The real story of The Zionist Fraudulent Madoff who ripped off 50 Billion Dollars + The story of Zionist Actor:Tom Cruise.

Zionist & Fradulent Bernard Madoff succesfully robbed 50 Billion US dollars and was one of the factors that destroyed the US Econmy.Who is behind him?.Why was his arrest so late?Why Israel benefits?Why does American-Zionist Actor Tom Cruise support the crimes of Zionism?.Read the untold and uncensored story which will shock you and impress you at the same time.

The Voice of the White House

Washington, D.C., December 31, 2008: “The real story of the Bernie Madoff rip-off is being kept under official U.S. lock and key since it has become very evident that most of the stolen funds w4re sequestered in Israeli banks and with the active connivance of top Israeli government officials. Of the 50 billions, give or take, that this scumbag made off with, about 40 are still safe in Israel and will remain secret under current Israeli laws. Because of Madoff’s Jewish political and social connections in the United States, the two SEC “investigations” into allegations of improprieties in his business methodology, were deliberately sequestered. There is absolutely no way that even the most cursory audit of Bernie’s books would not have at once exposed the fraud so the lying SEC reports are a strong indication of the immunity this thief had in the highest Bush governmental circles, Bush, himself, had been told of some of this and indicated that the investigations should be squashed because of Bernie’s “close and significant” Israeli government connections. The problem with some of this information is that not one word of it will ever be seen in the American media and the swindled will stay that way. If, the Bush people reason, the public ever gets wind of this passive complicity in this immense swindle, an avalanche of lawsuits might well follow. And Bernie? Bernie had accomplices, both in New York, Washington and Tel Aviv. When some of these realize that the 70 year old swindler might decide to plea bargain his way out of a long sentence, poor Bernie will be a dead man. He might fall out of his apartment while washing the windows, kill himself in a fit of remorse or, most likely, suffer the same kind of a very convenient heart attack that killed Ken Lay of Enron, another man with embarrassingly high level connections to the President. The hands-off attitude of our useless media in this reeking case of theft and political malfeasance should show the public why both the print media and the television industry in America is rapidly going the way of the SUV.”

Madoff’s Asset List Won’t Be Made Public, U.S. Regulator Says

January 1, 2009
by David Scheer and Allan Dodds Frank
Bloomberg

The U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, which sued Bernard Madoff last month for allegedly directing a $50 billion fraud, won’t make public a list of his assets filed yesterday, the regulator said.

A federal judge ordered Madoff to provide the SEC an accounting of all investments, loans, lines of credit, business interests, brokerage accounts and other holdings. The court hasn’t authorized its public disclosure, said SEC enforcement official Andrew Calamari, who confirmed receipt of the list.

“I think one of the fears here is that much of this money may be in offshore funds,” Columbia Law School Professor John Coffee told Bloomberg Television, adding that the SEC wants to keep the assets secret to protect them. “There is the danger that foreign regulators and foreign creditors may seek to seize that money if the names and sources are made public.”

Madoff, 70, was charged in December by federal prosecutors with directing an alleged Ponzi scheme through his New York investment firm. Defense lawyer Ira Sorkin has said Madoff’s company is cooperating with the government. His client met with prosecutors last month, according to people familiar with the case.

Shortly before he was arrested, Madoff allegedly told employees that he had $200 million to $300 million left, according to an FBI complaint. Sorkin declined to comment yesterday on the amount of Madoff’s remaining assets.

Madoff’s firm collapsed after he was arrested Dec. 11. He told his sons that he directed the Ponzi scheme, in which old investors are paid off with money from new ones, according to a lawyer for the brothers. The firm is liquidating under the Securities Investor Protection Corp., whose funds cover securities and cash claims of as much as $500,000 per customer, including as much as $100,000 in cash.

Disclosure Order

The Dec. 18 court order that Madoff disclose his assets required the list be given directly to the regulator, Calamari said. It “does not authorize public release of materials related to the SEC’s ongoing investigation,” he said. The effort “seeks to preserve and recover money for investors and hold wrongdoers accountable.”

The catalog of Madoff’s assets may be attractive to angry investors including hedge funds, universities and charities as they sue to recoup lost money. Madoff’s investment advisory business may have had more than 4,000 customers, people familiar with investigation said last month.

Losses disclosed by some clients may have been inflated by purported gains in their accounts with Madoff. Yeshiva University, which had previously valued its holdings with Madoff at $110 million, said on Dec. 30 that its net investment was about $14.5 million before inflation by “fictitious” profits.

‘Rabbit Trails’

“Madoff may very well have given money to other persons or other entities,” said Fred Longer, a lawyer suing hedge fund operator Tremont Group Holdings Inc. over Madoff-related losses. He said the SEC list will be useful primarily to investors suing Madoff directly. “Those are the rabbit trails. They’ll need to trace all of them to find the cash and it will take a lot of forensic efforts.”

Longer filed a lawsuit in Manhattan federal court yesterday against Tremont Group Holdings Inc., a hedge-fund firm owned by Massachusetts Mutual Life Insurance Co. The complaint seeks the recovery of losses suffered through the hedge fund firm’s investments with Madoff.

The lawyer represents Group Defined Pension Plan & Trust, a Jersey City, New Jersey-based investor. Also sued was Tremont’s auditor, Ernst & Young LLP. Longer claims the accounting firm missed warnings about the alleged scheme. The complaint seeks class-action, or group, status.

Congressional Hearings

Congress is set to hold hearings next week on the Madoff scandal. Witnesses scheduled to appear before the House Financial Services Committee on Jan. 5 include David Kotz, the SEC’s inspector general, Stephen Harbeck, president of the SIPC, and Harry Markopolos, a former investment firm employee who flagged suspicions about the alleged Ponzi scheme.

Madoff’s firm was the 23rd-largest market maker on Nasdaq in October, handling an average of about 50 million shares a day, according to exchange data. It took orders from online brokers for some of the largest U.S. companies, including General Electric Co. and Citigroup Inc.

Madoff, who hasn’t formally responded to the securities fraud charge, may have to appear in Manhattan federal court by Jan. 12 unless he is indicted before then.

Estate’s Funding

On Dec. 30, the trustee now in charge of Bernard L. Madoff Investment Securities LLC obtained court approval to use $28.1 million out of its accounts as it unwinds the firm.

“The estate requires the funding to get to the sale of certain assets,” said Richard Bernard, an attorney representing Irving Picard, the trustee appointed by the SIPC to supervise Madoff’s company.

The SIPC said that the use of some of the Madoff firm’s funds won’t diminish customer returns, according to a statement from the agency and Picard.

Picard reached a deal with Bank of New York Mellon Corp., which holds the funds, to have them released. U.S. Bankruptcy Judge Burton Lifland in Manhattan said the court papers outlining the agreement were very basic and asked the lawyer for more information on the accounts.

Bernard said there are more funds and accounts, without being specific. Bank of New York is holding some funds because it may have “set-off rights” on certain claims, he said, adding he was limited in what he could say in open court because of ongoing criminal investigations.

Investors’ Money

Picard is tasked with maximizing assets for the firm as investors that had about $36 billion with Madoff seek the return of their money.

Lifland last week gave him authority to share confidential information, such as proprietary trading programs, with potential buyers of the Madoff firm’s market-maker unit.

Picard will mail claim forms to customers and creditors of Madoff Securities by Jan. 9, the SIPC said.

The case is Securities and Exchange Commission v. Madoff, 08-cv-10791, U.S. District Court, Southern District of New York (Manhattan).

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601087&sid=aPL3IGt0JSlM&refer=home

IDF soldier with Gazan trophy baby. Yahoo News

57% of those killed by Israel in 2009 were children; 536 dead since strikes began

January 2, 2009

Ma'an news

Gaza – Ma’an – Sixteen out of the 28 killed in Israeli airstrikes since New Year’s Eve were children; nine were from the same family, nine of the adults killed were women.

The percentage of Israeli casualties that are children in 2009 is 57%.

On Friday the bodies of the Rayan family children were buried, and Palestinian medical sources confirmed the deaths of three more Palestinians under 17.

Seven Palestinians have been killed since midnight Thursday bringing the death toll to 428 and the injured to 2,220 on day seven of the Israeli operation.

The day’s strikes were reported as follows:

2:45 One of the children killed Friday was from the Al-Astal family. He was playing outside his home in the Al-Qararra neighborhood was killed when a shell hit the area.

2:30 In the An-Nuseirat refugee camp the Israeli army targeted the home of Imad A’qel, a prominent leader of the Al-Qassam Brigades, the armed wing of Hamas. The home was destroyed but no injuries were reported.

A’qel is one of the assistants to general leader of the brigades Ahmad Al-Ja’bari.

2:15pm Three were killed in an airstrike on Al-Qarara village in southern Gaza.

2:00pm Shells landed on the home of Hamas’ Al-Qassam Brigades leader in the central Strip.

1:15pm 20 year-old Fadi Shebat killed in Israeli shelling at Bet Hanoun

1:00pm 15 year-old Hammad Mesbeh was killed by Israeli shells in Gaza City.

Medical sources in the Palestinian Red Crescent confirmed that Hammad was killed by shrapnel from an Israeli missile strike fired from a pilotless drone. His body was difficult to identify since it arrived to the hospital in pieces.

12:10pm Gazans crowd Jabaliya streets in public outcry against Israeli killing of Hamas leader Nizar Ryan and his 15 family members on Thursday.

12:00pm Shells fall on Der Al-Balah in the central Gaza Strip. Fifteen homes were completely or partially demolished with approximately 63 dead and twenty seven wounded.

