Albert Kesselring
Encyclopedia
Albert Kesselring was a German Luftwaffe
Generalfeldmarschall
during World War II
. In a military career that spanned both World Wars, Kesselring became one of Nazi Germany
's most skilful commanders, being one of 27 soldiers awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds
. Nicknamed "Smiling Albert" by the Allies
The nickname "Smiling Albert" was bestowed on Kesselring by the Allies. It is not used by German writers. It was used during the war; see and "Uncle Albert" by his troops, he was one of the most popular generals of World War II with the rank and file.
Kesselring joined the Bavarian Army
as an officer cadet
in 1904, and served in the artillery branch. He completed training as a balloon
observer in 1912. During World War I
, he served on both the Western
and Eastern
fronts and was posted to the General Staff
, despite not having attended the War Academy
. Kesselring remained in the Army after the war but was discharged in 1933 to become head of the Department of Administration at the Reich Commissariat for Aviation
, where he was involved in the re-establishment of the aviation industry and the laying of the foundations for the Luftwaffe, serving as its Chief of Staff from 1936 to 1938.
During World War II he commanded air forces in the invasions of Poland
and France
, the Battle of Britain
, and Operation Barbarossa
. As Commander-in-Chief South, he was overall German commander in the Mediterranean theatre
, which included the operations in North Africa
. Kesselring conducted an uncompromising defensive campaign against the Allied forces in Italy
until he was injured in an accident in October 1944. In the final campaign of the war, he commanded German forces on the Western Front. He won the respect of his Allied opponents for his military accomplishments, but his record was marred by massacres committed by troops under his command in Italy.
After the war, Kesselring was tried for war crimes and sentenced to death. The sentence was subsequently commuted to life imprisonment
. A political and media campaign resulted in his release in 1952, ostensibly on health grounds. He was one of only three Generalfeldmarschalls to publish his memoirs, entitled Soldat bis zum letzten Tag (A Soldier to the Last Day).
, Bavaria
, on 30 November 1885, the son of Carl Adolf Kesselring, a schoolmaster and town councillor, and his wife Rosina, who was born a Kesselring, being Carl's second cousin. Albert's early years were spent in Marktsteft, where relatives had operated a brewery since 1688.
Matriculating from the Christian Ernestinum Secondary School in Bayreuth in 1904, Kesselring joined the German Army
as an Fahnenjunker (officer cadet
) in the 2nd Bavarian Foot Artillery Regiment
. The regiment was based at Metz
and was responsible for maintaining its forts. He remained with the regiment until 1915, except for periods at the Military Academy from 1905 to 1906, at the conclusion of which he received his commission as a Leutnant (lieutenant
), and at the School of Artillery and Engineering in Munich
from 1909 to 1910.
Kesselring married Luise Anna Pauline (Liny) Keyssler, the daughter of an apothecary
from Bayreuth, in 1910. The couple honeymoon
ed in Italy
. Their marriage was childless, but in 1913 they adopted Rainer, the son of Albert's second cousin Kurt Kesselring. In 1912, Kesselring completed training as a balloon
observer in a dirigible section – an early sign of an interest in aviation. Kesselring's superiors considered posting him to the School of Artillery and Engineering as an instructor because of his expertise in "the interplay between tactics and technology".
, Kesselring served with his regiment in Lorraine
until the end of 1914, when he was transferred to the 1st Bavarian Foot Artillery
, which formed part of the Sixth Army. On 19 May 1916, he was promoted to Hauptmann
(captain). In 1916 he was transferred again, to the 3rd Bavarian Foot Artillery
. He distinguished himself in the Battle of Arras
, using his tactical acumen to halt a British advance. For his services on the Western Front, he was decorated with the Iron Cross
2nd Class and 1st Class.
In 1917, he was posted to the General Staff
, despite having not attended the War Academy
. He served on the Eastern Front
on the staff of the 1st Bavarian Landwehr Division
. In January 1918, he returned to the Western Front
as a staff officer with the II and III Bavarian Corps.
) of III Bavarian Corps in the Nuremberg
area. A dispute with the leader of the local Freikorps
led to the issuance of an arrest warrant for his alleged involvement in a putsch against the command of III Bavarian Corps and Kesselring was thrown into prison. He was soon released but his superior, Major Hans Seyler, censured him for having "failed to display the requisite discretion".
From 1919 to 1922, Kesselring served as a battery
commander with the 24th Artillery Regiment. He joined the Reichswehr
on 1 October 1922 and was posted to the Military Training Department at the Reichswehr Ministry in Berlin
. He remained at this post until 1929, when he returned to Bavaria as commander of Wehrkreis
VII in Munich
. In his time with the Reichswehr Ministry, Kesselring was involved in the organisation of the army, trimming staff overheads to produce the best possible army with the limited resources available. He helped reorganise the Ordnance Department, laying the groundwork for the research and development
efforts that would produce new weapons. He was involved in secret military manoeuvres held in the Soviet Union
in 1924 and in the so-called Great Plan for a 102-division army, which was prepared in 1923 and 1924. After another brief stint at the Reichswehr Ministry, Kesselring was promoted to Oberstleutnant
(lieutenant colonel
) in 1930 and spent two years in Dresden
with the 4th Artillery Regiment.
Against his wishes, Kesselring was discharged from the army on 1 October 1933 and appointed head of the Department of Administration at the Reich Commissariat for Aviation (Reichskommissariat für die Luftfahrt), the forerunner of the Reich Air Ministry
(Reichsluftfahrtministerium), with the rank of Oberst
(colonel
). Since the Treaty of Versailles
forbade Germany from establishing an air force, this was nominally a civilian agency. The Luftwaffe would formally be established in 1935. As chief of administration, he had to assemble his new staff from scratch. He was involved in the re-establishment of the aviation industry and the construction of secret factories, forging alliances with industrialists and aviation engineers. He was promoted to Generalmajor (major general
) in 1934 and Generalleutnant (lieutenant general
) in 1936. Like other generals of Nazi Germany, he received personal payments from Adolf Hitler
; in Kesselring's case, RM
6,000, a considerable sum at the time.
At the age of 48, he learned to fly. Kesselring believed that first-hand knowledge of all aspects of aviation was crucial to being able to command airmen, although he was well aware that latecomers like himself did not impress the old pioneers or the young aviators. He qualified in various single and multi-engined aircraft and continued flying three or four days per week until March 1945. At times, his flight path took him over the concentration camps at Oranienburg
, Dachau, and Buchenwald
.
Following the death of Generalleutnant Walther Wever
in an air crash, Kesselring became Chief of Staff of the Luftwaffe on 3 June 1936. In that post, Kesselring oversaw the expansion of the Luftwaffe, the acquisition of new aircraft types such as the Messerschmitt Bf 109
and Junkers Ju 87
, and the development of paratroops. Like many ex-Army officers, he tended to see air power in the tactical
role, providing support to land operations. Kesselring and Hans-Jürgen Stumpff
, are usually blamed for the turning away from strategic bombing
and planning while over-focusing on close air support
with the army. However, it would seem the two most prominent enthusiasts for the focus on ground-support operations (direct or indirect) were actually Hugo Sperrle
and Hans Jeschonnek
. These men were long-time professional airmen involved in German air services since early in their careers. The Luftwaffe was not pressured into ground support operations because of pressure from the army, or because it was led by ex-army personnel like Kesselring. Interdiction
and close air support were operations that suited the Luftwaffe's pre-existing approach to warfare; a culture of joint inter-service operations, rather than independent strategic air campaigns. Moreover, many in the Luftwaffe command believed medium bomber
s to be sufficient in power for use in strategic bombing operations against Germany's most likely enemies; Britain and France.
Kesselring's main operational task during this time was the support of the Condor Legion
in the Spanish Civil War
. However, his tenure was marred by personal and professional conflicts with his superior, General der Flieger Erhard Milch
, and Kesselring asked to be relieved. The head of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Göring
, acquiesced and Kesselring became the commander of Air District III in Dresden. On 1 October 1938, he was promoted to General der Flieger
(air general
) and became commander of Luftflotte 1
, based in Berlin.
that began World War II
, Kesselring's Luftflotte 1 operated in support of Army Group North
, commanded by Generaloberst Fedor von Bock
. Although not under von Bock's command, Kesselring worked closely with Bock and considered himself under Bock's orders in all matters pertaining to the ground war. Kesselring strove to provide the best possible close air support
to the ground forces and used the flexibility of air power to concentrate all available air strength at critical points, such as during the Battle of the Bzura
. He attempted to cut the Polish communications by making a series of air attacks against Warsaw
, but found that even 1000 kg (2,204.6 lb) bombs could not guarantee that bridges would be destroyed.
Kesselring was himself shot down over Poland
by the Polish Air Force
. In all, he would be shot down five times during World War II. For his part in the Polish campaign, Kesselring was personally awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
by Adolf Hitler.
network in occupied Poland
. However, after the Mechelen Incident
, in which an aircraft made a forced landing in Belgium
with copies of the German invasion plan, Göring relieved the commander of Luftflotte 2
, General der Flieger Hellmuth Felmy
, of his command, and appointed Kesselring in his place. Kesselring flew to his new headquarters at Münster
the very next day, 13 January 1940. As Felmy's chief of staff, Generalmajor Josef Kammhuber
, had also been relieved, Kesselring brought his own chief of staff, Generalmajor Wilhelm Speidel, with him.
Arriving in the west, Kesselring found Luftflotte 2 operating in support of von Bock's Army Group B
. He inherited from Felmy a complex air plan requiring on-the-minute timing for several hours, incorporating an airborne operation
around Rotterdam
and The Hague
to seize airfields and bridges in the "fortress Holland" area. The paratroopers were General der Flieger Kurt Student
's airborne forces that depended on a quick link up with the mechanised forces. To facilitate this, Kesselring promised von Bock the fullest possible close air support
. Air and ground operations, however, were to commence simultaneously, so there would be no time to suppress the defending Royal Netherlands Air Force
.
The Battle of the Netherlands
commenced on 10 May 1940. While initial air operations went well, and Kesselring's fighters and bombers soon gained the upper hand against the small Dutch air force, the paratroopers ran into fierce opposition in the Battle for The Hague
and the Battle of Rotterdam
. On 14 May 1940, responding to a call for assistance from Student, Kesselring ordered the bombing of Rotterdam
city centre. Fires raged out of control, destroying much of the city.
