Wehrmacht

The Wehrmacht (also called the Defence Forces or German Army in English) was Nazi Germany's unified military armed forces from 1935 to 1945. The Wehrmacht consisted of the Heer (army), the Kriegsmarine (navy), and the Luftwaffe (air force). Overall command of all these forces was Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW).

The Waffen-SS was not part of the Wehrmacht, but was subject to its Supreme Command. It began as a small armed section of Heinrich Himmler's Allgemeine SS, but during World War II it grew to nearly a million members.

Origin and use of the terms

Before the rise of the Nazi Party (the NSDAP), the term Wehrmacht was used in a generic sense to describe armed forces of any nation, being utilized as the "home defence" version of the more general Streitmacht. For example, the term Britische Wehrmacht would identify the British armed forces.

Article 47 of the Weimar Constitution of 1919 declared Der Reichspräsident hat den Oberbefehl über die gesamte Wehrmacht des Reiches (meaning: "The Reichspräsident holds supreme command of all armed forces of the Reich"). To make a distinction, the term Reichswehr was commonly used to identify the German armed forces.

In 1935, the Reichswehr was renamed the Wehrmacht. After World War II, under the Allied occupation of Germany, the Wehrmacht was abolished.^[1]

Today the term Wehrmacht refers to Germany's armed forces during the Nazi Germany era and World War II, both in German and English. The Wehrmacht was not only the army (Wehrmacht Heer). Wehrmacht vehicles used by Heer, Luftwaffe or Kriegsmarine had license plates with WH, WL or WM.

History

Post-World War I

World War I ended with the armistice (ceasefire) of 11 November 1918. The armed forces were called Friedensheer (peace army) in January 1919. In March 1919, the national assembly passed a law creating a 420,000-member preliminary army as Vorläufige Reichswehr.

The terms of the Treaty of Versailles were announced in May and, in June, Germany was forced to sign it. Among other terms, it limited the army to 100,000 men and the navy to 15,000. Tanks and heavy artillery were forbidden and the air force was dissolved. A new post-war military (the Reichswehr) was established on 23 March 1921.

Germany immediately found ways not to keep to these conditions. It began a secret collaboration with the Soviet Union after the Treaty of Rapallo in 1922. Germany helped the Soviet Union with industrialisation and trained Soviet officers. Meanwhile, in the Soviet Union, the Germans were allowed to research and make chemical weapons (among other projects). German tank and air force specialists could practice in the Soviet Union. Around three hundred German pilots received training at Lipetsk; some tank training took place near Kazan; and poison gas was developed at Saratov for the German army.

Under Hitler

After the death of President Paul von Hindenburg on 2 August 1934, Adolf Hitler became Reichspräsident, and thus became commander-in-chief of the Wehrmacht. All officers and soldiers of the German armed forces had to swear a personal oath of loyalty to the Führer, as Hitler was now called. By 1935, Germany was openly breaking the military restrictions of the Versailles Treaty, and conscription was reintroduced on 16 March 1935. The conscription law also formalized the name Wehrmacht.

The size of the standing army remained at about the 100,000-man limit decreed by the treaty. However, a new group of conscripts equal to this size received training each year.

On 15 October 1935, the Nazis officially announced that the Wehrmacht existed. Their insignia was a simpler version of the Iron Cross (the straight-armed Balkenkreuz or 'beamed cross'). This had been used as an aircraft and tank marking late in World War I.

War years

German Army

Throughout World War II, around 90% of the Wehrmacht's units traveled by foot and used horses to move artillery. However, some units were motorized. They received much attention in the world press in the opening years of the war. Some suggested they were the reason why the Nazis succeeded in their invasions of Poland (September 1939), Norway (April 1940), Denmark, Belgium, France and Netherlands (May 1940), Yugoslavia (April 1941) and the early campaigns in the Soviet Union (June 1941).

Once the United States entered the war in December 1941, the Wehrmacht was engaged in ground campaigns against two major industrial powers. At this critical point, Hitler took personal control of the Wehrmacht high command. His personal failings as a military commander arguably contributed to major defeats in the spring of 1943, at Stalingrad and Tunis in North Africa.

