Wilhelm Keitel

Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel
Keitel as field marshal in 1942
Chief of the Armed Forces High Command Nazi Germany
In office 4 February 1938 – 8 May 1945
Preceded by	Werner von Blomberg (as Reich Minister of War)
Succeeded by	None (position abolished)
Chief of the Wehrmachtamt
In office 1 October 1935 – 4 February 1938
Preceded by	Walter von Reichenau
Succeeded by	None (position abolished)
Personal details
Born	Wilhelm Bodewin Johann Gustav Keitel (1882-09-22)22 September 1882 Helmscherode, Duchy of Brunswick, German Empire
Died	16 October 1946(1946-10-16) (aged 64) Nuremberg, Allied-occupied Germany (execution)
Spouse	Lisa Fontaine ​ (m. 1909)​ (born 1887 - died 1959)
Relations	Bodewin Keitel (brother)
Children	6
Signature
Nickname	"Lakeitel"
Military service
Allegiance	German Empire (to 1918) Weimar Republic (to 1933) Nazi Germany
Branch/service	German Army
Years of service	1901–1945
Rank	Generalfeldmarschall
Commands	Oberkommando der Wehrmacht
Battles/wars	World War I World War II
Awards	Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
Criminal conviction
Known for	War crimes of the Wehrmacht
Conviction(s)	Crimes against humanity Crimes against peace Criminal conspiracy War crimes
Trial	Nuremberg trials
Criminal penalty	Death penalty
Details
Victims	Soviet prisoners of war Soviet civilians (Jews and Slavs)

Wilhelm Bodewin Johann Gustav Keitel (22 September 1882 – 16 October 1946) was a German field marshal who served as Chief of the Armed Forces High Command in Nazi Germany during World War II. Keitel was well known and reviled as Hitler’s dependable sycophant and habitual yes-man among his military colleagues.

Following the war, Keitel was charged with war crimes and crimes against humanity by the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. He was found guilty, principally for issuing a series of criminal orders that led to widespread atrocities. He was sentenced to death and executed by hanging in 1946.

Early life and pre-Wehrmacht career

Keitel was born in the village of Helmscherode near Gandersheim in the Duchy of Brunswick, the eldest son of Carl Keitel (1854–1934), a middle-class landowner, and his wife Apollonia Vissering (1855–1888). His plan to take over his family's estates after completing his education at a gymnasium foundered on his father's resistance. Instead, he embarked on a military career in 1901, becoming an officer cadet of the Prussian Army. As a commoner, he did not join the cavalry, but a field artillery regiment in Wolfenbüttel, serving as adjutant from 1908. On 18 April 1909, Keitel married Lisa Fontaine, a wealthy landowner's daughter at Wülfel near Hanover. Together they had six children, one of whom died in infancy.

During World War I, Keitel served on the Western Front and took part in the fighting in Flanders, where he was severely wounded. Promoted to captain, Keitel was then posted to the staff of an infantry division in 1915. During this service on the Western Front, Keitel earned the Iron Cross 1st Class.

After the war, Keitel was retained in the newly created Reichswehr of the Weimar Republic and played a part in organizing the paramilitary Freikorps units on the Polish border. In 1924, Keitel was transferred to the Ministry of the Reichswehr in Berlin, serving with the Truppenamt ("Troop Office"), the post-Versailles disguised German General Staff. Three years later, he returned to field command.

Now a lieutenant-colonel, he was again assigned to the Ministry of War in 1929 and was soon promoted to Head of the Organizational Department ("T-2"), a post he held until Adolf Hitler took power in 1933. Playing a vital role in the German re-armament, he traveled at least once to the Soviet Union to inspect secret Reichswehr training camps. In the autumn of 1932, he suffered a heart attack. Shortly after his recovery, in October 1933, Keitel was appointed as deputy commander of the 3rd Infantry Division; in 1934, he was given command of the 22nd Infantry Division at Bremen.

Rise to the Wehrmacht High Command

In 1935, at the recommendation of General Werner von Fritsch, Keitel was promoted to the rank of major general and appointed chief of the War Ministry's Armed Forces Office, which oversaw the army, navy, and air force. After assuming office, Keitel was promoted to lieutenant general on 1 January 1936.