After the surrender of the Netherlands
on 14 May 1940, Luftflotte 2 attempted to move forward to new airfields in Belgium
while still providing support for the fast moving ground troops. The Battle of France
was going well, with General der Panzertruppe
Heinz Guderian
forcing a crossing of the Meuse River
at Sedan
on 13 May 1940. To support the breakthrough, Kesselring transferred Generalleutnant Wolfram von Richthofen
's VIII. Fliegerkorps
to Luftflotte 3
. By 24 May, the Allied forces had been cut in two, and the German Army was only 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) from Dunkirk, the last channel port remaining in Allied hands. However, that day Generaloberst Gerd von Rundstedt
ordered a halt. Kesselring considered this decision a "fatal error". It left the burden of preventing the Allied evacuation of Dunkirk to Kesselring's fliers, who were hampered by poor flying weather and staunch opposition from the British Royal Air Force
. For his role in the campaign in the west, Kesselring was promoted to Generalfeldmarschall
(field marshal
) on 19 July 1940.
Following the campaign in France, Kesselring's Luftflotte 2 was committed to the Battle of Britain
. Luftflotte 2 was initially responsible for the bombing of southeastern England and the London
area but as the battle progressed, command responsibility shifted, with Generalfeldmarschall Hugo Sperrle
's Luftflotte 3 taking more responsibility for the night-time Blitz attacks while the main daylight operations fell to Luftflotte 2. Kesselring was involved in the planning of numerous raids, including the Coventry Blitz
of November 1940. Kesselring's fliers reported numerous victories, but failed to press home attacks and achieve a decisive victory. Instead, the Luftwaffe employed the inherent flexibility of air power to switch targets.
, Luftflotte 2 remained in the west until May 1941. This was partly as a deception measure, and partly because new airbases in Poland could not be completed by the 1 June 1941 target date, although they were made ready in time for the actual commencement of Operation Barbarossa
on 22 June 1941. Kesselring established his new headquarters at Bielany
, a suburb of Warsaw
.
Luftflotte 2 operated in support of Army Group Centre
, commanded by Fedor von Bock, continuing the close working relationship between the two. Kesselring's mission was to gain air superiority, and if possible air supremacy
, as soon as possible while still supporting ground operations. For this he had a fleet of over 1,000 aircraft, about a third of the Luftwaffes total strength.
The German attack caught large numbers of Soviet Air Force
aircraft on the ground. Faulty tactics – sending unescorted bombers against the Germans at regular intervals in tactically unsound formations – accounted for many more. Kesselring reported that in the first week of operations Luftflotte 2 had accounted for 2,500 Soviet aircraft in the air and on the ground. Even Göring found these figures hard to believe and ordered them to be re-checked. As the ground troops advanced, the figures could be directly confirmed and were found to be too low. Within days, Kesselring was able to fly solo over the front in his Focke-Wulf Fw 189
.
With air supremacy attained, Luftflotte 2 turned to support of ground operations, particularly guarding the flanks of the armoured spearheads, without which the rapid advance was not possible. When enemy counterattacks threatened, Kesselring threw the full weight of his force against them. Now that the Army was convinced of the value of air support, units were all too inclined to call for it. Kesselring now had to convince the Army that air support should be concentrated at critical points. He strove to improve army–air cooperation with new tactics and the appointment of Colonel Martin Fiebig
as a special close air support commander. By 26 July, Kesselring reported the destruction of 165 tanks, 2,136 vehicles and 194 artillery pieces.
In late 1941, Luftflotte 2 supported the final German offensive against Moscow
, codenamed Operation Typhoon
. Raids on Moscow proved hazardous, as Moscow had good all-weather airfields and opposition from both fighters and anti-aircraft guns was similar to that encountered over Britain. The bad weather that hampered ground operations from October on impeded air operations even more. Nonetheless, Luftflotte 2 continued to fly critical reconnaissance, interdiction, close air support and air supply missions.
In November 1941, Kesselring was appointed Commander-in-Chief
South and was transferred to Italy along with his Luftflotte 2 staff, which for the time being also functioned as his Commander-in-Chief South staff. Only in January 1943 did he form his headquarters into a true theatre staff and create a separate staff to control Luftflotte 2. As a theatre commander, he was answerable directly to the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht
(OKW) and commanded ground, naval and air forces, but this was of little importance at first as most German units were under Italian operational control.
Kesselring strove to organise and protect supply convoys in order to get the German-Italian panzer army the resources it needed. He succeeded in establishing local air superiority and neutralising Malta
, which provided a base from which British aircraft and submarines could menace Axis convoys headed for North Africa. Without the vital supplies they carried, particularly fuel, the Axis forces in North Africa could not conduct operations. Through various expedients, Kesselring managed to deliver a greatly increased flow of supplies to Generaloberst Erwin Rommel
's Afrika Korps
in Libya. With his forces thus strengthened, Rommel prepared an attack on the British positions around Gazala, while Kesselring planned Operation Herkules
, an airborne and seaborne attack on Malta with the 185 Airborne Division Folgore
and Ramcke Parachute Brigade
. Kesselring hoped to thereby secure the Axis line of communication
with North Africa.
For the Battle of Gazala
, Rommel divided his command in two, taking personal command of the mobile units of the Deutsches Afrika Korps and Italian XX Motorized Corps, which he led around the southern flank of Lieutenant-General Neil Ritchie
's British Eighth Army
. Rommel left the infantry of the Italian X and XXI Corps under General der Panzertruppe
Ludwig Crüwell
to hold the rest of the Eighth Army in place. This command arrangement went awry on 29 May 1942 when Crüwell was taken prisoner. Lacking an available commander of sufficient seniority, Kesselring assumed personal command of Gruppe Crüwell. Flying his Fieseler Fi 156
Storch to a meeting, Kesselring was fired upon by a British force astride Rommel's line of communications. Kesselring called in an air strike by every available Stuka
and Jabo
. His attack was successful; the British force suffered heavy losses and was forced to pull back.
Kesselring and Rommel had a disagreement over the latter's conduct in the Battle of Bir Hakeim
. Rommel's initial infantry assaults had failed to capture this vital position, the southern pivot of the British Gazala Line, which was held by the 1st Free French brigade
, commanded by General Marie Pierre Koenig
. Rommel had called for air support but had failed to break the position, which Kesselring attributed to faulty coordination between the ground and air attacks. Bir Hakeim was evacuated on 10 June 1942. Kesselring was more impressed with the results of Rommel's successful assault on Tobruk on 21 June, for which Kesselring brought in additional aircraft from Greece and Crete. For his part in the campaign, Kesselring was awarded the Knight's Cross with oak leaves and swords.
In the wake of the victory at Tobruk, Rommel persuaded Hitler to authorise an attack on Egypt instead of Malta, over Kesselring's objections. The parachute troops assembled for Operation Herkules were sent to Rommel. Things went well at first, with Rommel winning the Battle of Mersa Matruh, but just as Kesselring had warned, the logistical difficulties mounted and the result was the disastrous First Battle of El Alamein
, Battle of Alam el Halfa and Second Battle of El Alamein
. Kesselring considered Rommel to be a great general leading fast-moving troops at the corps level of command, but felt that he was too moody and changeable for higher command. For Kesselring, Rommel's nervous breakdown and hospitalisation for depression at the end of the African Campaign only confirmed this.
Kesselring was briefly considered as a possible successor to Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel
as Chief of Staff of the OKW in September 1942, with General der Panzertruppe Friedrich Paulus
replacing Generaloberst Alfred Jodl
as Chief of the Operations Staff at OKW. The consideration demonstrated the high regard in which Kesselring was held by Hitler. Nevertheless, Hitler decided that neither Kesselring nor Paulus could be spared from their current posts. In October 1942, Kesselring was given direct command of all German armed forces in the theatre except Rommel's German-Italian Panzer Army
in North Africa, including General der Infantrie Enno von Rintelen, the German liaison officer at Commando Supremo, who spoke fluent Italian. Kesselring's command also included the troops in Greece and the Balkans until the end of the year, when Hitler created an army group headquarters under Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm List, naming him List Oberbefehlshaber Südost.
precipitated a crisis in Kesselring's command. He ordered Walther Nehring
, the former commander of the Afrika Korps
who was returning to action after recovering from wounds received at the Battle of Alam el Halfa, to proceed to Tunisia
to take command of a new corps (XC Corps). Kesselring ordered Nehring to establish a bridgehead in Tunisia and then to press west as far as possible so as to gain freedom to manoeuvre. By December, the Allied commander, General
Dwight D. Eisenhower
, was forced to concede that Kesselring had won the race; the final phase of Operation Torch
had failed and the Axis could only be ejected from Tunisia after a prolonged struggle.
With the initiative back with the Germans and Italians, Kesselring hoped to launch an offensive that would drive the Allies out of North Africa. At the Battle of the Kasserine Pass
his forces gave the Allies a beating but in the end strong Allied resistance and a string of Axis errors stopped the advance. Kesselring now concentrated on shoring up his forces by moving the required tonnages of supplies from Sicily
but his efforts were frustrated by Allied aircraft and submarines. An Allied offensive in April
finally broke through, leading to a collapse of the Axis position in Tunisia. Some 275,000 German and Italian prisoners were taken. Only the Battle of Stalingrad
overshadowed this disaster. In return, Kesselring had held up the Allies in Tunisia for six months, forcing a postponement of the Allied invasion of northern France from the middle of 1943 to the middle of 1944.
Kesselring expected that the Allies would next invade Sicily
, as a landing could be made there under fighter cover from Tunisia and Malta. He reinforced the six coastal and four mobile Italian divisions there with two mobile German divisions, the 15th Panzergrenadier Division and the Hermann Göring Panzer Division
, both rebuilt after being destroyed in Tunisia. Kesselring was well aware that while this force was large enough to stop the Allies from simply marching in, it could not withstand a large scale invasion. He therefore pinned his hopes on repelling the Allied invasion of Sicily
on an immediate counterattack, which he ordered Colonel Paul Conrath
of the Hermann Göring Panzer Division to carry out the moment the objective of the Allied invasion fleet was known, with or without orders from the island commander, Generale d'Armata Alfredo Guzzoni
.
Kesselring hoped that the Allied invasion fleet would provide good targets for U-boat
s, but they had few successes. U-953 sank two American LSTs and with U-375 sank three vessels from a British convoy on 4–5 July, while U-371 sank a Liberty ship
and a tanker
on 10 July. Pressure from the Allied air forces forced Luftflotte 2, commanded since June by von Richthofen, to withdraw most of its aircraft to the mainland.
