Rommel: Germany's Best General

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Achtung, Achtong, Wilkommen.

So wie haben die wiggen von um sie to spiken machen.

I'm in a German mood, Jim.

Yeah, no, no, no.

Well, it's always funny, isn't it?

Yeah, I mean, it wasn't back then, but it now is with the distance of time.

So, welcome to the final part of Best in the West, which is our definitive roundup of all the generals generally in the Western theaters.

Although some of these Germans have sort of been a bit peripatetic moving around, because that's the nature of the mess they got themselves in.

Yeah, let's just in this final episode, let's just remind everyone what's going on.

So, we've got 14 generals in the long list.

This is like the kind of booker prize, isn't it?

So, there's a long list.

Then there's going to be a short list, and then there can be only one.

So, how this is going to work is there's going to be three put forward from each category, which is then going to be debated at We Have Waste Fest.

So there'll be a Best in the West Duke, Best in the West American, Best in the West German.

And then the final, the winners of each of those rounds will be debated in the final event, which will be on the Sunday morning.

I think it's the last thing we're doing, isn't it?

I think it's the last thing we're doing.

As the hangover is clear, we settle for once the argument about who the finest commanding officers of the Second World War were so that no one need ever argue about this again.

I mean, obviously, you've got strong views.

I've got strong views.

But I can see university departments shutting down, publishing houses collapsing as a result of the death of the trade that we are about to bring about, Jim.

Max Hastings, Anthony Carlo, Deste, all losing influence as at last,

it is decided and agreed who is the best in the West.

If you find yourself making a TV program about the Second World War and trying to, the answers are here.

They're here and we have ways of making talk.

And I like to think already that we're steering people in a mildly different direction from the age-old narrative and let's change the age-old narrative because our first guest on today's episode is none other than General Feldmarshal Albert Kessering smiling Albert

who is broadly seen as a good Nazi and a jolly good chap and just a nice decent smiling optimistic fellow in a world of mayhem and brilliant what a brilliant campaign in Italy Jim a brilliant campaign Yeah, yeah, yeah, and all that.

So he's born in 1885 in Bavaria.

He's not from Prussia.

He's from lowly, lowly, lowly lowly stock.

He initially pursues a civilian engineering career before joining the army in 1904 as a vanrich in the Bavarian artillery.

You know, where's the fun in that?

Yeah, then works his way up, commissioned.

Staff roles, field batteries, frontline stuff.

Ends a rank as a Houtman, a captain.

Remains in the post-war Reichwehr, of course, but then leaves to become...

He joins the newly created Luftwaffe in 1935.

Yeah.

Despite having an artillery background, because they think this is going to be forward artillery, effectively.

So they want artillerymen.

They want people to understand about fire plans and all the rest of it.

He rises up the ranks pretty quickly.

You know, Gerald Meyer in 1936, General Leutenant in 1937, General de Flieger in 1938.

By 1938, on the death of General Wiefer, who had been the chief of staff of Luftwaffe, he gets killed in a flying crash.

And Kaserin takes over and doesn't do terribly well.

He's in line with Yodel and Udet in favoring dive bombing over heavy bombers, which was very much Wiefer's plan and very much the kind of, you know, what Erhard Mich is after.

He has spats with milk, you know, so he moves out of the Luftwaffe general staff and gets a gets effectively an air command.

Luftlotter one in Poland does pretty well.

Where he really comes to the fore, though, is in France, the Low Countries, where he's commanding Luftwlotter 2, and he's really good at that.

But what's interesting, Jim, is

the point at which he falls out with milk,

however, we say it.

We never did resolve it.

Well, actually, I've just been listening to you reading Ballabroni and you go, mish.

Milch.

Yeah, milch.

Apparently, it's milk.

It's the most accurate way of knowing.

Anyway, the point is, what he falls out with Milk about is that he has no strategic sense.

He's a tactical thinker.

And this is actually what characterizes the way things go forward in Kesselring's career.

Yes, he does well.

When Luftlotter 1 are a tactical air force, he's your man.

When he's making tactical decisions, he's really, really good.

The same in Falgelbe, France, the Low Countries.

You know, when he's with Luftlotta 2, he's good at that.

He's good at making tactical decisions.

It's when he has to be strategic that he starts to sort of unravel.

And I think, you know, the Battle of Britain, where he's intimately involved with trying to make that work, when we've talked about that on the podcast,

and we shall again, trust us, is the Germans' problem is they have no strategic sense of what they're doing at all.

No, and he doesn't either.

He absolutely doesn't.

And so it's interesting that at a time of strategic cluelessness, someone who is strategically clueless might obtain elevation.

He's a general Feldmarshal in July of 1947.

I mean, that's amazing.

There's a whole load of field marshals kind of created, and this is when Goering becomes a Reichsmarshal, the world's only six-star general.

And that's part of the kind of the flush of success of this huge, great victory.

It's like, you know, Hitler, to a certain extent, is just sort of handed him out willy-nilly.

I mean, he's probably at this point not really deserving of it.

You know, Ballabrett is a failure, and he has the largest air fleet, and he should shoulder some of the burden of that, but he doesn't.

You know, it's someone else's fault, and it's not really considered the fault of the Luftwaffe, particularly.

And he does really well in Barbarossa, where, again, he's in a tactical role.

It's a tactical air force, again, and supporting ground operations.

And that's all great.

And also, there's this feeling that he's genial and he gets on with people and the rest of it, which is why he's then appointed to be Oberfeldschaber in the Sud, Commander-in-Chief of the South in the Mediterranean in 1941, which basically means that he is now the Wehrmacht Commander-in-Chief rather than specifically Luftwaffe.

