196-525: The SS Division Hitlerjugend or 12th SS Panzer Division "Hitlerjugend" ( German : 12. SS-Panzerdivision "Hitlerjugend" ) was a German armoured division of the Waffen-SS during World War II . The majority of its junior enlisted men were drawn from members of the Hitler Youth , while the senior NCOs and officers were from other Waffen-SS divisions. Most of the enlisted men were teenagers , starting from
392-513: A Prussian family with a long military tradition, von Rundstedt entered the Prussian Army in 1892. During World War I , he served mainly as a staff officer . In the interwar period , he continued his military career, reaching the rank of Colonel General ( Generaloberst ) before retiring in 1938. He was recalled at the beginning of World War II as commander of Army Group South in the invasion of Poland . He commanded Army Group A during
588-460: A de facto official language of Namibia after the end of German colonial rule alongside English and Afrikaans , and had de jure co-official status from 1984 until its independence from South Africa in 1990. However, the Namibian government perceived Afrikaans and German as symbols of apartheid and colonialism, and decided English would be the sole official language upon independence, stating that it
784-402: A second language , and 75–100 million as a foreign language . This would imply the existence of approximately 175–220 million German speakers worldwide. German sociolinguist Ulrich Ammon estimated a number of 289 million German foreign language speakers without clarifying the criteria by which he classified a speaker. As of 2012 , about 90 million people, or 16% of
980-587: A "commonly used" language and the Pan South African Language Board is obligated to promote and ensure respect for it. Cameroon was also a colony of the German Empire from the same period (1884 to 1916). However, German was replaced by French and English, the languages of the two successor colonial powers, after its loss in World War I . Nevertheless, since the 21st century, German has become
1176-776: A confrontation with Poland over the Polish Corridor , and planning for a war with Poland began. In May, Hitler approved Rundstedt's appointment as commander of Army Group South, to invade Poland from Silesia and Slovakia . His chief of staff was General Erich von Manstein , his chief of operations Colonel Günther Blumentritt . His principal field commanders would be (from west to east as they entered Poland) General Johannes Blaskowitz (8th Army), General Walther von Reichenau (10th Army), and General Wilhelm List (14 Army). Rundstedt's armies advanced rapidly into southern Poland, capturing Kraków on 6 September, but Reichenau's over-ambitious attempt to take Warsaw by storm on 9 September
1372-570: A decisive victory was possible at this point; while saying farewell to the commander of Army Group North in early May, he remarked: "See you again in Siberia." The attack began on 22 June. Despite ample warning from intelligence sources and defectors, Joseph Stalin and the Soviet Command were caught by surprise, and the Germans rapidly broke through the frontier defences, helped by their total command of
1568-556: A few months indiscriminately. By December 1941, when Rundstedt was dismissed as commander of Army Group South, Einsatzgruppen C and D had killed between 100,000 and 150,000 people. In addition, various units participated in killing 33,000 Kiev Jews at Babi Yar in September 1941, only days after the city was occupied by the Army. The Army did participate directly in these mass killings: officers of Reichenau's 6th Army took part in organising
1764-556: A greater need for regularity in written conventions. While the major changes of the MHG period were socio-cultural, High German was still undergoing significant linguistic changes in syntax, phonetics, and morphology as well (e.g. diphthongization of certain vowel sounds: hus (OHG & MHG "house") → haus (regionally in later MHG)→ Haus (NHG), and weakening of unstressed short vowels to schwa [ə]: taga (OHG "days")→ tage (MHG)). A great wealth of texts survives from
1960-419: A group of senior officers in opposing the appointment, on the grounds that Reichenau was too openly a supporter of the regime. Hitler and Blomberg backed down and General Werner Freiherr von Fritsch was appointed instead. When Fritsch was forced to resign in 1938, Rundstedt again blocked Reichenau's appointment, and the post went to General Walther von Brauchitsch . Like most of the Army, von Rundstedt feared
2156-678: A lieutenant in June 1893. He made a good impression on his superiors. In 1896 he was made regimental adjutant, and in 1903 he was sent to the prestigious War Academy ( Kriegsakademie ) in Berlin for a three-year staff officer training course. At the end of his course Rundstedt was described as "an outstandingly able officer ... well suited for the General Staff." He married Luise "Bila" von Goetz in January 1902 and their only child, Hans Gerd von Rundstedt,
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#17328520193922352-452: A meeting of senior commanders. At the meeting widespread opposition to Hitler's plans to coerce Czechoslovakia over the Sudetenland issue was expressed. Beck urged the officers to oppose Hitler's plans openly, but Rundstedt, while agreeing about the dangers of war before Germany was fully re-armed, would not support him, but declared himself unwilling to provoke a new crisis between Hitler and
2548-462: A misunderstanding. He suggested that Rundstedt take a period of leave, "and then once more place your incomparable services at my disposal." On 5 December, his honour restored, Rundstedt left Poltava, never to return to the Russian front. Shortly after his return to Kassel , on his 66th birthday, Rundstedt received a cheque from Hitler for 250,000 Reichsmarks. This was part of Hitler's policy of buying
2744-453: A native tongue today, mostly descendants of German colonial settlers . The period of German colonialism in Namibia also led to the evolution of a Standard German-based pidgin language called " Namibian Black German ", which became a second language for parts of the indigenous population. Although it is nearly extinct today, some older Namibians still have some knowledge of it. German remained
2940-499: A number of other field commanders were to be promoted to the rank of Field Marshal ( Generalfeldmarschall ) during the 1940 Field Marshal Ceremony . Although Rundstedt wished to resume his retirement, he was persuaded by Hitler to stay in France and set up headquarters at Saint-Germain-en-Laye about 20 km (12 mi) outside Paris. There he oversaw the planning for the proposed invasion of Britain, Operation Sealion , but never took
3136-623: A pause while the armoured units recovered and the infantry caught up, and Rundstedt agreed to this. At the same time, Göring attempted to persuade Hitler that the Luftwaffe could destroy the trapped Allied armies, freeing the German forces to turn south towards Paris. Hitler accepted this view, and on 24 May issued what became known as the Halt Order , preventing the German armour from rapidly capturing Calais and Dunkirk . The Luftwaffe were unable to destroy
3332-679: A popular foreign language among pupils and students, with 300,000 people learning or speaking German in Cameroon in 2010 and over 230,000 in 2020. Today Cameroon is one of the African countries outside Namibia with the highest number of people learning German. In the United States, German is the fifth most spoken language in terms of native and second language speakers after English, Spanish , French , and Chinese (with figures for Cantonese and Mandarin combined), with over 1 million total speakers. In
3528-479: A reprisal against the civilian population after the railway they were on was sabotaged. The commander of the convoy, SS- Obersturmführer Walter Hauck , ordered troops to search and arrest all male members of the houses on both sides of the track. Altogether, 70 men were shot beside the railway line and another 16 killed in the village. In 1949, Hauck was put on trial in Lille, France, and was sentenced to death. His sentence
3724-475: A result, the surviving texts are written in highly disparate regional dialects and exhibit significant Latin influence, particularly in vocabulary. At this point monasteries, where most written works were produced, were dominated by Latin, and German saw only occasional use in official and ecclesiastical writing. While there is no complete agreement over the dates of the Middle High German (MHG) period, it
3920-693: A series of meetings in October and November. They were opposed to an offensive so close to the onset of winter, and they were opposed to launching the main attack through Belgium, where the many rivers and canals would hamper armoured operations. Manstein in particular, supported by Rundstedt, argued for an armoured assault by Army Group A, across the Ardennes to the sea, cutting the British and French off in Belgium. This " Manstein Plan "
4116-580: Is a recognized minority language in the following countries: In France, the High German varieties of Alsatian and Moselle Franconian are identified as " regional languages ", but the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages of 1998 has not yet been ratified by the government. Namibia also was a colony of the German Empire, from 1884 to 1915. About 30,000 people still speak German as
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#17328520193924312-596: Is also notable for its broad spectrum of dialects , with many varieties existing in Europe and other parts of the world. Some of these non-standard varieties have become recognized and protected by regional or national governments. Since 2004, heads of state of the German-speaking countries have met every year, and the Council for German Orthography has been the main international body regulating German orthography . German
4508-546: Is an Indo-European language that belongs to the West Germanic group of the Germanic languages . The Germanic languages are traditionally subdivided into three branches: North Germanic , East Germanic , and West Germanic . The first of these branches survives in modern Danish , Swedish , Norwegian , Faroese , and Icelandic , all of which are descended from Old Norse . The East Germanic languages are now extinct, and Gothic
4704-472: Is called the "German Sprachraum ". German is the official language of the following countries: German is a co-official language of the following countries: Although expulsions and (forced) assimilation after the two World wars greatly diminished them, minority communities of mostly bilingual German native speakers exist in areas both adjacent to and detached from the Sprachraum. Within Europe, German
4900-430: Is complicated by the existence of several varieties whose status as separate "languages" or "dialects" is disputed for political and linguistic reasons, including quantitatively strong varieties like certain forms of Alemannic and Low German . With the inclusion or exclusion of certain varieties, it is estimated that approximately 90–95 million people speak German as a first language , 10–25 million speak it as