German Air Force

The German Air Force (Luftwaffe), led by Hermann Göring, contributed many units of ground forces to the war in Russia as well as the Normandy front. In 1940, the Fallschirmjäger paratroops conquered the Belgian Fort Eben-Emael and took part in the airborne invasion of Norway, but after suffering heavy losses in the Battle of Crete, large scale airdrops were discontinued. Operating as ordinary infantry, the 1st Fallschirmjäger Division took part in the Battle of Monte Cassino.

German Navy

The German Navy (Kriegsmarine) played a major role in the Second World War as control over the commerce routes in the Atlantic was crucial for Germany, Britain and later the Soviet Union. In the Battle of the Atlantic, the initially successful German U-boat fleet arm was eventually defeated due to Allied technological advances like sonar, radar, and the breaking of the Enigma code. Large surface vessels were few in number due to construction limitations by international treaties prior to 1935. The "pocket battleships" Admiral Graf Spee and Admiral Scheer were important as commerce raiders only in the opening year of the war. No aircraft carrier was operational as German leadership lost interest in the Graf Zeppelin which had been launched in 1938. Following the loss of Bismarck in 1941, with Allied air superiority threatening the remaining battlecruisers in French Atlantic harbours, the ships were ordered to go back to German ports.

German Armed Elite Guard

Although the Waffen-SS (Armed SS) was not technically a part of the Wehrmacht, they were under the control of the Wehrmacht High Command during World War 2. They were considered as elite troops, and suffered heavy losses (more than the normal army).

War crimes

Polish prisoners of War shot by Wehrmacht in 1939

The Wehrmacht was used as a tool of state policy in the Second World War, for both military and political aims. There is considerable controversy over the allegations that the Wehrmacht was found to be significantly rather than incidentally involved in the Holocaust, especially because the elements of the SS and Gestapo involved in the Holocaust were not the Waffen-SS and not under the control of the OKW or field commanders. The Wehrmacht ordered and participated in massacres of civilians for reprisals, executions of prisoners of war, summary executions of Soviet political officers and executions of military and civilian hostages as punishment for partisan activities in occupied territories.However, the oft-repeeated claim of breaking the Geneva convention by its treatment of Russian prisoners of war is not correct. Common Clause 2 of the Geneva Convention states that the treatment requirements apply where both parties are signatories of the Conventions. The Germans were signatories, The Russians refused to sign.

Related pages

References

↑ When West Germany remilitarized in 1955, its newly-created armed forces became known as the Bundeswehr ("Federal Defence Force"). East Germany's armed forces, formally established in 1956, were known as the National People's Army (Nationale Volksarmee). When East Germany (the German Democratic Republic) was incorporated into "West Germany" (the Federal Republic of Germany) in 1990, much of the Volksarmee property and some of the staff were also incorporated into the Bundeswehr.

Max Hastings, Overlord: D-Day and the Battle for Normandy 1944, 1985, reissued 1999, Pan, ISBN 0-330-39012-0
Max Hastings, Armageddon: The Battle for Germany 1945, 2004, Macmillan, ISBN 0-333-90836-8
Anthony A Evans, World War II: An Illustrated Miscellany, 2005, Worth Press, ISBN 1-84567-681-5
Geoffrey P. Megargee, "War of Annihilation. Combat and Genocide on the Eastern Front, 1941", 2006, Rowman & Littelefield, ISBN 0742-54481-8
W.J.K. Davies, German Army Handbook, 1973, Ian Allen Ltd., Shepperton, Surrey, ISBN 0-7110-0290-8
Fest, Joachim; Plotting Hitler's Death—The Story of the German Resistance, Henry Holt and Company, New York, 1996. ISBN 0-8050-4213-X

Other websites

[1] When West Germany remilitarized in 1955, its newly-created armed forces became known as the Bundeswehr ("Federal Defence Force"). East Germany's armed forces, formally established in 1956, were known as the National People's Army (Nationale Volksarmee). When East Germany (the German Democratic Republic) was incorporated into "West Germany" (the Federal Republic of Germany) in 1990, much of the Volksarmee property and some of the staff were also incorporated into the Bundeswehr.

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