The Allied invasion of Sicily on 10 July 1943 was stubbornly opposed. A Stuka attacked and sank the ; an Bf 109 destroyed an LST; and a Liberty ship filled with ammunition was bombed by Ju 88s and caught fire, later exploding without loss of life. Unaware that Guzzoni had already ordered a major counterattack on 11 July, Kesselring bypassed the chain of command to order the Hermann Göring Panzer Division to attack that day in the hope that a vigorous attack could succeed before the Americans could bring the bulk of their artillery and armoured support ashore. Although his troops gave the Americans "quite a battering", they failed to capture the Allied position.
Kesselring flew to Sicily himself on 12 July to survey the situation and decided that no more than a delaying action was possible and that the island would eventually have to be evacuated. Nonetheless, he intended to fight on and he reinforced Sicily with the 29th Panzergrenadier Division on 15 July. Kesselring returned to Sicily by flying boat
on 16 July to give the senior German commander, General der Panzertruppe
Hans-Valentin Hube
, his instructions. Unable to provide much more in the way of air support, Kesselring gave Hube command of the heavy flak units on the island, although this was contrary to Luftwaffe doctrine. In all, Kesselring managed to delay the Allies in Sicily for another month and the Allied conquest of the Sicily was not complete until 17 August.
Kesselring's evacuation of Sicily, which began a week earlier on 10 August, was perhaps the most brilliant action of the campaign. In spite of the Allies' superiority on land, at sea, and in the air, Kesselring was able to evacuate not only 40,000 men, but also 96,605 vehicles, 94 guns, 47 tanks, 1,100 tons of ammunition, 970 tons of fuel, and 15,000 tons of stores. He was able to achieve near-perfect coordination between the three services under his command while his opponent, Eisenhower, could not.
, where his I Parachute Corps was under OKW orders to occupy the capital in case of Italian defection. Benito Mussolini
was removed from power on 25 July 1943 and Rommel and OKW began to plan for the occupation of Italy and the disarmament of the Italian Army. Kesselring remained uninformed of these plans for the time being.
On the advice of Rommel and Generaloberst Alfred Jodl
, Hitler decided that the Italian Peninsula
could not be held without the assistance of the Italian Army. Kesselring was ordered to withdraw from southern Italy and consolidate his Army Group C with Rommel's Army Group B in Northern Italy, where Rommel would assume overall command. Kesselring was slated to be posted to Norway
. Kesselring was appalled at the prospect of abandoning Italy. It would expose southern Germany to bombers operating from Italy; risk the Allies breaking into the Po Valley; and was completely unnecessary, as he was certain that Rome could be held until the summer of 1944. This assessment was based on his belief that the Allies would not conduct operations outside the range of their air cover, which could only reach as far as Salerno
. Kesselring submitted his resignation on 14 August 1943.
SS
Obergruppenführer
Karl Wolff
, the highest SS and police Führer
in Italy, intervened on Kesselring's behalf with Hitler. Wolff painted Rommel as "politically unreliable" and argued that Kesselring's presence in southern Italy was vital to prevent an early Italian defection. On Wolff's advice, Hitler refused to accept Kesselring's resignation.
Italy withdrew from the war on 8 September. Kesselring immediately moved to secure Rome, where he expected an Allied airborne and seaborne invasion. He ordered the 3rd Panzergrenadier Division and 2nd Parachute Division to close on the city, while a detachment made an unsuccessful attempt to seize the Italian Army staff at Monterotondo
in a coup de main
. Kesselring's two divisions were faced by five Italian divisions, two of them armoured, but he managed to overcome the opposition, disperse the Italian forces and secure the city in two days.
All over Italy, the Germans swiftly disarmed
Italian units. Rommel deported Italian soldiers, except for those willing to serve in German units, to Germany for forced labor, whereas Italian units in Kesselring's area were initially disbanded and their men permitted to go home. One Italian commander, General Gonzaga, refused German demands that his 222nd Coastal Division disarm, and was promptly shot. A significant part of the 184 Airborne Division Nembo
went over to the German side, eventually becoming the basis of the 4th Parachute Division
. On the Greek Island of Kefalonia
– outside Kesselring's command – some 5,000 Italian troops of the 33 Mountain Infantry Division Acqui
were massacred
. Mussolini was rescued by the Germans in Operation Oak (Unternehmen Eiche
), a raid planned by Kurt Student and carried out by Obersturmbannführer
Otto Skorzeny
on 12 September. The details of the operation were deliberately, though unsuccessfully, kept from Kesselring. "Kesselring is too honest for those born traitors down there" was Hitler's assessment.
Italy now effectively became an occupied country, as the Germans poured in troops. Italy's decision to switch sides created contempt for the Italians among both the Allies and Germans, which was to have far-reaching consequences.
Although his command was already "written off", Kesselring intended to fight. At the Battle of Salerno
in September 1943, he launched a full-scale counterattack against the Allied landings there with Generaloberst Heinrich von Vietinghoff
's Tenth Army. The counterattack inflicted heavy casualties on the Allied forces, forced them back in several areas, and, for a time, made Allied commanders contemplate evacuation. The short distance from German airfields allowed Luftflotte 2 to put 120 aircraft over the Salerno area on 11 September 1943. Using Fritz X
anti-ship missile
s, hits were scored on the battleship
and cruiser
s and , while a Liberty ship was sunk on 14 September and another damaged the next day. The offensive ultimately failed to throw the Allies back into the sea because of the intervention of Allied naval gunfire which decimated the advancing German units, stubborn Allied resistance and the advance of the British Eighth Army. On 17 September 1943, Kesselring gave Vietinghoff permission to break off the attack and withdraw.
Kesselring had been defeated but gained precious time. Already, in defiance of his orders, he was preparing a series of successive fallback positions on the Volturno Line
, the Barbara Line
and the Bernhardt Line
. Only in November 1943, after a month of hard fighting, did the Allies reach Kesselring's main position, the Gustav Line
. According to his memoirs, Kesselring felt that much more could have been accomplished if he had access to the troops held "uselessly" under Rommel's command.
In November 1943, Kesselring met with Hitler. Kesselring gave an optimistic assessment of the situation in Italy and gave reassurances that he could hold the Allies south of Rome on the Winter Line
. Kesselring further promised that he could prevent the Allies reaching the Northern Apennines
for at least six months. As a result, on 6 November 1943, Hitler ordered Rommel and his Army Group B headquarters to move to France to take charge of the Atlantic Wall
and prepare for the Allied attack that was expected there in the Spring of 1944. On 21 November 1943, Kesselring resumed command of all German forces in Italy, combining Commander-in-Chief South, a joint command, with that of Army Group C, a ground command. "I had always blamed Kesselring", Hitler later explained, "for looking at things too optimistically ... events have proved Rommel wrong, and I have been justified in my decision to leave Field Marshal Kesselring there, whom I have seen as an incredible political idealist, but also as a military optimist, and it is my opinion that military leadership without optimism is not possible."
The Luftwaffe scored a notable success on the night of 2 December 1943 when 105 Ju88 bombers struck the port of Bari
. Skilfully using chaff
to confuse the Allied radar
operators, they found the port packed with brightly lit Allied shipping. The result was the most destructive air raid on Allied shipping since the attack on Pearl Harbor
. Hits were scored on two ammunition ships and a tanker. Burning oil and exploding ammunition spread over the harbour. Some 16 ships were sunk and eight damaged, and the port was put out of action for three weeks. Moreover, one of the ships sunk, SS John Harvey, had been carrying mustard gas, which enveloped the port in a cloud of poisonous vapours.
The first Allied attempt to break through the Gustav Line in the Battle of Monte Cassino
in January 1944 met with early success, with the British X Corps
breaking through the line held by the 94th Infantry Division and imperilling the entire Tenth Army front. At the same time, Kesselring was receiving warnings of an imminent Allied amphibious attack. Kesselring rushed his reserves, the 29th and 90th Panzergrenadier Divisions, to the Cassino front. They were able to stabilise the German position there but left Rome poorly guarded. Kesselring felt that he had been out-generalled when the Allies landed at Anzio
.
Although taken by surprise, Kesselring moved rapidly to regain control of the situation, summoning Generaloberst Eberhard von Mackensen
's Fourteenth Army headquarters from northern Italy, the 29th and 90th Panzergrenadier Divisions from the Cassino front, and the 26th Panzer Division from Tenth Army. OKW chipped in some divisions from other theatres. By February, Kesselring was able to take the offensive at Anzio but his forces were unable to crush the Allied beachhead, for which Kesselring blamed himself, OKW and von Mackensen for avoidable errors.
Meanwhile, costly fighting at Monte Cassino
in February 1944 brought the Allies close to a breakthrough into the Liri Valley. To hold the bastion of Monte Cassino, Kesselring brought in the 1st Parachute Division
, an "exceptionally well trained and conditioned" formation, on 26 February. Despite heavy casualties and the expenditure of enormous quantities of ammunition, an Allied offensive in March 1944 failed to break the Gustav Line position.
On 11 May 1944 General Sir Harold Alexander
launched Operation Diadem
, which finally broke through the Gustav Line and forced the Tenth Army to withdraw. In the process, a gap opened up between the Tenth and Fourteenth Armies, threatening both with encirclement. For this failure, Kesselring relieved von Mackensen of his command, replacing him with General der Panzertruppe Joachim Lemelsen
. Fortunately for the Germans, Lieutenant General
Mark Clark
, obsessed with the capture of Rome, failed to take advantage of the situation and the Tenth Army was able to withdraw to the next line of defence, the Trasimene Line
, where it was able to link up with the Fourteenth Army and then conduct a fighting withdrawal.
For his part in the campaign, Kesselring was awarded the Knight's Cross with oak leaves, swords and diamonds by Hitler at the Wolfsschanze
near Rastenburg, East Prussia
on 19 July 1944. The next day, Hitler was the target of the 20 July plot. Informed of this event that evening by Göring, Kesselring, like many other senior commanders, sent a telegram to Hitler reaffirming his loyalty.