5096-594: Is evident that the 12th SS was not capable of conducting successful offensive operations against prepared positions in Normandy. Artillery and anti-tank guns were the key to victory, and the Allies possessed large numbers of these effective weapons. All of the German assaults were checked and defeated in detail. The 3rd Canadian Division had won a decisive victory". The 3rd Canadian Division ceased major combat operations until July, with only one day of major operations, on 11 June, at
5292-520: Is generally seen as ending when the 1346–53 Black Death decimated Europe's population. Modern High German begins with the Early New High German (ENHG) period, which Wilhelm Scherer dates 1350–1650, terminating with the end of the Thirty Years' War . This period saw the further displacement of Latin by German as the primary language of courtly proceedings and, increasingly, of literature in
5488-595: Is generally seen as lasting from 1050 to 1350. This was a period of significant expansion of the geographical territory occupied by Germanic tribes, and consequently of the number of German speakers. Whereas during the Old High German period the Germanic tribes extended only as far east as the Elbe and Saale rivers, the MHG period saw a number of these tribes expanding beyond this eastern boundary into Slavic territory (known as
5684-559: Is less closely related to languages based on Low Franconian dialects (e.g., Dutch and Afrikaans), Low German or Low Saxon dialects (spoken in northern Germany and southern Denmark ), neither of which underwent the High German consonant shift. As has been noted, the former of these dialect types is Istvaeonic and the latter Ingvaeonic, whereas the High German dialects are all Irminonic; the differences between these languages and standard German are therefore considerable. Also related to German are
5880-435: Is one of the major languages of the world . German is the second-most widely spoken Germanic language , after English, both as a first and as a second language . German is also widely taught as a foreign language , especially in continental Europe (where it is the third most taught foreign language after English and French), and in the United States. Overall, German is the fourth most commonly learned second language, and
6076-587: Is one of the three biggest newspapers in Namibia and the only German-language daily in Africa. An estimated 12,000 people speak German or a German variety as a first language in South Africa, mostly originating from different waves of immigration during the 19th and 20th centuries. One of the largest communities consists of the speakers of "Nataler Deutsch", a variety of Low German concentrated in and around Wartburg . The South African constitution identifies German as
12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend - Misplaced Pages Continue
6272-401: Is partly derived from Latin and Greek , along with fewer words borrowed from French and Modern English . English, however, is the main source of more recent loanwords . German is a pluricentric language ; the three standardized variants are German , Austrian , and Swiss Standard German . Standard German is sometimes called High German , which refers to its regional origin. German
6468-510: Is the Sachsenspiegel , the first book of laws written in Middle Low German ( c. 1220 ). The abundance and especially the secular character of the literature of the MHG period demonstrate the beginnings of a standardized written form of German, as well as the desire of poets and authors to be understood by individuals on supra-dialectal terms. The Middle High German period
6664-750: Is the most spoken native language within the European Union . It is the most widely spoken and official (or co-official) language in Germany , Austria , Switzerland , Liechtenstein , and the Italian autonomous province of South Tyrol . It is also an official language of Luxembourg , Belgium and the Italian autonomous region of Friuli-Venezia Giulia , as well as a recognized national language in Namibia . There are also notable German-speaking communities in France ( Alsace ),
6860-566: Is the only language in this branch which survives in written texts. The West Germanic languages, however, have undergone extensive dialectal subdivision and are now represented in modern languages such as English, German, Dutch , Yiddish , Afrikaans , and others. Within the West Germanic language dialect continuum, the Benrath and Uerdingen lines (running through Düsseldorf - Benrath and Krefeld - Uerdingen , respectively) serve to distinguish
7056-481: Is understood in all areas where German is spoken. Approximate distribution of native German speakers (assuming a rounded total of 95 million) worldwide: As a result of the German diaspora , as well as the popularity of German taught as a foreign language , the geographical distribution of German speakers (or "Germanophones") spans all inhabited continents. However, an exact, global number of native German speakers
7252-673: The Ostsiedlung ). With the increasing wealth and geographic spread of the Germanic groups came greater use of German in the courts of nobles as the standard language of official proceedings and literature. A clear example of this is the mittelhochdeutsche Dichtersprache employed in the Hohenstaufen court in Swabia as a standardized supra-dialectal written language. While these efforts were still regionally bound, German began to be used in place of Latin for certain official purposes, leading to
7448-630: The 6th SS Panzer Army of SS- Oberstgruppenführer Sepp Dietrich , which was forming up for Operation Wacht am Rhein (the Second Battle of the Ardennes, popularly known as the Battle of the Bulge ), a large-scale offensive to recapture Antwerp and halt the Allied advance. The operation opened on 16 December 1944, with Kampfgruppe Peiper from the 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler breaking through
7644-627: The Alamanni , Bavarian, and Thuringian groups, all belonging to the Elbe Germanic group ( Irminones ), which had settled in what is now southern-central Germany and Austria between the second and sixth centuries, during the great migration. In general, the surviving texts of Old High German (OHG) show a wide range of dialectal diversity with very little written uniformity. The early written tradition of OHG survived mostly through monasteries and scriptoria as local translations of Latin originals; as
7840-594: The Battle of France , and requested the Halt Order during the Battle of Dunkirk . He was promoted to the rank of Field Marshal in 1940. In the invasion of the Soviet Union , he commanded Army Group South , responsible for the largest encirclement in history, the Battle of Kiev . He was relieved of command in December 1941 after authorizing the withdrawal from Rostov but was recalled in 1942 and appointed Commander-in-Chief in
8036-657: The Battle of Le Mesnil-Patry . This saw the 12th SS inflict many casualties on the Queen's Own Rifles of Canada and the 1st Hussars (6th Armoured Regiment) which lost 51 Sherman tanks . Also on 11 June the 46th Royal Marine Commando assaulted Rots . The official historian of Le Régiment de la Chaudière , described the "ferocious battle" including hand-to-hand fighting and "smoldering" tanks, "from each blackened turret hangs
12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend - Misplaced Pages Continue
8232-626: The Battle of the Falaise Pocket . In December 1944, the division was committed against the US Army in the Ardennes offensive . After the operation's failure, which became known as the Battle of the Bulge, the division was sent to Hungary to participate in fighting around Budapest . The division eventually retreated into Austria and surrendered to the 7th US Army on 8 May 1945. After the war several members of
8428-474: The Commissar Order was issued, which stated that all Red Army commissars were to be executed when captured. Rundstedt testified at Nuremberg about the attitude of the Army to this Order: "Our attitude was unanimously and absolutely against it. Immediately after the conference we approached Brauchitsch and told him that this was impossible ... The order was simply not carried out." This latter statement
8624-557: The Czech Republic ( North Bohemia ), Poland ( Upper Silesia ), Slovakia ( Košice Region , Spiš , and Hauerland ), Denmark ( North Schleswig ), Romania and Hungary ( Sopron ). Overseas, sizeable communities of German-speakers are found in Brazil ( Blumenau and Pomerode ), South Africa ( Kroondal ), Namibia , among others, some communities have decidedly Austrian German or Swiss German characters (e.g. Pozuzo , Peru). German
8820-522: The Early Middle Ages . German is an inflected language , with four cases for nouns, pronouns, and adjectives (nominative, accusative, genitive, dative); three genders (masculine, feminine, neuter) and two numbers (singular, plural). It has strong and weak verbs . The majority of its vocabulary derives from the ancient Germanic branch of the Indo-European language family, while a smaller share
9016-417: The European Union 's population, spoke German as their mother tongue, making it the second most widely spoken language on the continent after Russian and the second biggest language in terms of overall speakers (after English), as well as the most spoken native language. The area in central Europe where the majority of the population speaks German as a first language and has German as a (co-)official language
9212-577: The Falaise Pocket . The 12th SS, along with several other German units and panzer ace SS- Oberscharführer Rudolf Roy who destroyed 26 Allied tanks, was instrumental in re-opening the corridor out of the pocket on 20 August, allowing an estimated 10,000 German soldiers to escape encirclement. During their retreat from France, members of the LSSAH and the Hitlerjugend division murdered 34 French civilians in
9408-514: The German states . While these states were still part of the Holy Roman Empire , and far from any form of unification, the desire for a cohesive written language that would be understandable across the many German-speaking principalities and kingdoms was stronger than ever. As a spoken language German remained highly fractured throughout this period, with a vast number of often mutually incomprehensible regional dialects being spoken throughout
9604-462: The HSSPF (Higher SS and Police Leadership). Himmler set up four Einsatzgruppen under the overall command of Reinhard Heydrich . In Rundstedt's area of command, Einsatzgruppe C, commanded by Otto Rasch , operated in northern Ukraine, and Einsatzgruppe D, commanded by Otto Ohlendorf , operated in southern Ukraine. The Einsatzgruppen were initially ordered to establish "security" in