But to start off, he keeps his Luftwaffe to staff.

And it's not actually until January 1943 that he finally creates a tri-service headquarters in Rome.

But anyway, he is the man who is responsible for blitzing Malta, you know, which is, after all, is not really a strategic operation either.

It's a tactical operation.

And trying to support Rommel's Afrika Corps.

And, you know, the truth is, he has enough air forces to hammer Malta, but not enough to support Rommel at the same time.

Well, as ever, they can't do all the things they've committed to.

And he is ridiculous in Tunisia.

I mean, you know, when it comes to the Tunisia campaign, he is telling Hitler what he wants.

He's known as an optimistic fellow, but his optimism is actually La La Land.

I mean, that is the truth of it.

So Rommel is reporting a very, very clear picture of the situation, what can be achieved, what can't be achieved, what they need to do, and his best advice.

He persuades the Italians.

Then Cazarin goes, oh, no, no, it's all going to be fine.

I'm going to do this.

And, you know, I've got a much, much rosier outlook, which is what everyone wants to hear.

And Hitler, of course, always goes at that.

And so they get themselves into this terrible pickle where they're massively overcommitting to Tunisia in a situation where they can't possibly hope to win.

And as a consequence of that, because it's across the sea, they lose all that material.

I mean, they do something like two and a half, 2,700 aircraft between November 1942 and May 1943 in North Africa and the Mediterranean.

I mean, that's a huge, huge number.

All their ships are gone.

You know, huge amount of, a huge amount of war material.

Jimmy does a really great job as commander in Italy.

Everyone says so.

Wow, yes.

But again, he's incredibly optimistic in Sicily.

And, you know, he does this really weird decision, which is moving 15th Panzer Grenadier Division from the center of the island where they're very comfortable and know the ground and replacing them with the Hermann Goering Division which have just arrived and don't know it at all.

I mean why would you do that?

But Jim all the all the history books say he fights a really great defense in Italy Jim.

Well and then we get to Italy and he makes a catastrophic decision at Salerno because he chucks all his eggs in one basket to try and push the Allies back into the sea which is fine if you succeed, but he doesn't succeed.

You know, by doing that, he leaves the back door open and that means he loses the Fodger Airfields, which is an airman.

He should know that.

Yeah.

Yeah, but Jim, he fights a really great defense.

everyone knows he fights this really great defense in Italy the problem with that is then the Hitlerian spotlight is on him which then means that you know he's then got to fight for every yard and while every single German commander in Germany is going this is nuts we need to pull back to the Pisa remedy line which is what eventually becomes the Gothic line he goes no no no no no we need to fight south and you know his handling of his troops along the Gustav line in January and February 1944 yes it prevents the Allied breakthrough, but these units are on their knees.

And, you know, what he is doing is sacrificing huge numbers of german troops when they haven't got a chance i mean it is cruelty to to kessering or a naivety or just a sort of slavish devotion to hitler which is frankly it's incredible you're saying he doesn't fight a good defensive campaign in italy then jumping no he fights a terrible one and on top of that he is the man who who decides that there should be 10 um italians executed for every one german's um armed troop um Hitler wants to do 50 and he goes well I think if I can persuade him to go with 10.

So 10 does it and so on his watch is the Argentina massacre, Cave Massacre, where 335 Italians are killed in retribution for the 33 SS police troops that are killed and the Via Roselli.

And, you know, his campaign in Italy is marred by unspeakable numbers of civilian atrocities, people being strung up by lampposts, executions, Rastro Lamenti, these clear-up operations, all of which are on his order, incidentally, not Wolfs, who is the SS police chief.

And he is sentenced to death at the end of the war for war crimes.

And that is only commuted on the lobbying of his adversaries, it has to be said, of one of which I'm afraid is Alex.

So, Jim, if you were to, how many votes would you like there to be for Albert Kesselring if it came to?

I would prefer to see more points for Dick McCreary than

he wouldn't get a single vote for me.

Okay, you think he's a plain straight zero?

Because he's no good.

He's crappy.

He's a good tactical Air Force commander, Luffflotter, fine, you know,

in a ground coordination role, but nothing more than that.

But it demonstrates no strategic sense in Italy, because if he'd shortened his line, pulled, but he'd have bunged up Italy forever, and he doesn't do that.

And in order to kill our Allied soldiers, he kills tons of his own.

So, you know, well done, slow hand clap.

Right, but is he in the same league, and I think we're going to say no, as Field Marshal Eric von Manstein?

No, but I also think that Eric von Manstein has been slightly over-trumpeted.

Fantastic.

If I'm honest.

Look, if you're driving, listening to this, you need to pull over because I have some breaking news about Eric von Mernstein in that he was Prussian.

He's got a Vaughan in his name.

It's a proper marmalade drop of that, isn't it?

He's Prussian.

You're spluttering into your cornflakes if you listen to this at breakfast.

I hope you weren't doing a DIY task and have drilled through your hand as a result of that shocking news.

He comes from a long Prussian military tradition.

Exactly.

He goes to the Prussian War Academy in 1913.

What do you want?

Eastern and Western fronts.

No news on his Iron Cross, first and and second class, though, here.

Yeah, I think he gets him.

Stays in.

It's part of the Reichswehr, the 100,000-strong army that's allowed after Versailles.

Up he goes steadily rising through the ranks.

He's a major general by 1936.

He's deputy chief of staff to General Fedoff von Bock.