10:30am One dead several injured as Israeli missiles land on home in Jabaliya, in the northern Gaza Strip. 6 year-old Christine At-Turk died from her wounds sustained during the strike on Friday afternoon.

10:00am Foad Al-Matuq was killed and four were injured after Israeli napalm shells hit an empty home in the Jabalia refugee camp in the northern Gaza Strip.

Shelling targeted the home of Nabil Matuq, Fouad’s brother. The home was also demolished.

9:00am Missile strikes in residential areas across the Strip were reported.

7:00am Israeli missiles targeted the homes of two Hamas members in the Al-Bureij refugee camp near Gaza City. The strikes left the homes of the men totally demolished, as well as damaging several buildings in the area. UN observers state that 45 civilians were killed and fifteen injured. Among these were 14 children under five.

One of the damaged homes belonged to Jamal Ad-Durrah, the father of Muhammad Ad-Durrah, whose death at the hands of Israeli gunfire was caught on film in the now iconic image of the young boy cowering behind his father as they hide behind an oil drum in the face of Israeli fire.

6:45am Two homes in Rafah were bombed, injuring six people.

6:30am Israeli shelling targeted a house in the Tel Al-Hawa neighborhood west of Gaza City, killing two entire families with a total of 23 dead and two injured..

6:00am Israeli shelling hit the Caliphates’ Mosque in the Jabalia refugee camp injuring four Palestinians.

5:45am Thousands of birds were killed when Israeli fire targeted a poultry farm in Gaza City.

http://uruknet.info/?p=m50258&hd=&size=1&l=e

Conversations with the Crow: Part 54

Editor’s note: When this series was prepared, a number of conversations were deliberately redacted because they were either very personal in nature or, more important, contained specific material which we felt might have considerable impact and present potential danger in publication. Now that all of the conversations are being readied for publication, along with illustrative specific notes, we are publishing many of the hitherto off-limits examples. Enjoy them!

On October 8th, 2000, Robert Trumbull Crowley, once a leader of the CIA's Clandestine Operations Division, died in a Washington hospital of heart failure and the end effects of Alzheimer's Disease. Before the late Assistant Director Crowley was cold, Joseph Trento, a writer of light-weight books on the CIA, descended on Crowley's widow at her town house on Cathedral Hill Drive in Washington and hauled away over fifty boxes of Crowley's CIA files.

Once Trento had his new find secure in his house in Front Royal , Virginia, he called a well-known Washington fix lawyer with the news of his success in securing what the CIA had always considered to be a potential major embarrassment. Three months before, July 20th of that year, retired Marine Corps colonel William R. Corson, and an associate of Crowley, died of emphysema and lung cancer at a hospital in Bethesda, Md.

After Corson's death, Trento and a well-known Washington fix-lawyer went to Corson's bank, got into his safe deposit box and removed a manuscript entitled 'Zipper.' This manuscript, which dealt with Crowley's involvement in the assassination of President John F. Kennedy, vanished into a CIA burn-bag and the matter was considered to be closed forever.

The small group of CIA officials gathered at Trento's house to search through the Crowley papers, looking for documents that must not become public. A few were found but, to their consternation, a significant number of files Crowley was known to have had in his possession had simply vanished.

When published material concerning the CIA's actions against Kennedy became public in 2002, it was discovered to the CIA's horror, that the missing documents had been sent by an increasingly erratic Crowley to another person and these missing papers included devastating material on the CIA's activities in South East Asia to include drug running, money laundering and the maintenance of the notorious 'Regional Interrogation Centers' in Viet Nam and, worse still, the Zipper files proving the CIA’s active organization of the assassination of President John Kennedy..

A massive, preemptive disinformation campaign was readied, using government-friendly bloggers, CIA-paid "historians" and others, in the event that anything from this file ever surfaced. The best-laid plans often go astray and in this case, one of the compliant historians, a former government librarian who fancied himself a serious writer, began to tell his friends about the CIA plan to kill Kennedy and eventually, word of this began to leak out into the outside world.

The originals had vanished and an extensive search was conducted by the FBI and CIA operatives but without success. Crowley's survivors, his aged wife and son, were interviewed extensively by the FBI and instructed to minimize any discussion of highly damaging CIA files that Crowley had, illegally, removed from Langley when he retired. Crowley had been a close friend of James Jesus Angleton, the CIA’s notorious head of Counterintelligence. When Angleton was sacked by DCI William Colby in December of 1974, Crowley and Angleton conspired to secretly remove Angleton’s most sensitive secret files our of the agency. Crowley did the same thing right before his own retirement , secretly removing thousands of pages of classified information that covered his entire agency career.

Known as “The Crow” within the agency, Robert T. Crowley joined the CIA at its inception and spent his entire career in the Directorate of Plans, also know as the “Department of Dirty Tricks,”: Crowley was one of the tallest man ever to work at the CIA. Born in 1924 and raised in Chicago, Crowley grew to six and a half feet when he entered the U.S. Military Academy at West Point in N.Y. as a cadet in 1943 in the class of 1946. He never graduated, having enlisted in the Army, serving in the Pacific during World War II. He retired from the Army Reserve in 1986 as a lieutenant colonel. According to a book he authored with his friend and colleague, William Corson, Crowley’s career included service in military intelligence and Naval Intelligence, before joining the CIA at inception in 1947. His entire career at the agency was spent within the Directorate of Plans in covert operations. Before his retirement, Bob Crowley became assistant deputy director for operations, the second-in-command in the Clandestine Directorate of Operations.

One of Crowley’s first major assignments within the agency was to assist in the recruitment and management of prominent World War II Nazis, especially those with advanced intelligence experience. One of the CIA’s major recruitment coups was Heinrich Mueller, once head of Hitler’s Gestapo who had fled to Switzerland after the collapse of the Third Reich and worked as an anti-Communist expert for Masson of Swiss counterintelligence. Mueller was initially hired by Colonel James Critchfield of the CIA, who was running the Gehlen Organization out of Pullach in southern Germany. Crowley eventually came to despise Critchfield but the colonel was totally unaware of this, to his later dismay.

Crowley’s real expertise within the agency was the Soviet KGB. One of his main jobs throughout his career was acting as the agency liaison with corporations like ITT, which the CIA often used as fronts for moving large amounts of cash off their books. He was deeply involved in the efforts by the U.S. to overthrow the democratically elected government of Salvador Allende in Chile, which eventually got him into legal problems with regard to investigations of the U.S. government’s grand jury where he has perjured himself in an agency cover-up

After his retirement, Crowley began to search for someone who might be able to write a competent history of his career. His first choice fell on British author John Costello (author of Ten Days to Destiny, The Pacific War and other works) but, discovering that Costello was a very aggressive homosexual, he dropped him and tentatively turned to Joseph Trento who had assisted Crowley and William Corson in writing a book on the KGB. When Crowley discovered that Trento had an ambiguous and probably cooperative relationship with the CIA, he began to distrust him and continued his search for an author.

Bob Crowley first contacted Gregory Douglas in 1993 when he found out from John Costello that Douglas was about to publish his first book on Heinrich Mueller, the former head of the Gestapo who had become a secret, long-time asset to the CIA. Crowley contacted Douglas and they began a series of long and often very informative telephone conversations that lasted for four years. . In 1996, Crowley , Crowley told Douglas that he believed him to be the person that should ultimately tell Crowley’s story but only after Crowley’s death. Douglas, for his part, became so entranced with some of the material that Crowley began to share with him that he secretly began to record their conversations, later transcribing them word for word, planning to incorporate some, or all, of the material in later publications.

In 1998, when Crowley was slated to go into the hospital for exploratory surgery, he had his son, Greg, ship two large foot lockers of documents to Douglas with the caveat that they were not to be opened until after Crowley’s death. These documents, totaled an astonishing 15,000 pages of CIA classified files involving many covert operations, both foreign and domestic, during the Cold War.

After Crowley’s death and Trento’s raid on the Crowley files, huge gaps were subsequently discovered by horrified CIA officials and when Crowley’s friends mentioned Gregory Douglas, it was discovered that Crowley’s son had shipped two large boxes to Douglas. No one knew their contents but because Douglas was viewed as an uncontrollable loose cannon who had done considerable damage to the CIA’s reputation by his on-going publication of the history of Gestapo-Mueller, they bent every effort both to identify the missing files and make some effort to retrieve them before Douglas made any use of them.

All of this furor eventually came to the attention of Dr. Peter Janney, a Massachusetts clinical psychologist and son of Wistar Janney, another career senior CIA official, colleague of not only Bob Crowley but Cord Meyer, Richard Helms, Jim Angleton and others. Janney was working on a book concerning the murder of Mary Pinchot Meyer, former wife of Cord Meyer, a high-level CIA official, and later the mistress of President John F. Kennedy. Douglas had authored a book, ‘Regicide’ which dealt with Crowley’s part in the Kennedy assassination and he obviously had access to at least some of Crowley’s papers. Janney was very well connected inside the CIA’s higher levels and when he discovered that Douglas had indeed known, and had often spoken with, Crowley and that after Crowley’s death, the FBI had descended on Crowley’s widow and son, warning them to never speak with Douglas about anything, he contacted Douglas and finally obtained from him a number of original documents, including the originals of the transcribed conversations with Robert Crowley.

In spite of the burn bags, the top secret safes and the vigilance of the CIA to keep its own secrets, the truth has an embarrassing and often very fatal habit of emerging, albeit decades later.

While CIA drug running , money-launderings and brutal assassinations are very often strongly rumored and suspected, it has so far not been possible to actually pin them down but it is more than possible that the publication of the transcribed and detailed Crowley-Douglas conversations will do a great deal towards accomplishing this.