9800-724: The Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian I , and the other being Meißner Deutsch , used in the Electorate of Saxony in the Duchy of Saxe-Wittenberg . Alongside these courtly written standards, the invention of the printing press led to the development of a number of printers' languages ( Druckersprachen ) aimed at making printed material readable and understandable across as many diverse dialects of German as possible. The greater ease of production and increased availability of written texts brought about increased standardisation in
9996-768: The IX SS Mountain Corps had been encircled. While the division was in transit, the IV SS Panzer Corps launched several unsuccessful relief operations. The division, alongside the LSSAH as a part of I SS Panzer Corps arrived in Hungary in early February 1945, a few days before the city fell. The division next took part in Operation Spring Awakening , another operation to retake the Hungarian oilfields. The attack got underway on 6 March 1945; after initial success,
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#173285201939210192-644: The Old High German language in several Elder Futhark inscriptions from as early as the sixth century AD (such as the Pforzen buckle ), the Old High German period is generally seen as beginning with the Abrogans (written c. 765–775 ), a Latin-German glossary supplying over 3,000 Old High German words with their Latin equivalents. After the Abrogans , the first coherent works written in Old High German appear in
10388-407: The Regina Rifles , 7th Canadian Infantry Brigade, 3rd Canadian Division . Their orders were to overrun the Canadians and force a deep wedge between them and the British to the west. No reconnaissance of the Canadian positions was done and the infantry met intense defensive fire from firmly established positions. The attack at 03:30 hours on 8 June had little initial success. The various companies in
10584-427: The Sprachraum in Europe. German is used in a wide variety of spheres throughout the country, especially in business, tourism, and public signage, as well as in education, churches (most notably the German-speaking Evangelical Lutheran Church in Namibia (GELK) ), other cultural spheres such as music, and media (such as German language radio programs by the Namibian Broadcasting Corporation ). The Allgemeine Zeitung
10780-422: The Standard German language in its written form, and the Duden Handbook was declared its standard definition. Punctuation and compound spelling (joined or isolated compounds) were not standardized in the process. The Deutsche Bühnensprache ( lit. ' German stage language ' ) by Theodor Siebs had established conventions for German pronunciation in theatres , three years earlier; however, this
10976-400: The Upper German dialects spoken in the southern German-speaking countries , such as Swiss German ( Alemannic dialects ) and the various Germanic dialects spoken in the French region of Grand Est , such as Alsatian (mainly Alemannic, but also Central–and Upper Franconian dialects) and Lorraine Franconian (Central Franconian). After these High German dialects, standard German
11172-408: The pagan Germanic tradition. Of particular interest to scholars, however, has been the Hildebrandslied , a secular epic poem telling the tale of an estranged father and son unknowingly meeting each other in battle. Linguistically, this text is highly interesting due to the mixed use of Old Saxon and Old High German dialects in its composition. The written works of this period stem mainly from
11368-495: The 12th SS Panzer Regiment, arrived and moved into position north-west of Caen. Supported by a battalion of artillery (3rd Battalion, 12th SS Panzer Regiment), this battle group was ordered to stop the Canadian advance and drive through to the coast, a few kilometres away. They failed to break through the Canadians around Buron , a kilometre to the north. Meyer countermanded the divisional commander's order on his own initiative, feeling that objective unrealistic and hoped merely to stop
11564-427: The 12th SS reached their assembly area near Evrecy at 22:00 hours on 6 June but the Panther battalion ran out of fuel east of the Orne River. According to Marc Milner, "[t]his was just the first example of sloppy staff work and command and control that characterized 12th SS Division's experience in the beachhead battles". At 10:00 hours on 7 June, the 25th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment, along with 50 Panzer IV tanks of
11760-513: The 21st . But the Soviets had had time to prepare, and launched a counter-offensive on the 25th. On the 28th Rundstedt authorised Kleist to withdraw from Rostov and establish a front on the Mius , 70 km to the west. When Hitler heard of this the next day, he ordered that Rostov should be held, although it had in fact already been evacuated. Rundstedt replied by insisting on his decision, and adding: "Should confidence in my leadership no longer exist, I beg to request someone be substituted who enjoys
11956-479: The 26th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment under command of SS- Obersturmbannfuhrer Wilhelm Mohnke arrived on the battlefield. Meyer had pushed back one part of the Canadian advance but to the west, the 7th Canadian Infantry Brigade had occupied a group of small villages three kilometres into the German line. The 26th Panzergrenadier Regiment crossed behind Meyer's regiment and took post to the west. The 1st Battalion launched an attack towards Norrey-en-Bessin , defended by
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#173285201939212152-441: The Allied armies, however, and the halt allowed the British Expeditionary Force and many French troops to be evacuated from Dunkirk . This decision, for which Hitler, Rundstedt and Kleist shared responsibility, proved very costly to Germany's war effort in the long term. After the war, Rundstedt described the Halt Order as "an incredible blunder" and assigned full blame to Hitler. His biographer concedes that this "does not represent
12348-400: The American lines with some difficulty. After the 12th SS reached the front, it was met with heavy resistance from American troops stationed on the Elsenborn Ridge . Despite repeated efforts, the division could not budge the American defenders. As a result, the division was ordered to swing left and follow the advance line of the remainder of the 1st SS Panzer Division. American troops prevented
12544-400: The Army Command's apparent tolerance of such incidents. Nevertheless, as commander of Army Group South, Rundstedt was legally responsible for the behaviour of his troops, and these incidents later formed part of the charges of war crimes against him. Behind the Army came SS Einsatzgruppen (task forces) commanded by Theodor Eicke , who began systematically executing Jews and members of
12740-526: The Army) declined to pass on Fritsch's letter. During 1938 and 1939 Beck and other senior officers were hatching plots to remove Hitler from power if he provoked a new war with Britain and France over Czechoslovakia or Poland, a war they were convinced Germany would lose. Rundstedt was aware of these plots, and Beck tried to recruit him to the plotters' ranks, knowing of his disdain for the Nazi regime. But Rundstedt stuck firmly to his position that officers should not be involved in politics, no matter how grave
12936-403: The Army, apparently at the request of General Wilhelm Groener , who assumed leadership of the shattered Army. He briefly rejoined the General Staff, but this was abolished under the terms of the Treaty of Versailles , signed in June 1919. In October, Rundstedt was posted to the staff of Military District ( Wehrkreis ) V, based in Stuttgart , under General Walter von Bergmann. He was there when
13132-442: The Army. He advised Brauchitsch not to confront Hitler, apparently afraid that Brauchitsch would be dismissed and replaced by Reichenau. When Hitler heard about the meeting, Beck was forced to resign. Even after this, two of Rundstedt's friends, Generals Erwin von Witzleben and Erich Hoepner , remained involved in anti-Hitler plots and continued to try to recruit him. In November 1938, shortly after his division had taken part in
13328-435: The Canadian War Crimes Commission (CWCC) strove to discover the details of the murders. As commander of the regiment, Kurt Meyer was the prime suspect. At Meyer's war crimes trial in December 1945, he was found guilty of inciting his troops to commit murder and of being responsible as a commander for the killings at the Abbey. He was sentenced to death on 28 December 1945; his sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 1946. He
13524-407: The Carpathians, were to thrust south-eastwards into Ukraine, aiming to capture Kiev and encircle and destroy the Soviet forces west of the Dnieper . In the south, General Eugen Ritter von Schobert (11th Army), supported by the Hungarian and Romanian armies, and also an Italian Army Corps, was to advance into Bessarabia (now Moldova ) and the southern Ukraine. It's unlikely that Rundstedt thought
13720-614: The Empire. Its use indicated that the speaker was a merchant or someone from an urban area, regardless of nationality. Prague (German: Prag ) and Budapest ( Buda , German: Ofen ), to name two examples, were gradually Germanized in the years after their incorporation into the Habsburg domain; others, like Pressburg ( Pozsony , now Bratislava), were originally settled during the Habsburg period and were primarily German at that time. Prague, Budapest, Bratislava, and cities like Zagreb (German: Agram ) or Ljubljana (German: Laibach ), contained significant German minorities. In
13916-433: The French along the Maginot Line . Manstein was again his chief of staff and Blumentritt his chief of operations, although Manstein soon departed to command an infantry corps and was replaced by General Georg von Sodenstern . Rundstedt's main field commanders (from north to south) were Blaskowitz (9th Army), List (12th Army) and General Ernst Busch (16th Army). Hitler's original plan was to attack in late November, before
14112-775: The French and British had time fully to deploy along their front. The plan, devised by Hitler, was essentially for a re-run of the invasion of 1914, with the main assault to come in the north, through Belgium and the Netherlands, then wheeling south to capture Paris, leaving the French Army anchored on the Maginot Line. Most senior officers were opposed to both the timing and the plan. Rundstedt, Manstein, Reichenau (commanding 6th Army in Army Group B), List and Brauchitsch remonstrated with Hitler in
14308-718: The Frisian languages— North Frisian (spoken in Nordfriesland ), Saterland Frisian (spoken in Saterland ), and West Frisian (spoken in Friesland )—as well as the Anglic languages of English and Scots. These Anglo-Frisian dialects did not take part in the High German consonant shift, and the Anglic languages also adopted much vocabulary from both Old Norse and the Norman language . The history of
14504-462: The German Army in the Soviet Union had suffered nearly 500,000 casualties. In a statement to the Army on 15 August, Rundstedt acknowledged: "It is only natural that such great effort would result in fatigue, the combat strength of the troops has weakened and in many places there is a desire for rest." But, said Rundstedt: "We must keep pressure on the enemy for he has many more reserves than we." This