And then he's part of the planning for the annexation of Sudetenland.

Which he doesn't think it's going to work, so he's wrong on that.

It works brilliantly.

I mean, this is actually a major contribution that isn't a sort of battlefield thing.

It's him that says, we've got to get into the Stug, the assault gun gun to support infantry.

Okay, that's a tip for him.

I'll give you that.

Yeah, you've got to give him that, really.

You know, he's living the stug life in Poland.

He's von Ronstedt's chief of staff, Army Group South.

He does well, doesn't he, in Poland at that level.

But the Manstein sort of footprint on history, and the and as you say, the sort of the bone of argument, really, as to was it really his idea or whatever, is the von Man, it's the von Manstein plan, right?

Yeah, and you know, the von Manstein plan is the whole idea that this is the this his genius is what delivers victory in 1940 is is just absurd.

Because the sickle cut plan, this idea that you send Army Group A through the north, and then the obvious bit where the Allies are expecting, which he knows because of the Venno incident.

Not the Venno, yes, it is Venno incident.

Plans are handed over to the Allies for the Britskrieg in the West, is that they will just go through the Low Countries.

They said they don't just do that last time, they also do a sickle cut in 1914 because not only do they go through the Low Countries, they also try and go through the Ardennes and they go to Sedan and they cross across the River Meurs at the

Drapery Sedanaise just as they do in 1870 in the Franco-Prussian War.

I mean this is this is the thing we talked about in the last episode is that a big thing that contributes in 1940 to the German genius is the absolute plum-wittedness of their opponents who, in an attempt to win the war the same way again, fail to notice how it was fought last time when it started.

So I just want to be absolutely clear about this.

There is nothing original about von Manstein's plan at all.

Nothing at all.

What is original is the execution and that is down to Guderian, and it is down to Halder for recognising it is the only chance of success and presenting it in such a way to Hitler that Hitler is always going to go for it, and he does.

So that's the key thing.

So disabuse yourself of this fact.

And also, let's not forget, there's lots of people fighting for credit at that particular moment, including Hitler himself.

Yeah, and also, and also the plan that comes forward from von Manstein is also the plan of Gunther Blumentripp and Henning von Tresco.

It is a tri-planned thing.

I mean, I don't know.

Von Manstein's easier to say than Blumentripp or von Tresco, isn't it?

I mean, it's something like that.

But the bottom line is, and I think we can, we can swizz past most of this.

He then spends the rest of the war on the Eastern Front, you know, and we're not, this is the best in the West.

So he's not actually commanding any troops in the West at this point.

He does in Poland, but he doesn't in the West Battle.

He's got a Ghost Corps at this time.

So he's not actually commanding anything in 1940.

And, you know, he's also responsible for war crimes.

And he's a very skillful armoured manoeuvreist and all the rest of it.

and a wily tactician, blah, blah, blah, and very learned.

But he's irrelevant to this because

his contribution is in the West because of 1940, which, as we've just been talking about, is a bit of a non-event.

Okay, next up.

General Freiherr Hasse von Manteufel.

The diminutive Hasse von Manteufel.

P is for Prussian.

You know, knee hide to a grasshopper.

Should have been a jockey.

Yeah, exactly.

He's from Potsdam.

And he's from an aristocratic Prussian military background.

Yeah, I know.

This is all a bit of a surprise to the listener, I'm sure.

But he's a bit younger.

So he's born in 1897.

Yes, he's a little younger, isn't he?

And he's a hussar during the First World War,

which can't have been much fun.

And he only wins the Iron Cross second class.

Yeah.

But stays in the cavalry in the tiny Reichs.

And guess what?

He develops expertise in reconnaissance and mobile tactics.

And attends the Craigs Academy.

Guess what else he does?

He transitions from traditional cavalry to mechanised units.

I mean, not got much choice, right?

If you're into horses at this point, you can either stay towing artillery pieces or you can join the tank people.

And if you're a cavalryman, you're not interested in towing artillery pieces, are you?

No matter how much you like the horses.

But he is a connoisseurs battalion commander in 1939 in Poland and also in France where he serves in the 7th Panzer Division, which of course is under Rommel.

So he's only a half colonel at this point.

And then he spends lots of time in the Eastern Front.

So he's leading reconnaissance units in Barbarossa.

He takes command of the 7th Panzer Division's Panzer Grenadier Regiment 6.

He's colonel in 1942.

Knights Cross for leadership.

He is given, yes, he then eventually takes command of the 7th Panzer Division, temporarily transferred to the Tunisian front.

So he does see a bit of West then.

Awarded the Oak Least for the Knights Cross for his division successes.

But really, where he comes to the fore is when he's given command of the Gross Deutschland Panzer Grenadier Division.

And

that's one of the most prestigious Panzer divisions in the Wehrmacht, even in the kind of sort of much depleted Wehrmacht of 1944.

And he's given an army command as a general Leutenant.

You know, it's ironic that Fritz Baerlein is a general Leutenant and is commanding the Panzer-led division.

At this point, Hasse von Manteufel is given an army.

So he's given the fifth Panzer Army.

And he does much better than the SS Panzer Army in the north.

Yes, he's regarded as having good finger touch, isn't it?

That's what they say about him in the way that he handles his troops.

He does do some patrolling, doesn't he?

So he knows what he's getting himself into and makes sure he knows what he's dealing with when he comes to attack the Americans rather than just sort of saying, well, we're all going to go, we're all going to just march across a great big open field and get cut down, as in the northern sector.

I think we're right.