Throughout July and August 1944, Kesselring fought a stubborn delaying action, gradually retreating to the formidable Gothic Line
north of Florence
. There, he was finally able to halt the Allied advance. Casualties of the Gothic Line battles in September and October 1944 included Kesselring himself. On 25 October 1944, his car collided with an artillery piece coming out of a side road. Kesselring suffered serious head and facial injuries and did not return to his command until January 1945.
and Orvieto
. In some cases, historic bridges – such as the Ponte Vecchio
(literally "Old Bridge") – were booby trap
ped rather than blown up. However, other historic Florentine bridges were destroyed on his orders and, in addition to booby-trapping the old bridge, he ordered the demolition of the ancient historical central borough at its two ends, in order to delay the Allied advance across the Arno
river. In the same vein, Kesselring supported the Italian declaration of Rome, Florence and Chieti
as open cities
. In the case of Rome, this was in spite of there being considerable tactical advantages to be had from defending the Tiber
bridges. These declarations were never agreed to by the Allies as the cities were not demilitarised and remained centres of government and industry. Despite the repeated declarations of "open city", Rome was bombed more than fifty times by the Allies, whose air forces hit Florence as well. In practice, the open city status was rendered meaningless.Among several relevant documents available at the National Archives of the United Kingdom – all of which clarify beyond any doubt that the "open city" status was never operative in Rome – the , which contains a number of filed documents about the Allied policy towards Rome, is of most interest. The file n. 400 is a message sent to the Foreign Office by D'Arcy Osborne, Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Holy See, in which he transmits the latest German proposal for declaring Rome "open city", relayed to him by the German Ambassador in Rome, via the Vatican Undersecretary of State; the message was then urgently retransmitted to Washington, and is dated 4 June 1944, the same day General Mark Clark's tanks entered Rome. Up to the very last minute, the Germans had used Rome and the diplomatic delusion of the never-ending talks about the "open city" in order to take any possible advantage out of it, including using the Italian capital to cover their ordered retreat behind a safer defence line.
Kesselring tried to preserve the monastery of Monte Cassino
by avoiding its military occupation even though it offered a superb observing point over the battlefield. Ultimately this was unsuccessful, as the Allies never believed the monastery would not be used to direct the German artillery against their lines. On the morning of 15 February 1944, 142 B-17 Flying Fortress, 47 B-25 Mitchell
and 40 B-26 Marauder
medium bombers deliberately dropped 1,150 tons of high explosives and incendiary bombs on the abbey, reducing the historic monastery to a smoking mass of rubble. Kesselring was aware that some artworks taken from Monte Cassino for safekeeping wound up in the possession of Hermann Göring. Kesselring had some German soldiers shot for looting. German authorities avoided giving the Italian authorities control over artworks because they feared that "entire collections would be sold to Switzerland". A 1945 Allied investigation reported that Italian cultural treasures had suffered relatively little war damage. Kesselring received regular updates on efforts to preserve cultural treasures and his personal interest in the matter contributed to the high proportion of art treasures that were saved.
(OSS) Operational Group landed in inflatable boat
s from US Navy PT boats on the Liguria
n coast as part of Operation Ginny II, a mission to blow up the entrances of two vital railway tunnels. Their boats were discovered and they were captured by a smaller group of Italian and German soldiers. On 26 March, they were executed under Hitler's "Commando Order
", issued after German soldiers had been shackled during the Dieppe Raid
. General Anton Dostler
, who had signed the execution order, was tried after the war, found guilty, and executed by firing squad on 1 December 1945.
In Rome on 23 March 1944, 33 policemen of the Polizeiregiment Bozen from the German
-speaking population of the Italian province of South Tyrol
and three Italian civilians were killed by a bomb blast and the subsequent shooting. In response, Hitler approved the recommendation of Generaloberst Eberhard von Mackensen
, the commander of the Fourteenth Army who was responsible for the sector including Rome
, that 10 Italians should be shot for each policeman killed. The task fell to SS Obersturmbannführer Herbert Kappler
who, finding there were not enough condemned prisoners available, made up the numbers as he thought best, using Jewish prisoners and even civilians taken from the streets. The result was the Ardeatine massacre
.
The fall of Rome on 4 June 1944 placed Kesselring in a dangerous situation as his forces attempted to withdraw from Rome to the Gothic Line
. That the Germans were especially vulnerable to Italian partisans was not lost on General Alexander, who appealed in a radio broadcast for Italians to kill Germans "wherever you encounter them". Kesselring responded by authorising the "massive employment of artillery, grenade
and mine throwers
, armoured cars, flamethrower
s and other technical combat equipment" against the partisans. He also issued an order promising indemnity to soldiers who "exceed our normal restraint". Whether or not as a result of Kesselring's hard line, massacres were carried out by the Hermann Göring Panzer Division
at Stia
in April, Civitella in Val di Chiana
in June and Bucine in July 1944, by the 26th Panzer Division at Padule di Fucecchio
on 23 August 1944, and by the 16th SS Panzergrenadier Division Reichsführer-SS
at Sant'Anna di Stazzema
in August 1944 and Marzabotto
in September and October 1944.
In August 1944 Kesselring was informed by Rudolf Rahn, the German ambassador to the RSI
, that Mussolini had filed protests about the killing of Italian citizens. In response, Kesselring issued another edict to his troops on 21 August, deploring incidents that had "damaged the German Wehrmachts reputation and discipline and which no longer have anything to do with reprisal operations" and launched investigations into specific cases that Mussolini cited. Between 21 July and 25 September 1944, 624 Germans were killed, 993 wounded and 872 missing in partisan operations, while some 9,520 partisans were killed.
Kesselring used the Jews of Rome as slave labour on the construction of fortifications – as he had earlier done with those of Tunis. He needed a large labour force, given the magnitude of the logistical challenges he was facing. When ordered to deport the Roman Jews, Kesselring resisted. He announced that no resources were available to carry out such an order. Hitler then transferred responsibility to the SS and around 8,000 Roman Jews were ultimately deported. During the German occupation of Italy, the Germans were believed to have killed some 46,000 Italian civilians, including 7,000 Jews.
as OB West
on 10 March 1945. On arrival, he told his new staff, "Well, gentlemen, I am the new V-3", referring to the Vergeltungswaffe
("vengeance" weapons) and, in particular, to the V-3 cannon
, prototypes of which were fired on the Western Front
in late 1944 and early 1945. Given the desperate situation of the Western Front, this was another sign of Kesselring's proverbial optimism. Kesselring still described as "lucid" Hitler's analysis of the situation, according to which the Germans were about to inflict a historical defeat upon the Soviets, after which the victorious German armies would be brought west to crush the Allies and sweep them from the continent. Therefore, Kesselring was determined to "hang on" in the west until the "decision in the East" came. Kesselring endorsed Hitler's order that deserters should be hanged from the nearest tree. When a staff officer sought to make Kesselring aware of the hopelessness of the situation, Kesselring told him that he had driven through the entire army rear area and not seen a single hanged man.
The Western Front at this time generally followed the Rhine river with two important exceptions: the American bridgehead over the Rhine at Remagen
, and a large German salient
west of the Rhine, the Saar
–Palatinate triangle. Consideration was given to evacuating the triangle, but OKW ordered it held. When Kesselring paid his first visit to the German First and Seventh Army headquarters there on 13 March 1945, the army group commander, Oberstgruppenführer
Paul Hausser
, and the two army commanders all affirmed the defence of the triangle could only result in heavy losses or complete annihilation of their commands. General der Infanterie Hans Felber
of the Seventh Army considered the latter the most likely outcome. Nonetheless, Kesselring insisted that the positions had to be held.
The triangle was already under attack from two sides by Lieutenant General George Patton's Third Army and Lieutenant General Alexander Patch
's Seventh Army. The German position soon crumbled and Hitler reluctantly sanctioned a withdrawal. The First and Seventh Armies suffered heavy losses: around 113,000 Germans casualties at the cost of 17,000 on the Allied side. Nonetheless, they had avoided encirclement and managed to conduct a skilful delaying action, evacuating the last troops to the east bank of the Rhine on 25 March 1945.
As Germany was cut in two, Kesselring's command was enlarged to include Army Groups Centre
, South
and South-East on the Eastern Front
, and Army Group C in Italy, as well as his own Army Group G
and Army Group Upper Rhine
. On 30 April, Hitler committed suicide in Berlin. On 1 May, Karl Dönitz
was designated German President (Reichspräsident
) and the Flensburg government
was created. One of the new president's first acts was the appointment of Kesselring as Commander-in-Chief of Southern Germany, with plenipotentiary powers.
, Allen Dulles. Known as Operation Sunrise
, these secret negotiations had been in progress since early March 1945. Kesselring was aware of them, having previously consented to them, although he had not informed his own staff. He did, however, later inform Hitler.
At first he did not accept the agreement and, on 30 April, relieved both Vietinghoff and his Chief of Staff, Generalleutnant Hans Röttiger
, putting them at the disposition of the OKW for a possible court martial. They were replaced by General Friedrich Schulz
and Generalmajor Friedrich Wenzel respectively. The next morning, 1 May, Röttinger reacted by placing both Schulz and Wenzel under arrest, and summoning General Joachim Lemelsen
to take Schulz's place. Lemelsen initially refused, as he was in possession of a written order from Kesselring which prohibited any talks with the enemy without his explicit authorization. By this time, Vietinghoff and Wolff had concluded an armistice with the Allied Commander in Chief of the Mediterranean Theatre, Field Marshal
Alexander, which became effective on 2 May at 14:00. Lemelsen reached Bolzano, and Schulz and Wenzel regained control, this time agreeing with the officers pushing for a quick surrender. The German armies in Italy were now utterly defeated by the Allies, who were rapidly advancing from Garmisch towards Innsbruck
. Kesselring remained stubbornly opposed to the surrender, but was finally won over by Wolff on the late morning of 2 May after a two-hour phone call to Kesselring at his headquarters at Pullach
.
North of the Alps, Army Group G followed suit on 6 May. Kesselring now decided to surrender his own headquarters. He ordered SS Oberstgruppenführer
Paul Hausser
to supervise the SS troops to ensure that the surrender was carried out in accordance with his instructions. Kesselring then surrendered to an American major at Saalfelden
, near Salzburg
, in Austria
on 9 May 1945. He was taken to see Major General Maxwell D. Taylor
, the commander of the 101st Airborne Division
, who treated him courteously, allowing him to keep his weapons and field marshal's baton, and to visit the Eastern Front headquarters of Army Groups Centre and South at Zeltweg
and Graz
unescorted. Taylor arranged for Kesselring and his staff to move into a hotel at Berchtesgaden
. Photographs of Taylor and Kesselring drinking tea together created a stir in the United States. Kesselring met with Lieutenant General Jacob L. Devers
, commander of the Sixth United States Army Group, and gave interviews to Allied newspaper reporters.
