Hermann Goring
Hermann Wilhelm Göring (also spelled Goering; pronunciation, [ˈɡøː.ʁɪŋ]; Rosenheim, January 12, 1893-Nuremberg, October 15, 1946) was a politician, commander of the Luftwaffe, and Nazi war criminal. He was a prominent member of the National Socialist German Workers' Party (NSDAP) and one of the leaders of Adolf Hitler's regime. A flying ace during World War I, he was awarded the coveted Pour le Mérite medal. Likewise, he was the last commander of the Jagdgeschwader I, the combat fighter unit led by Manfred von Richthofen, the Red Baron .
A member of the National Socialist German Workers Party from its earliest days, he was injured in 1923 during the failed coup known as the Beer Hall Putsch. While receiving treatment for his injuries, he developed an addiction to morphine that persisted until the end of his days. After Hitler became chancellor of Germany in 1933, he was appointed minister without portfolio in the new government. He founded the Gestapo that same year and put Heinrich Himmler in charge. Following the establishment of the Nazi regime, Göring amassed power and political capital to become the second most powerful man in the Third Reich. He was appointed commander-in-chief of the Luftwaffe, the air force, a position he held until the end of World War II. Before the systematic bombing campaign on Germany by the Allies, he enjoyed great popularity among the German people. In 1940 he was at the zenith of his power and influence and as minister in charge of the Quadrennial Plan (Vierjahresplan), in which he had the task of mobilizing all sectors of the economy for war, for which reason he put numerous agencies government agencies under his control, which helped make him one of the richest men in the country. In 1938, Hitler appointed him his successor and representative in all institutions. After the fall of France in 1940, he granted her the rank of Reichsmarschall, a position higher than other Wehrmacht commanders.
As World War II progressed, Göring's position vis-à-vis Hitler and the German public diminished after the Luftwaffe proved incapable of preventing the Allied bombing of German cities and the resupply of Axis forces encircled in the battle of Stalingrad. As a result, he increasingly withdrew from military and political affairs to turn his attention to acquiring property and works of art, much of which was stolen from Jewish Holocaust victims. Informed on April 22, 1945 of Hitler's intention to commit suicide, he decided to send him a telegram asking for permission to assume control of the Reich. Considering it an act of treason, the Führer dropped all charges against him, expelled him from the party and ordered his arrest.
After the war, he was tried at the Nuremberg trials and found guilty of conspiracy, crimes against peace, war crimes and crimes against humanity. He was sentenced to die by hanging, but committed suicide the night before his execution with the ingestion of a cyanide capsule.
Early Years
She was born on January 12, 1893 in the Marienbad sanatorium in Rosenheim, Bavaria. His father, Heinrich Ernst Göring (1839-1913), a former cavalry officer, had been the first Governor-General of the German Protectorate of South West Africa (present-day Namibia), Heinrich had three children from a previous marriage. Hermann was the fourth of five children born to Heinrich's second wife, Franziska Tiefenbrunn (1859-1943), a Bavarian peasant woman. Göring's older siblings were Karl, Olga and Paula; his younger brother was Albert.At the time he was born, his father was serving as Consul General in Haiti and his mother had returned home briefly to give birth. She left the six-week-old baby with a friend in Bavaria and did not see him again for three years, when she and her husband returned to Germany.
His godfather was Hermann Epenstein, a wealthy Jewish doctor and businessman his father had met in Africa. Epenstein provided the Göring family, who survived on Heinrich's pension, first with a family home in Friedenau (Berlin), and later with a small castle called Veldenstein, near Nuremberg. Göring's mother became Epenstein's mistress around this time, in a relationship that lasted for some fifteen years. Epenstein acquired the lesser title of Ritter (knight) von Epenstein through service and donations to the Crown.
Interested in a career as a soldier from an early age, he liked to play with toy soldiers and dress up in the Boer uniform his father had given him. He was sent to a boarding school at the age of eleven, where the food was poor and the discipline very strict. He sold a violin to pay for his train ticket home, then lay in bed, feigning illness, until told he would not have to return. He continued to enjoy war games, pretending to besiege Veldenstein Castle, and studying legends and Teutonic sagas. He practiced mountaineering, climbing peaks in Germany, in the Mont Blanc massif and in the Austrian Alps. At sixteen he was sent to a military academy in Lichterfelde (Berlin), from which he graduated with honors.During the Nuremberg war crimes trials in 1946, psychologist Gustave Gilbert estimated his IQ at 138.
He joined the Prince Wilhelm Regiment (112th Infantry, Garrison: Mülhausen) of the Prussian Army in 1912. The following year his mother had a falling out with Epenstein, forcing the family to leave Veldenstein and moved to Munich; his father died soon after. When World War I began in August 1914, he was stationed in Mülhausen (Mulhouse) with his regiment.
