Erwin Rommel The desert fox

 

Erwin Rommel

The desert fox

SOURCE: NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC HISTORY

 

Born on November 15, 1891, Erwin Rommel was a hero to the Germans and the most respected and feared officer in the British Army, who came to nickname him "the desert fox." But in the end Adolf Hitler forced him to commit suicide accused of participating in a coup.

Biographies

 

Second World War

 

Nazism.

J.M. Sadurni

Historical news specialist

Updated April 29, 2020

Erwin Rommel, the Desert Fox, unlike the highest Nazi barons, was born into a middle-class bourgeois family on November 15, 1891. The most famous field marshal of the German army would become an unconditional admirer of Adolf Hitler, although he realized too late that his idol was an unscrupulous criminal.

LEADER, AUSTERE AND ASTUTE STRATEGIST

Attracted by the emerging aviation industry and technological advances, the young Erwin planned to study engineering, but against the opposition of his father, he enlisted in the army, a very attractive option for an ambitious young man at that time. Enrolled in a local unit, Rommel soon stood out for his leadership and in a short time he went from corporal to being promoted to sergeant. Rommel entered the Danzig Military School, where he excelled more in the physical tests than in the theoretical ones.

During his stay at the academy he met what would be his only wife, Lucie Maria Mollin. Rommel's life at that time was practically that of an ascetic: he didn't smoke, he didn't drink, and he never was: he didn't smoke, he didn't drink, and he was never immersed in the nightlife that the other officers enjoyed so much. He was a serious-minded young man, and apparently more given to listening than to arguing.

Rommel's life did not fit in with that of the rest of the officers. He did not enjoy the nightlife, nor did he smoke or drink.

At the outbreak of World War I, Rommel was sent with his regiment to the Argonne area, a region that stretches between the Marne, the Ardennes and the Meuse. He quickly stood out for his courage and was promoted to lieutenant, earning the respect of his men for always being on the front line of combat. In 1915 Rommel was awarded the Iron Cross 1st Class and was subsequently sent to the Romanian front. He later received the highest distinction, reserved only for generals, for his cunning on the battlefield: Pour le Mérite.

Photo: Cordon Press

FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH THE FÜHRER

Rommel took very badly the result of the German surrender that culminated in the Treaty of Versailles. From then on, and with a Germany in full revolutionary effervescence, his life was transformed: he went from the turmoil on the battlefield to the tranquility and calm of domestic life with his wife Lucie, with whom he had his only son, Manfred. In 1932, while an instructor at the Dresden Military Academy, Rommel was promoted to Commander. Shortly after, Nazism came to power in Germany.

The first time that Rommel and Hitler met was during the 1935 Easter parade, and it was not exactly a cordial meeting. Rommel learned that for security an SS platoon would form between the Führer and his battalion. This decision greatly annoyed the commander who refused to march. Rommel stated: "This is an insult. If the Head of State doesn't feel safe in front of his own soldiers, I won't have them line up." His reckless decision could have ended in harsh punishment if Heinrich Himmler and Joseph Goebbels had not intervened. Finally, the SS did not form, and Hitler ended up congratulating Rommel and his battalion for their attitude.

Photo: Cordon Press

HIS MOST DEVOTED READER: ADOLF HITLER

HIS MOST DEVOTED READER: ADOLF HITLER

Foto: Cordon press

Rommel was a training freak. He forced his battalion to go up and down a hill up to four times arguing that "sweating saves blood." After his promotion to lieutenant colonel, Rommel had a run-in with Baldur Von Shirach, leader of the Hitler Youth, who had called him for the formation of this group of young people. But very soon Rommel clashed with him and his collaborators because of the dictatorial methods used by the SA. According to Rommel, they looked more like "little Napoleons" than soldiers. His experience in combat earned him the publication of a book in 1937 that is still required reading and study in countless military academies around the world.

The work pleasantly surprised Hitler, who became his most devoted reader. In this way, Rommel was appointed commander-in-chief of his escort battalion during his visits to Austria, the Sudetenland, Prague and Poland. The result was that Rommel came to deal daily with Hitler, and the influence he exerted on the commander was hypnotic, so much so that he came to "fall in love" with the Führer's virtues after the invasion of Poland. They were glory days. It was still a long way before Rommel realized Hitler's irrational obstinacy, his capricious character, his hysterical attacks and the contempt he felt for his own soldiers, whom he sent on suicide missions, but, above all, After all, the least he would come to bear in the future would be "his infinite imbecility."

Following the publication of his book, Rommel was appointed commander-in-chief of the Führer's escort battalion. At that time, the commander was not yet aware of Hitler's hysterical and irrational character.