On 21 January 1938, Keitel received evidence revealing that the wife of his superior, War Minister Werner von Blomberg, was a former prostitute. Upon reviewing this information, Keitel suggested that the dossier be forwarded to Hitler's deputy, Hermann Göring, who used it to bring about Blomberg's resignation.

Hitler took command of the Wehrmacht in 1938 and replaced the War Ministry with the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces (Oberkommando der Wehrmacht), with Keitel as its chief. As a result of his appointment, Keitel assumed the responsibilities of Germany's War Minister. Soon after his promotion, Keitel convinced Hitler to appoint Walther von Brauchitsch to replace Fritsch as Commander-in-Chief of the Army. He became a full general in November 1938.

World War II

Keitel (far left) and other members of the German high command with Adolf Hitler (second from right) at a military briefing, (c. 1940).

Field Marshal Ewald von Kleist labelled him as nothing more than a "stupid follower of Hitler" because of his servile "yes man" attitude with regard to Hitler. His sycophancy was well known in the army, and he acquired the nickname 'Lakeitel', a pun on his name which translates into English as 'lackey'. Hermann Göring's description of Keitel as having "a sergeant's mind inside a field marshal's body" was a feeling commonly expressed among his peers. He had been promoted because of his craven willingness to function as Hitler's mouth-piece. German officers consistently bypassed him and went directly to Hitler.

The planning for Operation Barbarossa, the Invasion of the Soviet Union, was begun tentatively by Halder with the redeployment of the 18th Army into an offensive position against the Soviet Union. On 31 July 1940, Hitler held a major conference that included Keitel, Halder, Alfred Jodl, Erich Raeder, Brauchitsch and Hans Jeschonnek which further discussed the invasion. The participants did not object to the invasion. Hitler asked for war studies to be completed. General Thomas was given the task of completing two studies on economic matters. The first study by Thomas detailed serious problems with fuelling and rubber supplies. Keitel bluntly dismissed it telling Thomas that Hitler would not want to see it. This influenced Thomas' second study which offered a glowing recommendation for the invasion based upon fabricated economic benefits.

Keitel issued a series of Criminal orders from April 1941. The orders went beyond established codes of conduct for the military and broadly allowed the execution of Jews, civilians and non combatants for any reason. Those carrying out the murders were exempted from court martial or later being tried for war crimes. The orders were signed by Keitel, however, other members of the OKW including Halder wrote or changed the wording of the orders. Commanders in the field interpreted and carried out the orders.

He received a "Golden" (Honorary) Nazi membership badge on occasion of the German invasion of Czechoslovakia. Keitel claimed never to have been a Nazi party member at his trial, however, subsequent to his trial a 1939 application for membership was discovered in the archives.

Keitel played an important role after the failed 20 July plot in 1944. As Hitler related after the explosion, Keitel rushed to Hitler's side exclaiming, "Mein Führer, you're alive, you're alive!" Hitler goes on to say, "Keitel was almost killed himself, he will show no mercy," when it came to seeking vengeance. Keitel then sat on the Army "court of honour" that handed over many officers who were involved, including Field Marshal Erwin von Witzleben, to Roland Freisler's notorious People's Court. Around 7,000 people were arrested, many of whom were tortured by the Gestapo, and around 5,000 were executed.

Keitel was named by Hitler to be his deputy supreme commander of the German Armed Forces, with broad powers in terms of arming, equipping and disciplining soldiers. The Volkssturm, the civilian militia force of Germany, was also attached to the military; thus Keitel had jurisdiction over it even though its commander was Joseph Goebbels, the Minister of Propaganda. Keitel, during this time, visited German troops and auxiliary civilian forces on front lines throughout Germany and he conducted regular meetings with field commanders to coordinate their military operations.

Keitel, signing the ratified surrender terms for the German Army in Berlin, 8/9 May 1945

In April and May 1945, during the Battle of Berlin, Keitel called for counterattacks to drive back the Soviet forces and relieve Berlin. However, there were insufficient German forces to carry out such attacks. After Hitler's suicide on 30 April, Keitel stayed on as a member of the short-lived Flensburg government under Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz. Upon arriving in Flensburg, Albert Speer said that Keitel grovelled to Dönitz in the same way as he had done to Hitler. On 7 May 1945 Alfred Jodl, on behalf of Donitz, signed Germany's unconditional surrender on all fronts. This did not please Stalin, so on 8 May Dönitz sent Keitel to the Berlin suburb Karlshorst, where he signed the German surrender to the Soviet Union. He then expected to be arrested and shot, but to his surprise the Russians let him go. Five days later he was arrested along with the rest of the Flensburg Government, at American request.