These many transcribed conversations are relatively short because Crowley was a man who tired easily but they make excellent reading. There is an interesting admixture of shocking revelations on the part of the retired CIA official and often rampant anti-social (and very entertaining) activities on the part of Douglas but readers of this new and on-going series are gently reminded to always look for the truth in the jest!

Conversation no. 54

Date: Monday, July 22, 1996

Commenced: 9:40 AM CST

Concluded: 10:10 AM CST

GD: Good morning, Robert. Been out and about today?
RTC: Gregory, I rarely get out and about these days. My hip problems you know. And there is nothing on television but trash and the continuing entertainment of the ignorant masses.

GD: Oh God, tell me about it. And the news is so controlled that the only way you can figure out what is happening is to read the foreign press. Not ours.

RTC: Well, if it doesn’t impact on Israel in a negative sense, we do get some news but God help the TV managers if anything negative in that area ever gets out. Israel and her boys inside the Beltway are sacred cows, believe me.

GD: I have no doubt of that, Robert. It’s interesting to consider than in the two thousand years since the mythic Jesus got nailed up, the poor Jews have been kicked out of every country they have colonized. No one wants them around after they get to know them. They were kicked out of England, France, Russia, Poland, Spain, and on and on. Why? Infectious bigotry? No, the locals get wind of what they are like and out they go. Get their hands on all the money and squeeze the public dry. None of them ever did manual labor in their lives but they live off the labor of everyone else. And then they get too greedy and too careless and out they go or, in some countries, into the bonfires.

RTC: The Germans?

GD: No, I had the Spanish in mind. Now I ask you, Robert, why would there be such universal hatred against Jews? There must be a reason. Jews have told me that it’s because they are so smart that people are jealous of them and perhaps this might have some validity but I personally think that it’s their utterly predatory nature. Jews are taught in their religion that non-Jews, and especially the hated Christians, are legitimate targets to attack. I mean, this sounds like some kind of redneck propaganda but an objective reading of history will more than bear me out. Besides, most of the really evil Jews are not Semitic Jews at all but actually Mongolian Turks. The Khazars. Before they were converted to Judaism by their Khan in 900 AD, they were a particularly vicious and depraved Caspian Sea army of marauding, raping and killing Turks, intermixed with Mongolian blood. The other Jews, the real ones, hate them with a passion.

RTC: And why so?

GD: Because they make them look bad. My God, they hate them. But these internecine fights are of no lasting consequence.

RTC: Jim loved the Jews and I warned him many times to be careful. But he never listened and got that Mossad right into our organization. What I’m truly afraid of is that these shits suck up all kinds of secret information and off it goes to Israel, mostly through their Embassy here. A real spy center.

GD: Well, under Roosevelt, who opened the gates for them, they stole everything and sent it to Stalin under the mistaken apprehension that he loved Jews. He did not, of course, but that’s another story. So, now they steal everything, like Pollard, and ship it off to Tel Aviv instead of Moscow.

RTC: Sometimes, I can sympathize with Hitler.

GD: Well, when it happens here, and it will soon enough, Hitler will be seen in a different light. But I must comment on something else. Johnson passed the Civil Rights laws and gave the blacks a good crack at a decent middle-class life. Of course he did it to get votes and not out of any decency, but they do have entrée now and many of them are coming up. Which, considering that we brought them all here as slaves, is not a bad nor improper concept. However, there are many people here who despise blacks and, in fact, hate them. We don’t hear from them because of the political correctness crap being shoved on kids in the schools but they are still there. I say this because I know some of them. Anyway, they are quiet now but if the time ever comes when the lower middle class loses its position, look for the racial issue to erupt here. Oh yes, civilization is only a very thin veneer on very cheap plywood, Robert. And the clever Jews have managed to promote the blacks, not to help them but to use them as potential victims. If they get too gross, the Jews that is, and the economy takes a dump, then the public will want scapegoats and guess what? The Jews will point to the blacks and we can count on their papers, writers, think tanks and so on to play the race card in the domestic economic poker game. A nasty business but totally predictable.

RTC: Yes, I’ve seen this coming and so have some of my friends. But there is nothing to do with it. I suppose it’s better to see the black district of New Orleans going up in flames rather than synagogues in Skokie.

GD: But the economy is pretty sound now, Robert, so that hypothesis is not valid. I am speaking theoretically here.

RTC: My God, Gregory, I do hope the FBI isn’t tapping your phone.

GD: Or yours, Robert. Don’t forget, they hate you.

RTC: Well, there is freedom of speech.

GD: Yes, there is, but don’t scream fire in a crowded theater, Robert.

RTC: (Laughter) No correct on that one.

GD: My late grandfather once told me that. Do you know what else he said? I think I might have told you this before because it’s so funny but he said that you should not tell bald-headed jokes to Custer’s widow.

RTC: You may have said that but these days, I wouldn’t bother to tell anyone that.

GD: Bad taste?

RTC: No, no one remembers Custer anymore.

GD: How soon they forget. They’ve forgotten Pollard but I will bet you that he will never get out of prison alive.

RTC: I wouldn’t take that bet. They are supposed to be our wonderful allies yet they encourage one of theirs to steal our most valuable secrets, all of which they shipped to Russia, and then, after he got caught, toss him out of the safety of the Israeli Embassy here right into the waiting arms of the FBI and life in prison. On the other hand, they set up a trust fund for him and made him a honorary member of their Knesset. That sends someone a message, doesn’t it?

GD: Yes, it does. I’m not quite sure what message, but it does send a message.

RTC: Can you imagine the New York Times or the Post running one of your comments?

GD: That would be like someone in Dublin endorsing an Orange candidate for the Dial.

RTC: (Laughter)

(Concluded at 10:10 AM CST)

Editor’s Note: A current motion picture, starring Tom Cruise, presents a highly fictional accounting of the failed bomb plot against Adolf Hitler. Here, for readers interested in a more factual accounting, we are publishing a far more accurate view.

20th July, 1944, The Assassination Plot against Adolf Hitler

The Conference Room at Hitler’s Headquarters when the bomb was exploded

Hitler’s study

Hitler and his staff immediately after the explosion

SS-Gruppenführer Heinrich Müller was head of the Gestapo and after the assassination attempt, was personally appointed by Hitler to head a special commission to investigate the incident. Müller was given carte blanche power by the Führer and his commission, which sat until the last days of the war, numbered over 500 specialists.

Escaping to Switzerland after the end of the War, Müller subsequently worked for Colonel James Critchfield of the CIA-controlled Gehlen Org.

The Official Gestapo report on the 20th of July Assassination Plot

By: Heinrich Müller, SS-Gruppenführer, Amtschef, Reichssicherheitshauptamt-IV-

Sonderkommission 20.7. 1944.
Berlin, den 26. Juli 1944.

Report on the assassination attempt against the Führer on 20 July, 1944.

I.

On 20 July, 1944, at approximately 12:50 PM, an explosion occurred in the “Wolfsschanze,” Restricted Area “A,” visitor’s barracks, during the situation conference. The Führer suffered only slight injuries, although in the immediate vicinity of the center of the explosion.

Severely injured were:
General Korten,
Colonel Brandt and
Stenographer Berger,
who have since died of their injuries, and
General Bodenschatz,
General Schmundt,
General Scherff and
Lt. Colonel Borgmann.
Less severely injured were:
General Buhle,
General Heusinger,
Rear Admiral v. Puttkamer and
Naval Captain Assmann.
Others present received lighter injuries.

II.

Immediately after he learned of the assassination attempt, the Reichsführer-SS appointed a Special Commission of the Reich Main Security Office to conduct a full investigation which began the same day.

The Reichsführer-SS noted in his report to the RSHA that the perpetrator of the attempt was presumed to be Colonel Graf von Stauffenberg, Chief of Staff to the Commander of the Reserve Army. He had been present at the briefing session, then left without notice before the detonation. Immediately thereafter, he flew to Berlin by aircraft.

III.

The locality of the incident is to be found in the Situation Room in which the daily situation conferences were held, a 12.5 meter long and 5 m wide room, in whose center is a large map table, on the right side a round table and left, a writing table and a phonograph. The immediate area and the furniture was heavily damaged. Right of the entrance was a 55 centimeter hole in the floor. For a wider radius, floor was depressed and charred. Points of impact of metal fragments not detectable, but splinters of wood and leather fragments are embedded into the wood. Bomb crater shows that the explosion occurred above the surface of the floor.

Reconstructed fragments of the right section of the three sections of the table clearly show the direction of the blast wave. This is indicated in photographs and sketches.

Lower pressure wave from detonation continued through cavities under floor of the entire barracks, noticeable by an upward buckling of the floor. Upper pressure wave destroyed the situation room to a large extent and exited through windows and doors, as well as through partition walls. Very exact sifting of mass of rubble has led to discovery of extremely small leather and metal fragments, obviously from a brief case; of two pieces of sheet metal and two compression springs from English chemical-mechanical time fuze detonators; also, part of flat iron pliers. Other material discovered has no obvious connection with these findings.

IV.

Recovered leather fragments have been identified by witnesses as belonging to Stauffenberg’s briefcase. Small parts of the fuze found at the locale come from two fuzes that are of the same type as the two English chemical-mechanical time fuzes found along the roadway. As two compression springs from this type of time fuze were found at the site of the explosion, the explosive charge must have contained two such time fuzes. The charge that was found along the roadway was also arranged for two fuzes. Therefore the explosive that was used for the attempt was presumably of exactly the same kind as that which was found later. According to the report of an explosive expert, the extent of damage at the site of the blast corresponds to the potential power of the recovered charge. The driver of the car that took Stauffenberg to the airport noted that he threw an object out the window in the general area from which explosives were recovered and the driver has supplied an affidavit.