World War I
During the first year of World War I, Göring served with his infantry regiment in the Mülhausen area, a stronghold less than a mile from the French border. He was hospitalized with rheumatism, a result of the damp from trench warfare. While he was recovering, his friend Bruno Loerzer convinced him to transfer to what would become, in October 1916, the Luftstreitkräfte ("air combat forces") of the Deutsches Heer, but his request was denied. Later that year, he flew as a Loerzer spotter on Feldflieger Abteilung 25 (FFA 25); by those dates he had already transferred informally. He was discovered and sentenced to three weeks of confinement in the barracks, but the sentence was never carried out. By the time it was supposed to take hold, Göring's association with Loerzer had been made official. They were assigned as a team to FFA 25 in Prince William of Prussia's Fifth Army. They flew reconnaissance and bombing missions, for which the prince awarded both Göring and Loerzer the Iron Cross 1st class.
After completing the pilot training course, he was assigned to Jagdstaffel (Jasta) 5. Severely wounded in the hip in air combat, it took him nearly a year to recover. He then transferred to Jagdstaffel 26, commanded by Loerzer, in February 1917. He consistently scored aerial victories until May, when he was assigned to command Jagdstaffel 27. Serving with the Jastas 5, 26 and 27, continued to score victories. In addition to his Iron Crosses (1st and 2nd class), he was awarded the Order of the Zähringen Lion with swords, the Order of Frederick, the Order of Hohenzollern with 3rd class swords, and finally, in May 1918, the coveted Pour le Mérite. According to Hermann Dahlmann, who knew both men, Göring had Loerzer lobby for the award. He ended the war with twenty-two victories. A comprehensive postwar review of casualty records of the Allies showed that two of their awarded victories were doubtful, three were possible, and seventeen were certain or very probable.
On 7 July 1918, after the death of Wilhelm Reinhard, successor to Manfred von Richthofen (nicknamed the Red Baron), Göring was appointed commander of the "Flying Circus", Jagdgeschwader I. His arrogance made him unpopular with the men from his squadron. In the last days of the war he received repeated orders to withdraw his squadron, first to Tellancourt airfield and then to Darmstadt. At a certain point he was ordered to hand over the plane to the allies, which he refused. Many of his pilots intentionally crashed their planes to prevent them from falling into enemy hands.
Like many other German veterans, he was a supporter of the backstabbing legend, a belief that the German army had not really lost the war, but had been betrayed by politicians: Marxists, Jews, and especially the republicans, who had overthrown the German monarchy.
He stayed in aviation after the war. He tried touring the country hosting air shows and briefly worked on Fokker. After spending most of 1919 living in Denmark, he moved to Sweden to join the airline Svensk Lufttrafik. He was frequently hired for private flights. During the winter of 1920-1921, he was employed by Count Eric von Rosen to bring him to his castle from Stockholm. Invited to spend the night, Göring may have seen for the first time the swastika emblem, which Rosen had placed on the fireplace as a family insignia.
This was also the first time he met his future wife; the count introduced her to his sister-in-law, Baroness Carin von Kantzow (née von Fock). She was ten years old and had an eight-year-old son, but she did not live with her husband. Göring fell in love with her immediately and asked her to meet him in the Swedish capital. They arranged a visit to his parents' house and spent a lot of time together until 1921, when he went to Munich to study Political Science at the university. Carin divorced and followed Göring; they were married on 3 February 1922. Their first home together was a hunting lodge in Hochkreuth in the Bavarian Alps, near Bayrischzell, about 50 miles (80 km) from Munich. After meeting Adolf Hitler and joining the National Socialist Party German Workers' Association (NSDAP) In 1922, the Göring family moved to Obermenzing, a suburb of Munich.
Beginnings in National Socialism
He joined the NSDAP in 1922 after hearing a speech by Hitler. He was commissioned to command the SA (Sturmabteilung) as Oberster SA-Führer in 1923 He was later appointed SA-Gruppenführer (lieutenant general) and held this rank on the SA lists until 1945. At this time, Carin, who liked Hitler, was a frequent host of meetings of the main Nazis, such as her husband, Hitler, Rudolf Heß, Alfred Rosenberg and Ernst Röhm. Hitler later recalled his early friendship with Göring:
I liked it. I made him the head of my SA. He's the only one of his bosses who led the SA properly. I gave her a peeled chusma. In a very short time he had organized a division of 11,000 men.
Hitler and the NSDAP held mass rallies and demonstrations in Munich and elsewhere in the early 1920s, trying to win supporters in a bid for political power. Inspired by Benito Mussolini's March on Rome, the Nazis they attempted to seize power on November 8–9, 1923 in an unsuccessful coup known as the Brewery Putsch. Göring, who was accompanying Hitler leading the march to the War Ministry, was shot in the groin. Fourteen Nazis and four policemen were killed; many leading Nazis, including Hitler, were arrested.With Carin's help, Göring was smuggled to Innsbruck, where he received surgery and was given morphine for pain. He remained in the hospital until December 24. (This was the beginning of his morphine addiction, which lasted until his imprisonment in Nuremberg.) Meanwhile, authorities in Munich declared him a wanted man. The Göring family, poor and dependent on the goodwill of Nazi sympathizers abroad, moved from Austria to Venice. In May 1924 they visited Rome, passing through Florence and Siena. In the Italian capital he met Mussolini, who expressed an interest in meeting Hitler, who was then in prison.