14700-516: The German Army. In fact Rundstedt refused to have anything to do with the money, handing it over to his daughter-in-law, and it was still untouched at his death in 1953. In April 1941, during the planning phase of Barbarossa, Himmler and Brauchitsch had agreed that as the Army conquered Soviet territory, it would be handed over at once to the SS and the German Police, now fused under Himmler's leadership in
14896-551: The German advance was slowed by the autumn rains and the Soviet scorched earth policy, which denied the Germans food and fuel and forced them to rely on overstretched lines of supply. Rundstedt's armies were also weakened by the transfer of units back to Army Group Centre to take part in the attack on Moscow ( Operation Typhoon ). Reichenau did not take Kharkov until 24 October. Nevertheless, during October Rundstedt's forces won another great victory when Manstein and Kleist's tanks reached
15092-613: The German invasion of Yugoslavia and Greece in April, as is commonly supposed). Rundstedt moved his headquarters to Tarnów in south-eastern Poland. Since the dividing line between Army Group Centre and Army Group South was just south of Brest-Litovsk , he was in command of more than half of the total German-Soviet front. Sodenstern was again his chief of staff. Under his command were (from north to south) Reichenau (6th Army), Kleist (1st Panzer Army) and General Carl-Heinrich von Stülpnagel (17th Army). These three armies, bunched between Lublin and
15288-475: The German language begins with the High German consonant shift during the Migration Period , which separated Old High German dialects from Old Saxon . This sound shift involved a drastic change in the pronunciation of both voiced and voiceless stop consonants ( b , d , g , and p , t , k , respectively). The primary effects of the shift were the following below. While there is written evidence of
15484-517: The German lines, with which 6th Army at any rate was actively co-operating, Rundstedt's open endorsement of its strongly anti-Semitic language clearly contradicts his later assertions that he did not know what the Einsatzgruppen were doing. He told interrogators in 1946 that he was aware of just one atrocity, at Berdichev on 30 July. At Nuremberg he sought to portray the issue in terms of anti-partisan warfare : "Disorderly, irregular warfare behind
15680-481: The German plan for victory in the west known as the Schlieffen Plan . Von Rundstedt served as 22nd Division's chief of staff during the invasion of Belgium , but he saw no action since his Division was held in reserve during the initial advance. In December 1914, suffering from a lung ailment, he was promoted to Major and transferred to the military government of Antwerp . In April 1915 his health recovered, and he
15876-447: The German states; the invention of the printing press c. 1440 and the publication of Luther's vernacular translation of the Bible in 1534, however, had an immense effect on standardizing German as a supra-dialectal written language. The ENHG period saw the rise of several important cross-regional forms of chancery German, one being gemeine tiutsch , used in the court of
16072-544: The German war effort and contribute to the ultimate downfall of the Third Reich . Despite the triumph at Kiev, by the end of September Rundstedt was becoming concerned about the state of his command. After three months of continuous fighting, the German armies were exhausted, and the Panzer divisions were in urgent need of new equipment as a result of losses in battle and damage from the poorly-paved Ukrainian roads. As autumn set in,
16268-675: The Germanic dialects that were affected by the High German consonant shift (south of Benrath) from those that were not (north of Uerdingen). The various regional dialects spoken south of these lines are grouped as High German dialects, while those spoken to the north comprise the Low German and Low Franconian dialects. As members of the West Germanic language family, High German, Low German, and Low Franconian have been proposed to be further distinguished historically as Irminonic , Ingvaeonic , and Istvaeonic , respectively. This classification indicates their historical descent from dialects spoken by
16464-446: The Germans' weakened state. Rundstedt, aware of the grim reality, acknowledged the growing resilience and capability of the Soviet forces. The campaign that was envisioned as a quick, decisive victory was now evolving into a drawn-out war of attrition, with the Germans struggling to maintain their foothold against a resurgent and determined enemy. This shift marked the beginning of a protracted and brutal conflict that would eventually drain
16660-561: The Hitler-Stalin pact had served Germany's interests well, both strategically and economically, his whole career had been based on anti-communism and the belief that " Jewish Bolshevism " was the main threat to Germany and the Aryan race. In December Hitler made a firm decision for an attack on the Soviets the following spring, codenamed Operation Barbarossa . At this point Rundstedt learned that he
16856-646: The Irminones (also known as the Elbe group), Ingvaeones (or North Sea Germanic group), and Istvaeones (or Weser–Rhine group). Standard German is based on a combination of Thuringian - Upper Saxon and Upper Franconian dialects, which are Central German and Upper German dialects belonging to the High German dialect group. German is therefore closely related to the other languages based on High German dialects, such as Luxembourgish (based on Central Franconian dialects ) and Yiddish . Also closely related to Standard German are
17052-507: The MHG period. Significantly, these texts include a number of impressive secular works, such as the Nibelungenlied , an epic poem telling the story of the dragon -slayer Siegfried ( c. thirteenth century ), and the Iwein , an Arthurian verse poem by Hartmann von Aue ( c. 1203 ), lyric poems , and courtly romances such as Parzival and Tristan . Also noteworthy
17248-624: The Nazi regime at the expense of the military leadership. Together they forced the resignation of both Blomberg and Fritsch, the former under threat of blackmail because of his second wife's dubious past, and the latter on fabricated charges of homosexuality. On 31 January, Rundstedt and the Army Chief of Staff, General Ludwig Beck , representing the officer corps, had an angry meeting with Hitler. Rundstedt agreed that Blomberg had disgraced himself and demanded that he be court-martialled, which Hitler refused. On
17444-702: The Normandy campaign, with the Canadian Brigadier, Harry Foster, later noting that "no use was made of the fact that the Reginas' flanks were exposed; instead, the enemy flung himself straight against the strongest points and utterly failed to exploit the undoubted weakness of his opponent's position". On the Canadian right, the 2nd Battalion attacked the Royal Winnipeg Rifles defending the village of Putot-en-Bessin at 06:30 hours. The battalion managed to break into
17640-453: The Polish educated classes. One Einsatzgruppe commanded by Udo von Woyrsch operated in 14th Army's area. At Dynów Woyrsch's men herded the town's Jews into the synagogue then burned it down. By 20 September, over 500 Jews had been killed. In 1939, this was still too much for most German Army officers to stand. After complaints from numerous officers, Rundstedt banned Woyrsch's units from
17836-510: The Red Army was showing no signs of collapse. Rundstedt wrote to his wife on 12 August: "How much longer? I have no great hope that it will be soon. The distances in Russia devour us." Neither the success at Uman nor what followed at Kiev would have happened had Rundstedt not backed his subordinates and resisted Hitler's interference in the conduct of the campaign. As during the French campaign, Hitler
18032-550: The Sea of Azov, trapping two Soviet Armies around Mariupol and taking over 100,000 prisoners. This victory enabled Manstein to undertake the conquest of the Crimea (apart from the fortress city of Sevastopol ) against only weak opposition, while Kleist advanced towards Rostov. Despite these defeats, the Red Army was able to fall back on the Don in reasonably good order, and also to evacuate many of
18228-455: The Soviet Army's strength at the start of the war – were killed or captured, and the great majority of those captured died in captivity. Kiev fell on 19 September. Kirponos was killed in action on 20 September, shortly before resistance ceased. Rundstedt had thus presided over one of the greatest victories in the history of warfare. But this catastrophe for the Red Army resulted far more from
18424-586: The Versailles Treaty. In May 1920 he was made chief of staff to the 3rd Cavalry Division, based in Weimar , thus achieving his early ambition of being a cavalry commander. He was promoted to lieutenant-colonel ( Oberstleutnant ) in 1920, and to full colonel in 1923, when he was transferred to Wehrkreis II, based in Stettin . In 1926 he was made chief of staff to Group Command ( Gruppenkommando ) 2, which covered
18620-513: The Volga at Stalingrad . On the other hand, they were over 1,000 km from their starting point in eastern Poland, and even further from their supply bases in Germany. The Russian winter set in with full force in mid-November. The Germans were short of food, fuel, ammunition, vehicles, spare parts and winter clothing. Partisan activity was growing in their rear areas, threatening their supplies. Rundstedt
18816-579: The West. He was dismissed after the German defeat in Normandy in July 1944 but was again recalled as Commander-in-Chief in the West in September, holding this post until his final dismissal by Adolf Hitler in March 1945. Though aware of the various plots to depose Hitler, von Rundstedt neither supported nor reported them. After the war, he was charged with war crimes , but did not face trial due to his age and poor health. He
19012-578: The ages of 16 or even 15. The division committed several war crimes while en route to and during the early battles of the Allied Normandy landings , including the Ascq and Normandy massacres , and several massacres, arsons and rapes in the cities of Plomion, Tavaux, Bouillon, Godinne, Hun, Rivere, Warnant and Namur. It first saw action on 7 June 1944 as part of the German defensive operations at Caen against Allied Forces, and suffered great casualties during
19208-414: The air. But the Soviet commander in northern Ukraine, Colonel-General Mikhail Kirponos , was one of the better Soviet generals, and he commanded the Red Army's largest and best-equipped force: nearly a million men and 4,800 tanks. The Germans soon encountered stubborn resistance. Rundstedt testified at Nuremberg: "The resistance at the frontier was not too great, but it grew continually as we advanced into