We can discount his eastern time.

He's best in the west.

He does best in the Ardennes of the crew that are involved in commanding the Ardennes, but then the Ardennes is after all a fool's errand.

A massive shower from start to finish.

Yeah, exactly.

Totally.

Wasteful shower of nonsense.

So he, but he's got a good reputation, I would say.

He's also very, he's very helpful to the Americans in their foreign military studies project they do after the war.

So there's lots of accounts from Manteufel.

I've got them all, read them all.

You know, he's clinical, he's a technician, he's very thorough, he's a detailed planner.

Is he kind of, you know, he's not a Gadarian, you know, he's not even a balk, he's not a visionary, he's not, he doesn't have the charisma of the kind of the great leaders, I would say.

No, but I mean, well, our last one before we take the break, though, this is this is another one of these, he's a big name, he's a giant, he's this guy is unbelievably good, and he is really, really good.

He spends a lot of time on the Eastern Front, but we're going to have to talk about Volter Model.

General Feldmarschall Walter Model.

Now, you'll be delighted to hear that the Models were middle class.

His father was a music teacher.

No von in sight.

They were from Prussia.

They're from Prussia, ladies and gentlemen.

They're from Saxony, yeah.

Thing is, Jim, if you're one of those sort of Western politicians who literally believes in a Prussian military class that has dragged Europe into the abyss, you've got quite a lot to be working on here, right, haven't you?

If you're Winston Churchill, the Prussian menace must be finally extinguished.

The Prussian flame of militarism.

But these people do rather indicate that there is is a military caste.

Class of 1909, joins the Imperial German Army as a cadet in 1909.

Yeah, 1909 is the daddy year.

Yep, First World War, Iron Cross, first and second class.

Wounded several times.

Gets a reputation for bravery and tactical skill.

Stays in the Reichsfair.

Stays in.

Yep.

And guess what?

He distinguishes himself as a staff officer and committed advocate of mechanised warfare.

He has a good interwar year.

He knows the right people.

He's close to Gudarian.

And then he does well in Poland, right?

Yeah, yeah.

He's a staff officer.

He's chief of staff to 4th Army Corps.

You know, it's quite a big deal.

And, you know, operational planning, movement coordination, logistics at corps level.

Really impresses with his meticulous staff work, willingness to visit the front personally, assess situations, talk to the troops, see what's going on.

You know, and he's energetic.

You know, this is a guy who's decisive, you know, he's aggressive.

You know, his staff work is second to none.

Yeah, yeah.

It's interesting because, again, we're talking about best of the west.

He has a good Barbara Rosser, doesn't he?

Yes, very much so.

basically in charge of 41 panzer corps well by november yeah he's got a division to start off with and then yeah but but you know he's doing really he does really really well in barbarossa well so much so that he's got he's in command of knife army by um by january 1942 and that's army group center which again is the kind of you know the main event for most of the time so yeah but his thing his thing though is he starts to have to fight defensive battles and this is a sort of pattern of his career as it emerges isn't it there's a defensive battle in uh first rev shivyovska yeah i think i've got that right and he he thinks it's fortified lines of strong points you've got to defend in depth you've got to trade space for time counter-attack at the right moment to restore the line you know very very like a measured way of defending you know not not actually a hold every position to the last round thing like a much more a much more delivered and organic stuff and he's very very good at holding off the Soviets even when they've got superior numbers.

And this is his reputation as it it develops, which means, you know, so in 43, he's holding the Rezhev salient,

this fantastically named operation, Operation Buffalo Bevigen, the Buffalo Movement, which is like a withdrawal from, you know, but without, you know, a credible withdrawal.

The Buffalo's horns, but in reverse.

So

you pull back in the centre, suck them in, and you're tritting your enemy as they're following up from the sides.

It is good.

It's good.

It is very, very good, Walter.

And then, you know, this is involved in Kursk.

And this is how he develops this reputation as Hitler's fireman, right?

He's the guy who's going to come and solve the problem.

So he's moved back to the West eventually by the end of 44, isn't he?

Basically, August of 44, he's back in the Western Front, having dealt with Bagratine, having dealt with all sorts of disasters.

And it's him who then is given Army Group B, replaces von Kluge, and it's his job to deal with getting back over the Seine.

So post-falaise, what to do in the great sort of scramble out of France and Belgium.

And of course, Myrdle, who stops Market Garden by realising that what you've got to do is pump it full of troops.

Again, not on this occasion, not worry about your own losses.

And let's face it, you know, when he moves, he moves with unspeakable speed.

I mean, it is incredible how quickly, you know, railway lines held open, you know, no one else allowed to use them until these panzers have got there.

And, you know, it's incredible the scale of cooperation, coordination, and speed with which reinforcements are sent there.

You know, particularly when you're thinking, this is September, this is only, well, a month after Normandy, it's very impressive.

And I think, you know, one of the things to consider, for everyone to consider is when you're considering who is the best in the West.

We know there's plenty of German generals who do well when they're winning, but who is doing well when they're losing?

Yeah, yeah.

And actually not many of them because they're losing.

But you could not deny that Model does a brilliant job when he's losing.

No, he does a heck of a job.

And, you know, doesn't like the bulge battle plan much, but, you know, nods it through.

I didn't know.

When I was in Freiburg, I looked at all his papers, which are voluminous, and they're in the

military archives in Germany.

They're just fascinating.

And I've got to say, he comes across as a much more humane person

than I.

Yeah, really.

He's absolutely devoted to his wife, writes to her all the time.

She writes letters too, back to him.