Personal problems continued to multiply. By 1925, Carin's mother was ill. The Görings, with difficulty, raised in the spring of 1925 the money for a trip to Sweden via Austria, Czechoslovakia, Poland and Danzig (present-day Gdańsk). Göring had become an aggressive morphine addict and his wife's family was shocked by his deterioration. Carin, already ill with epilepsy and a weak heart, had to allow the doctors to take care of her husband; her son was carried away by her father. Göring was certified as a dangerous drug addict and sent to the Långbro asylum on 1 September 1925. He was violent to the point that he had to be confined in a straitjacket, but his psychiatrist felt that he was sane; the condition was caused solely by morphine.Weaned off the drug, he briefly left the facility, but had to return for further treatment. He returned to Germany when a general amnesty was declared in 1927 and continued to work in the aircraft industry. Hitler, who had written My Struggle (Mein Kampf) while in prison, he had been released in December 1924. Carin Göring, ill with epilepsy and tuberculosis, died of heart failure on October 17, 1931.
Meanwhile, the NSDAP was in a period of rebuilding and expectation. The economy had recovered, which meant fewer opportunities for Nazi agitation. The SA was reorganized, but with Franz Pfeffer von Salomon as its head, instead of Göring, and the SS (Schutzstaffel) were founded in 1925, initially as Hitler's bodyguards. Party membership increased from 27,000 in 1925 to 108,000 in 1928 and 178,000 the following year. In the May 1928 elections, the NSDAP won only twelve seats out of the 491 available in the Reichstag. Göring was elected to represent Bavaria. The Great Depression led to a disastrous recession in the German economy and, in the 1930 elections,, the NSDAP won 6,409,600 votes and 107 seats. In May 1931, Hitler sent him on a mission to the Vatican, where he met the future Pope Pius XII. In the July 1932 election, the Nazis won 230 seats, which made them the largest party in the Reichstag. By tradition, the Nazis had the right to select the President of the Reichstag, and they chose Göring for the position.
On the night of February 27, 1933, the Reichstag fire occurred. Göring was one of the first to arrive on the scene. Marinus van der Lubbe, a Dutch communist radical, was arrested and held solely responsible for the fire. Göring immediately called for an offensive against the communists. The Nazis took advantage of the fire to further their own political goals. The Reichstag fire decree, passed the next day at Hitler's request, suspended basic rights and allowed detention without trial. The activities of the Communist Party of Germany were suppressed and some four thousand of its members were arrested. Göring demanded that the detainees be shot, but Rudolf Diels, head of the Prussian political police, ignored the order. Some investigators, such as William L. Shirer and Alan Bullock, were of the opinion that the NSDAP itself was responsible for starting the fire.
In the early 1930s, he was in the company of Emmy Sonnemann, an actress from Hamburg. They were married on April 10, 1935 in Berlin; the wedding was celebrated with all pomp. The night before there was a grand reception at the Berlin Opera. Fighter planes flew overhead the night of the reception and the day of the ceremony, at which Hitler was best man.Hitler's only daughter, Edda, was born on June 2, 1938.
Nazi potentate
When Hitler became Chancellor of Germany in January 1933, Göring was appointed Minister without Portfolio, Interior Minister for Prussia, and Reich Aviation Commissioner; Wilhelm Frick was appointed Reich Minister of the Interior. SS chief Frick and Heinrich Himmler hoped to create a unified police force for all of Germany, but Göring on November 30, 1933 established a Prussian police force, headed by Rudolf Diels, called the Gestapo (Geheime Staatspolizei ). Thinking that Diels was not ruthless enough to use the Gestapo effectively to counter the power of the SA, he handed over control of the new organization to Himmler on April 20, 1934. By then, the SA numbered more than two millions of men.
Hitler was deeply concerned that Ernst Röhm, the head of the SA, was planning a coup. Himmler and Reinhard Heydrich conspired with Göring to use the Gestapo and SS to crush the SA. Members of the SA learned of the proposed action and thousands of them took to the streets in violent demonstrations on the night of June 29, 1934. Enraged, Hitler ordered the arrest of SA leaders. Röhm was shot to death in his cell when he refused to commit suicide; Göring personally reviewed the arrest lists, which numbered in the thousands, and determined who else should be shot. At least eighty-five people were killed between June 30 and July 2, in what is now known as the Night of the Long Knives. Hitler acknowledged, in the Reichstag, on July 13, that the killings had been illegal., but claimed that a plan to overthrow the Reich had been initiated. A retroactive law was passed that legalized the action. Any criticism was met with arrests.
One of the terms of the Treaty of Versailles, which had been in place since the end of World War I, stated that Germany was not allowed to maintain an air force. After the signing in 1926 of the Briand-Kellogg Pact, police planes were allowed. Göring was appointed Minister of Air Traffic in May 1933. Germany began amassing aircraft in violation of the Treaty, and in 1935 the existence of the Luftwaffe was formally recognized, with Göring as Reich Minister of Aviation.
