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24 April Himmler had told Count Bernadotte that Hitler was "a The suicide theory was also a weapon of psychological warfare dying man" and that Himmler's intelligence chief, Walter on the German population. To understand the propaganda impact Schellenberg, had told Bernadotte that Hitler was "suffering from _ of the Hitler suicide legend on the German mind, it is important to a brain hemorrhage"."” Initially, therefore, the Allies inclined understand that, for many if not most Germans, the idea that towards the view that Hitler had died of natural causes, in effect Hitler had taken his own life was deeply repugnant as it taking Himmler's word over Doenitz's. A BBC announcer also contradicted everything they believed he had stood for. When told the world that Hitler had died of a stroke—information that General Krebs gave him the news, General Helmuth Weidling had been leaked that same day at the San Francisco conference by __ recalled thinking: "So we have been fighting for five-and-a-half the British Foreign Minister, Sir Anthony Eden.” years for someone who committed suicide. Having drawn us into However, the Allies were not merely prejudiced from the start __ this terrible disaster, he himself chose the easy way out and left us against any account of Hitler's fate that might have fuelled the to fend for ourselves." enthusiasm of the Nazi underground resistance, but were also At the other end of the military hierarchy, sixteen-year-old biased in favour of the most ignominious account possible. Thus Dieter Borkowski, who had been among the Hitler Youth recruits the idea that Hitler had died a natural death began being deflated fighting to defend Berlin to the last, felt drained of the desire to as soon as evidence emerged that Hitler had not been in bad live. "These words make me feel sick, as if I have to vomit," he health at all. On 7 May, the Baltimore Sun stated that according wrote. "I think that my life has no sense any more. What was this to Major Erwin Giesing (Hitler's brain, ear, nose and throat battle for, what were the deaths of so many people for? Life has specialist, who had seen him on 15 February apparently become worthless, for if Hitler 1945), Hitler had been "in unusually good as shot himself, the Russians will have physical condition for a man of his age" and finally won... Has the Fuehrer not betrayed had certainly not died of a brain is own Volk then after all?"”” haemorrhage.”' Reports pouring cold water The suicide legend was therefore used to on the theory that Hitler had been ill and had a ao discredit Hitler in the eyes of his own probably died a natural death or had been wal 1S important to followers and stifle their urge to resist whenever the pnortunity rose. published understand that, There was so much haste to assign to Hitler But what really brought about the rapid for many if not most what was thought to be a fitting end that few demise of the natural death theory were the i eople stopped to ask such obvious questions revelations of the most important member of Germans, the idea as how Dr Fritzsche knew that Hitler had the regime to have been captured alive thus that Hitler had taken committed suicide, whether the Soviets could far: Dr Hans Fritzsche. his own life was ave pressured him into saying this, or Dr Fritzsche, Goebbels's deputy in the Propaganda Ministry and Germany's leading radio propagandist, was taken into custody by the Soviets on 2 May after he had formally handed the city over to them in a ceremony in the Tiergarten. The next morning, 3 May, the Soviets issued a communiqué stating that Dr Fritzsche had made a deposition in which he declared that Hitler, Dr Goebbels and General Hans Krebs had all committed suicide in the bunker.” whether the suicide story could have been a cover story for Hitler's escape. Given Dr Fritzsche's status as the most important man in the Propagandaministerium after Dr Goebbels, it is self-evident that nothing he told the Soviets immediately after the regime collapsed can be regarded as free of the possibility of propagandistic deception. Yet in London and Washington, where throughout the war the view had been taken that the Nazis were unconscionable liars, there was a dramatic shift away from scepticism. The idea that Hitler had committed designed to facilitate Hitler's escape—the suicide was so appealing that any Nazi suicide story was at once taken up by the western press.” who claimed to know that Hitler had committed suicide never Intriguingly, there is evidence that the public was preconditioned _ risked having his or her veracity impugned. Clearly, all Nazis were to accept the suicide theory. As early as 31 March 1945, the Globe liars—except those who told the Allies what they wanted to hear. and Mail published a Canadian Press report headlined "Expect Hitler To Be Suicide". Datelined "Emmerich, March 30", the Operation Trevor-Roper piece stated that a rumour was current among German troops to the The fact that Hitler's corpse had apparently not been found in effect that Hitler would commit suicide. In any event, the suicide Berlin caused considerable consternation in the Western press. A story was an immense boon to Anglo-American propaganda, since Toronto Daily Star editorial commented anxiously on 18 July: deeply repugnant as it contradicted everything they believed he had stood for. Although the Soviets were duly sceptical—Moscow state radio suggested that it was "another Fascist tric Hitler's resort to suicide could be used to convey a message about "It is becoming apparent that indisputable proof of Hitler's the nature of Nazism itself: death either during the past ten weeks or at some early future date, "When the American journalist William L. Shirer, who had if he should still be alive, is highly desirable for psychological as been living as a correspondent in Berlin until 1941, learned of well as for practical reasons. Unless his demise is beyond Hitler's death by suicide in the bunker of the Reich Chancellery argument...the world is in for a potentially dangerous Hitler on 30 April 1945, he declared: 'In fact, I have always been certain legend. This might become a psychological weapon in the efforts myself that that was what he wanted to do in the end,’ thereby of German leaders eventually to restore the self-confidence and seeing the Third Reich as an ultimately suicidal regime."* revive the truculence of this people who for so long have been .»jit is important to understand that, for many if not most Germans, the idea that Hitler had taken deeply repugnant as it contradicted everything they believed he had stood for. Operation Trevor-Roper The fact that Hitler's corpse had apparently not been found in Berlin caused considerable consternation in the Western press. A Toronto Daily Star editorial commented anxiously on 18 July: "It is becoming apparent that indisputable proof of Hitler's death either during the past ten weeks or at some early future date, if he should still be alive, is highly desirable for psychological as well as for practical reasons. Unless his demise is beyond argument...the world is in for a potentially dangerous Hitler legend. This might become a psychological weapon in the efforts of German leaders eventually to restore the self-confidence and revive the truculence of this people who for so long have been NEXUS = 37 his own life was FEBRUARY — MARCH 2008 www.nexusmagazine.com