With the end of the war, Kesselring was hoping to be able to make a start on the rehabilitation of Germany. Instead, he found himself placed under arrest. On 15 May 1945, Kesselring was taken to Mondorf-les-Bains
where his baton and decorations were taken from him and he was incarcerated. He was held in a number of American POW camps before being transferred to British custody in 1946. He testified at the Nuremberg trial
of Hermann Göring, but his offers to testify against Soviet, American, and British commanders were declined.
By the end of the war, for many Italians the name of Kesselring, whose signature appeared on posters and printed orders announcing draconian measures adopted by the German occupation, had become synonymous with the oppression and terror that had characterised the German occupation. Kesselring's name headed the list of German officers blamed for a long series of atrocities perpetrated by the German forces.
The Moscow Declaration
of October 1943 promised that "those German officers and men and members of the Nazi party who have been responsible for or have taken a consenting part in the above atrocities, massacres and executions will be sent back to the countries in which their abominable deeds were done in order that they may be judged and punished according to the laws of these liberated countries and of free governments which will be erected therein." However, the British, who had been a driving force in moulding the war crimes trial policy that culminated in the Nuremberg Trials, explicitly excluded high-ranking German officers in their custody. Thus, Kesselring's conviction became "a legal prerequisite if perpetrators of war crimes were to be found guilty by Italian courts".
The British held two major trials against the top German war criminals who had perpetrated crimes during the Italian campaign. For political reasons it was decided to hold the trials in Italy, but a request by Italy to allow an Italian judge to participate was denied on the grounds that Italy was not an Allied country. The trials were held under the Royal Warrant of 18 June 1945, thus essentially under British Common Military Law. The decision put the trials on a shaky legal basis, as foreign nationals were being tried for crimes against foreigners in a foreign country. The first trial, held in Rome, was of von Mackensen and Generalleutnant Kurt Mälzer
, the Commandant of Rome, for their part in the Ardeatine massacre. Both were sentenced to death on 30 November 1946.
Kesselring's own trial began in Venice on 17 February 1947. The British Military Court was presided over by Major General Sir Edmund Hakewill-Smith
, assisted by four lieutenant colonels. Colonel Richard C. Halse – who had already obtained the death penalty for von Mackensen and Mältzer – was the prosecutor. Kesselring's legal team was headed by Hans Laternser
, a skilful German lawyer who specialised in Anglo-Saxon law, had represented several defendants at the Nuremberg Trials, and would later go on to represent Generalfeldmarschall Erich von Manstein
. Kesselring's ability to pay his legal team was hampered because his assets had been frozen by the Allies, but his legal costs were eventually met by friends in South America
and relatives in Franconia
.
Kesselring was arraigned on two charges: the shooting of 335 Italians in the Ardeatine massacre and incitement to kill Italian civilians. Kesselring did not invoke the "Nuremberg defence". Rather, he maintained that his actions were lawful. On 6 May 1947 the Court found him guilty of both charges and sentenced him to death by firing squad, which was considered more honourable than hanging. The court left open the question of the legality of killing innocent persons in reprisals.
The planned major trial for the campaign of reprisals never took place, but a series of smaller trials was held instead in Padua
between April and June 1947 for SS Brigadeführer Willy Tensfeld, Kapitänleutnant
Waldemar Krummhaar, the 26th Panzer Division's Generalleutnant Eduard Crasemann
and SS Gruppenführer Max Simon
of the 16th SS Panzergrenadier Division Reichsführer-SS. Tensfeld was acquitted; Crasemann was sentenced to 10 years; and Simon was sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted. Simons's trial was the last held in Italy by the British. By 1949, British military tribunals had sentenced 230 Germans to death and another 447 to custodial sentences. None of the death sentences imposed between the end of 1946 and 1948 were carried out. A number of officers, all below the rank of General, including Herbert Kappler
, were transferred to the Italian courts for trial. These applied very different legal standards to the British – ones which were often more favourable to the defendants. Ironically, in view of the repeated attempts by many senior Wehrmacht commanders to shift blame for atrocities onto the SS, the most senior SS commanders in Italy, Karl Wolff
and Himmler's personal representative in Italy, SS Standartenführer Eugen Dollmann
, escaped prosecution.
Winston Churchill
immediately branded it as too harsh and intervened in favour of Kesselring. Field Marshal Alexander, now Governor General of Canada
, sent a telegram to Prime Minister Clement Attlee
in which he expressed his hope that Kesselring's sentence would be commuted. "As his old opponent on the battlefield", he started, "I have no complaints against him. Kesselring and his soldiers fought against us hard but clean." Alexander had expressed his admiration for Kesselring as a military commander as early as 1943. In his 1961 memoirs Alexander paid tribute to Kesselring as a commander who "showed great skill in extricating himself from the desperate situations into which his faulty intelligence had led him". Alexander's sentiments were echoed by Lieutenant General Sir Oliver Leese
, who had commanded the British Eighth Army
in the Italian campaign. In a May 1947 interview, Leese said he was "very sad" to hear of what he considered "British victor's justice" being imposed on Kesselring, an "extremely gallant soldier who had fought his battles fairly and squarely". Lord de L'Isle
, who had been awarded the Victoria Cross
for gallantry at Anzio, raised the issue in the House of Lords
.
The Italian government flatly refused to carry out death sentences, as the death penalty had been abolished in Italy in 1944 and was regarded as a relic of Mussolini's Fascist
regime. The Italian decision was very disappointing to the British government because the trials had partly been intended to meet the expectations of the Italian public. The War Office notified Lieutenant General Sir John Harding
, who had succeeded Alexander as commander of British forces in the Mediterranean in 1946, that there should be no more death sentences and those already imposed should be commuted. Accordingly, Harding commuted the death sentences imposed on von Mackensen, Mältzer and Kesselring to life imprisonment on 4 July 1947. Mältzer died while still in prison in February 1952, while von Mackensen, after having his sentence reduced to 21 years, was eventually freed in October 1952. Kesselring was moved from Mestre
prison near Venice to Wolfsberg, Carinthia, in May 1947. In October 1947 he was transferred for the last time, to Werl
prison, in Westphalia
.
In Wolfsberg, Kesselring was approached by a former SS major who had an escape plan prepared. Kesselring declined the offer on the grounds that he felt it would be seen as a confession of guilt. Other senior Nazi figures did manage to escape from Wolfsberg to South America or Syria
.
Kesselring resumed his work on a history of the war that he was writing for the US Army's Historical Division. This effort, working under the direction of Generaloberst Franz Halder
in 1946, brought together a number of German generals for the purpose of producing historical studies of the war, including Gotthard Heinrici
, Heinz Guderian
, Lothar Rendulic
, Hasso von Manteuffel
and Georg von Küchler
. Kesselring contributed studies of the war in Italy and North Africa and the problems faced by the German high command. Kesselring also worked secretly on his memoirs. The manuscript was smuggled out by Irmgard Horn-Kesselring, Rainer's mother, who typed it up at her home.
An influential group assembled in Britain to lobby for his release from prison. Headed by Lord Hankey
, the group included politicians Lord de L'Isle and Richard Stokes
, Field Marshal Alexander and Admiral of the Fleet
The Earl of Cork and Orrery
, and military historians Basil Liddell Hart
and J. F. C. Fuller. Upon re-gaining the prime ministership in 1951, Winston Churchill, who was closely associated with the group, gave priority to the quick release of the war criminals remaining in British custody.
Meanwhile, in Germany, the release of military prisoners had become a political issue. With the establishment of West Germany
in 1949, and the advent of the Cold War
between the former Allies and the Soviet Union, it became inevitable that the Wehrmacht would be revived in some form, and there were calls for amnesty for military prisoners as a precondition for German military participation in the Western Alliance. A media campaign gradually gathered steam in Germany. Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
published an interview with Liny Kesselring and Stern
ran a series about Kesselring and von Manstein entitled "Justice, Not Clemency". The pressure on the British government was increased in 1952, when the German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer
made it clear that West German ratification of the European Defence Community
Treaty was dependent on the release of German military figures.
In July 1952, Kesselring was diagnosed with a cancerous growth in the throat. During World War I, he had frequently smoked up to twenty cigars per day but he quit smoking in 1925. Although the British were suspicious of the diagnosis, they were concerned that he might die in prison like Mältzer, which would be a public relations disaster. Kesselring was transferred to a hospital, under guard. In October 1952, Kesselring was released from his prison sentence on the grounds of ill-health.
. Leadership of this organisation tarnished his reputation. He attempted to reform the organisation, proposing that the new German flag
be flown instead of the old Imperial Flag; that the old Stahlhelm greeting Front heil! be abolished; and that members of the Social Democratic Party of Germany
be allowed to join. The response was very unenthusiastic.
Kesselring's memoirs were published in 1953, as Soldat bis zum letzten Tag (A Soldier to the Last Day). They were reprinted in English as A Soldier's Record a year later. Although written while he was in prison, without access to his papers, the memoirs formed a valuable resource, informing military historians on topics such as the background to the invasion of the Soviet Union. When the English edition was published, Kesselring's contentions that the Luftwaffe was not defeated in the air in the Battle of Britain and that Operation Sea Lion– the invasion of Britain–was thought about but never seriously planned were controversial. In 1955, he published a second book, Gedanken zum Zweiten Weltkrieg (Thoughts on the Second World War).
Interviewed by the Italian journalist Enzo Biagi
soon after his release in 1952, Kesselring defiantly described the Marzabotto massacre
–in which almost 800 innocent Italian civilians had been killed–as a "normal military operation". Since the event was considered to be the worst massacre of civilians committed in Italy during World War II, Kesselring's definition caused outcry and indignation in the Italian Parliament. Kesselring reacted by raising the provocation and affirming that he had "saved Italy" and that the Italians ought to build him "a monument". In response, on 4 December 1952, Piero Calamandrei
, an Italian jurist, soldier, university professor, and politician, who had been a leader of the Resistance, penned an antifascist poem, Lapide ad ignominia ("A Monument to Ignominy"). In the poem, Calamandrei stated that if Kesselring returned he would indeed find a monument, but one stronger than stone, composed of Italian Resistance fighters who "willingly took up arms, to preserve dignity, not to promote hate, and who decided to fight back against the shame and terror of the world". Calamandrei's poem appears in monuments in the towns of Cuneo
and Montepulciano
.