Thus, Stauffenberg’s complicity has been objectively ascertained.

V.

As Chief of Staff under General Fromm, Stauffenberg has repeatedly taken part in briefings at the Führer’s headquarters. The locale was therefore well known to him. He landed at Rastenberg airport 20 July, 1944, at 10:15AM. Major General Stieff, chief of the Organizational Section of the Army General Staff, and 1st Lt. von Haeften, Stauffenberg’s orderly, arrived at the same time. Stauffenberg went directly to “Wolfsschanze,” Stieff to Army High Command quarters, von Haeften first with Stieff, was later to meet Stauffenberg at “Wolfsschanze.”

Stauffenberg had breakfast in the officers’ mess with headquarters commander and was later called to scheduled conference with General Buhle. General von Thadden, chief of staff of Military District I, Königsberg, also participated in this conference.

Afterwards, Buhle, von Thadden and Stauffenberg went to a conference with Field Marshal Keitel.

Throughout the entire time, Stauffenberg kept his briefcase with him. When all persons mentioned were ready to proceed to the daily situation conference from Keitel’s bunker at 12:30 PM, Stauffenberg went to a room next door with his briefcase for a short time, so that the other persons had to wait for him. Presumably while there he activated the time fuses by pushing them in, probably with the assistance of the pair of flat pliers as his right hand and two fingers of his left hand were missing. Activating the time fuses without such aid would have been difficult for him. In the situation room, Stauffenberg was presented to the Führer as a participant in the briefing session and was welcomed by the Führer. Following this, Stauffenberg went to the map table, putting the brief case under the table to the right of Colonel Brandt. After a short time, he left the situation room and also left Restricted Area A.

Stauffenberg’s absence was noted before the explosion, as he was expected to provide information. General Buhle looked for him. After the explosion, the telephone operator, Sgt. Adam, reported that he had seen Stauffenberg leave shortly after the start of the briefing session. Presumably latter was perpetrator of the explosion, said sergeant. From further interrogations and investigations, the following was developed: At about noon, General Fellgiebel, chief of the military signals office, appeared at the office of the headquarters signals officer (Lt. Col. Sander) in order to discuss several official matters with him. First, Fellgiebel and Sander went together to see Lt. Col. Waizenegger of General Jodl’s staff on signals matters. Later, Fellgiebel and Sander returned to the latter’s office in Bunker 88.

At about 12:30 PM, they noted that Field Marshal Keitel, accompanied by Stauffenberg and others, was headed for the situation conference.

In order to make sure that Stauffenberg would come to General Fellgiebel after the session, Sander telephoned Sgt. Adam and told him to have Stauffenberg come to Bunker 88 after the conclusion of the session.

Shortly after that, Lt. von Haeften appeared in Sander’s office and asked Fellgiebel for assistance in procuring a vehicle as Colonel Stauffenberg had to leave immediately. Accordingly, Sander telephoned headquarters to request a car. At that time he was asked by headquarters to remind Stauffenberg that he was expected for lunch with the headquarters commander, Lt. Col. Streve, and that General von Thadden would also be present.

While this phone conversation was in progress, Stauffenberg had looked into the room and announced himself to General Fellgiebel as being ready for their talk. Then Fellgiebel and Stauffenberg went out in front of the bunker and discussed fortifications in the East. Sander joined them and reported that a car was coming, adding that Stauffenberg was expected for lunch with the commander. Stauffenberg thereupon told Lt. Col. Sander that he first had to go back to the briefing session once more then would come to lunch. He also pointed out that he had a car at his disposal. When Sander had informed headquarters accordingly and returned to the front of the bunker, the explosion happened. At that moment Sander noticed a very nervous demeanor on the part of Stauffenberg. In reply to Fellgiebel’s question as to what was the matter, Sander stated, without giving much thought to the incident, that occasionally someone shot a gun or a land mine exploded.

Then Stauffenberg said he was not going back to the briefing session but instead would go to lunch with Lt. Col. Streve. He drove away with von Haeften, actually in order to go to the airfield.

The event in the visitors’ barracks was noted by Guard post I, so that the lieutenant on duty ordered the barriers closed. Accordingly, Stauffenberg was halted by the guard. He told the guard commander that he must get to the airfield urgently. As his pass was in order and additionally he was known to the guard commander, the latter let him pass, especially as the general alarm had not yet been sounded but came only 11?2 minutes later. At the outer southern guard post, Stauffenberg was halted again. He went to the guard commander, Sgt. Kolbe, whom he told that he had by all means to get to the airfield at once. Instead of being persuaded, Kolbe pointed out the closed barriers. Then Kolbe telephoned headquarters, at Stauffenberg’s request, and spoke with the adjutant, von Möllendorf, captain of cavalry, who was acting in the absence of the commander who was now at the scene of the explosion. Stauffenberg told Möllendorf that he had received the commander’s permission to leave the security area and that he had to take off by 1:15 PM at all events. The adjutant, who did not know the reason for the alarm that had been sounded, did know that Colonel Stauffenberg was authorized to be at the Wolfsschanze and agreed, on the strength of Stauffenberg’s statements, that he could depart and passed this to Sgt. Kolbe.

In this situation it should be considered that:

1. The alarm is sounded rather frequently.

2. Stauffenberg’s papers were in order.

3. Since Stauffenberg was known as a seriously disabled man and an officer in excellent standing, von Möllendorf had no reason to be initially suspicious.

Stauffenberg also passed the outermost gate and took off at 1:15 PM from the Rastenberg airfield for Berlin-Rangsdorf. Inquiry as to the origin of the aircraft has revealed that it was provided for Stauffenberg by order of General Wagner, Army Quartermaster General, by arrangement with the 1st Air Liaison Wing (2) Berlin, from Lötzen airfield. The aircraft was scheduled in any case to go to Berlin.

VI.

In light of the above report, the circumstances of the attempted assassination and the arrival and departure of the perpetrator can be considered as having been objectively determined.

It cannot be concluded that the security measures existing as a safeguard against such attempts broke down in this instance because the possibility that a General Staff officer summoned to a briefing session would lend himself to such a crime was not considered.

The incident does, however, require consideration of the future security measures to be taken for the protection of the Führer in all circumstances. Accordingly, proposals with regard to security measures will be submitted separately as per agreement with the RSHA.

Events in Berlin, July 20, 1944

by Otto-Ernst Remer, Generalmajor a.D.

General Remer, at that time a Lt. Colonel, was commander of the Berlin guard regiment and was ordered by the plotters to secure important sectors of the capitol. His prompt actions in putting down the revolt subsequently earned him the promotion to General and the enduring hatred of the postwar American-controlled German government and its many left-wing supporters.

My assignment to the guard regiment "Großdeutschland" in Berlin was actually a form of rest and recreation -- my first leave from the front -- after my many wounds and in recognition of my combat decorations, including the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves and the Close Combat Badge in Silver (forty-eight days of close combat). Later I would be wounded again. In all I was to command the guard regiment for only four months, since I felt obligated to be back with my comrades at the front.

My mission as commander of the guard regiment "Großdeutschland," which I took over at the end of May 1944, was, aside from purely ceremonial duties, to safeguard the Reich government and the Reich capital. Since there were more than a million foreign workers in Berlin and its immediate vicinity, the possibility of internal unrest had to be taken into account. Around noon on July 20, 1944, 1st Lieutenant Dr. Hans Hagen, who had been severely wounded at the front, concluded his lecture on cultural history before the officers and NCO's of the regiment. He was attached to my regiment only administratively and in no way as a National Socialist political officer, as has often been reported. I was the regiments sole leader, politically as well as militarily.

I had invited Hagen to lunch afterward in my quarters at the Rathenow barracks, together with my adjutant, 1st Lieutenant Siebert. Siebert, who had lost an eye in combat, was a pastor of the Confessional Church Protestant Church which he attended services every Sunday at the Garrison Church, with my express permission, although I myself had left the church. Among us personal freedom was the rule. Nor did it bother me that, after having been an SA Stormtrooper and a member of the party during the years of struggle before Hitler came to power, he had resigned from both organizations to protest defamatory remarks by his local party leader concerning the ancestry of Jesus Christ. Lt. Siebert suffered no adverse consequences due to his resignation.

In those days that sort of thing was entirely possible, with no repercussions. Indeed, before I chose Siebert, due to his character, as my adjutant, he confided to me that while still a Stormtrooper he had broken into a Gestapo office in order to obtain documents incriminating colleagues in the Confessional Church. For me Siebert's frank admissions were just a further evidence of the personal élan that recommended him as a trustworthy adjutant That's the way it was in the Third Reich, so widely execrated nowadays. Neither in my unit nor in the officer corps as a whole did there prevail the stubborn narrow- mindedness, not to mention the sort of terror against dissenting opinions, that is carried on against nationalists in West Germany today by the Office for Constitutional Protection. Nor have I ever heard that Pastor Siebert considered himself to be a "resistance fighter" or that he later pretended to have been one. Characteristic of our open-mindedness was a discourse which took place after lunch between Hagen, the top-notch cultural historian, and Pastor Siebert concerning the Heliand .The question involved the extent to which traditional Germanic structures were invoked in order to render the new and alien doctrine understandable. Thus Christ was represented as a warlord, and his disciples the warrior band. After a while, I lost interest in the two scholarly gamecocks' wordy contention, so I placed a reconciliatory bottle of wine on the table and headed for the swimming pool at the nearby sports arena to keep myself fit for my next front assignment.