She keeps a diary.

She's worrying about him all the time.

He comes across as, you know, is strikingly impressive.

But he's loyal to the regime, though, isn't he?

He loves the regime.

He's tied up in that.

And that's why, probably why, I mean, he kills himself for 21st of April 1945 1945, to avoid capture, because he's encircled in the Ruhr pocket and won't surrender.

Puts on all his best togs.

That's right.

Goes off into a wood.

You sent me a thing when you were looking at these documents.

Yeah.

Yeah, which is Colonel General Model, 9th Army.

A very strong, sometimes headstrong personality.

His urge for activity is not always easy for subordinates to bear.

But one thing is certain.

A leader who is placed in the most critical position will never disappoint.

Personally, exemplary in bravery, ruthless towards himself, he demands the same from his troops, who, after initial grumbling, soon recognise who is leading them and who they have before them.

For higher command, a man of inestimable value when it comes to expressing a very particular vill in a decisive place, performs very well.

Signed, von Kluger.

That's early on in the war.

That's in 1940, 42 or something.

But yeah, it's sort of impressive.

Yeah, he's quite a man.

There was also a description of him killing himself by the witness to it.

It's just, it's actually quite moving, weirdly.

Okay, right, we've got to take a break right now.

And what we have for you when we return, well, do you like desert foxes i'm sure you do the best foxes um we will see you very very shortly for the big one oh gold it's rommel see you in a moment

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Right, Jim, a quick one before we crack on.

And this is 100% We Have Ways, isn't it?

Yes, it is, yeah, yeah, yeah.

The 1941 British denim smock has been remade properly by our little company avery industries hasn't it yeah that's right and and the thing is with these as well that they're not inspired by these actually they're hand-made in greenwich and the original mill has done a new run re-woven the cloth for this run so this denim is made exactly as it was made in 1941 yeah and it is absolutely gorgeous isn't it it's such a lovely feel to it i i honestly i just absolutely love it anyway when i bore mine i thought this is my male modeling career had begun basically i looked so sharp in in it.

Yeah.

Simple as it was.

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

It's a very, very, very strong look.

Anyway, here's the important bit.

We are opening pre-orders on the 12th of September.

250 jackets only, £349 each.

You pre-order and you will get your smock.

Simple as that.

Couldn't be any easier, could it, James?

No, it absolutely couldn't.

And if you want one, just go to averyind.com.

That's A-V-R-E-I-N-D dot com right now and register.

And if you have registered, the information will be winging its way to your inbox.

There we go.

12th of September, 250 only.

Averyind.com.

Do not dither.

Do not delay.

Welcome back to We Have Ways of Making You Talk.

And with me, I'm Murray and James Holland with the definitive breakdown of the German generals of the Second World War.

It's best of the West part six or episode part.

No, God, I can't do it.

I can't do it, Jim.

We've done six of these.

This is part two of the sixth, isn't it?

Yeah, yeah.

Something like that.

6.2.

3.2.

It doesn't matter don't worry about it just don't worry about it because here he is and should we just reveal to everyone should we reveal to everyone what his full name is irvin johannes

rommel rommel he's born in 1891 in württemberg he's not prussian which might mean he wins this he's

look he's initially interested engineering but with all of these people there's no one we've had is there who's like been conscripted in the first world war and thought actually i like the army life of staying in absolutely every one of these people is a soldier they're into it for being a soldier right That's fair to say.

He joins in 1910.

He enters the Royal Württemberg Cadet Corps.

He's a Leitner in the 124th Infantry in 1912.

Energy, athleticism, tactic creativity, you know, all the things you need.

And he fights all over in the First World War.

You know, he's Romanian France, Western France, Italian France.

Wins the Paula Marit, you know, the Blue Max.

It's equivalent to the VC.

You know, no one else has.

that we've talked about.

Leads a small force to capture 1500 Italian troops, Lon Garone in the Alpine fighting.

He's a stormtrooper, effectively.

You know, he's developing stormtroop tactics.

This idea of it's very much in line with Guderian, this idea that you have you're forward leading, you just go for it, you don't worry about your flanks, you just smash through.

This is very much what he's into.

Remains in the post-war Reichswehr famously, teaches at lots of infantry schools and publishes a book called Infantere Ger Greift, which is infantry attacks in 1937.

Does very well,

read very widely, both in Germany and abroad.

And in 1911, comes to Hitler's attention because he's dynamic and charismatic and good and all those sort of things.

And so, from 1938 to 1939, he's commanding the Führer Begleit Battalion, which is Hitler's personal escort from the Wehrmacht, not the SS.

And he gets on very well with Hitler Sotov.

Initially, he's very admiring of him.

But of course, you know, this is Hitler before he's, you know, he hasn't revealed just how base he's become by this point.

Yeah.

He commands Hitler's Headquarters Guard during the Polish campaign, so he doesn't do any frontline combat.

So, but he is part of that campaign.

And then he's given 7th Panzer Division in February 1940 and

a spectacular run.

First across the MERS, you know, his troops do get across at sort of 11:30 p.m.

or just north of Dinant.

There's a weir and they get they get across there at 11:30 p.m.

roughly on the 12th of May.

So, you know, supposedly three days the MERS across in four, he's he's three days and across in three.

And then rounds up lots of French and British troops, gets across the Somme, reaches the Channel coast ahead of Schedule.

Yeah, he has this fantastic battle, the armoured battle of Dene, where he is largely responsible.

It's also the 5th Panzer Division, but he's a guy that kind of absolutely outsmarts the

French 1st Armoured Division.