Role in the Holocaust

Keitel had full knowledge of the Holocaust and its criminal nature during the planning and the subsequent Invasion of Poland; he agreed to its aims in principle. The Nazi plans included mass arrests, population transfers and mass murder. He did not contest the regime's assault upon basic human rights or counter the role of the Einsatzgruppen in the murders. The Wehrmacht leadership including Keitel, Walther von Brauchitsch and Franz Halder did not initially share their knowledge of the Holocaust with their subordinate officers. The criminal nature of the regime became obvious but local commanders continued to express shock and protest over the events they were witnessing. Keitel continued to ignore the protests among the officer corps while they became morally numbed to the atrocities. On March 13, 1940 at Gerd von Rundstedt's headquarters in Koblenz, Himmler gave a speech to a wider circle of officers and made it clear that SS actions in Poland were authorised by Hitler himself. The speech ended open discontent and the criticism of a courageous few dissenting from the policy. Having failed to prevent the Holocaust in Poland the army became an accomplice in war crimes during the remainder of World War II.

Trial and conviction

Wilhelm Keitel's detention report from June 1945

17 Oct 1946 Newsreel of Nuremberg Trials Sentencing

He faced the International Military Tribunal (IMT), which indicted him on all four counts before it: conspiracy to commit crimes against peace, planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Most of the case against him was based on his signature being present on dozens of orders that called for soldiers and political prisoners to be killed or disappeared.

Keitel admitted that he knew many of Hitler's orders were illegal. Not only did Keitel approve the Night and Fog Decree, he also presided over the Nazi "Court of Honour" (which condemned the July Plotters), signed the Commissar Order, encouraged the lynching of downed Allied aircrews by civilians, and sanctioned extreme measures against partisan fighters in the East. His defence relied almost entirely on the argument he was merely following orders in conformity to "the leader principle" (Führerprinzip) and his personal oath of loyalty to Hitler.

The IMT rejected this defence and convicted him on all charges. Although the tribunal's charter allowed "superior orders" to be considered a mitigating factor, it found Keitel's crimes were so egregious that "there is nothing in mitigation." In its judgment against him, the IMT wrote, "Superior orders, even to a soldier, cannot be considered in mitigation where crimes as shocking and extensive have been committed consciously, ruthlessly and without military excuse or justification." It was also pointed out that while he claimed the Commando Order, which ordered Allied commandos to be shot without trial, was illegal, he had reaffirmed it and extended its application. It also noted several instances where he issued illegal orders on his own authority.

In his statement before the Tribunal, Keitel said: "As these atrocities developed, one from the other, step by step, and without any foreknowledge of the consequences, destiny took its tragic course, with its fateful consequences." To underscore the criminal rather than military nature of Keitel's acts, the Allies denied his request to be shot by firing squad. Instead, he was executed at Nuremberg Prison by hanging.

Execution

Keitel's body after execution

The execution was performed by the American Army Sgt. John C. Woods. Keitel's body, as those of the other nine executed men and the corpse of Hermann Göring, was cremated at Ostfriedhof (Munich) and the ashes were scattered in the river Isar. The facial blood stains seen in the photo of Keitel's corpse were due to the trapdoor being too small, causing him and several others of the condemned to suffer head injuries through hitting the trapdoor during the drop. Donald E. Wilkes Jr., a professor of law at the University of Georgia School of Law, noted that many of the executed Nazis fell from the gallows with insufficient force to snap their necks, resulting in a macabre, suffocating death struggle that in Keitel's case lasted 24 minutes.

Personal life

Keitel's youngest son, Hans-Georg Keitel, was badly wounded in the thigh during the 1940 campaign in France. He died on 18 July 1941 in a field hospital after being mortally wounded the day before in a Soviet aircraft attack. Hans was buried in the family plot in Bad Gandersheim. Another son, Major Ernst-Wilhelm Keitel, was captured by the Soviets at the end of World War II. He was released in January 1956, and returned home to Germany. The eldest son, Obersturmbannführer (Lieutenant Colonel) Karl-Heinz Keitel, was wounded in December 1944 but fought until the war ended, and died in 1968.