During a cabinet meeting in September 1936, Göring and Hitler announced that the German rearmament program should be accelerated. On October 18, he was appointed plenipotentiary of the Four-Year Plan (Vierjahresplan) to undertake this task.He created a new organization to manage the project and brought the ministries of Labor and Agriculture under his umbrella. He bypassed the Ministry of Finance in his policy-making decisions, much to the chagrin of Hjalmar Schacht, who was in charge of him. Huge expenditures were made on rearmament, despite mounting deficits. Schacht resigned on December 8, 1937, and Walther Funk assumed office and control of the Reichsbank. In this way, both institutions came under the control of Göring under the auspices of the Four-Year Plan. In July of that year, he established the Reichswerke Hermann Göring conglomerate under state ownership, although directed by him, with the aim of boosting steel production. beyond the level that private enterprise could provide economically.
In 1938, he was involved in the Blomberg-Fritsch scandal, which led to the resignation of the Minister of War, Werner von Blomberg, and the commander-in-chief of the Heer, Werner von Fritsch. He had acted as a witness at Blomberg's wedding to Margarethe Gruhn, a 26-year-old typist, on January 12, 1938. Information received from the police showed that the young bride was a prostitute. He felt compelled to tell Hitler, but he too saw this event as an opportunity to get rid of Blomberg, who was forced to resign. Göring did not want Fritsch to be appointed to that position and thus be his superior. Several days later, Heydrich revealed a file on Fritsch containing allegations of homosexual activity and blackmail. The charges were later shown to be false, but Fritsch had lost Hitler's trust and was forced to resign. Hitler used the dismissals as an opportunity to reshuffle the leadership of the military. Göring applied for the post of Minister of War, but was turned down; he was appointed to the rank of Generalfeldmarschall. He took over as Supreme Commander of the Wehrmacht and created subordinate positions to head the three main branches of the service.
As the minister in charge of the Four Year Plan, he became concerned about Germany's lack of natural resources and began to push for Austria to join the Reich. The province of Styria had rich deposits of iron ore, and the country as a whole was home to many skilled workers who would also be useful. Hitler had always been in favor of taking possession of Austria, his native country. He met Austrian Chancellor Kurt Schuschnigg on February 12, 1938, threatening an invasion if peaceful unification did not take place. The NSDAP was legalized in Austria to gain a power base, and a referendum on reunification was scheduled for March. When Hitler did not approve the wording of the plebiscite, Göring telephoned Schuschnigg and the Austrian head of state, Wilhelm Miklas, to demand the chancellor's resignation and threatened an invasion by German forces and civil unrest by members of the Austrian NSDAP. Schuschnigg resigned on March 11, and the referendum was called off. At 5:30 the next morning, German troops that had massed on the border entered Austria, meeting no resistance.
Although Joachim von Ribbentrop had been appointed foreign minister in February 1938, Göring continued to become involved in international affairs. That July, he contacted the British government with the idea that he should pay an official visit to discuss Germany's intentions. about Czechoslovakia. British Prime Minister Neville Chamberlain agreed to the meeting and there was talk of signing a pact between the UK and Germany. In February 1938, he visited Warsaw to calm rumors about the imminent invasion of Poland. He had talks with the Hungarian government that summer, too, about his potential role in an invasion of Czechoslovakia. At the Nuremberg congress in September, Göring and other speakers denounced the Czechs as an inferior race to be conquered. Chamberlain and Hitler had a series of meetings that led to the signing of the Munich Agreement (29 September 1938).), which handed over control of the Sudetenland to Germany. In March 1939, Göring threatened Czechoslovak President Emil Hácha with the bombing of Prague, for which he agreed to sign a statement accepting the German occupation of the rest of Bohemia and Moravia.
Although disliked by many in the NSDAP, before the war Göring enjoyed great personal popularity among the German public due to his perceived sociability, colourfulness, and humor. As the Nazi leader responsible for major economic affairs, presented himself as a defender of national interests over supposedly corrupt big business and the rancid German elite. The Nazi press was on his side. Other leaders, such as Heß and Ribbentrop, were envious of his popularity.In the United Kingdom and the United States, some saw him as more acceptable than the other Nazis and as a possible mediator between Western democracies and Hitler.
World War II
Success on all fronts
Göring and other senior officers were concerned that Germany was not yet ready for war, but Hitler insisted on moving forward as soon as possible. The invasion of Poland, the opening action of World War II, began at dawn 1 September 1939. Later that day, speaking to the Reichstag, Hitler designated Göring as his successor as Führer of all Germany, "if something should happen to me", with Heß as the second alternative. Important German victories soon followed, one after another in quick succession. With the help of the Luftwaffe, the Polish Air Force was defeated within a week. The Fallschirmjäger (Parachute Corps) seized key airfields in occupied Norway and captured Fort Eben-Emael in Belgium. Göring's Luftwaffe played a critical role in the battles in the Netherlands, Belgium and France in May 1940.
On 19 July 1940, during the 1940 Field Marshal Ceremony, Hitler appointed him Reichsmarschall and awarded him the Grand Cross of the Iron Cross for his successful leadership, the only he received it during the Nazi period. During the 1940 field marshals ceremony, Hitler promoted him to the rank of Reichsmarschall des Großdeutsche Reiches ("Reich Marshal of the Greater German Reich"), especially created for him that made him superior to all field marshals in the Wehrmacht. As a result of this promotion, he was the highest ranking soldier in Germany until the end of the war. Göring had already received the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross on September 30, 1939 when he was Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe.