After release from prison, Kesselring protested against what he regarded as the "unjustly smirched reputation of the German soldier". In November 1953, testifying at a war crimes trial, he warned that "there won't be any volunteers for the new German army if the German government continues to try German soldiers for acts committed in World War II". He enthusiastically supported the European Defence Community
and suggested that the "war opponents of yesterday must become the peace comrades and friends of tomorrow". On the other hand, he also declared that he found "astonishing" those who believe "that we must revise our ideas in accordance with democratic principles ... That is more than I can take."
In March 1954, Kesselring and Liny toured Austria
ostensibly as private citizens. He met with former comrades-in-arms and prison-mates, some of them former SS members, causing embarrassment to the Austrian government, which ordered his deportation. He ignored the order and completed his tour before leaving a week later, as per his original plan. His only official service was on the Medals Commission, which was established by President
Theodor Heuss
. Ultimately, the commission unanimously recommended that medals should be permitted to be worn—but without the swastika
. He was an expert witness for the "Generals' Trials". The Generals' Trials were trials of German citizens before German courts for crimes committed in Germany, the most prominent of which was that of Generalfeldmarschall Ferdinand Schörner
.
Kesselring died at Bad Nauheim
, West Germany
, on 16 July 1960 at the age of 74. He was given a quasi-military Stahlhelm funeral and buried in Bergfriedhof Cemetery in Bad Wiessee
. Members of Stahlhelm acted as his pall bearers and fired a rifle volley over his grave. His former chief of staff, Siegfried Westphal
, spoke for the veterans of North Africa and Italy, describing Kesselring as "a man of admirable strength of character whose care was for soldiers of all ranks". General Josef Kammhuber
spoke on behalf of the Luftwaffe and Bundeswehr
, expressing the hope that Kesselring would be remembered for his earlier accomplishments rather than for his later activities. Also present were the former SS Oberstgruppenführer
Sepp Dietrich
, the ex-Chancellor Franz von Papen
, Generalfeldmarschall Ferdinand Schörner
, Grossadmiral and former Reichspräsident
Karl Dönitz
, Otto Remer, SS Standartenführer
Joachim Peiper
, and former Ambassador Rudolf Rahn.
In 2000, a memorial event was held in Bad Wiessee marking the fortieth anniversary of Kesselring's death. No representatives of the Bundeswehr attended, on the grounds that Kesselring was "not worthy of being part of our tradition". Instead, the task of remembering the Generalfeldmarschall fell to two veterans groups, the Deutsche Montecassino Vereinigung (German Monte Cassino Association) and the Bund Deutscher Fallschirmjäger (Association of German Paratroopers). To his ageing troops, Kesselring remained a commander to be commemorated.
Luftwaffe
Luftwaffe is a generic German term for an air force. It is also the official name for two of the four historic German air forces, the Wehrmacht air arm founded in 1935 and disbanded in 1946; and the current Bundeswehr air arm founded in 1956....
Generalfeldmarschall
Generalfeldmarschall
Field Marshal or Generalfeldmarschall in German, was a rank in the armies of several German states and the Holy Roman Empire; in the Austrian Empire, the rank Feldmarschall was used...
during World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
. In a military career that spanned both World Wars, Kesselring became one of Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany
Nazi Germany , also known as the Third Reich , but officially called German Reich from 1933 to 1943 and Greater German Reich from 26 June 1943 onward, is the name commonly used to refer to the state of Germany from 1933 to 1945, when it was a totalitarian dictatorship ruled by...
's most skilful commanders, being one of 27 soldiers awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross was a grade of the 1939 version of the 1813 created Iron Cross . The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross was the highest award of Germany to recognize extreme battlefield bravery or successful military leadership during World War II...
. Nicknamed "Smiling Albert" by the Allies
Allies of World War II
The Allies of World War II were the countries that opposed the Axis powers during the Second World War . Former Axis states contributing to the Allied victory are not considered Allied states...
The nickname "Smiling Albert" was bestowed on Kesselring by the Allies. It is not used by German writers. It was used during the war; see and "Uncle Albert" by his troops, he was one of the most popular generals of World War II with the rank and file.
Kesselring joined the Bavarian Army
Bavarian army
The Bavarian Army was the army of the Electorate and then Kingdom of Bavaria. It existed from 1682 as the standing army of Bavaria until the merger of the military sovereignty of Bavaria into that of the German State in 1919...
as an officer cadet
Officer Cadet
Officer cadet is a rank held by military and merchant navy cadets during their training to become commissioned officers and merchant navy officers, respectively. The term officer trainee is used interchangeably in some countries...
in 1904, and served in the artillery branch. He completed training as a balloon
Observation balloon
Observation balloons are balloons that are employed as aerial platforms for intelligence gathering and artillery spotting. Their use began during the French Revolutionary Wars, reaching their zenith during World War I, and they continue in limited use today....
observer in 1912. During World War I
World War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, he served on both the Western
Western Front (World War I)
Following the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining military control of important industrial regions in France. The tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne...
and Eastern
Eastern Front (World War I)
The Eastern Front was a theatre of war during World War I in Central and, primarily, Eastern Europe. The term is in contrast to the Western Front. Despite the geographical separation, the events in the two theatres strongly influenced each other...
fronts and was posted to the General Staff
General Staff
A military staff, often referred to as General Staff, Army Staff, Navy Staff or Air Staff within the individual services, is a group of officers and enlisted personnel that provides a bi-directional flow of information between a commanding officer and subordinate military units...
, despite not having attended the War Academy
War Academy (Kingdom of Bavaria)
The Kriegsakademie of the Bavarian Army was the military academy and staff college of the Kingdom of Bavaria, existing from 1867 to the beginning of World War I in 1914...
. Kesselring remained in the Army after the war but was discharged in 1933 to become head of the Department of Administration at the Reich Commissariat for Aviation
Reich Air Ministry
thumb|300px|The Ministry of Aviation, December 1938The Ministry of Aviation was a government department during the period of Nazi Germany...
, where he was involved in the re-establishment of the aviation industry and the laying of the foundations for the Luftwaffe, serving as its Chief of Staff from 1936 to 1938.
During World War II he commanded air forces in the invasions of Poland
Invasion of Poland (1939)
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign or 1939 Defensive War in Poland and the Poland Campaign in Germany, was an invasion of Poland by Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small Slovak contingent that marked the start of World War II in Europe...
and France
Battle of France
In the Second World War, the Battle of France was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries, beginning on 10 May 1940, which ended the Phoney War. The battle consisted of two main operations. In the first, Fall Gelb , German armoured units pushed through the Ardennes, to cut off and...
, the Battle of Britain
Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain is the name given to the World War II air campaign waged by the German Air Force against the United Kingdom during the summer and autumn of 1940...
, and Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
. As Commander-in-Chief South, he was overall German commander in the Mediterranean theatre
Mediterranean Theatre of World War II
The African, Mediterranean and Middle East theatres encompassed the naval, land, and air campaigns fought between the Allied and Axis forces in the Mediterranean Basin, the Middle East and Africa...
, which included the operations in North Africa
North African campaign
During the Second World War, the North African Campaign took place in North Africa from 10 June 1940 to 13 May 1943. It included campaigns fought in the Libyan and Egyptian deserts and in Morocco and Algeria and Tunisia .The campaign was fought between the Allies and Axis powers, many of whom had...
. Kesselring conducted an uncompromising defensive campaign against the Allied forces in Italy
Italian Campaign (World War II)
The Italian Campaign of World War II was the name of Allied operations in and around Italy, from 1943 to the end of the war in Europe. Joint Allied Forces Headquarters AFHQ was operationally responsible for all Allied land forces in the Mediterranean theatre, and it planned and commanded the...
until he was injured in an accident in October 1944. In the final campaign of the war, he commanded German forces on the Western Front. He won the respect of his Allied opponents for his military accomplishments, but his record was marred by massacres committed by troops under his command in Italy.
After the war, Kesselring was tried for war crimes and sentenced to death. The sentence was subsequently commuted to life imprisonment
Life imprisonment
Life imprisonment is a sentence of imprisonment for a serious crime under which the convicted person is to remain in jail for the rest of his or her life...
. A political and media campaign resulted in his release in 1952, ostensibly on health grounds. He was one of only three Generalfeldmarschalls to publish his memoirs, entitled Soldat bis zum letzten Tag (A Soldier to the Last Day).
Early life
Albert Kesselring was born in MarktsteftMarktsteft
Marktsteft is a town in the district of Kitzingen, in Bavaria, Germany. It is situated on the left bank of the Main, southwest of Kitzingen.It was the birthplace of the well-known Second World War general Albert Kesselring.-External links:*...
, Bavaria
Kingdom of Bavaria
The Kingdom of Bavaria was a German state that existed from 1806 to 1918. The Bavarian Elector Maximilian IV Joseph of the House of Wittelsbach became the first King of Bavaria in 1806 as Maximilian I Joseph. The monarchy would remain held by the Wittelsbachs until the kingdom's dissolution in 1918...
, on 30 November 1885, the son of Carl Adolf Kesselring, a schoolmaster and town councillor, and his wife Rosina, who was born a Kesselring, being Carl's second cousin. Albert's early years were spent in Marktsteft, where relatives had operated a brewery since 1688.
Matriculating from the Christian Ernestinum Secondary School in Bayreuth in 1904, Kesselring joined the German Army
German Army (German Empire)
The German Army was the name given the combined land forces of the German Empire, also known as the National Army , Imperial Army or Imperial German Army. The term "Deutsches Heer" is also used for the modern German Army, the land component of the German Bundeswehr...
as an Fahnenjunker (officer cadet
Officer Cadet
Officer cadet is a rank held by military and merchant navy cadets during their training to become commissioned officers and merchant navy officers, respectively. The term officer trainee is used interchangeably in some countries...
) in the 2nd Bavarian Foot Artillery Regiment
4th Royal Bavarian Division
The 4th Royal Bavarian Division was a unit of the Royal Bavarian Army which served alongside the Prussian Army as part of the Imperial German Army. The division was formed on November 27, 1815 as an Infantry Division of the Würzburg General Command...
