Franz Halder(born 30 June 1884 in Würzburg, April 2, 1972 in Aschau im Chiemgau, Upper Bavaria) was a German army officer (since 1940 Colonel-General) and as successor to Ludwig Beck September 1938 to September 1942 Chief of Staff of the Army.
Franz Halder Life
Empire And World War I
Halder was born into a family that had been associated with the Bavarian army for over 300 years. His mother was Matilda, born Steinheil, and his father, Colonel-General of the army Maximilian Haider.
After graduation, he joined on 14 July 1902 as an ensign in the 3rd Field Artillery Regiment “Prince Leopold” in Amberg one. This regiment was under the command of his father. In 1904, he was appointed with special commendation to lieutenant. Following various commanding stakes came military school, Artillery and Engineering School, and the Royal Military Academy. He graduated from the military academy in 1914; he graduated on top of his gear.
1907, married Gertrude Erl Halder, who also came from a military family. Halder, with his wife, had three daughters.
During World War, Halder was used in various bars on the east and west front. On the 14th of September 1914, he was awarded the Iron Cross II Grade awarded. On 6 January 1915, he was appointed Quartermaster General of the 6th Bavarian Infantry Division appointed. On 9 August 1915, he was promoted to captain. As early as 15 December 1914, he had the Bavarian Military Merit Order 4th Class with swords, and on 22 December 1915, the Iron Cross I.
Class, on 8 April 1917, the Knight’s Cross, First Class of the Saxon Albert Order with swords, and on 6 February 1918, the Austrian Military Merit Cross III Class with war decoration received. “For personal courage and his outstanding performance” (Heuer), Halder was born on 2 October 1918 and awarded the Knight’s Cross of the House Order of Hohenzollern with swords.
Weimar Republic
After the end of World War I in 1919, Halder was a training officer in the Defense Ministry of Tactics. In 1922, he became a Major and, in 1931, finally appointed colonel.
Prewar
With the seizure of power by the National Socialists in 1933, Halder was distanced. The appointment to significant general was on 1 October 1934. On 15 October 1935, he was promoted to the commander of the 7th Infantry Division in Munich. Another career leap Halder made on 2 August 1936, when he was promoted to lieutenant general, which joined its use as Oberquartiermeister I and II.
In one of his major organized maneuvers, Halder Adolf Hitler met in person. The contacts made it to Hitler had for his future career in the armed forces were of great benefit. In February 1938, his appointment was made general of the artillery. In September of that year, General Ludwig Beck resigned in protest against the overthrow of the Wehrmacht by Hitler back as Chief of Staff of the Army.
The item Becks was on 1 September 1938 finally transferred to Halder. Halder and Beck were part of a group of conspirators who had planned the event of a military response to theUK’sSudetencrisis of 1938, the removal of Hitler. The Munich Agreement with the known concessions Chamberlain to Hitler escaped the circle of conspirators, which consisted mainly of high-ranking military, any plausible justification for a coup.
Haider resigned after forever and consistently from the resistance group against Hitler. He explained his change of attitude diametrically with the ideal of the Prussian military discipline and obedience to a head of state.
World War II
Franz Halder was involved at the beginning of World War II in all strategic plans of the Armed Forces. These included the Polish campaign, the campaign in the West in 1940, and Operation Barbarossa, the war against the Soviet Union from 1941 to 1945. For his contribution to the preparations of the Polish campaign, Halder received, on 27 October 1939, as one of the first German soldiers, the Knight’s Cross of the Iron Cross.
In advance of the French campaign that took place in the winter of 1939/1940 to a conspiracy against Hitler, was involved in the Halder. The trigger was Hitler’s plan to have an attack in November 1939. The head of the armed forces for this project was absolutely impracticable; the commander of the army, General Walther von Brauchitsch, and Franz Halder declared as his chief of staff ready to arrest Hitler if he would give the order to attack. After the conclusion of the French campaign in 1940, Halder was promoted to colonel general.
As is apparent from Halder’s war diary, he insisted on 25 June 1940 a” new perspective: impact in the East.” The General Staff of the Army approved On 3 July, he instructed his staff to consider “how a military strike against Russia is cause to extort him the recognition of the dominant role of Germany in Europe.”