19404-545: The approval of Hitler. "I do nothing that the Führer does not know", he said. The attack was finally launched on 10 May. By 14 May, armoured units under Hermann Hoth and Guderian had crossed the Meuse and had broken open the Allied front. As planned, the British and French had advanced into Belgium to meet Bock's offensive, and were in danger of being cut off there by a German thrust to the sea. Both Hitler and Rundstedt had doubts about
19600-583: The area, but after his departure his order was rescinded. On 20 October Rundstedt resigned his command and was transferred to the western front. On 25 October, Rundstedt took up his new post as commander of Army Group A, facing the French border in the Ardennes mountains sector, and based in Koblenz . To his north Army Group B under General Fedor von Bock faced the Dutch and Belgian borders, while to his south Army Group C under General Wilhelm Ritter von Leeb faced
19796-486: The attack. Two of the conspirators, Abwehr officers Hans Oster and Hans Bernd Gisevius , discussed this with Leeb, who turned them down but did not report them. On 13 March, Himmler came to Koblenz to give the generals, including Rundstedt, an ideological lecture, in the course of which he made it clear that the atrocities against civilians which some of them had witnessed in Poland had been carried out on his orders, and with
19992-518: The attacking battalion failed to coordinate effectively and suffered many casualties. Facing Canadian artillery and the supporting heavy machine guns of the Cameron Highlanders of Ottawa , the 1st Battalion of the 12th SS was forced to fall back. Despite their losses, the Regina Rifles stood their ground. The Hitlerjugend division was criticized for performing inadequately in the opening days of
20188-583: The attempted military coup known as the Kapp Putsch took place in March 1920. Bergmann and Rundstedt, like most of the Army leadership, refused to support the coup attempt: Rundstedt later described it as "a failure and a very stupid one at that." This was not an indication of any fondness for the Weimar Republic on Rundstedt's part – he remained a monarchist. It was a reflection of his view that Army officers should not interfere in politics, and should support
20384-516: The bloodless occupation of the Sudetenland, Rundstedt retired from the Army with the rank of Colonel-General ( Generaloberst ), second only to the rank of Field Marshal. It was suggested that Hitler had forced him out, either because of his opposition to the plan to invade Czechoslovakia or because of his support for Fritsch, but this seems not be the case: he had in fact asked permission to retire some time earlier. Just short of his 63rd birthday, he
20580-488: The charred corpse of a machine gunner". The following two weeks was a period of relative quiet, as both sides were exhausted. What did not stop was the constant Allied artillery, naval bombardment and air attacks. Major operations for both sides began again in July, including Operation Windsor and Operation Charnwood . During Charnwood, the division was driven from its positions in Buron and nearby villages of Gruchy and Cussy and
20776-478: The combination of the muddy terrain and strong Soviet resistance ground them to a halt. On 16 March, the Soviet forces counterattacked in strength, driving the entire southern front into a retreat towards Vienna . The Soviet forces took Vienna on 13 April. Retreating through Odenburg and Hirtenberg , the division reached Linz , Austria near the American lines. On 8 May 1945, 10,000 men of the division surrendered near
20972-439: The continuing loyalty of his senior commanders. Many found this offensive, but none turned down these gifts. Rundstedt tried to do the next best thing by failing to cash the cheque. By February this was attracting adverse comment in Berlin, and Rundstedt then cashed it. Some writers have sought to connect Rundstedt's acceptance of this money with his continuing refusal to support the resistance movement against Hitler's regime within
21168-457: The cost of joining a cavalry regiment, von Rundstedt joined the 83rd Infantry Regiment in March 1892 as a cadet officer ( Portepee Fähnrich ). The regiment was based at Kassel in Hesse-Kassel , which he came to regard as his home town and where he maintained a home until 1945. He undertook further training at the military college ( Kriegsschule ) at Hannover , before being commissioned as
21364-459: The danger of encirclement, rather than withdraw and make a stand on the Dnieper. Rundstedt therefore decided to break off the advance towards Kiev, and to direct Kleist's armour south-eastwards, towards Krivoy Rog . By 30 July the Germans were at Kirovograd , 130 km east of Uman, cutting off the Soviet line of retreat (which had in any case been forbidden by Stalin). Meanwhile, Schobert's 11th Army
21560-430: The development of non-local forms of language and exposed all speakers to forms of German from outside their own area. With Luther's rendering of the Bible in the vernacular, German asserted itself against the dominance of Latin as a legitimate language for courtly, literary, and now ecclesiastical subject-matter. His Bible was ubiquitous in the German states: nearly every household possessed a copy. Nevertheless, even with
21756-452: The dialect so as to make the work as natural and accessible to German speakers as possible. Copies of Luther's Bible featured a long list of glosses for each region, translating words which were unknown in the region into the regional dialect. Luther said the following concerning his translation method: One who would talk German does not ask the Latin how he shall do it; he must ask the mother in
21952-677: The dictates of their respective political masters rather than by the decisions of the military professionals. Stahel sums the situation up with his chapter heading: "Subordinating the generals: the dictators dictate." Kirponos could have withdrawn most of his army across the Dnieper in time had Stalin allowed him to do so, and Rundstedt himself acknowledged this. Had this happened, Rundstedt's forces would have been in no state to give chase: they were exhausted after two months of ceaseless combat. Despite their successes, they had sustained high levels of casualties and even higher levels of loss of equipment, both of which were impossible to replace. By September
22148-501: The disaster at Kiev, but it is clear that while he was out of his depth as a front commander, he warned Stalin of the danger, and was dismissed for his pains. On 12 September Kleist crossed the Dnieper at Cherkasy heading north-east, and on 16 September his tanks linked up with Guderian's at Lokhvitsa , nearly 200 km east of Kiev. Although many Soviet troops were able to escape eastwards in small groups, around 600,000 men – four whole armies comprising 43 divisions, nearly one-third of
22344-402: The division from reaching its objective, and after the destruction of Kampfgruppe Peiper from the LSSAH, the advance of Dietrich's forces was altogether stopped. On 8 January Hitler gave the authorization to withdraw. The attack was ultimately a failure. The 12th SS had been severely mauled, with only 26 tanks and assault guns and an average of 120 men remaining in each battalion. In total during
22540-555: The division, including its former commander Kurt Meyer , were convicted of war crimes. The idea for the Waffen-SS division was first proposed by Artur Axmann , the leader of the Hitler Youth , to Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler in early 1943. The plan for a division made up of Hitler Youth members born in 1926 was passed on to Adolf Hitler for his approval. Hitler approved the plan in February and SS- Gruppenführer Gottlob Berger
22736-498: The divisional command post in the Ardenne Abbey, which had been occupied since before D-Day, was lost. Witt was killed in action by a Royal Navy naval artillery barrage which hit the divisional command post at Venoix on 14 June 1944 and Kurt Meyer was placed in command of the division. In August, the division was involved in the fighting around Falaise against the Polish 1st Armoured Division battlegroups who were trying to close
22932-507: The eastern provinces of Banat , Bukovina , and Transylvania (German: Banat, Buchenland, Siebenbürgen ), German was the predominant language not only in the larger towns—like Temeschburg ( Timișoara ), Hermannstadt ( Sibiu ), and Kronstadt ( Brașov )—but also in many smaller localities in the surrounding areas. In 1901, the Second Orthographic Conference ended with a (nearly) complete standardization of
23128-677: The end of the war in November. Bothmer described him as "a wholly excellent staff officer and amiable comrade." He was awarded the Iron Cross , first class, and was recommended for the Pour le Mérite , but did not receive it. He thus ended World War I, although still a major, with a high reputation as a staff officer. Von Rundstedt's Corps disintegrated in the wake of defeat and the German Revolution , but while most officers were demobilised, he remained in
23324-462: The first reports of the landings. Prior to this Field Marshal Gerd von Rundstedt had ordered over half of the division to deal with a parachute landing on the coast near Lisieux which was found to be dummies from Operation Titanic . The division's advance to the areas near the British–Canadian landing beaches of Sword and Juno proceeded slowly due to Allied air attacks. The first units of
23520-437: The flow of Canadian units inland until the situation could be stabilized. The attack by the division was supposed to have been supported by the 21st Panzer Division but they could not disengage from fighting the British 3rd Infantry Division and were still at Couvre . Casualties of the 25th SS Panzergrenadier Regiment amounted to about 300 men, while 15 tanks from the 12th SS Panzer Regiment were also destroyed. Late on 7 June,
23716-409: The front of the Army must bring very great misery to the population of the country affected. No army in the world can tolerate such conditions for any length of time, but in the interests of the security and protection of its own troops it must take sharp, energetic measures. But this should, of course, be done in a correct and soldierly manner." Rundstedt shared the general German Army prejudice against
23912-600: The full. Without his sanction we could never have kept up our attempts to change OKW 's mind." During this hiatus, the group of senior officers who were plotting against Hitler's war plans, led by Halder, renewed their efforts, convinced that an attack in the west would lead to a war which Germany would lose. Brauchitsch agreed with Halder's fears, but continued to vacillate about opposing Hitler – he asked Reichenau and Rundstedt to remonstrate with Hitler, but they refused. Witzleben suggested that Rundstedt, Leeb and Bock should jointly refuse to carry out Hitler's orders to carry out
24108-522: The government of the day, whatever its nature: a view he was to hold firmly to throughout his career. He testified at the Nuremberg trials in 1946: "We generals did not concern ourselves with politics. We did not take part in any political discussions, and we did not hold any political discussions among ourselves." Rundstedt rose steadily in the small 100,000-man army (the Reichswehr ) allowed to Germany by