The United Kingdom had declared war on Germany immediately after the invasion of Poland. In July 1940, Hitler began preparations for an invasion of that country. As part of the plan, the British Royal Air Force (RAF) had to be neutralized. Bombing raids began on British air installations and on cities and industrial centers. By then, Göring had already announced in a radio address: "If an enemy plane flies over German soil, my name is Meier!", words that he they would pursue, when the RAF began bombing German cities on 11 May 1940. Although confident that the Luftwaffe could defeat the RAF in a matter of days, Göring, as well as Admiral Erich Raeder, commander-in-chief of the Kriegsmarine, he was pessimistic about the possibility of success of the planned invasion (codenamed Operation Sea Lion). Göring hoped that a victory in the air would be enough to force peace without an invasion. The campaign failed and the operation was indefinitely postponed on 17 September 1940. After their defeat in the Battle of Britain, the Luftwaffe attempted to defeat the United Kingdom through strategic bombing raids. On 12 October, Hitler called off the operation due to the onset of winter. By the end of the year, it was clear that the Blitz was not shaking British morale, although the bombing raids continued until May 1941.
Decline on all fronts
Despite the Ribbentrop-Molotov Pact, signed in 1939, Germany began Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, on June 22, 1941. Initially, the Luftwaffe had the upper hand, destroying thousands of Soviet aircraft in the first month of fighting. Hitler and his high-ranking officers were certain that the campaign would end by Christmas and no provision was made for reserves of men or equipment. However, by July, the Germans had only 1,000 aircraft left in operation and his troop casualties exceeded 213,000 men. The decision was made to concentrate the attack on one part of the vast Eastern Front; efforts would be directed at capturing Moscow. After the long but successful battle of Smolensk, Hitler ordered Army Group Center to halt its advance on the Soviet capital and temporarily diverted Panzer groups north and south to assist in the attack. encirclement of Leningrad and kyiv. The pause provided the Red Army with an opportunity to mobilize fresh reserves; the historian Russel Stolfi considered that it was one of the main factors that caused the failure of the Moscow offensive, which was resumed in October 1941 with the Battle of Moscow. Bad weather conditions, fuel shortages, the delay in the construction of airbases in Eastern Europe and overloading of supply lines were also factors. Hitler did not give permission for even a partial withdrawal until mid-January 1942; by then the losses were comparable to those of the Napoleonic invasion of Russia in 1812.
Hitler decided that the campaign of the summer of 1942 would be concentrated in the south and that efforts would be made to capture the oil fields of the Caucasus. The Battle of Stalingrad, a major turning point of the war, began on August 23. of 1942 with a bombing campaign by the Luftwaffe. The German 6th Army entered the city, but due to its location on the front line, the Soviets were still able to encircle and trap it without reinforcements or supplies. When the 6th Army was surrounded in late November during Operation Uranus, Göring promised that the Luftwaffe would be able to deliver a minimum of three hundred tons of supplies to the encircled soldiers every day. Based on these assurances, Hitler demanded that there was no retreat and that they must fight to the last man. Although some airlifts were able to get through, the amount of supplies delivered never exceeded 120 tons per day. The remainder of 6th Army, some 91,000 men out of a group of 285,000, surrendered in early February 1943.; only 5,000 of these captives survived the Russian POW camps to return to Germany.
War on Germany
Meanwhile, the strength of the American and British bomber fleets had increased. Based in the UK, they began operations against German targets. The first thousand-bomber raid was flown over Cologne on 30 May 1942. Air raids continued on targets further away from England, after auxiliary fuel tanks were fitted to American fighter aircraft. Göring refused to believe reports that American fighters had been shot down as far east as Aachen in the winter of 1943. His reputation began to decline.
The American P-51 Mustang, with a range of more than 1,800 miles (2,900 km) when using drop tanks, began escorting bombers in large formations to and from the target area in early 1944. A from that point on, the Luftwaffe began to suffer aircrew casualties that could not be sufficiently replaced. By attacking oil refineries and rail communications, Allied bombers crippled the German war effort in late 1944. German civilians blamed Göring for his failure to protect the homeland. Hitler began to exclude him from the conferences, but he kept him in his post at the head of the Luftwaffe and as plenipotentiary of the Four Year Plan. When he finally lost the confidence of the Führer, he began spending more time in his various residences. On D-Day (6 June 1944), the Luftwaffe had around three hundred fighters and a small number of bombers in the landing area; instead the Allies had a total force of 11,000 aircraft.
End of the war
As the Soviets closed in on Berlin, Hitler's efforts to organize the city's defense became increasingly futile and pointless. His last birthday, celebrated in the Führerbunker in Berlin on April 20, 1945, it was the occasion to say goodbye to many of the Nazi leaders, such as Göring. By this time, Göring's hunting estate, called Carinhall, had been evacuated, the central dwelling destroyed, and his art treasures moved to Berchtesgaden and elsewhere. He arrived at his property in Obersalzberg on 22 April, the same day in which Hitler, in a lengthy tirade against his generals, publicly admitted that the war was lost and that he intended to remain in the capital until the end and then commit suicide. He also stated that Göring was in a better position to negotiate an agreement of peace.