THE LEGEND OF ROMMEL AND THE MADNESS OF HITLER

During the time when everything was going well between the two men, Rommel agreed to lead the 7th Panzer Division (known as the Deutsches Afrikakorps) which would be known as the "ghost division" for the surprise, speed and destructiveness with which it subdued his enemies.

The victories on the battlefield followed one after the other and the legend of Rommel grew, even reaching the British lines that christened him the Desert Fox. His successes earned him the highest decoration in the German army: the Cross of Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds after the capture of Benghazi, and his promotion to field marshal, the youngest in German history. But an error in the strategy on the part of the Führer ended up causing the German debacle in the battle of El Alamein. If Rommel managed to control the Suez Canal, London's communications with its colonies in the Middle East would be interrupted and this would be used by Axis forces to seize the region's oil wealth. But the German advance had to be stopped dead by an inconceivable logistical failure: the fuel for the tanks had run out. Foreseeing the coming disaster, Rommel ordered the withdrawal of his men in the face of an imminent massacre. Upon hearing the news, Hitler went mad and issued his eternal and delusional order: "No retreats!"

 

 

A flaw in Hitler's military strategy caused the Panzer division to run out of fuel

That order meant the beginning of the end for the Thousand Year Reich. On June 6, 1944, Hitler's strategic mistakes were exposed on the fateful D-Day, the day the Allies landed on the Normandy beaches. Neither Rommel nor his armored personnel could do anything in the face of this catastrophe; the dream of winning the war had turned into a nightmare in which there was only death and destruction.

FAILED OPERATION

At that point, Rommel was already fed up with Hitler. He considered that he was useless and a madman who had unleashed "a stupid and brutal war". Furthermore, at that time he came to know of the existence of the concentration camps and their monstrous methods. Rommel had never committed a war crime, not even against partisans, the generic name for resistance movements against Nazism. The Field Marshal did not refuse to be the man to bring about Hitler's downfall, but his integrity prevented him from accepting his death. He wanted him to be jailed and tried.

On 17 July, while traveling alone to his headquarters in the French town of Roche-Guyon, his vehicle was strafed by two British Spitfire fighters. The Desert Fox was thrown from the car. His fall left him unconscious and seriously injured: he suffered a quadruple skull fracture, facial injuries, and a blow to his left eye that caused severe swelling.

Photo: Cordon Press

On July 20, the so-called "Valkyrie operation", one of the attempts to end Hitler's life, had failed. Immediately, the regime's repression brought the alleged instigators to the firing squad.

 

To the surprise of many, and despite his seriousness, Rommel began to improve slightly. In the words of Dr. Esch, one of the most popular doctors of the Nazi regime, who worked tirelessly to keep the marshal alive, said: "Rommel overcame the operations with his left eye completely closed, completely deaf in his left ear and with terrible transient migraines. It was the sixth wound he had received in the line of duty."

Rommel, fed up with Hitler, was aware of the horror of the concentration camps and decided to get involved in the fall of the Führer.

TREASON, SUICIDE AND BURIAL OF A LEGEND

By then, Rommel had already lost favor with the Führer after one of those involved had mentioned his name several times during interrogations after the attack and Hans Speidel, also an active collaborator in the plot, testified against him.

 

Although Rommel categorically denied his involvement, on October 14, 1944 Generals Meisel and Burgdorf showed up at his home with an offer: either commit suicide and be buried with all the honors of a heroic field marshal, or he would be killed. arrested, tried and sentenced to death, his family dishonored and their property confiscated. After an hour of interview, the two officers went to the car that was waiting for them and Rommel told his wife: "I have come to say goodbye to you. Within a quarter of an hour I will be dead. They suspect that I took part in the plot to assassinate Hitler. Apparently, my name was on a list made by Goerdeler in which they considered me the future president of the Reich. [...] They say that Von Stülpnagel, Speidel and Von Hofacker have denounced me. It is the method they always use. I answered that I did not believe what they said, that it had to be a lie. The Führer gives me the choice between poison or being tried by a people's court".

Rommel was forced to choose between committing suicide or seeing his honor and his family disgraced. He chose suicide.

 

Rommel left his house and got into the car where Meisel and Burgdorf were waiting for him. Two hundred yards from Rommel's home, General Burgdorf ordered the car to stop and the occupants to get out of the vehicle except himself and the field marshal. Minutes later, the officer got out of the car and called his colleagues who, as they approached, saw Rommel hunched over and lying in the back seat, with his marshal's cap and baton on the floor of the vehicle, in his last moments of agony after having ingested a cyanide pill.

 

Facing public opinion, Rommel was said to have died of a stroke. During his funeral, the Führer, Adolf Hitler, was unable to look at the widow and son of one of Germany's most admired soldiers.

With affection,

Ruben