24304-488: The growing power of the Sturmabteilung (SA) and was relieved when it was purged , although he and many others were angered that two generals, Schleicher and von Bredow , were killed. He was among the senior officers who later persuaded Hitler to have these two officers posthumously (but secretly) rehabilitated. Some sources also claim he was among those senior officers who demanded courts-martial for those responsible for
24500-435: The home, the children on the streets, the common man in the market-place and note carefully how they talk, then translate accordingly. They will then understand what is said to them because it is German. When Christ says ' ex abundantia cordis os loquitur ,' I would translate, if I followed the papists, aus dem Überflusz des Herzens redet der Mund . But tell me is this talking German? What German understands such stuff? No,
24696-607: The industrial plants of the Donbass . On 3 November Brauchitsch visited Rundstedt's headquarters at Poltava , where Rundstedt told him that the armies must halt and dig in for the winter. But Hitler drove his commanders on, insisting on an advance to the Volga and into the North Caucasus , to seize the oilfields at Maikop . These demands put Rundstedt under severe strain. The Germans were more than 300 km from Maikop and 500 km from
24892-447: The inflexibility of Stalin than it did from the talents of Rundstedt as a commander or the skill of the German Army. David Stahel , a recent historian of the Kiev campaign, wrote: "Germany had been handed a triumph far in excess of what its exhausted armoured forces could have achieved without Stalin's obduracy and incompetence." In fact both the German Army and the Red Army were driven more by
25088-474: The influence of Luther's Bible as an unofficial written standard, a widely accepted standard for written German did not appear until the middle of the eighteenth century. German was the language of commerce and government in the Habsburg Empire , which encompassed a large area of Central and Eastern Europe . Until the mid-nineteenth century, it was essentially the language of townspeople throughout most of
25284-452: The interior of the country. Very strong tank forces, tanks of a better type, far superior to ours, appeared." The Soviet tank armies were in fact stronger than the German panzer divisions, and in the T-34 they possessed a superior tank: Kleist called it "the finest tank in the world." Rundstedt said after the war: "I realised soon after the attack that everything that had been written about Russia
25480-502: The invasion, and believed it would succeed. Even the most experienced officers shared Hitler's contempt for the Soviet state and army. "You have only to kick in the door," Hitler told Rundstedt, "and the whole rotten structure will come crashing down." In March Rundstedt left Paris to set up Army Group South's headquarters in Breslau . On the way he attended a conference in Berlin at which Hitler addressed senior officers. He made it clear that
25676-459: The issues at stake. On the other hand, he did not report these approaches to Hitler or the Gestapo , then or later. From a purely military point of view, Rundstedt was apprehensive about Hitler's plans to attack Czechoslovakia, since he believed that Britain and France would intervene and Germany would be defeated. Brauchitsch lacked the courage to oppose Hitler directly, but agreed to Beck's request for
25872-491: The largest concentrations of German speakers are in the states of Rio Grande do Sul (where Riograndenser Hunsrückisch developed), Santa Catarina , and Espírito Santo . Gerd von Rundstedt World War I World War II Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt (12 December 1875 – 24 February 1953) was a German Generalfeldmarschall ( Field Marshal ) in the Heer (Army) of Nazi Germany during World War II . Born into
26068-429: The march," that is, without a prolonged siege. Despite these successes, the campaign did not go according to plan. The front door was "kicked in", but the Red Army was not destroyed, and the Soviet state did not collapse. Once this became apparent, at the end of July, Hitler and his commanders had to decide how to proceed. Hitler ordered Army Group Centre to pause at Smolensk , while the panzer divisions were shipped to
26264-539: The mass of Soviet forces at Uman and Kiev to escape. Rundstedt defended Kleist's ability to execute the larger encirclement, and persuaded Brauchitsch that he was right. Brauchitsch then contacted Halder, who succeeded in persuading Hitler to support Rundstedt. This was a sign that Rundstedt still had Hitler's respect, as were Hitler's two visits to Rundstedt's armies during this period. After Uman Budyonny's forces massed around Kiev – over 700,000 men – were left dangerously exposed, with Kleist's 1st Panzer Army regrouping to
26460-669: The massacre at Babi Yar. On 10 October he issued an order (known as the "Reichenau Order") headed Conduct of the Troops in the East , in which he said: "The primary goal of the campaign against the Jewish-Bolshevist system is the absolute destruction of the means of power and the eradication of the Asian influence in the European cultural sphere ... Therefore, the soldier must have full understanding of
26656-458: The most senior commander of the German Army. He arrived in Poltava on 3 December, where he found both Reichenau and Sepp Dietrich firm in defending the correctness of Rundstedt's actions. Sodenstern explained the full circumstances of the retreat from Rostov to Hitler, an explanation which Hitler grudgingly accepted. Hitler then met with Rundstedt and excused himself on the grounds that it had all been
26852-402: The mother in the home and the plain man would say, Wesz das Herz voll ist, des gehet der Mund über . Luther's translation of the Bible into High German was also decisive for the German language and its evolution from Early New High German to modern Standard German. The publication of Luther's Bible was a decisive moment in the spread of literacy in early modern Germany , and promoted
27048-502: The murders, although Rundstedt didn't testify to that at Nuremberg. The Army was uncomfortable with the purge but Rundstedt, and the rest of the Army, still took the personal oath of loyalty to Hitler that Blomberg introduced. Rundstedt also supported the regime's plans for rearmament, culminating in the denunciation of the Treaty of Versailles in 1935, which was followed by the reintroduction of conscription. By 1935, when he turned 60, Rundstedt
27244-632: The necessary confidence of the Supreme Command ." Hitler took Rundstedt at his word, and on 1 December he dismissed him, replacing him with Reichenau. The new commander saw at once that Rundstedt was right, and succeeded in persuading Hitler, via Halder , to authorise the withdrawal. This was the first significant defeat the German Army suffered in World War II, and Rundstedt was the first senior commander to be dismissed. Hitler, however, immediately realised that he had gone too far in arbitrarily sacking
27440-503: The necessity of hard but just atonement of Jewish subhumanity [ Untermenschentum ]." Two days later Rundstedt circulated it to all his senior commanders, with the comment: "I thoroughly concur with its contents." He urged them to release their own versions and to impress upon their troops the need to exterminate the Jews. Since Reichenau's order was widely understood as endorsing the mass killings of Ukrainian Jews which were going on behind
27636-586: The new regime. In February he arranged for Hitler to meet with senior generals, including Rundstedt. Hitler assured the generals that he favoured a strong Army and that there would be no interference with its internal affairs. Von Rundstedt was satisfied with this, but made it clear in private conversations that he did not like the Nazi regime. He also said, however, that he would do nothing to oppose it. In 1934, when General Kurt Freiherr von Hammerstein-Equord resigned as chief of staff, Hitler wished to appoint General Walther von Reichenau to succeed him. Rundstedt led
27832-630: The ninth century, chief among them being the Muspilli , Merseburg charms , and Hildebrandslied , and other religious texts (the Georgslied , Ludwigslied , Evangelienbuch , and translated hymns and prayers). The Muspilli is a Christian poem written in a Bavarian dialect offering an account of the soul after the Last Judgment , and the Merseburg charms are transcriptions of spells and charms from
28028-442: The north and the south. Although Rundstedt opposed this diversion of forces, he was its beneficiary as attention was shifted to the southern front. He also benefited from disastrous decisions made by the Soviets. On 10 July Stalin appointed his old crony Marshal Semyon Budyonny commander in Ukraine, with orders to stop the German advance at all costs. Budyonny ordered Kirponos to push his forces forwards to Kiev and Uman , despite
28224-415: The offensive the division had lost 9,870 men which included 328 officers and 1,698 NCO's. By 28 January 1945, the 12th SS, along with all the German forces, had been pushed back to its starting positions. On 14 January 1945, Dietrich's 6th SS Panzer Army was ordered to Hungary where it was to take part in an offensive to recapture the Hungarian oilfields and open the way to Budapest , where 45,000 men of
28420-420: The offensive was resumed. Reichenau advanced east towards Kharkov and Kleist and Stülpnagel headed south-east towards the lower Donets. In the south 11th Army and the Romanians (commanded by Manstein following the death of Schobert) advanced along the Sea of Azov coast towards Rostov . The Soviet armies were in a poor state after the catastrophes of Uman and Kiev, and could offer only sporadic resistance, but
28616-456: The ordinary rules of warfare would not apply to the Russian campaign. "This is a war of extermination", he told them. "We do not wage war to preserve the enemy." This gave the generals a clear warning that they would be expected not to obstruct Hitler's wider war aims in the east – the extermination of the Jews and the reduction of the Slavic peoples to serfdom under a new Herrenvolk (Master race) of German settlers. As part of this strategy,
28812-431: The other hand, he defended Fritsch, correctly accusing Himmler of having fabricated the allegations against him. He insisted that Fritsch have the right to defend himself before a Court of Honour, which Hitler reluctantly agreed to. Beck promoted Rundstedt as Fritsch's successor, but Rundstedt declined, and the post went to Brauchitsch. At Beck's urging, Fritsch challenged Himmler to a duel, but Rundstedt (as senior officer of
29008-542: The pace of the advance. The harsh Russian winter arrived earlier than expected, bringing with it temperatures that plummeted to unprecedented lows, wreaking havoc on both men and machinery. German troops, unprepared for such extreme conditions, suffered from frostbite and hypothermia, severely impacting their combat effectiveness. Equipment and vehicles, not designed for sub-zero temperatures, frequently malfunctioned or were rendered inoperable. The Red Army , though battered, began to regroup and launch counteroffensives, exploiting