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht chief of operations Alfred Jodl was present at Hitler's row and notified Göring's chief of staff Karl Koller in a meeting a few hours later. Sensing the implications from him, he immediately flew to Berchtesgaden to notify his superior of this event. A week after the start of the Soviet invasion, Hitler had issued a decree naming Göring his successor in the event of his death, thus codifying the declaration he had made shortly after the start of the war. The decree also gave full authority to act as Hitler's surrogate if Hitler ever lost his freedom of action.
Göring feared being branded a traitor if he tried to seize power, but also fearing dereliction of duty if he did nothing. After some hesitation, he reviewed his copy of the 1941 decree, which named him successor to the Führer . After consulting with Koller and Hans Lammers, State Secretary in the Reich Chancellery, he concluded that by remaining in Berlin to face certain death, Hitler had rendered himself unfit to rule. They agreed that, under the terms of the decree, it was for Göring to take power in his place. He was also motivated by fears that his rival, Martin Bormann, would seize the position after the death of the Führer i> and ordered his execution as a traitor. With this in mind, he sent a carefully worded telegram asking for her permission to assume the post of Führer of all Germany, stressing that he would act as deputy. He added that if he did not receive an answer by 10:00 p.m. that night (April 23), he would assume that Hitler had lost his freedom of action and therefore take responsibility for the leadership of the Reich.
The telegram was intercepted by Bormann, who convinced Hitler that Göring was a traitor. He argued that the telegram was not a request for permission to act as a stand-in, but rather a demand for Hitler to resign or be overthrown. Bormann also intercepted another telegram in which Göring instructed Ribbentrop to inform him if there were no more messages from Hitler or Göring before midnight. Hitler sent him a reply, prepared with Bormann's help, rescinding the 1941 decree and threatening him with execution for high treason unless he immediately resigned all his posts. Göring promptly resigned, but Hitler—or Bormann, depending on the source—ordered the SS to place him under house arrest in Obersalzberg, as well as his staff and his Lammers.Bormann made a radio announcement that Göring had resigned for health reasons.
By April 26, the compound at Obersalzberg was under attack by the Allies, so he was transferred to his castle at Mauterndorf. In his political last will and testament, Hitler expelled him from the NSDAP, formally annulled the decree making him his successor, and reprimanded him for "illegally attempting to seize control of the state". Kriegsmarine, as President of the Reich and Commander-in-Chief of the Wehrmacht. Hitler and his wife Eva Braun committed suicide on April 30, just hours after a hastily arranged wedding. Göring was released on 5 May by a passing Luftwaffe unit that headed for the American lines, hoping to surrender to them rather than the Soviets. He was arrested near Radstadt on May 6 by elements of the US Army's 36th Infantry Division This move likely saved his life, as Bormann had ordered his execution if Berlin had fallen.
Trial and death
He was airlifted to Camp Ashcan, a temporary POW camp located at the Palace Hotel in Mondorf-les-Bains, Luxembourg. There he was treated for his addiction to dihydrocodeine—a mild morphine derivative—before his arrest he had been taking the equivalent of three or four grains (260-320 mg) of morphine a day; likewise, he was placed on a strict diet and lost about 60 pounds.Top Nazi officials were transferred in September to Nuremberg, which would be the location of a series of military tribunals beginning in November.
He was the second highest-ranking civil servant tried at Nuremberg, after Reich President (former Admiral) Dönitz. The prosecution filed a four-count indictment, including conspiracy, waging aggressive warfare, war crimes—such as looting and moving works of art and other property to Germany—and crimes against humanity—such as the disappearance of political opponents and other opponents under the Nacht und Nebel (night and fog) decree, the torture and ill-treatment of prisoners of war, and the murder and enslavement of civilians, estimated at the time at 5,700,000 Jews—. Prevented from presenting a lengthy defence, Göring pleaded, "within the meaning of the prosecution, not guilty".
The trial lasted 218 days; the prosecution presented its case from November 1945 to March 1946 and Göring's defense, the first presented, lasted from 8 to 22 March. The sentences were read out on September 30. Forced to remain silent while sitting in the dock, he communicated his views on the proceedings through gestures, shaking his head or laughing. He constantly took notes, whispered to the other defendants, and tried to control the erratic behavior of Heß, sitting next to him. During breaks in the trial, he tried to dominate the other defendants and was eventually placed in solitary confinement when he tried to influence their testimony. Göring told American psychiatrist Leon Goldensohn that the court was "stupid" in prosecuting "small followers" like Funk and Kaltenbrunner instead of allowing him to take responsibility himself. He also claimed that he had never heard of most of the other defendants before the trial. Gustave Gilbert, a German-speaking American intelligence officer and psychologist, interviewed Göring and the others in prison during the trial. Gilbert kept a diary, which he later published as the Nuremberg diary; according to an entry about the night of April 18, 1946, when the trials were adjourned for a three-day Easter recess:
Sliding in his cell at night, Göring was at the defensive, deflated and not very happy for the turn he was taking the trial. He said he had no control over the actions or defense of others, that he himself had never been anti-Semite, that he had not believed those atrocities and that several Jews had offered to testify on his behalf.
