would he explain to his son who smiled innocently and wished his father good luck?
That your father couldn’t do what his conscience told him to do and survived as an enemy of this regime?
Of course, there was one thing that bothered him in this sense of guilt.
‘It’s too convenient. Too convenient.’
No matter how Hitler and the Nazis ran amok, how could so many people in the defense forces be involved in a coup? Especially when the situation on the Eastern Front was so urgent?
Of course, the Führer’s actions were really insane.
That must have made everything possible.
Model himself might have been one of those who just talked and got involved.
Most of them would be at that level of involvement. But they were unlucky enough to be connected to the Soviet Union.
‘Soviet Union?’
A corner of the puzzle seemed to fit.
But he soon shook his head.
How could the Soviets know the internal affairs of the defense forces so well?
Canaris had been involved in anti-Nazi activities since years ago, even before the toxin war broke out.
Model’s eyes went up.
Beyond that wall, on the vast land of Eastern Europe, the sons of Germany would be spilling blood. Even at this moment.
The investigator’s questions continued, but his thoughts had already left for that wide land.
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