29204-496: The policy of good relations with the Soviets followed by the Reichswehr commander General Hans von Seekt during the Weimar Republic years, when the Soviet connection was seen as a counter to the threat from Poland. He was also apprehensive about launching a new war in the east while Britain was undefeated. If so, he did nothing to oppose them, and in this he was in company even with officers who disliked and opposed Hitler's regime, such as Halder, who threw themselves into planning
29400-462: The pronunciation of the ending -ig as [ɪk] instead of [ɪç]. In Northern Germany, High German was a foreign language to most inhabitants, whose native dialects were subsets of Low German. It was usually encountered only in writing or formal speech; in fact, most of High German was a written language, not identical to any spoken dialect, throughout the German-speaking area until well into the 19th century. However, wider standardization of pronunciation
29596-479: The prospects for this operation seriously, and was not surprised when Hitler called it off in September after the Luftwaffe's setback in the Battle of Britain . Even then, Rundstedt was not to be allowed to retire, when in October Hitler appointed him Commander-in-Chief West ( Oberbefehlshaber West , or OB West). By July 1940 Hitler was turning his mind to the invasion of the Soviet Union , commissioning General Erich Marcks to prepare preliminary plans. Although
29792-428: The rear areas by killing communists and partisans, but by 1941 the identity between Jews and communism was strongly established in the minds of most SS men and Police officers. In July Himmler told an SS gathering: "This nation [Russia] has been united by the Jews in a religion, a world-view, called Bolshevism." From the beginning, therefore, the Einsatzgruppen mostly killed Jews: initially only adult males, but after
29988-447: The safety of allowing the armoured corps to get too far ahead of their infantry support, however. Hitler sent the chief of staff of the Armed Forces Supreme Command ( Oberkommando der Wehrmacht , OKW), General Wilhelm Keitel , to Rundstedt's headquarters, to urge caution. In Halder's words, Hitler was "frightened by his own success ... afraid to take any chance." Guderian objected vehemently to being ordered to halt, and Rundstedt
30184-444: The south-east and General Heinz Guderian 's 2nd Panzer Army (part of Army Group Centre) smashing General Yeromenko 's Briansk Front and advancing south from Gomel in White Russia , on a line well east of Kiev. The danger of encirclement was obvious, but Stalin stubbornly refused to consider withdrawal, despite warnings from both Budyonny and Kirponos that catastrophe was imminent. Budyonny has been freely blamed by postwar writers for
30380-492: The states of North Dakota and South Dakota , German is the most common language spoken at home after English. As a legacy of significant German immigration to the country , German geographical names can be found throughout the Midwest region , such as New Ulm and Bismarck (North Dakota's state capital), plus many other regions. A number of German varieties have developed in the country and are still spoken today, such as Pennsylvania Dutch and Texas German . In Brazil,
30576-449: The third most commonly learned second language in the United States in K-12 education. The language has been influential in the fields of philosophy, theology, science, and technology. It is the second most commonly used language in science and the third most widely used language on websites . The German-speaking countries are ranked fifth in terms of annual publication of new books, with one-tenth of all books (including e-books) in
30772-414: The town of Enns to the troops of the 65th Infantry Division commanded by Major General Stanley Eric Reinhart . The organization structure of this SS formation was as follows: German language German (German: Deutsch , pronounced [dɔʏtʃ] ) is a West Germanic language in the Indo-European language family , mainly spoken in Western and Central Europe . It
30968-509: The towns of Tavaux and Plomion . The units in the division that were not fit for combat were ordered to return to Germany on 8 September, leaving behind a small Kampfgruppe attached to the SS Division Das Reich . The division losses during the fighting in Normandy, in the three months from June to September, amounted to c. 8,000 men, over 80 per cent of its tanks, 70 per cent of its armored vehicles, 60 per cent of its artillery and 50 per cent of its motor vehicles. Another massacre
31164-421: The village and surround several companies, pushing the Winnipeg Rifles out of the village by 13:00 hours and inflicting 256 casualties – of which 175 were taken prisoner. Later that day, a counter-attack by the Canadian Scottish Regiment , with artillery, tank and tank-destroyer support, re-took Putot with the SS giving up the struggle for the village and withdrawing around midnight. Oliver Haller concluded that "It
31360-462: The von Rundstedt men since the time of Frederick the Great had served in the Prussian Army . Rundstedt's mother, Adelheid Fischer, was of Huguenot (French Protestant) descent. He was the eldest of four brothers, all of whom became Army officers. Von Rundstedt's education followed the path ordained for Prussian military families: the junior cadet college at Diez , near Koblenz , then the military academy at Lichterfelde in Berlin. Unable to meet
31556-414: The weather deteriorated, making the situation worse. Rundstedt wanted to halt on the Dnieper for the winter, which would allow the German Army time to rest and be re-equipped. But the German armies could not rest, for fear the Soviet southern armies (now commanded by the stubborn Marshal Semyon Timoshenko ) would regroup and consolidate a front on the Donets or the Don . So, soon after the fall of Kiev,
31752-432: The whole of western Germany and was based in Kassel , and promoted to major general ( Generalmajor ). In 1928 Rundstedt finally left staff positions behind him and was made commander of the 2nd Cavalry Division, based in Breslau . This was considered a front-line posting, given Germany's tense relations with Poland and the fact that Poland at this time had a much bigger army than Germany. In January 1932, von Rundstedt
31948-451: The whole truth", because the original impetus for a pause came from Kleist and Rundstedt himself. Attention then turned to the attack on the French armies to the south. On 29 May, Hitler came to Rundstedt's headquarters at Charleville-Mézières to discuss the new offensive. Bock's Army Group B on the right was to advance on Paris, while Rundstedt's Army Group A, now consisting only of List's 12th Army, Weichs's 2nd Army and Busch's 16th Army,
32144-409: The work of units of the SS-VT , forerunner of the Waffen-SS , but some involved regular Army units. Rundstedt's biographer says: "There is certainly no evidence that Rundstedt ever condoned, let alone encouraged, these acts." Rundstedt told Reichenau that such actions did not have his authorisation. In fact, both Rundstedt and Blaskowitz complained to the chief of staff, General Franz Halder , about
32340-438: The world being published in German. German is most closely related to other West Germanic languages, namely Afrikaans , Dutch , English , the Frisian languages , and Scots . It also contains close similarities in vocabulary to some languages in the North Germanic group , such as Danish , Norwegian , and Swedish . Modern German gradually developed from Old High German , which in turn developed from Proto-Germanic during
32536-415: The written form of German. One of the central events in the development of ENHG was the publication of Luther's translation of the Bible into High German (the New Testament was published in 1522; the Old Testament was published in parts and completed in 1534). Luther based his translation primarily on the Meißner Deutsch of Saxony , spending much time among the population of Saxony researching
32732-429: Was a "neutral" language as there were virtually no English native speakers in Namibia at that time. German, Afrikaans, and several indigenous languages thus became "national languages" by law, identifying them as elements of the cultural heritage of the nation and ensuring that the state acknowledged and supported their presence in the country. Today, Namibia is considered to be the only German-speaking country outside of
32928-585: Was a remarkable admission so early in the Russian campaign, and it showed that Rundstedt was already well aware of how unrealistic the German belief in a quick victory had been. Despite the monumental efforts and initial successes of Operation Barbarossa , by late 1941, the German advance began to falter significantly. Rundstedt’s forces, along with the rest of the Wehrmacht , faced an increasingly dire situation as they pushed deeper into Soviet territory. The logistical nightmare became more pronounced, with supply lines overextended and insufficient resources to maintain
33124-435: Was advancing north-eastwards from Bessarabia. On 2 August the two armies met, trapping over 100,000 Soviet troops, virtually all of whom were killed or captured. Southern Ukraine was thus left virtually defenceless, and by 25 August, when they entered Dniepropetrovsk , the Germans had occupied everything west of the Dnieper (except Odessa , which held out until October). Nevertheless, this had all taken longer than expected, and
33320-407: Was an artificial standard that did not correspond to any traditional spoken dialect. Rather, it was based on the pronunciation of German in Northern Germany, although it was subsequently regarded often as a general prescriptive norm, despite differing pronunciation traditions especially in the Upper-German-speaking regions that still characterise the dialect of the area today – especially
33516-497: Was appointed commander of Wehrkreis III, based in Berlin , and also given command of the 3rd Infantry Division . This brought him, at 57, into the highest ranks of the German Army, reflected in his promotion to Lieutenant General ( Generalleutnant ). It also inevitably brought him into close contact with the political world, which was in a disturbed state due to the Great Depression and subsequent rise of Hitler's Nazi Party . The Defence Minister, General Kurt von Schleicher ,
33712-553: Was besieged. Reichenau's forces took Lublin on 11 September, while List's army was advancing to the east towards Lvov , where they eventually linked up with Soviet forces advancing from the east under the terms of the Molotov–Ribbentrop Pact . Warsaw surrendered on 28 September, and by 6 October fighting in southern Poland had ceased. From the first days of the invasion, there had been incidents of German troops shooting Polish soldiers after they had surrendered, and killing civilians, especially Polish Jews . Some of these incidents were