. The regiment was based at Metz
Metz
Metz is a city in the northeast of France located at the confluence of the Moselle and the Seille rivers.Metz is the capital of the Lorraine region and prefecture of the Moselle department. Located near the tripoint along the junction of France, Germany, and Luxembourg, Metz forms a central place...
and was responsible for maintaining its forts. He remained with the regiment until 1915, except for periods at the Military Academy from 1905 to 1906, at the conclusion of which he received his commission as a Leutnant (lieutenant
Lieutenant
A lieutenant is a junior commissioned officer in many nations' armed forces. Typically, the rank of lieutenant in naval usage, while still a junior officer rank, is senior to the army rank...
), and at the School of Artillery and Engineering in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
from 1909 to 1910.
Kesselring married Luise Anna Pauline (Liny) Keyssler, the daughter of an apothecary
Apothecary
Apothecary is a historical name for a medical professional who formulates and dispenses materia medica to physicians, surgeons and patients — a role now served by a pharmacist and some caregivers....
from Bayreuth, in 1910. The couple honeymoon
Honeymoon
-History:One early reference to a honeymoon is in Deuteronomy 24:5 “When a man is newly wed, he need not go out on a military expedition, nor shall any public duty be imposed on him...
ed in Italy
Italy
Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...
. Their marriage was childless, but in 1913 they adopted Rainer, the son of Albert's second cousin Kurt Kesselring. In 1912, Kesselring completed training as a balloon
Observation balloon
Observation balloons are balloons that are employed as aerial platforms for intelligence gathering and artillery spotting. Their use began during the French Revolutionary Wars, reaching their zenith during World War I, and they continue in limited use today....
observer in a dirigible section – an early sign of an interest in aviation. Kesselring's superiors considered posting him to the School of Artillery and Engineering as an instructor because of his expertise in "the interplay between tactics and technology".
World War I
During World War IWorld War I
World War I , which was predominantly called the World War or the Great War from its occurrence until 1939, and the First World War or World War I thereafter, was a major war centred in Europe that began on 28 July 1914 and lasted until 11 November 1918...
, Kesselring served with his regiment in Lorraine
Lorraine (région)
Lorraine is one of the 27 régions of France. The administrative region has two cities of equal importance, Metz and Nancy. Metz is considered to be the official capital since that is where the regional parliament is situated...
until the end of 1914, when he was transferred to the 1st Bavarian Foot Artillery
1st Royal Bavarian Division
The 1st Royal Bavarian Division was a unit of the Royal Bavarian Army which served alongside the Prussian Army as part of the Imperial German Army. The division was formed on November 27, 1815 as the Infantry Division of the Munich General Command...
, which formed part of the Sixth Army. On 19 May 1916, he was promoted to Hauptmann
Hauptmann
Hauptmann is a German word usually translated as captain when it is used as an officer's rank in the German, Austrian and Swiss armies. While "haupt" in contemporary German means "main", it also has the dated meaning of "head", i.e...
(captain). In 1916 he was transferred again, to the 3rd Bavarian Foot Artillery
6th Royal Bavarian Division
The 6th Royal Bavarian Division was a unit of the Royal Bavarian Army which served alongside the Prussian Army as part of the Imperial German Army. The division was formed on April 1, 1900 and was headquartered in Regensburg...
. He distinguished himself in the Battle of Arras
Battle of Arras (1917)
The Battle of Arras was a British offensive during the First World War. From 9 April to 16 May 1917, British, Canadian, New Zealand, Newfoundland, and Australian troops attacked German trenches near the French city of Arras on the Western Front....
, using his tactical acumen to halt a British advance. For his services on the Western Front, he was decorated with the Iron Cross
Iron Cross
The Iron Cross is a cross symbol typically in black with a white or silver outline that originated after 1219 when the Kingdom of Jerusalem granted the Teutonic Order the right to combine the Teutonic Black Cross placed above a silver Cross of Jerusalem....
2nd Class and 1st Class.
In 1917, he was posted to the General Staff
General Staff
A military staff, often referred to as General Staff, Army Staff, Navy Staff or Air Staff within the individual services, is a group of officers and enlisted personnel that provides a bi-directional flow of information between a commanding officer and subordinate military units...
, despite having not attended the War Academy
War Academy (Kingdom of Bavaria)
The Kriegsakademie of the Bavarian Army was the military academy and staff college of the Kingdom of Bavaria, existing from 1867 to the beginning of World War I in 1914...
. He served on the Eastern Front
Eastern Front (World War I)
The Eastern Front was a theatre of war during World War I in Central and, primarily, Eastern Europe. The term is in contrast to the Western Front. Despite the geographical separation, the events in the two theatres strongly influenced each other...
on the staff of the 1st Bavarian Landwehr Division
1st Bavarian Landwehr Division (German Empire)
The 1st Bavarian Landwehr Division was a unit of the Bavarian Army, part of the Imperial German Army, in World War I...
. In January 1918, he returned to the Western Front
Western Front (World War I)
Following the outbreak of World War I in 1914, the German Army opened the Western Front by first invading Luxembourg and Belgium, then gaining military control of important industrial regions in France. The tide of the advance was dramatically turned with the Battle of the Marne...
as a staff officer with the II and III Bavarian Corps.
Between the wars
At the conclusion of the war, Kesselring was involved in the demobilisation (as mandated by the Treaty of VersaillesTreaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...
) of III Bavarian Corps in the Nuremberg
Nuremberg
Nuremberg[p] is a city in the German state of Bavaria, in the administrative region of Middle Franconia. Situated on the Pegnitz river and the Rhine–Main–Danube Canal, it is located about north of Munich and is Franconia's largest city. The population is 505,664...
area. A dispute with the leader of the local Freikorps
Freikorps
Freikorps are German volunteer military or paramilitary units. The term was originally applied to voluntary armies formed in German lands from the middle of the 18th century onwards. Between World War I and World War II the term was also used for the paramilitary organizations that arose during...
led to the issuance of an arrest warrant for his alleged involvement in a putsch against the command of III Bavarian Corps and Kesselring was thrown into prison. He was soon released but his superior, Major Hans Seyler, censured him for having "failed to display the requisite discretion".
From 1919 to 1922, Kesselring served as a battery
Artillery battery
In military organizations, an artillery battery is a unit of guns, mortars, rockets or missiles so grouped in order to facilitate better battlefield communication and command and control, as well as to provide dispersion for its constituent gunnery crews and their systems...
commander with the 24th Artillery Regiment. He joined the Reichswehr
Reichswehr
The Reichswehr formed the military organisation of Germany from 1919 until 1935, when it was renamed the Wehrmacht ....
on 1 October 1922 and was posted to the Military Training Department at the Reichswehr Ministry in Berlin
Berlin
Berlin is the capital city of Germany and is one of the 16 states of Germany. With a population of 3.45 million people, Berlin is Germany's largest city. It is the second most populous city proper and the seventh most populous urban area in the European Union...
. He remained at this post until 1929, when he returned to Bavaria as commander of Wehrkreis
Military district (Germany)
During World War II Germany used the system of military districts to relieve field commanders of as much administrative work as possible and to provide a regular flow of trained recruits and supplies to the Field Army...
VII in Munich
Munich
Munich The city's motto is "" . Before 2006, it was "Weltstadt mit Herz" . Its native name, , is derived from the Old High German Munichen, meaning "by the monks' place". The city's name derives from the monks of the Benedictine order who founded the city; hence the monk depicted on the city's coat...
. In his time with the Reichswehr Ministry, Kesselring was involved in the organisation of the army, trimming staff overheads to produce the best possible army with the limited resources available. He helped reorganise the Ordnance Department, laying the groundwork for the research and development
Research and development
The phrase research and development , according to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, refers to "creative work undertaken on a systematic basis in order to increase the stock of knowledge, including knowledge of man, culture and society, and the use of this stock of...
efforts that would produce new weapons. He was involved in secret military manoeuvres held in the Soviet Union
Soviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
in 1924 and in the so-called Great Plan for a 102-division army, which was prepared in 1923 and 1924. After another brief stint at the Reichswehr Ministry, Kesselring was promoted to Oberstleutnant
Oberstleutnant
Oberstleutnant is a German Army and Air Force rank equal to Lieutenant Colonel, above Major, and below Oberst.There are two paygrade associated to the rank of Oberstleutnant...
(lieutenant colonel
Lieutenant colonel
Lieutenant colonel is a rank of commissioned officer in the armies and most marine forces and some air forces of the world, typically ranking above a major and below a colonel. The rank of lieutenant colonel is often shortened to simply "colonel" in conversation and in unofficial correspondence...
) in 1930 and spent two years in Dresden
Dresden
Dresden is the capital city of the Free State of Saxony in Germany. It is situated in a valley on the River Elbe, near the Czech border. The Dresden conurbation is part of the Saxon Triangle metropolitan area....
with the 4th Artillery Regiment.
Against his wishes, Kesselring was discharged from the army on 1 October 1933 and appointed head of the Department of Administration at the Reich Commissariat for Aviation (Reichskommissariat für die Luftfahrt), the forerunner of the Reich Air Ministry
Reich Air Ministry
thumb|300px|The Ministry of Aviation, December 1938The Ministry of Aviation was a government department during the period of Nazi Germany...
(Reichsluftfahrtministerium), with the rank of Oberst
Oberst
Oberst is a military rank in several German-speaking and Scandinavian countries, equivalent to Colonel. It is currently used by both the ground and air forces of Austria, Germany, Switzerland, Denmark and Norway. The Swedish rank överste is a direct translation, as are the Finnish rank eversti...
(colonel
Colonel
Colonel , abbreviated Col or COL, is a military rank of a senior commissioned officer. It or a corresponding rank exists in most armies and in many air forces; the naval equivalent rank is generally "Captain". It is also used in some police forces and other paramilitary rank structures...
). Since the Treaty of Versailles
Treaty of Versailles
The Treaty of Versailles was one of the peace treaties at the end of World War I. It ended the state of war between Germany and the Allied Powers. It was signed on 28 June 1919, exactly five years after the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand. The other Central Powers on the German side of...
forbade Germany from establishing an air force, this was nominally a civilian agency. The Luftwaffe would formally be established in 1935. As chief of administration, he had to assemble his new staff from scratch. He was involved in the re-establishment of the aviation industry and the construction of secret factories, forging alliances with industrialists and aviation engineers. He was promoted to Generalmajor (major general
Major General
Major general or major-general is a military rank used in many countries. It is derived from the older rank of sergeant major general. A major general is a high-ranking officer, normally subordinate to the rank of lieutenant general and senior to the ranks of brigadier and brigadier general...