During the early afternoon of July 20, 1944 my regiment, like all units of the Replacement Army, was alerted by the codeword "Valkyrie." "Valkyrie" provided for the mobilization of the Replacement Army in case of internal unrest. While my regiment automatically implemented the prescribed measures, I was summoned from the swimming pool. In compliance with my orders I drove immediately to my designated post, the Berlin City Command Center, directly across from the "Eternal Watch" honor guard. While the other unit commanders waited in the anteroom, I alone was admitted to the city commander, Major General von Hase, and given the following briefing on the situation and my assignment:

The Führer has had a fatal accident! Civil disorder has broken out The Army has assumed executive authority! The guard regiment is ordered to concentrate a strong force, reinforced for counterattack, to seal off the government quarter so that nobody, not even a general or a government minister, can enter or leave! To support you in sealing off the streets and subways I'm seconding Lieutenant Colonel Wolters to your command!

As these orders were being issued, I was struck by the circumstance that a younger officer of the general staff, Major Hayessen, assisted, while the former and senior general staff officer, whom I knew personally, stood about, idle and noticeably nervous.

I was naturally very shocked by the general's words, since I felt that with Hitler's death the possibility of a favorable turn in the war had almost disappeared. Immediately, I asked:

Is the Führer actually dead? Was it an accident or has he been assassinated? Where have civil disturbances occurred? I saw nothing unusual while driving here through Berlin Why is executive authority passing to the Army and not to the Wehrmacht? Who is the Führer's successor? According to Hitler's testament Hermann Goring is automatically his successor. Has he issued any orders or proclamations?

Since I received neither detailed information nor clear answers to my questions, the situation became even murkier, and I felt a certain sense of mistrust even from the beginning. When I tried to get a brief glimpse of the papers which lay before me on the table, above all to see who had signed the orders, Major Hayessen ostentatiously gathered them up and put them in a folder. As I returned to my regiment I was oppressed by the notion that "Hitler's dead, now confusion reigns, various people will probably try to seize power." I contemplated the future struggles for succession.

I decided that, in any case, I would not allow myself to be misused in my capacity as commander of the only elite unit on active duty in Berlin. My regiment was made up entirely of picked, proven combat soldiers with high decorations for bravery. Every officer sported the Knights Cross. I bore in mind as well the events of 1918, after which the Berlin guard units had been reproached for their hesitancy, which contributed to the success of the revolution. I had no desire to expose myself to a similar reproach before history.

When I returned to my troops, I gathered my officers and informed them of the situation and our orders. The alleged death of Adolf Hitler sent officers and men into shock. Never in my life, even at Germany's final defeat, have I witnessed such despondency. Despite the numerous stories which flourish today, that is the absolute truth: I vouch for it

I made no secret to my officers that there was a lot that was still unclear, indeed mysterious to me, and that I would in no way allow myself or my unit to be exploited. I expressly demanded unconditional confidence and absolute obedience, just as at the front, from every one of my officers. This somewhat unusual demand was due to a telephone call I received during the briefing from a general I didn't recognize -- it was probably Major General Friedrich Olbricht -- at the High Command of the Replacement Army, requisitioning a company from my unit for a special assignment. This demand I explicitly rejected, pointing out that I had been entrusted with a clearly defined mission and that dispersing my forces didn't seem advisable.

After the briefing I received two reports which further disturbed me. The first was from 1st Lt Dr. Hagen, a member of my staff, who informed me that while on the way to the barracks he had seen Field Marshal Brauchitsch, in full uniform, driving his car on the streets of Berlin. This was strange, for Brauchitsch was retired. Given the circumstances, his appearance in uniform seemed remarkable. It later turned out that the officer seen by Dr. Hagen can't have been Brauchitsch. Probably it was one of the conspirators.

The second disconcerting report was from Lt Colonel Wolters, who had been attached to my regiment as a liaison officer by the Command Center. He told me that I mustn’t believe he was there to keep tabs on me as an informer. Such a remark was completely uncalled for. Not only was it incongruous and annoying, it awoke precisely the suspicion it was designed to allay: somebody had something up his sleeve. As it turned out, the briefing I gave my officers caused the colonel misgivings. In order to avoid responsibility, he simply went home -- an unthinkable course of action for an officer on active duty.

My doubts that Major General von Hase's description of the situation matched the facts, doubts strengthened by another version which had Hitler murdered by the SS, convinced me that I had to determine the facts for myself. I decided to telephone every command post I could. This was just basic reconnaissance, a matter of course for every commander before committing his troops. Needless to say this type of thinking and acting is quite at odds with the notorious corpse-like obedience that denigrators of the Third Reich's army attribute to it.

Among other things I decided to send 1st Lt Dr. Hagen, who had eagerly volunteered, to the Reich Defense Commissioner for Berlin, Dr. Joseph Goebbels. Dr. Hagen had earlier worked under Dr. Goebbels in the Propaganda Ministry, and I believed that by dispatching him to Dr. Goebbels I would be informed about not only the military but also the political situation. Gauleiter and Defense Commissioner for Berlin as well as Propaganda Minister, Dr. Goebbels was in consequence of the former positions patron of the "Grossßdeutschland" Division, which was made up of soldiers from all the provinces of the Reich.

About an hour and a half after the "Valkyrie" order was given, my regiment, by then combat-ready, moved into the areas to be sealed off in accordance with its orders. The normal guard units, such as those at the War Memorial and the Bendlerblock, the headquarters of the Commander of the Replacement Army and of the Defense Production Office, remained at their posts. At about 4:15 p.m. Lt. Arends, the duty officer in the Bendlerblock, reported to me that he had been ordered to seal off all entrances to the building. A Colonel Mertz von Quirnheim, whom Lt Arends didn't know, had given him this assignment Lt Arends had further been instructed by General Olbricht to open fire on any SS units that might approach.

After personally inspecting my troops in their new positions, at about 5:00 p.m. I returned once more to the City Commander, General von Hase, to inform him that I had carried out his orders. At this time I was asked to established my command post there in the City Command Center, opposite the War Memorial. I had already set up a message center, commanded by Lt Gees, in the Rathenow Barracks, with which I maintained telephone contact Then von Hase gave me an additional assignment, to seal off a block of buildings north of the Anhalt Station (he showed me where on the map), very tightly.

As I commenced carrying out these orders, I ascertained that the block designated housed the Main Office of Reich Security. The unclearness, not to mention the deception, of this misleading order, could only strengthen my suspicions. Why wasn't I given explicit orders to place the Main Office of Reich Security under guard? It goes without saying that I would have carried out even this order.

Thus, on my third visit to General von Hase, I asked him directly "Herr General, why am I receiving orders formulated so obscurely? Why wasn't I simply told to pay special attention to the Main Office of Reich Security?" Von Hase was quite nervous and excited. He didn't even respond to my question. If one wonders today how a young officer like me could allow himself such liberties with a general, it should be borne in mind that we young commanders saw ourselves as battle-hardened, proven combat leaders, and we had scant regard for the chair borne warriors of the home front.

In this connection I should like to point out something based on my long experience at the front just as in the First World War it was the veteran commanders of the shock companies who epitomized the front experience, so in the Second World War it was the young commanders, come of age on the front, who had forged with their troops a sworn fellowship of combat. These men could not only fight, they wanted to fight, particularly since they believed in Germany's victory.

While in General von Hase's office I overheard from a conversation between the General and his First General Staff Officer that Goebbels was now to be arrested, and that this assignment was to be mine. Since I found this an unpleasant duty in light of my attempt to contact Goebbels, I jumped in and told General von Hase:

Herr General I consider myself unsuitable for this assignment As you know, I've been with the "Grossßdeutschland" Division, I've worn its stripe, for years. For me your mission would be very unchivalrous, for as you are doubtless aware, Dr. Goebbels, in his capacity as Gauleiter of Berlin, is at the same time the patron of the "Großdeutschland." Only two weeks ago I paid Goebbels my first call as new commander of the guard regiment. On these grounds I consider it inappropriate that I, in particular, be ordered to arrest my patron.

Possibly von Hase sympathized with my arguments; from whatever grounds he now ordered the military police to take Reich Minister Dr. Goebbels into custody.

Around 5:30 p.m. Lt Dr. Hagen finally met with Dr. Goebbels in his private residence, at 20 Hermann-Göring Strasse beside the Brandenburg Gate, after having tried in vain to see him at the Propaganda Ministry. The Reich Minister had no idea of the danger he was in. It was only after Hagen, in order to emphasize how serious the situation was, pointed out vehicles from the guard regiment as they drove by, that Goebbels took fright. He cried, This is impossible, what shall we do?"

To which Hagen suggested, "The best thing would be for you to summon my commander here." Goebbels asked curtly: "Can your commander be trusted?" "I'd lay down my life for him!" replied Hagen.

As I was going down the corridor just after leaving the City Commander's office, I finally found my bearings as a result of Hagen's contacting Goebbels.

Hagen had driven back to the barracks, given Gees his instructions, and then driven to my new command post at the Command Center, which was being heavily guarded. To avoid any hindrance, he did not enter the building, but informed my adjutant, Lt Siebert, and my orderly, Lt. Buck, of the situation, asking them to inform me without delay. They reported as follows:

There's a completely new situation! This is probably a military putsch! Nothing further is known! The Reich Defense Commissioner requests that you come to him as quickly as possible! If you're not there within twenty minutes, he will assume that you are being forcibly restrained. In that case he will be compelled to alert the Waffen-SS. To avoid civil war, he has until then ordered the Leibstandarte to stay where it is.