And he uses tanks not as

to lure the much heavier French armor into a trap of anti-tank guns.

Yeah.

As a scare arras, the improvised counter-attack.

Using 88mm in an anti-tank role?

Yeah.

He has a fantastic 1940.

San Valerie destroys the 51st Harnor Division.

Exactly.

Epitomises the values of the new form of warfare.

It's a sort of poster boy for it in lots of ways, isn't he?

And, you know, it's a mark of how bright he he is that he's come from the infantry, but he's he's figured out how to do this sort of stormtrooper thing, essentially, but with mechanisation.

He's a clever operator and he gets the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross for his leadership.

Then he goes to North Africa.

February 1941, takes command of the embryonic Deutsche Africa Corps.

His instructions are to basically hold the line at El Agalo, don't do anything else, but he tears off into Cyrenaica, captures O'Connor, Dick O'Connor and General Neen, goes all the way back across Cyrenaica and so become the sort of Benghazi stakes, as they're called by the British.

This sort of toing and froing back and forth

across North Africa.

And, you know, there's no question that he's a highly charismatic, leading-from-the-front kind of guy.

And I would say that in the first part, you know, actually, you know, his greatest moment on one level is his extraordinary victory at the Gazala line and the capture of Tobruk on the 21st of June 1942.

But in actual fact,

there's problems with that because that is a bit like 1940.

It is 50% the deficiencies of the British command and the British defensive system and just everything, and 50%

his tactical brilliance.

And, you know, they get caught out

in the pursuit.

He thinks he's got this great opportunity.

And, you know, they get hammered by the desert air force of the RAF.

And he's reached his culmination point by the time they get to the Alamein line, which is, after all, is only 60 miles to the west of Alexandria.

And it seems he's so close, but actually, he's not.

It's like a number of occasions.

It's a bit like the armoured frost at Salerno.

It looks like it's really, really close, but actually, it might as well have been a million miles away for all the the good it was going to do him.

And Alamein is a terrible experience.

You know, this is where the Panzer Army Africa gets destroyed.

They get destroyed logistically.

They get destroyed because Rommel has overreached himself.

He's staying where he is on the Alamein line at Hitler's assistant, to be fair.

But, you know, he's overcooked it.

And I think one of the problems is he doesn't really understand air power at this point.

And he doesn't really understand the operational level, but he's still quite a young general.

And he learns.

And actually, the experience of falling back along the North African coastline or through Libya, Egypt, and Libya, all the the way to Tunisia again, is huge in his development.

He really understands now what it is like fighting the British, you know, what the advantage of air power is, what he can do, what he can't do.

And actually, ironically, although he's perceived by Hitler and the OKW to be in decline, first part of 1943, this is actually one of his finest moments.

I mean, his counter-thrust in southern Tunisia is brilliantly executed.

And had he got his way, I mean, his big problem then is there is no army group command at this point.

So he is on a level with von Arnim, who is the fifth panzer army commander.

And von Armin goes, no, I'm not going to do what you suggest.

And he's got no recourse.

And he's also got to answer to the Commando Supremo and the Italians.

And he's got to answer to Kesselring.

And he's got to answer to the AKW.

And the chain is too heavy, is too top-heavy.

He is the best place to judge what should and shouldn't be doing.

And he's not allowed that freedom.

But all his suggestions are spot on.

And I think if they ever had a chance to completely set back the Allies, the plan that he comes up with for this separation, it is stretching what can be achieved.

But rather like the Japanese, his intention is to live off the spoils of overrunning the Allies.

And there is no question that they are very, very badly spooked.

And that had he got his way with his plan rather than von Arnen rebutting it, he might well have achieved quite a lot.

And I think he's pretty impressive at this point.

But what that shows, though, is that the German command system is a nonsense.

There's no one in charge.

If there is anyone in charge, there's someone who doesn't know what they're doing in the form of the Fuhrer.

It's just everything's a mess.

And that you can have brilliant people and you can have bad people.

And, you know, the Allies have enough slow coaches and enough sort of mercurial people, but there's still someone in charge.

Yeah, there is.

Well, there is, but this is at the same time, at the same time that the Allies are coming to the conclusion: what you need is a supreme ally commander and you need an army group commander.

The Axis are late on this, and they do come up with an army group commander, but only once it's too late.

Once the counter-thrust into Tunisia, which is designed by Rommel to go into Algeria, once that comes a cropper because of the dispersal of his forces and because he's not concentrating enough, von Arnen won't play ball, they then make him the army group commander, but it's too late.

This is the thing, though.

What he's then next known for is his role in preparing the defense of Normandy, you know, building the West Wall.

Just quickly about, he's Army Group B in northern Italy, and he's the one who says, this is where we should stand.

We should do, you know, we should hold the line on the Pisa-Rimini line up in the north where our lines are, you know, because I've experienced defeat at the hands of the Allies and I understand their air power, and this is how we can do it, and this would be the best way.

And he's right.

He's absolutely right on this.

Yeah.

But he's also saying we should do things my way rather than anyone else's way.

But though I was saying the other way is wrong.

I mean, I think he's right on this.

But there's also a complete failure in the German, there is no collegiate effort here at all.

By the time he's getting things ready in Normandy, German command is so collapsed and malfunctioning and sclerotic and, you know, that he can be as right as he likes.

that you will end up with this argument, do you fight on?

Do you push the Allies back to the sea immediately?