At various times during the trial, the prosecution showed films of concentration camps and other atrocities. Those present, as well as Göring, found the contents of the tapes shocking; he said they must have been forgeries. Witnesses such as Paul Körner and Erhard Milch tried to portray him as a peaceful moderate. Milch declared that it was impossible to oppose Hitler or disobey his orders; to do so would likely have meant death for oneself and his family.Testifying on his own behalf, Göring emphasized his loyalty to Hitler and claimed to know nothing about what had happened in the concentration camps, which were under the control from Himmler. He gave evasive and complicated answers to direct questions and had plausible excuses for every action during the war. He used the witness box to expound extensively on his own role in the Reich, attempting to present himself as a peacemaker and diplomat before the outbreak of war. During cross-examination, Chief Prosecutor Robert H. Jackson read the minutes of a meeting held it was held shortly after the Night of Broken Glass (Kristallnacht), in November 1938. At the meeting, Göring had planned to confiscate Jewish property taking advantage of the pogrom. Later, prosecutor David Maxwell Fyfe proved that it was impossible for Göring not to know in time to prevent the Stalag Luft III murders—a shooting of fifty airmen recaptured after escaping from that POW camp. He also presented clear evidence. that he knew about the extermination of the Hungarian Jews.
He was found guilty of all four counts and sentenced to death by hanging. The sentence reads:
There's nothing to say attenuating. For Göring was many times, in fact almost always, the driving force, only surpassed by his boss. He was the main aggressor of war, both as a political and military leader; he was the director of the slave labor program and the creator of the oppressive program against Jews and other races, in Germany and abroad. All these crimes have admitted them frankly. In some specific cases there may be conflict of testimony, but in general, their own admissions are more than sufficiently broad to conclude their guilt. His fault is unique in his gravity. The record doesn't reveal any excuses for this man.
He filed an appeal requesting that he be shot as a soldier rather than be hanged as a common criminal, but the court refused. He committed suicide with a potassium cyanide vial the night before he was to be hanged. His body, as those of the executed, was exhibited at the site of the sentence for the witnesses of the executions. The bodies were cremated in Ostfriedhof (Munich) and the ashes scattered in the Isar river.
There are two theories as to how Göring obtained the poison: the first claims that American Lieutenant Jack G. Wheelis, who was serving as a watchman at the Nuremberg trials, recovered the capsules from their hiding place among Göring's confiscated belongings by the army and gave them to the prisoner, who bribed him with a gold watch, a pen, and a cigarette case. The second theory, in 2005, was by retired US soldier Herbert Lee Stivers, who served in the 26th Regiment. of the 1st Infantry Division, the honor guard during the Nuremberg trials, claimed that he gave Göring a "medicine" hidden inside a fountain pen that a German woman had asked him to smuggle into the prison. Stivers later said that he did not know what was in the blister until after the suicide.
Personal property
Göring's name is closely associated with the Nazi looting of Jewish property. His name appears one hundred thirty-five times on the OSS Art Looting Investigation Unit's List of Red Flag Names, compiled by United States Army intelligence in 1945-1946 and declassified in 1997. The confiscation of Jewish property gave him the opportunity to accumulate a personal fortune. Some he expropriated or acquired for a nominal price; in other cases, he received money in exchange for allowing others to steal Jewish property. He was bribed by industrialists to favor their decisions when he was director of the Quadrennial Plan and to supply arms to the Republican side in the Spanish civil war through the Pyrkal company in Greece, although Germany supported Francisco Franco and the nationalists.
He was appointed Reich Master of Hunting (Reichsjägermeister) in 1933 and of Forests (Reichsforstmeister) in 1934. He instituted reforms to forest laws and acted to protect forests. endangered species. During this time he became interested in the Schorfheide Forest, where he set aside 100,000 acres (400 km²) for a state park, which still exists. There he built an elaborate hunting lodge, Carinhall, in memory of his first wife; by 1934, his coffin had been transported to the site and placed in a vault on the estate. For most of the 1930s, Göring kept lion cubs, on loan from the Berlin Zoo, both in Carinhall and at his home in Obersalzberg. The main hostel in Carinhall had a large art gallery displaying works that had been looted from private collections and European museums from 1939 onwards. He worked closely with the Reichsleiter Rosenberg Operations Staff ( Einsatzstab Reichsleiter Rosenberg), an organization tasked with looting works of art and cultural property from Jewish collections, libraries, and museums across the continent. Headed by Alfred Rosenberg, the group established a collection center, based in Paris. From France alone, some 26,000 rail cars filled with looted art treasures, furniture, and other items were shipped to Germany. Göring would repeatedly visit the Parisian headquarters to inspect incoming stolen items and select the items to be sent by special carriage to Carinhall and his other residences. The estimated value of his collection, of around 1,500 pieces, was $200 million.
He was known for his extravagant tastes and flashy clothing. He had several special uniforms for the various offices he held; his Reichsmarschall uniform included a jewel-encrusted cane. Hans-Ulrich Rudel, the best Stuka pilot in the war, twice recalled meeting Göring dressed in extravagant costumes: first, a medieval hunting suit, when he was practicing archery with his doctor, and then again. second, a red robe tied with a gold clasp, smoking an unusually large pipe. Italian Foreign Minister Galeazzo Ciano once noted that Göring wore a fur coat that resembled what "a high-ranking prostitute wears to the opera". construction round in Carinhall and changed costumes several times during the afternoons.