When I learned these things from my adjutant, I decided to see General von Hase one more time. That I still trusted the Major General, even then, is shown by my having Lt. Buck repeat to me once again, in the presence of von Hase, the message from Goebbels. I didn't want to seem an intriguer; as a veteran combat officer it was my practice to lay all my cards on the table. Von Hase bluntly rejected my request to comply with the Reich Defense Commissioner's summons so that I might clarify the situation in the interest of all concerned. After leaving the Command Center without interference, I deliberated, together with my adjutant, Lt. Siebert -today a pastor in Nuremberg -- as to what I should do. My key role in this difficult and obscure situation, which I had not caused, was increasingly clear to me. I felt that by now my head was on the line too. After evaluating the situation as carefully as I could at that time, I decided that in spite of von Hase's order to the contrary I would go to Goebbels. My reasons were as follows:

* First, I didn't want to be deprived of my freedom of action under any circumstances, as often happened at the front Often there was a very thin line between being awarded a high decoration or being sentenced to death by a court martial.
* Second, I felt myself still bound by my oath; so far the report of the Führer's death was at least doubtful. Thus, I had to act in keeping with the oath I swore on the flag.
* Third, at the front I had many times made responsible decisions on my own, decisions the correctness of which was confirmed by my being awarded high decorations. Many a situation can only be mastered by decisive action. I felt as one with my comrades at the front, who wouldn't understand were I to stand idly by out of a lack of civic courage. I could not allow myself the responsibility of letting things come to a fatal head. I thought of 1918.
* Fourth, I was under compulsion, since Goebbels had plans to alert the Waffen-SS, raising the possibility that a fraternal war between two forces, each proven in combat, might break out As the commander of the only elite unit in Berlin on active duty I was responsible for the lives of the men entrusted to me. To employ them in a totally confused affair was not my duty.

Nevertheless, I didn't entirely trust Goebbels either, for I still assumed that Hitler was dead, and believed a struggle for succession was possible. I was far from wanting to let myself and my unit be thrust into a latterday Diadochian struggle. Inasmuch as Goebbels' role remained unclear, I took along Lt Buck and a platoon of soldiers. Their orders were to come and get me if I didn't emerge from Goebbels' residence in fifteen minutes.

Then, after releasing the safety catch of my pistol, I entered the Reich Minister's office, where I had been eagerly awaited, and asked Goebbels to orient me. With that Goebbels asked me to tell him everything I knew. I did so, although I didn't reveal that von Hase intended to arrest him, since I was still unclear as to Goebbels' role in all this. When he asked me what I intended to do, I told him that I would stick to my military orders and that I was determined to carry them out Even if the Führer were no longer alive, I felt bound by my oath and could only act in accord with my conscience as an officer. At that Goebbels looked at me in amazement and cried: "What are you talking about? The Führer is alive! I've spoken with him on the telephone. The assassination failed! You've been tricked."

This information came as a complete surprise. When I heard that the Führer was still alive, I was greatly relieved. But I was still suspicious. Therefore I asked Goebbels to assure me, on his word of honor, that what he said was true and that he stood unconditionally behind the Führer. Goebbels hesitated at first, because he didn't understand the reason for my request It was only after I repeated that as an officer I needed his word of honor in order to see my way clear that he obliged.

My wish to telephone the Führer's headquarters coincided with his. Within seconds I was connected to the Wolf's Lair at Rastenburg in East Prussia. To my great surprise Hitler himself came on the line Geobbels quickly explained the situation to the Führer and then handed me the receiver.

Adolf Hitler said to me, approximately, the following: "Major Remer, can you hear me, do you recognize my voice? Do you understand me?" I replied affirmatively, but I was nevertheless uncertain. It flashed through my mind that someone could possibly be imitating the Führer's voice. To be sure I had become personally acquainted with the Führer's voice during the previous year, when, after he had awarded me the Oak Leaf to the Knight's Cross, I had been able to speak alone and completely frankly with him for an hour about the cares and miseries of the front. It was only as he continued speaking over the telephone that I became convinced that I was indeed speaking with Hitler. He went on:

As you can tell I'm alive. The assassination has failed, providence didn't intend it. A small clique of ambitious, disloyal, and traitorous officers wanted to kill me. Now we've got these saboteurs of the front. We'll make short work of this treacherous plague, by brute force if necessary.

From this moment on, Major Remer, I am giving you complete authority in Berlin. You are responsible to me personally and exclusively for the immediate restoration of peace and security in the Reich capital. You will remain under my personal command for this purpose until Reichsführer Himmler arrives there and relieves you of responsibility.

The Führer's words were very calm, determined, and convincing. I could breathe a sigh of relief, for the conversation had removed all my doubts. The soldier's oath which I had sworn to the Führer was still binding, and the guiding principle of my actions. Now my only concern was to eliminate misunderstandings and to avoid unnecessary bloodshed by acting quickly and decisively.

Goebbels asked me to inform him of the content of my conversation with Hitler, and asked me what I intended to do next He placed the downstairs rooms of his house at my disposal, and I set up a new command post there. By this time it was 6:30 p.m. The first report of the bomb attack in the Führer's headquarters was broadcast over the Greater German Radio Network around fifteen minutes later.

Due to my visit to the Berlin City Command Center I had a rough idea, for the most part, of the dispositions of the units advancing on Berlin. To let their commanders know the real situation, I dispatched staff officers in all directions to bring the word. Success was total. The question "The Führer -- with him or against him?" worked miracles. I would like to state unequivocally that every one of these commanding officers, who like me were outraged at what had happened, subordinated themselves unconditionally to my command, although they all outranked me. Thus, they demonstrated that their soldier's oaths were binding for them as well. Difficulties, temporary in nature, arose here and there, where personal briefings were not immediately possible.

Due to the prevailing uncertainty and because of misunderstanding - some thought that the guard regiments sealing off its designated area meant that it had mutinied -- on two occasions my regiment came within a hair's breadth of being fired on by other units. At the Fehrbelliner Platz an armored brigade had assembled at the order of the conspirators, but an order radioed by Lt. General Guderian removed it from the conspirators' control. Thereafter this unit undertook reconnaissance and mistakenly concluded that the guard regiment "Großdeutschland" was on the side of the conspirators and had apprehended Reich Minister Goebbels. Several of the brigade's tanks advanced tentatively, and bloodshed would have been a near thing had I not intervened personally to clear up the confusion.

The same thing happened in front of the Bendlerblock, the headquarters of the Commander of the Replacement Army, when a Panzergrenadier company tried to take over from my guard, which had been authorized by the Führer. The energetic intervention of officers from my regiment made possible a clarification at the last moment and prevented German soldiers from firing on each other. Here too the question "Hitler-with him or against him?" proved decisive. I had sent one of my company commanders, Captain Schlee, to the Bendlerblock in order to clear things up. At this point I had no idea that the leadership of the conspiracy had its Headquarters there. Schlee had orders to withdraw our guards, because I wanted, as much as possible, to avoid bloodshed. When he arrived he was ordered to see General Olbricht. He took the precaution of telling the guard to bring him out by force in the event he didn't return promptly. In fact he was placed under arrest in the General's waiting room by Colonel Mertz von Quirnheim, who told him to stay there. When Mertz went into Olbricht's office, however, Schlee simply walked away.

When he returned to our guard, Lt. Arends informed him of a strange occurrence. He'd heard shouts coming from an upper story of the building and just then a typewriter and a telephone came flying through the window and into the courtyard. Schlee did an about-face and led a patrol back up to find out what was going on. He quickly identified the room from which the noise was coming; it was locked, but not under guard, and the key was still in the lock Inside was General von Kortzfleisch, commanding general of the Berlin Military District it was he who had thrown the objects out the window. The general had been summoned to the Bendlerblock to receive his orders. On his arrival, he steadfastly refused to cooperate with the conspirators. He was arrested and locked in, but left unguarded. Now that he was free, he gave us our first information as to the leadership of the conspiracy.

At 7:30 p.m. our guards were relieved, in keeping with orders. Olbricht had to replace our guard detail with his own officers. The commander of the new guard was Lt. Colonel Fritz von der Lancken. As he was moving out Schlee learned from a captain in the communications center in the Benderblock that Major Remer had been ordered by the Führer to put down the putsch. They had been able to overhear my conversation with the Führer, and recognized that the telexes they were to send out were the conspirators' orders. Thus the men in the communications center deliberately delayed sending the messages, or in some cases didn't dispatch them at all.

Truly a masterfully prepared plan: the conspirators had no accomplices! Furthermore, telexes and telephone messages continued to come in from the Führer Headquarters, making the actual state of affairs quite clear.

Countless orders were given that late afternoon of the twentieth of July. Among other measures I moved the replacement brigade of the "Großdeutschland" from Cottbus to the outskirts of Berlin as a combat reserve. The brigade, too, had gotten different orders from the conspirators beforehand. Its tried and true commander, Colonel Schulte-Neuhaus, who had lost an arm in combat and whom I knew from the front, reported to my command post I introduced him to Goebbels. Meanwhile I concentrated my own troops more tightly around the Reich Chancery complex, and formed a strong combat reserve in the garden of Goebbels' official residence. Goebbels asked me to address the troops assembled there, which I did. Their outrage at the traitorous goings-on was so great that they would have torn every single conspirator to pieces, had they been there.

Then I sealed off the City Command Center, for I'd gotten the impression that there was a number of questionable characters there. I also learned that after my refusal to arrest Goebbels, the military police had been ordered to do so. I waited in vain for them to appear. Later I heard that not a single unit was ready to arrest Dr. Goebbels, so that it was left to von Hase himself The City Commander was at this point at the headquarters of the deputy commander, to which he had driven in order to work out further measures with the general, who had been installed there by the Conspirators. They had discussed things for two hours without coming to a decision, typical behavior for these combat-shy conspirators.