It was under the “keyword Otto” from 25th July 1940, “expansion of railway and road network in the East” mode. On 21 July, Hitler demanded from the OKH that it “take Russian problem in attack” and “make mental preparations” for it.
After initiating the Halder plan, it should be assumed that the Red Army, in four to six weeks, hit 80 to 100 divisions in a lightning war and destroy Russia’s attack capabilities with the objective of the Ukraine, the Baltic states, and Finland under German control to bring.
On 5 December 1940, Halder Hitler argued that the now carried out further and coordinated planning of Friedrich Paulus had surrendered. Then he wrote in his war diary - “Otto” - Preparations put in full accordance with the principles of our plan in motion. On 18 December 1940, resulting from the Hitler signed “Operation Barbarossa”. After Hitler’s speech to about 200-250 military leaders at the Chancellery on 30 Halder recorded in March 1941 following:
“Russia’s role and capabilities. Justification of the need to clean up the Russian position. Only then will we be able to master in two years and staff our tasks in the air and on the oceans if we solve the land question definitively and thoroughly. Our duties towards Russia - army smashed. State dissolve.
Question of Russian evasion. That is not likely since it is binding to the Baltic and Ukraine. If the Russians should settle, he would have to do it very early on because he would not want to leave in order. After solving the problems in the East, it will meet 50-60 divisions (Panzer).
A portion of the land force will be released for military operations for the Air Force and Navy; a part will be needed for other tasks, such. Spain. Colonial tasks! A damning indictment of Bolshevism is the same anti-social crime. We must abandon the standpoint of military comradeship.
The Communist is no comrade before and after no comrade. It is a war of extermination. If we do not understand, then we will indeed hit the enemy, but in 30 years, we will be back to the communist enemy face. We do not wage war to preserve the enemy. Future States Picture: Northern Russia belongs to Finland.
The new states must be socialist states, but without its intelligence. It must be prevented that a new intelligence forms. Suffice it, a primitive socialist intelligentsia. The struggle must be waged against the poison of decomposition. This is not a matter of court-martial. The leader of the troupe must know what it is.
It would be best if you led the fight. The troops must defend with the means by which it is attacked. Commissioners and GPU men are criminals and must be treated as such. Therefore needs, the troops not to come from the hand of the leader. The leader must make his arrangements in line with the perception of the force. The fight will be very different from the war in the West. In the east, hardness is mild for the future. The leaders must ask the victim to overcome their concerns.”
In the formulation of the “Commissar Orders” that preceded the invasion of Russia, Halder was then involved in “significant responsibility.”
Following a confrontation with Hitler, Halder, on 29 September 1942, dismissed his military post and put in a reserve leader. Kurt Zeitzler took over Halder’s functions.
As a result of the failed assassination attempt on Hitler on 20 July 1944 by Colonel Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, there were extensive arrests and interrogations. Here, the SS systematically tortured. In this way, the names of the conspirator's circle from 1938 were determined. Thereupon, Halder arrested his wife and eldest daughter and interned in a concentration camp in Flossenburg. On 31 January 1945, Halder was officially discharged from the Army.
During his detention, just before the war, he moved to the Dachau concentration camp and from there to other so-called special prisoners, including members of the Stauffenberg family abducted by the SS with the intent to South Tyrol, to eliminate this group. Haider and his wife Gertrude were there on the 4th of May, 1945. He spent time until the summer of 1945 as an American prisoner of war in Italy and then released.
Postwar Period
In the Nuremberg Trials of the High Command of the Wehrmacht, Halder was heard as a witness for the prosecution.
From 1946 to 1961, Halder worked as head of the German Department of the Military History Research Group of the United States Army, the Operational History (German) Section of the “Historical Division” in Königstein and Karlsruhe. Here, he had a significant influence on the war history of the Second World War.
This was in 1995 by the military historian Bernd Wegner, who judged very critically. According to the specifications, Halder war is either a fatality or even a necessary pre-emptive strike, and in any case, has been “as the work of a demon, basically ahistorical exceptional personality - interpreted - just as Hitler’s War ‘.”
For his many years of service in the German Department of the Military History Research Institute in 1961, he received the highest civilian honor of the U.S. Army, the U.S. Meritorious Civilian Service Medal.