Do you have an armoured reserve in a way those arguments are purely academic because what's coming the allies have considered essentially all possibilities and their invasion is built for both possibilities it's built for the germans trying to defend the shore because of the naval gunnery they've got at their disposal and it's it's built for if the germans withdraw to a proper defensive line because that's what they want them to do so they can build up their own forces Totally agree.

I agreed.

But the plan that he's suggesting and the focus on the Normandy area, which I think makes most sense, he's right.

And he is the one person who's looking at it logically rather than trying to sort of cover every which way.

And, you know, he's trying to be much more focused and much more clinical.

And

he's right.

I mean, you know,

I've flip-flopped with Rommel.

You know, I thought he was really good.

Then I thought he wasn't quite so good.

I've dissed him a little bit.

I've now come around to the view that actually he was really, really good.

I think, funnily enough, I think where he was less good as an army commander was in his days of glory, because I think it went to his head and he got ahead of himself.

He's using excellent intelligence at that point.

And he had excellent intelligence.

But I think, you know, what he does in Tunisia is really impressive.

His plans for Italy are the best plans and are ignored.

And his plans for Normandy and defense of Normandy in the Normandy area, either side of the Seine, are the correct plans and are also ignored.

So I think he was pretty good.

And, you know, he has spent more time fighting troops in the West than any other senior command.

And he is an army group commander.

If we're talking best in the West, he's the most experienced in the West.

Yeah, but he's also really good in 1940.

He He has incredible successes in North Africa, albeit he overstretches himself.

I mean, that's his weak point.

You know, he's really good in Tunisia, really good in Italy, and I think he's pretty impressive in Normandy.

It's just that he can't do what he wants to do.

But had he been given, you know, the point is his vision, his leadership, his concept are the right ones.

It's just that he's not allowed to enact them.

And even then, when if there were a change of heart at the top, it's too late because he's injured in July, 17th of July, strafed by a load of aircraft.

And effectively, they're murdered by the regime, you know.

Yeah.

And he doesn't have to put his compromise himself on the Eastern Front.

So, you know,

he is a decent, fair man.

I mean, you know, there's no getting away from that.

Okay.

Our next general, now we've done Rommel.

I mean, what is there to say about Fredlin von Singer undeterling, Jim?

Well, let's rattle through him because we talked about him a lot when we were talking about Italy.

You know, he's he, again, he's always liked massively and got a very good press and considered a good German.

He's he's very Catholic.

He hates Hitler, all this sort of stuff.

He's a fighter.

He's a Rhodes Scholar, speaks English.

He's a deep thinker, all the rest of it.

He's actually from Baden, near the Swiss border.

He's aristocratic, very clever, very intellectual, studying law and languages, fluent in English and French and Italian, all the rest of it.

Has his First World War service, gets his Iron Cross first class, remains in the Reichswehr, blah, blah, blah.

Cavalry officer.

But he does reject the ideology of Nazivism and goes up the chain despite this.

I mean, he never makes any bones about it, that he's not, but he still fights for Germany.

You know, he still fights for the Führer.

Third Cavalry Regiment in invasion of Poland.

Captures Cherbourg just ahead of Erwin Rommel in 1940.

He does lots of staff jobs because of his languages and all the rest of it, and because of his sort of, you know, charm and all the rest of it.

So he ends up spending a lot of time in Italy.

He is the kind of sort of chief liaison officer to the Italians and in Sicily.

Then takes command of 14th Panzer Corps after Huber gets moved on.

And obviously is a big player in the casino battles.

He does do his level best to kind of keep Cassino out of the firing line.

It's not his decision to put the Gustav line where it is.

He's a good bloke.

Let's not get away from it.

But he remains in Italy for the rest of the war.

So, I mean, the thing is, and I think one of the things that marks the end of his war is the fact that he's under suspicion for the July plot.

He is, but

he stays in Italy.

Yeah, but he's not sufficiently enthusiastic as a Nazi.

And I think that's

why you're able to say he's a great bloke, right?

I mean, this is the problem.

He's not a great bloke.

He's a good bloke.

Yeah, study on.

He does very well.

You know,

in a defensive role, he does as well as can be possibly expected.

He's a clear tactician.

In all his writings and stuff, it's very clear that he has an appreciation of what's going on.

He's very against staying at the Gustav line.

He's very against, you know, wholesale slaughter of all his troops.

You know, he's a very, very, very competent commander.

You know, he's right up there.

Is he the best in the West?

No, he's only a corps commander.

He's not an army commander.

He's certainly not an army group commander.

But is he a Kurtstudent?

Our final candidate for best of the West, General Oberst Kurchstudent.

Someone who went to the Prussian Main Cadet Institute at Lichtefelder.

Yep.

which may amaze some of you.

He joins the army in 1911, Prussian infantry regiment, the second Prussian infantry regiment.

He has a First World War that involves the Iron Cross first class.

And second class.

And the second class Iron Cross.

And he's a pilot, though.

So it's quite interesting.

He's a fighter pilot and a reckey pilot.

He's done infantry fighting and then he's been an airman.

Which I think is why probably, you know, he's one of those people.

He's forward thinking.

He's involved in the Clandeston aviation training between the wars in the tiny non-existent air forces.

He then goes into the Luftwaffe in 1934 and is fascinated by what the Soviets, the Italians are doing with parachutes.

And he becomes a massive, massive advocate for using parachutes and gliders as a strategic offensive weapon.

And certainly, I mean, the thing is, is the glider, when you think about it, if all you've got to do is cross a border at dawn and you're coming from the east, the glider is the most ideal weapon imaginable, isn't it?

You're coming out of the rising sun.