After General von Hase's return to the City Command Center was |reported to me, I asked him over the telephone to come by my command post at Goebbels' residence in order to clarify the situation. At first he refused my invitation, and demanded that, since I was his subordinate, I should report to him at the Command Center. It was only after I informed him that I had been ordered personally by the Führer to restore peace and order, as his immediate subordinate; that thus von Hase was under my orders; and that I would come and get him if he didn't appear of his own free will, that the general arrived. At this point I was still under the impression that von Hase, who had often been my guest at the officers' club, who frequently expressed his solidarity with the soldiers at the front, and who on no account omitted a "Sieg Heil!" to his beloved Führer from any speech, had been deceived, just as I had been, and was unaware of the facts. Therefore I apologized for my unusual treatment. On his arrival von Hase was affability personified; he even praised me for my independence and decisiveness, and for seeking out Goebbels, by which I had averted a good deal of mischief.

Even with Goebbels von Hase played the innocent, and acted as if he had no inkling of any conspiracy. He was asked to stand by for further information, and a room was placed at his disposal. As von Hase left Goebbels' office, there was an embarrassing incident, which made me, as a German officer, blush for shame. In these very tense circumstances, von Hase stated that he had been busy the whole day and hadn't had a thing to eat. Goebbels immediately offered to have a sandwich prepared and asked him if he would like a glass of Mosel or Rhine wine as well. As soon as von Hase had left the office, Goebbels sneered:

‘My name is Hare [Hase], I know nothing.’ That's the stuff our revolutionary putsch generals are made of. With the irons still in the fire they want to be wined and dined, and call their mommies on the telephone. In their place I'd see my tongue ripped out before I'd make such contemptible requests.

Two events illustrate how little thought and planning went into the putsch. My conversations and orders were routed through the same communications center in the Bendlerblock, headquarters of the conspiracy, from which the plotters' orders were being disseminated n all directions. The communications officers could have delayed my orders or not transmitted them at all or they could have interrupted my telephone calls, none of which they did. I even received a message from the Reich Broadcasting Service, inquiring about what was going on. As a result, I was able to give the order that under no circumstances was any unscheduled transmission to be made. As a result this important communications medium was denied to the plotters as well. What transpired at the Broadcasting Center on the Masurenallee? Major Jacob had been ordered to occupy the Broadcasting Center. Astonishingly enough he had been ordered neither to broadcast any announcements nor to shut down the station. He attempted to telephone the conspirators to report his occupation of the radio station and to request additional orders. He had no luck, however he wasn't put through, as happened at many offices. For front-line soldiers the loss of telephone connections was a frequent occurrence. In such a case the normal procedure was to establish radio communications or to send a courier. Major Jacob had a teleprinter at his disposal as well, but he used none of these methods. Stauffenberg, the General Staff officer who planned the putsch, gave no thought to furnishing motorcycle couriers -- such trivial details were studiously overlooked!

Rudolf-Günther Wagner, the man who was to broadcast the conspirators' proclamations, said later:

I had known for years that I was to broadcast the proclamation on the day of the putsch I awaited with feverish excitement the arrival of the lieutenant who was to bring me the proclamation. Unfortunately I waited in vain, until I heard from Goebbels' loudspeakers that the assassination had failed.

As is now well known, General Lindemann, who had the text of the proclamation, was nowhere to be found. General Beck was not willing to step in; he ordered Hans-Bernd Gisevius, a conspirator with the Abwehr, to bring the proclamation. First, however, Gisevius had to speedily draft a new statement, while the conspirators Stauffenberg, Hoepner, Yorck, Schwerin, and Schulenburg shouted suggestions at him. For this fiasco, too, Stauffenberg, the "manager" of the conspiracy, bears responsibility. To keep a broadcasting station in operation requires skilled and trustworthy personnel. A team had been ordered to the City Command Center but waited there idly until it was arrested during the counteraction. Hans Kasper, who was part of Operation Jacob, later commented:

It was around that time that the twentieth of July collapsed. From the perspective of a radio editor it was tragic. Tragic because the way in which details were handled made it obvious that this revolt had had very lithe chance of succeeding.

In the meantime Lt. Schlee had reported to me what was happening at the Bendlerblock. I knew nothing of the inside story, nor that Lt. General Fromm, Commander in Chief of the l Replacement Army, had withdrawn from the plot and been arrested by the conspirators. Schlee was further ordered, after our guards ad been relieved, to surround and seal off the Bendlerblock, without entering the buildings. At about 7:00 p.m. I felt I had the situation in Berlin in hand. The tension began to subside.

Otto Ernst Remer Verschwörung und Verrat um Hitler Verlag K. W. Schütz, Preussisch Oldendorf, Germany

General Remer’s additional remarks

The uprising, or, better said, the revolt, of July 20, 1944, failed not because of my intervention, but rather because of the inner lack of goals and conceptualization by its heterogeneous participants, apparently a privileged but subdued nobility class, who were, of course, united in their rejection of Hitler, but who were completely disunited in all other issues. The putsch failed because it began with unclear ideas, was prepared with insufficient means, and was carried out with almost astonishing awkwardness. Moreover, it is also known that no political support was promised from outside of Germany, which meant that the only possible result would have been unconditional surrender.

No one needs to ask what would have happened if the July 20, 1944, undertaking had succeeded. The German eastern front, which at that time was involved in extremely serious defensive battles, would undoubtedly have collapsed as a result of the civil war that inevitably would have broken out, and the attendant interruption of supplies... A collapse of the eastern front, however, would not only have meant the deportation of further millions of German soldiers into the death camps of Russian captivity, but would also have prevented the evacuation of countless women and children who lived in the eastern territories of the Reich, or who had been evacuated to those areas as a result of the terror attacks from the air by the western Allies.

Precisely because of his experiences on the eastern front, every thinking soldier knew what would happen to us if we were to lose this war. German soldiers were quite deeply convinced of the necessity of this struggle in the interest of the survival of our continent. We had not attacked Russia out of pure zeal to conquer. Rather, we were forced to act because the Soviets had deployed superior forces of more than 256 divisions in order to invade Europe at an opportune hour.

During my lifetime I have gotten to know and understand more than 50 countries, particularly in the Arab world and black Africa. These countries live under diverse political systems. In contrast to us, these nations all love and respect their own homelands, and are proud of their own countries and traditions.

The system of "reeducation" after 1945 has turned the Germans into a neurotic people. This spiritual-psychic condition of society in the Federal Republic thereby renders it incapable of self-awareness or of taking decisive counter-measures against the leftist organized revaluation of the natural life order.

A democracy is not good and acceptable because it calls itself a democracy, but rather when it recognizes and respects the traditional and living values of its own national community. I also believe that in every western democratic country, including here in Germany, no one can be happy about a democracy that does not also have a positive regard for its own people, state and nation. Contrary to the prevailing dogma, I have gained the impression that human beings are not equal, if for no other reason than on the basis of their very different cultural views. Nevertheless, I have observed that everywhere in the world, nationalists and those who love their own countries are able to speak with each other in the same language and understand each other, which is not the case among democrats of each country.

When one observes the tumultuous defamation of the Third Reich and the continual and repulsive self-accusations, one has to ask himself: is Hitler still so strong and the German Federal Republic so weak that the ignorant citizens of Germany can be convinced of the value of this democracy only by repetitiously repeating the old confessions of self-guilt? I do not believe so. In the long run, the historical truth cannot be suppressed

Stauffenberg background

Observations of Heinrich Müller, formerly head of the Gestapo and also head of the 20. July, 1944 Special Commission. Taken from his initial interview with James Kronthal, CIA station chief in Bern, Switzerland in 1948 when Müller was being vetted for CIA employment

M I think that Stauffenberg’s personality is important to consider. Any competent police officer likes to know as much as he can about a suspect. There was a man named Stefan George, a poet, who died in 1933. He taught elitism and racial superiority to a circle of young men that always surrounded him. He was the Oscar Wilde type.

Q George was a homosexual in other words.

M Yes, of course. I learnt of this affair after the 20th of July through a comrade in the Munich Police who had access to a long official report about George from the earlier times. George had seduced a pretty boy in Munich and his family intercepted disgusting love poems George had written to this boy. Complaints were made and an investigation followed. The names of the brothers Stauffenberg came up at several points. George was up in Heidelberg and had a sort of religious cult with all kinds of secret ceremonies with young men performing nude dances and so on. Revolting behavior.

Q And Stauffenberg was in this group?

M Yes, he and his brothers. Stauffenberg was quite handsome if you have seen his pictures. He was tall and slender with good features so I suppose George was drawn to him. Stauffenberg himself joined this cult when he was seventeen. George fled from Germany after the taking over of power in 1933 and the Stauffenbergs and others joined him in Switzerland. George died in that year.

Q But was this a permanent way of life for Stauffenberg or just something he experimented with as a young man?

M I could never prove anything for certain but many of Stauffenberg’s fellow staff officers believed he was a fumbling auntie. Or a homosexual to be more formal. He always surrounded himself with pretty young officers whom he preached Greek culture to. He went on about the body beautiful and the soul perfect or however he termed it. Many older, normal, officers found him loud and obnoxious, very dirty in his personal hygiene and strongly objected to his male harem that he dragged around the offices.

Also, this George talked about a secret Germany that was to be led by his special young friends after he had converted them to his perverted way of life. I have many papers which show me that the so-called secret Germany was in reality a clique of homosexuals with an interest in younger men and I think a case might very well be made that some of the plotters who were allied with Stauffenberg were as interested in repealing the very strictly applied State laws against homosexuality as in overthrowing Hitler. The whole business reeked of perversion. Like the Redl case.