Memoirs

Before his execution, Keitel published his memoirs which were titled in English as In the Service of the Reich. It was later re-edited as The Memoirs of Field-Marshal Keitel by Walter Görlitz ISBN 978-0-8154-1072-0 Another work by Keitel later published in English was Questionnaire on the Ardennes offensive.

See also

• German Instrument of Surrender . 8 May 1945 – via Wikisource.
• War crimes of the Wehrmacht

References

Bibliography

• Barnett, Correlli, ed. (2003) [1989]. Hitler’s Generals. New York: Grove Press. ISBN 978-0-80213-994-8
• Bartov, Omer (1986). The Eastern Front, 1941–45: German Troops and the Barbarisation of Warfare. New York: St. Martin's Press. ISBN 978-0-312-22486-8. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Brinkley, Douglas, and Michael E. Haskew, eds. (2004). The World War II Desk Reference. New York: Grand Central Press. ISBN 978-0-06052-651-1
• Browning, Christopher (2004). The Origins of the Final Solution. University of Nebraska Press and Yad Vashem. ISBN 0-8032-1327-1. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Burleigh, Michael (2010). Moral Combat: Good and Evil in World War II. New York and London: Harper Collins. ISBN 978-0-00-719576-3
• Conot, Robert E. (2000) [1947]. Justice at Nuremberg. New York: Carroll & Graf Publishers. ISBN 978-0-88184-032-2
• Evans, Richard J. (1989). In Hitler's Shadow West German Historians and the Attempt to Escape the Nazi Past. New York: Pantheon. ISBN 978-0-394-57686-2. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Heer, Hannes; Manoschek, Walter; Pollak, Alexander; Wodak, Ruth (2008). The Discursive Construction of History: Remembering the Wehrmacht's War of Annihilation. New York: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 9780230013230. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Hildebrand, Klaus (1986). The Third Reich. London & New York: Routledge. ISBN 0-04-9430327
• Knopp, Guido (2000). Hitlers Krieger. Leipzig: Goldmann Verlag. ISBN 3-442-15045-0
• Megargee, Geoffrey. War of Annihilation. Combat and Genocide on the Eastern Front, 1941, 2006, Rowman & Littelefield, ISBN 0-7425-4481-8
• Megargee, Geoffrey P. (2000). Inside Hitler's High Command. Lawrence, Kansas: Kansas University Press. ISBN 0-7006-1015-4. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Miller, Donald L. (2006). The Story of World War II. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-7432-2718-2.
• Mitcham, Samuel and Gene Mueller (2012). Hitler’s Commanders: Officers of the Wehrmacht, the Luftwaffe, the Kriegsmarine, and the Waffen-SS. Lanham, MD: Rowman & Littlefield. ISBN 978-1-44221-153-7
• Mitcham Jr., Samuel W. (2001). Hitler's Field Marshals and Their Battles. New York City, New York: Cooper Square Press. ISBN 0-8154-1130-8. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Mueller, Gene (1979). The Forgotten Field Marshal: Wilhelm Keitel. Durham, NC: Moore Publishing. ISBN 978-0-87716-105-9
• Roberts, Andrew (2011). The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War. New York: Harper Perennial. ISBN 978-0-06122-860-5
• Stahel, David (2009). Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-76847-4. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Taylor, Telford (1995) [1952]. Sword and Swastika: Generals and Nazis in the Third Reich. New York: Barnes & Noble. ISBN 978-1-56619-746-5
• Tucker, Spencer (2005). World War II: A Student Encyclopedia. ABC Clio. ISBN 1-85109-857-7. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Walker, Andrew (2006). The Nazi War Trials. CPD Ltd. ISBN 978-1-903047-50-7. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Wheeler-Bennett, John W. (1980) [1953]. Nemesis of Power: The German Army in Politics 1918–1945. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan. ISBN 0-333-06864-5

Online sources

• "Nazi Conspiracy and Aggression, Volume 2, Chapter XV, Part 3: The Reich Cabinet" (PDF). Office of United States Chief of Counsel For Prosecution of Axis Criminality. 1946. Retrieved 20 August 2017.

External links

• Wilhelm Keitel in the German National Library catalogue
• Newspaper clippings about Wilhelm Keitel in the 20th Century Press Archives of the ZBW