You've got no distance to travel.

You haven't got to cross the channel or any of that nonsense, like, or a chunk of the med.

It's a brilliant way of landing people.

He's a General Mayo in 38, and then he's involved in Germany's first dedicated airborne division.

He forms the 7th Air Division.

They're not doing anything in Poland, but they're getting ready.

They're training.

Some pretty squiffy, iffy stuff in Norway.

Some disasters at Norway, but they do also succeed.

Combass, for example.

Exactly.

But

they seize airfields.

And then he's involved in, I mean, they're headline grabbing, but they're pretty disastrous.

Again, airborne operations in Rotterdam, where they're really

the crap kicked out of them.

He's shot.

Yes, but they're very much a symbol of the victory in the West and the Britskrieg in the West.

Yeah, and everyone else is so dazzled by them that they adopt it too, British Americans, all the rest of it.

But the weird thing is, he's actually accidentally shot in the head by a German soldier during the Dutch campaign.

So he's out of the action by kind of 14th of May.

Yeah.

And then, I mean, his high watermark is Crete.

So he's given command of 11th Fleet of Corps as a General Leutnant.

And this is Operation Mercury, the airborne invasion to Crete.

You know, this is an extraordinary operation, which is sort of the British, it's for the British to lose, although the Germans have air superiority, which is a big, a big factor in it, and a big reason why they're actually able to press their advantage to the end.

It's hugely costly.

4,000 Fauschim Jaeger are killed.

Although they succeed in seizing Crete, holding Crete as a sort of then what for the Germans.

Yeah, yeah.

Can't do anything with it.

And this means that...

Fauschim Jaeger, from now on, they're ground troops and they're mobile reserve, basically.

They're being brought in as and when they can and i mean his last hurrah really is market garden where again his men play a big big big part in um defeating the airborne effort and he winds up captured by the british after surrendering in the in the

captured by the by the americans wait surrendered in america but he's then then picked up by the british and placed on trial for war crimes yeah but the thing about him okay so he also he also liberates mussolini from from the grand sasso in the brutsey mountains in the southern part of the apennines the other thing is he's in the West the whole time.

I mean, he's a Western-based commander.

So if you're talking about the best in the West, I mean, he's right up there.

Fausch and Jaeger are the poster boys of the Wehrmacht.

They're all German.

They're all highly motivated.

You know, there's no one who would deny that the Fauschenjäger are, in terms of infantry, the best troops.

Now, you know, we've had debates about what that means.

You know, they weren't that good, but they are...

highly motivated, seen as elite troops, all the rest of it.

And they're definitely the ones that cause the Allies the most headache in terms of determined defense and all the rest of it.

You know, that guy that you interviewed all those years ago...

Worst day of his life has been captured.

I think he deserves quite a lot of credit for that.

Yeah, me too.

And in fact, and for everything he sets in motion on the other side is the truth.

When the enemy copies you quite so comprehensively, you must be doing something important.

So that's Kurchstudent.

And that's our 14, 14.

Our dirty dozen plus two of German generals, best of the West, a rogues gallery of.

It is hard to judge them, isn't it?

Because after all, they lose.

Yeah.

You know, there's that to consider.

I mean, I think what's been good about this, Jim, though, is to actually step back and look at some of these people.

And it means you're telling the history of the war as much as of these people's lives.

The sort of progression, the high watermark for Germany, and then the lessons learned and the lessons demonstrated being learned by the Allies, really.

And then the high watermark for the Allies is the, you know, once the stuff arrives and things get much more difficult for the Germans.

I think it's been...

been really, really interesting this.

And I think it's also, I think everyone is going to thank us for having done this one way or another, for having finally put to rest who the best in the West is.

Well, before we get to the We Have Ways Fest, where if you want to continue with this debate, that's where you're going to need to be.

Who is your top three for the Axis Generals?

Who are you going to go for?

Cripes.

Well, you made a very strong case.

You see...

You made a very strong case for Rommel, but I think much of what he gets up to in the desert is actually us being a bit rubbish and him reading our emails.

So

I just don't know.

Judy Barnaby, he does really well in 1940, and then he does.

And I think he's really good after that.

i think that's the point all right okay i think you've got to say gudarian let's just let's just if we can possibly for one moment try although of course it's impossible to park how political that some of these people were because after all rommel bent with the wind he was a trimmer on that um particular topic wasn't he yep uh i think gudarian gudarian chase it changes although those we've said he adapts and builds on prussian tradition of warfare he changes and rewrites the the

strategic earthquake changes the world but you know he he is the pioneer of armor tactics.

Everyone's copying him for the rest of the war.

You know, Patton is copying Gudarian.

Yeah, yeah.

Lots of radios, lots of, you know, all-arms combat.

You know, Waitman would tell you at West Point there were people who would refer to their tanks as panzers and were basically obsessed with 1940 Blitzkrieg.

It's got to be Gudarian.

Although there are massive kind of

crosses for his performance later on in the war.

So Gudarian, I think, stood in, just because I like the airborne thing, and because he's a villain for defeating Market Garden Modal.

Yeah, okay, well, I am definitely putting Rommel in.

I'm definitely putting Modal in.

For me, it's a toss-up between Gadarian and Student, but I think it has to be Gadarian.

So I'm going Rommel, Modal.

And I've got to say, I mean, I think I really think outstanding one is Modal.

Yeah, I think so.

Anyway, thanks everybody for listening.

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No.

Well, come back and join us for our epic Battle of Britain series.

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Cheerio.

Cheerio.

Chussy juzz.