He was noted for his patronage of music, especially opera. He was frequently and sumptuously entertained and organized elaborate birthday parties for him. Armaments Minister Albert Speer recalled that guests brought expensive gifts such as gold bars, Dutch cigars and valuable works of art. For his birthday in 1944, Speer gave him a large marble bust of Hitler. As a member of the Prussian State Council, Speer had to donate a considerable part of his salary to the Council's birthday present, without being given it. asked the lucky one. Erhard Milch told Speer that similar donations were needed from the general fund of the Ministry of Aviation. For his birthday in 1940, Ciano decorated Göring with the coveted Annunciation necklace, which brought him to tears.
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The design of his Reichsmarschall banner, on a pale azure field, featured a gilt German eagle clutching a crown under two swastika-covered batons. The reverse of the banner had the Grand Cross of the Iron Cross surrounded by a wreath between four Luftwaffe eagles. He was carried by his personal standard bearer on all public occasions.
Although he liked to be called der Eiserne ("the Iron Man"), Göring, a once handsome and muscular fighter pilot, had grown burly. He was one of the few Nazi leaders who did not take offense at hearing jokes about himself, "no matter how rude," taking it as a sign of popularity. The Germans joked about his ego—such as wearing an admiral's uniform with rubber bathing medals—and his obesity—"he sits on his stomach." his visit to the Vatican: «Mission accomplished. The Pope left the habits. The tiara and pontifical vestments fit perfectly."
Role in the Holocaust
Goebbels and Himmler were much more anti-Semitic than Göring, who took this attitude mainly because party politics forced him to. His deputy Erhard Milch had a Jewish father. However, he supported the Nuremberg Laws of 1935 and, later, undertook economic measures unfavorable to Jews. He required the registration of all Jewish property as part of the Four Year Plan and, at a meeting after the Night of Broken Glass,, he was enraged that German insurance companies had to offset the financial burden of Jewish losses. He proposed that the Jews be fined one billion imperial marks.At the same meeting, options for the disposition of the Jews and their property were discussed. The groups would be segregated into ghettos or encouraged to emigrate, while their property would be confiscated in a program of "Aryanization" (Arisierung). Compensation for seized property would be low, if any, due. Detailed minutes of this meeting and other documents were read at the Nuremberg trial, demonstrating his knowledge of and complicity in the persecution of the Jews. Göring told Gilbert that he never he would have supported the anti-Jewish measures if he had known what was going to happen. "I just thought we would remove Jews from jobs in big business and government," he claimed.
In July 1941, he issued a memorandum to Heydrich ordering him to arrange the practical details of the final solution to the "Jewish question." At the time of writing this letter, many Jews and other groups had already been killed in Poland, Russia, and elsewhere. At the Wannsee Conference, held six months later, Heydrich formally announced that the genocide of the Jews was now official Reich policy. Göring did not attend, but was present at other meetings where the number of killed was discussed. He led the anti-partisan operations (Bandenbekämpfung) of the Luftwaffe security battalions in Białowieża Forest between 1942 and 1944, which resulted in the murder of thousands of Jews and Polish civilians.
Awards
- National
- Iron Cross
- Second class (15 September 1914)
- First class (22 March 1915)
- Pour le Mérite (2 June 1918)
- Order of Blood (medal of 9 November 1923)
- Brooch to the Iron Cross
- Second Class (30 September 1939)
- First class (30 September 1939)
- Cross of Knight of the Iron Cross (September 30, 1939)
- Great Cross of the Iron Cross, for “the victories of the Luftwaffe in 1940 during the French campaign” (19 August 1940), was the only prize of this decoration during the Second World War
- Knight of the Order of the Lion of Zähringen of the great Duke of Baden, second class with swords
- Golden Plate of the Party
- Cross of Knight with swords of the Order of Hohenzollern
- Cruz de Caballero de la Orden de Mérito Militar Carlos Federico
- Danzig Cross, First and Second Class
- Foreigners
- Grand Cross of the Order of Saints Cyril and Methodius, Kingdom of Bulgaria
- Great Cord of the Order of the rising Sun (1943), Great Empire of Japan
- First class member of the Order of Michael the Valiente (1941), Kingdom of Romania
- Knight of the Order of St Stephen, Kingdom of Hungary
- Commander Grand Cross of the Order of the Bride (1939), Kingdom of Sweden
- Gran Cruz de la Orden Imperial del Yugo y las Flechas (1939), Spain
- Knight Grand Cross of the Order of Saints Mauritius and Lazarus (1938), Kingdom of Italy
- Knight of the Supreme Order of the Most Holy Annunciation (1940), Kingdom of Italy
- Knight Grand Cross of the Order of the Crown of Italy (1940), Kingdom of Italy
- Grand Cross of the Order of the Star of Karađorđe (1939), Kingdom of Yugoslavia
- Order of the White Rose as commander, Republic of Finland
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