Q You have documentation on all this?

M Of course. I still have a huge file put away on these creatures. I told all of these things to Hitler who was disgusted and told me he wanted to hear nothing more about this. He said to me, “First there was Röhm and his gang of fairies and now this. Keep all that quiet for now. Later, we can bring it up and use it to clean out the degenerates from their positions but this is not the time.”

Q Could we have copies of these papers?

M Certainly. Perhaps you would like to find out who else was in this society so you could make use of their services. I don’t mean sexual services, of course, but such knowledge can assure better cooperation.

Q Let us say that we would be interested in more information in this area. I assure you we are not interested in blackmail...

M Oh, the furthest thing from my mind, I can tell you.

Q Do you think the Soviets know about this?

M They have a nose for such things. It is a cheap way to get free information and the Soviets are adept at sexual blackmail. I know that they were aware of this situation but exactly what they did about it is beyond my present knowledge.

Q Would…if the Soviets knew about Stauffenberg’s activities, would they have been…or would they be now…aware of surviving personalities who had connections with this group? The secret Germany group?

M Probably. If they have been running these people, you could turn them. While I am on that subject, I should tell you that there were a number of so-called heroes of that time who were very cooperative with me in supplying all kinds of information I needed, quite freely by the way, and helping me track down others in their various groups. Perhaps we could discuss someone whose name is probably known to you.

………..

Q Is there any proof of the Stauffenberg group’s Soviet connections?

M Certainly. The Gestapo seized all of Stauffenberg’s personal papers from every source. Actually, when we searched his quarters in Berlin…I mean his private living quarters in Potsdam…we found that Stauffenberg had put everything down on paper. Not only that, we found the house stuffed with illegal black market food, wine, clothing and other luxury items. A very law abiding and patriotic man was Stauffenberg. You asked me about perversion before? Several albums of pictures of naked young Italian boys by the infamous von Glöden. Those I don’t have in my papers. We followed up all the information we had and the Soviet thread came up almost at once. We missed Köstring although he was interrogated but we did get all of the others. Hitler ordered all these documents kept strictly secret and in my own hands because he wanted no one else to be aware of what he did or did not know. There were many frightened people after that time, let me assure you.

Q What happened to these documents?

M Stauffenberg’s papers?

Q Yes.

M I kept them. And to answer your unasked question, I still have them. Except for the pictures of the little boys.

……………

The ugly facets of Stauffenberg’s persona are entirely true and Müller’s inelegant but blunt reports are not fictions designed to entertain Hitler and his entourage.

The comments on the homosexual poet, George, are true. They might be interpreted differently by persons who find themselves in sympathy with his lifestyle but this does not change their veracity. There are still reports in the Munich police files, not generally available to the public, that cover the subject in detail. There is no question that Stauffenberg and his brothers were intimate members of George’s inner circle and accompanied him into exile in Switzerland. The point can be made that Stauffenberg’s sexual activities do not negate his political ones but to understand clearly the nature of the resistance movement, it is necessary to examine not only the motives but the character of its participants.

The Stauffenberg family was, even to sympathetic biographers, strange.

Stauffenberg’s father had been Hofmarschall, or major-domo, to the King of Württemberg. He managed the King’s financial affairs and after the deposed King died, members of the royal family accused the elder Stauffenberg of dipping into the treasury. The elder Stauffenbergs were considered to be eccentric to a degree. Stauffenberg’s father and uncle did not talk to each other but barked back and forth like dogs. Stauffenberg’s mother wandered about the town of Lautlingen dressed in flowing gowns, reading poetry aloud to no one in particular.

Stauffenberg was initially impressed with Hitler, being attracted to dominant male figures, but soon grew tired of the new head of state and began to seek other father figures.

Often stated to be a brilliant staff officer, Stauffenberg was a competent and energetic planner but was so abrasive and opinionated that he was generally shunned by his peers. Stauffenberg was one of those persons whom one either deeply admires or detests. His personal hygiene left much to be desired. He bathed occasionally, wore clean uniforms when he thought about it, sometimes had his hair cut by a barber and rarely used a toothbrush. These eccentricities, coupled with his loud, insistent domination of any conversation he chanced to encounter, did not endear him to members of the German General Staff whose motto was, “Be more than you seem.”

Merely because Stauffenberg possessed a number of irritating mannerisms does not mean that he was incompetent or in error in his actions. Stauffenberg was in error because he failed. He was also wrong because his overweening ego blinded him to the fact that his attempt was doomed to failure from the start. Killing Hitler and his top military leadership might have pleased Stalin but it would not have stopped the war with any degree of certainty and his plans for a quick and happy ending to the savage conflict are, at this remove, so idealistic as to border on lunacy.

Stauffenberg put a bomb under Hitler’s table and almost literally ran out of the room to watch the carnage at a distance. He was not a martyr in any sense of the word. When he returned to Berlin after a three hour trip by slow aircraft, he found the headquarters of the Reserve Army in a state of torpid inaction. It was at this point that Stauffenberg committed an unforgivable act: he lied to his fellow plotters and told them that he had actually seen Hitler’s corpse with his one good eye. On the strength of his insistence and the knowledge that if they did not take action, the Gestapo would soon be paying a visit to their headquarters in force, the reluctant Generals began to act. With his lie, Stauffenberg doomed most of the men around him to an ugly and degrading road to death but like most fanatics, to Stauffenberg the end justified the means.

A number of apocryphal stories about intended assassination attempts against Hitler have proliferated since the end of the war. Gersdorff’s story about the bomb in his pocket has been proven false and the Schlabrendorff aircraft bomb has been disproved by the discovery of Hitler’s official travel orders of the day in question that show Colonel Brandt on another aircraft. One story relates how intrepid officers were planning to bomb Hitler at an exhibition of new uniforms in Berlin. This failed, the story goes, because a bomb dropped by an Allied pilot destroyed the uniforms and the showing was canceled.

In fact the display was made but not in Berlin and the uniforms in question were not developed until a year after the date of the imaginary attack.

In his book, Putsch, (Wyden, New York, 1970) Richard Hanser discusses the homoerotic nature of George and his movement. The poems to a handsome Munich youth are also mentioned. (pps.54-57.). On the other hand, Stauffenberg biographer Joachim Kramarz devotes an entire chapter to George and his influence over Stauffenberg, mentions the suspicion of homosexuality but dismisses it out of hand. It should be noted that Kramarz has also dismissed any negative report on Stauffenberg as Nazi propaganda designed to smear a great hero of impeccable character and high motives. The forward to his book was written by Trevor-Roper. (Stauffenberg, Macmillan, New York, 1967, pps 29-35.)

Stauffenberg’s End

This section is taken from the book: “Gestapo Chief, the 1948 Interrogation of Heinrich Müller” by Gregory Douglas. The series is available from TBR Books.

Although the material in the Müller files on the 20 July plot runs to thousands of pages, probably the most dramatic material is contained in the final entry.

Q Although this is not important to this discussion, could you perhaps answer a question about the twentieth of July aftermath? One of the Stauffenberg family has asked about the fate of the Colonel...

M He was shot in the courtyard of the headquarters of the Replacement Army in the Bendler Street early on the 21st.

Q I was referring to the actual disposition of the remains. There has been a rumor that the bodies were secretly buried somewhere in Berlin and the family wants to get some verification of this. This isn’t because they are aware of your existence but I have a note here...

M They were taken away to the St. Matthew’s cemetery and buried. The next day...or rather that day, I was at a conference with Himmler present and I mentioned to him that perhaps it would be a good idea to make positive identification of the bodies. I had not seen them and neither had Himmler. He agreed that this was probably a good idea. Then I suggested that I do this personally. Also, there was a question about what the final disposition would be. I said that we shouldn’t leave even a scrap behind that our enemies could make relics from and again he agreed. I suggested that after the corpses were properly and accurately identified that they be totally destroyed. By cremation. And the ashes disposed of. There was general agreement then but the question of how the ashes should be gotten rid of came up. I said I would see to it personally. I went out to the cemetery with a forensic group and the bodies were dug up, photographed with and without their uniforms. The pictures went to Himmler and to me and I have a set somewhere if you want to see it. They weren’t in the best of shape. Beck had head wounds and of course Stauffenberg had lost an arm and an eye before, not to mention a bullet hole in one shoulder. But they could be identified without any real problems and then we had them put into postal service cloth mail sacks and transported to a nearby crematorium and burned. I stayed there throughout and personally supervised the business. When it was all over, there was a question about the ashes. I had them put into a metal bucket that had been full of sand for fire bombs and made very sure there were no teeth or other bits left over.

Q Not a pleasant task for you, I imagine.

M You imagine wrong. The question of what to do with the ashes was solved when one of the technicians asked the director of the crematorium where the lavatory was. I could see at once what to do with the remains so I simply put the contents of the bucket down the toilet and pulled the chain. I think it took two or three flushings to finish the business. Only then did I let the man use the facility. There was nice frosting on their cake, believe me. The bucket I took with me and threw it into the river. Tell the family not to look too hard for poor Claus. I would say he was in his proper element. I mentioned this once to Göring and he laughed for quite some time and later sent me a box of very good cigars and a case of excellent wine.

Q I don’t think I will repeat any of this conversation. At least not outside our agency. We don’t view Stauffenberg as any kind of a hero but then we know quite a bit about him and not only from you.

M We should have done it all while he was still alive.

Comment: Was Tom Cruise type-cast in the role of the notorious Stauffenberg? BH

Click here