33908-448: Was born in January 1903. Von Rundstedt joined the General Staff of the German Army in April 1907 serving there until July 1914, when he was appointed chief of operations to the 22nd Reserve Infantry Division. This division was part of XI Corps, which in turn was part of General Alexander von Kluck 's First Army. In 1914 this Army was deployed along the Belgian border, in preparation for the invasion of Belgium and France, in accordance with
34104-426: Was clearly untrue, as the Commissar Order was widely carried out. But whether Rundstedt knew this was another matter, and this question was later to figure prominently in the issue of whether to charge him with war crimes. Barbarossa was initially scheduled for May, at the beginning of the Russian spring, but was postponed until June because unseasonably wet weather made the roads impassable for armour (not because of
34300-439: Was committed by the division on its second day of operations during Operation Overlord , the Allied invasion of France. During the evening of 7 June, 11 Canadian prisoners of war from the North Nova Scotia Highlanders , the Stormont, Dundas and Glengarry Highlanders and the 27th Armoured Regiment (The Sherbrooke Fusilier Regiment) , were shot in the back of the head. After a year of investigations from August 1944 to August 1945,
34496-427: Was established on the basis of public speaking in theatres and the media during the 20th century and documented in pronouncing dictionaries. Official revisions of some of the rules from 1901 were not issued until the controversial German orthography reform of 1996 was made the official standard by governments of all German-speaking countries. Media and written works are now almost all produced in Standard German which
34692-465: Was fighting in the Carpathians . Here he saw much action against the Russians. In October 1917 he was appointed chief of staff to LIII Corps, in northern Poland. The following month, however, the October Revolution led to the collapse of the Russian armies and the end of the war on the eastern front. In August 1918 Rundstedt was transferred to the west, as chief of staff to XV Corps in Alsace , under General Felix Graf von Bothmer . Here he remained until
34888-425: Was forced to mediate between Hitler and his impetuous armoured commanders, who were backed by Halder. By 20 May, Guderian's tanks had reached the sea at Abbeville and closed the trap on the British and French, who were already in retreat to the English Channel ports. By this time, however, Kleist's armoured forces were thinly stretched and had suffered losses of up to 50% of their tanks. Kleist asked Rundstedt for
35084-426: Was later commuted to life imprisonment. He was freed in 1957 after a further sentence reduction. On 6 June 1944, the division, along with the 21st Panzer Division , were the closest Panzer divisions to the landing beaches but they were unable to move until ordered by the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht (OKW, armed forces high command). The division was ordered to the front at 14:30 hours on 6 June, over twelve hours after
35280-421: Was made martial law plenipotentiary. He protested to Papen about this and martial law was lifted after a few days. In October Rundstedt was promoted to full General and given command of Gruppenkommando 1, covering the whole of eastern Germany. In January 1933 Hitler became chancellor, and within a few months, dictator. The Defence Minister, General Werner von Blomberg , ensured that the Army remained loyal to
35476-415: Was not in good health and missed his family – he was now a grandfather. Moreover, despite their recent confrontations, he remained on good terms with Hitler, who made him honorary colonel ( Chef ) of his old regiment on his retirement. Rundstedt also agreed that in the event of war he would return to active service. Rundstedt's retirement did not last long. By early 1939 Hitler had decided to force
35672-565: Was now 65 and not in good health – he was a heavy smoker, and in October in Poltava he suffered a mild heart attack. He increasingly resorted to drink to cope with the strain. He was now in the position of having to launch a new offensive against his better judgement, with exhausted troops in very adverse conditions. This was a recipe for defeat, but Rundstedt obeyed Hitler's orders. Kleist, his units reinforced by Waffen-SS General Sepp Dietrich 's 1st SS Division (the Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler ), attacked on 17 November, and captured Rostov on
35868-496: Was now to command Panzer (Armoured) Group Kleist, consisting of three armoured corps, led by Heinz Guderian , Georg-Hans Reinhardt and Gustav Anton von Wietersheim . These armoured corps were to be the spearhead of the German thrust into France. Although Manstein is often credited for the change of plans, he himself acknowledged Rundstedt's decisive role. "I would stress that my commander, Colonel-General von Rundstedt, agreed with my view throughout, and backed our recommendations to
36064-562: Was often brutal; while in Allied captivity, an SS man from the division recalled: "In the Waffen-SS you couldn't do anything if an Unterfuhrer hit you during the training. The purpose of the training is to make you just as they are; it's pure sadism". In March 1944 the 12th SS was attached to the I SS Panzer Corps and transferred to Caen in Normandy. At the beginning of June, the division had over 150 tanks. The division committed its first massacre while en route to Normandy. The division executed 86 French men on 1 April 1944 in Ascq, France, in
36260-507: Was ordered to recruit the personnel. SS- Oberführer Fritz Witt of 1st SS Panzer Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler (LSSAH) was appointed the divisional commander. Personnel from the LSSAH provided the regimental, battalion and most of the company commanders for the division. About 2,000 personnel were transferred from the LSSAH and in September 1943, the division had over 16,000 recruits on its roster, undergoing training in Beverloo Camp in Leopoldsburg , Belgium. The indoctrination
36456-509: Was panicked by his own success. By early July he was full of anxiety that the German armour was advancing too quickly, without infantry support, and that it was exposed to Soviet counter-attacks. On 10 July Brauchitsch arrived at Rundstedt's headquarters at Brody , with instructions from Hitler that Kleist was turn south towards Vinnitsa and link up with Schobert's army there, rather than continue south-east to Kirovograd. This would still have trapped many Soviet divisions, but it would have allowed
36652-427: Was posted as chief of staff to the 86th Infantry Division which was serving as part of General Max von Gallwitz 's forces on the Eastern Front . In September he was once again given an administrative post, as part of the military government of German-occupied Poland, based in Warsaw . He stayed in this post until November 1916, until he was promoted by being made chief of staff to an Army Corps, XXV Reserve Corps, which
36848-484: Was released in 1949, and died in 1953. Gerd von Rundstedt was born in Aschersleben , north of Halle in Prussian Saxony (now in Saxony-Anhalt ). He was the eldest son of Gerd Arnold Konrad von Rundstedt, a cavalry officer who served in the Franco-Prussian War . The von Rundstedts are an old Junker family that traced its origins to the 12th century and classed as members of the Uradel , or old nobility, although they held no titles and were not wealthy. Virtually all
37044-407: Was released in 1954. In September, SS- Obersturmbannführer Hubert Meyer was placed in command of the division. In November 1944, the division was sent to Nienburg in Germany, where it was to be reformed. The majority of reinforcements were transferred from Luftwaffe and Kriegsmarine personnel. Hubert Meyer was replaced by SS- Obersturmbannführer Hugo Kraas , and the division was attached to
37240-404: Was repelled. Soon after, Blaskowitz's exposed northern flank was attacked by the Polish Poznań Army , leading to the major engagement of the Polish campaign, the Battle of the Bzura . Rundstedt and Manstein travelled to Blaskowitz's headquarters to take charge, and by 11 September the Poles had been contained in a pocket around Kutno . By 18 September the Poznan Army had been destroyed, and Warsaw
37436-414: Was scheming to bring the Nazis into the government, and the Chancellor, Franz von Papen , was planning to overthrow the Social Democrat government of Prussia, Germany's largest state. Despite his dislike of politics, Rundstedt could not remain uninvolved in these matters. In July 1932 Papen used his emergency powers to dismiss the Prussian Government. Martial law was briefly declared in Berlin and Rundstedt
37632-579: Was the genesis of the blitzkrieg of May 1940. A combination of bad weather, the arguments of his generals, and a breach of security when the details of the original plan fell into Allied hands, eventually led Hitler to agree to postpone the attack until early 1940, when it was again delayed by the invasion of Denmark and Norway . In February, Hitler finally accepted the Manstein Plan. General Günther von Kluge 's 4th Army and General Maximilian Reichsfreiherr von Weichs 's 2nd Army were transferred from Army Group B to Rundstedt's command. General Ewald von Kleist
37828-496: Was the senior officer of the German Army in terms of service, and second only to Blomberg in rank. Recognising his status, Hitler cultivated him, appointing him as Germany's representative at the funeral of King George V in January 1936. Given his prestige, Rundstedt was a central figure in the Blomberg–Fritsch Affair which engulfed the German Army in early 1938. This was a political manoeuvre by senior Nazis Hermann Göring and Heinrich Himmler to strengthen their positions within
38024-415: Was to attack towards Soissons and Rheims . Rundstedt's attack began on 9 June, and within a few days had broken the French resistance. By 12 June, his forces were across the Marne and advancing south-east towards Alsace . Dijon fell on 16 June and Lyon on 20 June. By this time French resistance was crumbling and on 22 June the French requested an armistice. In July, Hitler announced that Rundstedt and
38220-423: Was to give up his quiet life in occupied France and assume command of Army Group South, tasked with the conquest of Ukraine. Leeb would command in the north, heading for Leningrad , and Bock in the centre, charged with capturing Moscow . On the way, the three army groups were to encircle and destroy the Red Army before it could retreat into the Russian interior. Rundstedt, like most German officers, had favoured
38416-407: Was wrong." But at this stage of the war the Red Army tank commanders lacked the tactical skill and experience of the German panzer commanders, and after ten days of bitter fighting Kleist's armour broke through, reaching Zhitomir , only 130 km from Kiev, on 12 July. By 30 July the Red Army in Ukraine was in full retreat. Rundstedt and his commanders were confident that they could seize Kiev "off
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