) in 1934 and Generalleutnant (lieutenant general
Lieutenant General
Lieutenant General is a military rank used in many countries. The rank traces its origins to the Middle Ages where the title of Lieutenant General was held by the second in command on the battlefield, who was normally subordinate to a Captain General....
) in 1936. Like other generals of Nazi Germany, he received personal payments from Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler
Adolf Hitler was an Austrian-born German politician and the leader of the National Socialist German Workers Party , commonly referred to as the Nazi Party). He was Chancellor of Germany from 1933 to 1945, and head of state from 1934 to 1945...
; in Kesselring's case, RM
German reichsmark
The Reichsmark was the currency in Germany from 1924 until June 20, 1948. The Reichsmark was subdivided into 100 Reichspfennig.-History:...
6,000, a considerable sum at the time.
Oranienburg
Oranienburg is a town in Brandenburg, Germany. It is the capital of the district of Oberhavel.- Geography :Oranienburg is a town located on the banks of the Havel river, 35 km north of the centre of Berlin.- Division of the town :...
, Dachau, and Buchenwald
Buchenwald concentration camp
Buchenwald concentration camp was a German Nazi concentration camp established on the Ettersberg near Weimar, Germany, in July 1937, one of the first and the largest of the concentration camps on German soil.Camp prisoners from all over Europe and Russia—Jews, non-Jewish Poles and Slovenes,...
.
Following the death of Generalleutnant Walther Wever
Walther Wever (general)
Walther Wever was a pre-World War II Luftwaffe Commander.-Early life:Walther Wever was born on 11 November 1887 in Wilhelmsort in the county of Bromberg . He was the son of Arnold Wever, the one-time director of a Berlin bank and the grandson of the Prussian Prosecutor-General Dr...
in an air crash, Kesselring became Chief of Staff of the Luftwaffe on 3 June 1936. In that post, Kesselring oversaw the expansion of the Luftwaffe, the acquisition of new aircraft types such as the Messerschmitt Bf 109
Messerschmitt Bf 109
The Messerschmitt Bf 109, often called Me 109, was a German World War II fighter aircraft designed by Willy Messerschmitt and Robert Lusser during the early to mid 1930s...
and Junkers Ju 87
Junkers Ju 87
The Junkers Ju 87 or Stuka was a two-man German ground-attack aircraft...
, and the development of paratroops. Like many ex-Army officers, he tended to see air power in the tactical
Tactical bombing
Tactical bombing is the aerial bombing aimed at targets of immediate military value, such as troops, military installations or equipment. This is in contrast to strategic bombing, attacking enemy's cities and factories to debilitate the enemy's capacity to wage war, the enemy's future military...
role, providing support to land operations. Kesselring and Hans-Jürgen Stumpff
Hans-Jürgen Stumpff
Hans-Jürgen Stumpff , was a German general of the Luftwaffe during the Second World War.-Early life:Born in Kolberg, Stumpff entered the Brandenburgisches Grenadierregiment Nr. 12 "Prinz Karl von Preußen" as an ensign in 1907. Promoted to lieutenant in 1908, by the start of the First World War,...
, are usually blamed for the turning away from strategic bombing
Strategic bombing
Strategic bombing is a military strategy used in a total war with the goal of defeating an enemy nation-state by destroying its economic ability and public will to wage war rather than destroying its land or naval forces...
and planning while over-focusing on close air support
Close air support
In military tactics, close air support is defined as air action by fixed or rotary winged aircraft against hostile targets that are close to friendly forces, and which requires detailed integration of each air mission with fire and movement of these forces.The determining factor for CAS is...
with the army. However, it would seem the two most prominent enthusiasts for the focus on ground-support operations (direct or indirect) were actually Hugo Sperrle
Hugo Sperrle
Hugo Sperrle was a German field marshal of the Luftwaffe during World War II. His forces were deployed solely on the Western Front and the Mediterranean throughout the war...
and Hans Jeschonnek
Hans Jeschonnek
Hans Jeschonnek was a German Generaloberst and a Chief of the General Staff of Nazi Germany′s Luftwaffe during World War II. He committed suicide in August 1943.-Biography:...
. These men were long-time professional airmen involved in German air services since early in their careers. The Luftwaffe was not pressured into ground support operations because of pressure from the army, or because it was led by ex-army personnel like Kesselring. Interdiction
Interdiction
Interdiction is a military term that refers to the act of delaying, disrupting, or destroying enemy forces or supplies en route to the battle area. A distinction is often made between strategic and tactical interdiction...
and close air support were operations that suited the Luftwaffe's pre-existing approach to warfare; a culture of joint inter-service operations, rather than independent strategic air campaigns. Moreover, many in the Luftwaffe command believed medium bomber
Medium bomber
A medium bomber is a bomber aircraft designed to operate with medium bombloads over medium distances; the name serves to distinguish them from the larger heavy bombers and smaller light bombers...
s to be sufficient in power for use in strategic bombing operations against Germany's most likely enemies; Britain and France.
Kesselring's main operational task during this time was the support of the Condor Legion
Condor Legion
The Condor Legion was a unit composed of volunteers from the German Air Force and from the German Army which served with the Nationalists during the Spanish Civil War of July 1936 to March 1939. The Condor Legion developed methods of terror bombing which were used widely in the Second World War...
in the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
. However, his tenure was marred by personal and professional conflicts with his superior, General der Flieger Erhard Milch
Erhard Milch
Erhard Milch was a German Field Marshal who oversaw the development of the Luftwaffe as part of the re-armament of Germany following World War I, and served as founding Director of Deutsche Luft Hansa...
, and Kesselring asked to be relieved. The head of the Luftwaffe, Hermann Göring
Hermann Göring
Hermann Wilhelm Göring, was a German politician, military leader, and a leading member of the Nazi Party. He was a veteran of World War I as an ace fighter pilot, and a recipient of the coveted Pour le Mérite, also known as "The Blue Max"...
, acquiesced and Kesselring became the commander of Air District III in Dresden. On 1 October 1938, he was promoted to General der Flieger
General der Flieger
General der Flieger was a General’s rank of the German Luftwaffe.The rank was equivalent to the long established General der Kavallerie, General der Artillerie and General der Infanterie...
(air general
General
A general officer is an officer of high military rank, usually in the army, and in some nations, the air force. The term is widely used by many nations of the world, and when a country uses a different term, there is an equivalent title given....
) and became commander of Luftflotte 1
Luftflotte 1
Luftflotte 1 was one of the primary divisions of the German Luftwaffe in World War II. It was formed February 1, 1939 from Luftwaffengruppenkommando 1 in Berlin...
, based in Berlin.
Poland
In the Polish campaignInvasion of Poland (1939)
The Invasion of Poland, also known as the September Campaign or 1939 Defensive War in Poland and the Poland Campaign in Germany, was an invasion of Poland by Germany, the Soviet Union, and a small Slovak contingent that marked the start of World War II in Europe...
that began World War II
World War II
World War II, or the Second World War , was a global conflict lasting from 1939 to 1945, involving most of the world's nations—including all of the great powers—eventually forming two opposing military alliances: the Allies and the Axis...
, Kesselring's Luftflotte 1 operated in support of Army Group North
Army Group North
Army Group North was a German strategic echelon formation commanding a grouping of Field Armies subordinated to the OKH during World War II. The army group coordinated the operations of attached separate army corps, reserve formations, rear services and logistics.- Formation :The Army Group North...
, commanded by Generaloberst Fedor von Bock
Fedor von Bock
Fedor von Bock was a German Generalfeldmarshall who served in the Wehrmacht during the Second World War. As a leader who lectured his soldiers about the honor of dying for the German Fatherland, he was nicknamed "Der Sterber"...
. Although not under von Bock's command, Kesselring worked closely with Bock and considered himself under Bock's orders in all matters pertaining to the ground war. Kesselring strove to provide the best possible close air support
Close air support
In military tactics, close air support is defined as air action by fixed or rotary winged aircraft against hostile targets that are close to friendly forces, and which requires detailed integration of each air mission with fire and movement of these forces.The determining factor for CAS is...
to the ground forces and used the flexibility of air power to concentrate all available air strength at critical points, such as during the Battle of the Bzura
Battle of the Bzura
The Battle of the Bzura was a battle in the opening campaign of World War II during the 1939 German invasion of Poland, fought between 9 and 19 September, 1939, between Polish and German forces...
. He attempted to cut the Polish communications by making a series of air attacks against Warsaw
Bombing of Warsaw in World War II
The Bombing of Warsaw in World War II refers both to the Strategic bombing campaign of Warsaw by the Luftwaffe during the siege of Warsaw in the Invasion of Poland in 1939 and to the German bombing raids during the Warsaw Uprising in 1944....
, but found that even 1000 kg (2,204.6 lb) bombs could not guarantee that bridges would be destroyed.
Kesselring was himself shot down over Poland
Poland
Poland , officially the Republic of Poland , is a country in Central Europe bordered by Germany to the west; the Czech Republic and Slovakia to the south; Ukraine, Belarus and Lithuania to the east; and the Baltic Sea and Kaliningrad Oblast, a Russian exclave, to the north...
by the Polish Air Force
Polish Air Force
The Polish Air Force is the military Air Force wing of the Polish Armed Forces. Until July 2004 it was officially known as Wojska Lotnicze i Obrony Powietrznej...
. In all, he would be shot down five times during World War II. For his part in the Polish campaign, Kesselring was personally awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross
The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross was a grade of the 1939 version of the 1813 created Iron Cross . The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross was the highest award of Germany to recognize extreme battlefield bravery or successful military leadership during World War II...
by Adolf Hitler.
Western Europe
Kesselring's Luftflotte 1 was not involved in the preparations for the campaigns in the west. Instead it remained in the east on garrison duty, establishing new airbases and an Air Raid PrecautionsAir Raid Precautions
Air Raid Precautions was an organisation in the United Kingdom set up as an aid in the prelude to the Second World War dedicated to the protection of civilians from the danger of air-raids. It was created in 1924 as a response to the fears about the growing threat from the development of bomber...
network in occupied Poland
General Government
The General Government was an area of Second Republic of Poland under Nazi German rule during World War II; designated as a separate region of the Third Reich between 1939–1945...
. However, after the Mechelen Incident
Mechelen Incident
The Mechelen Incident of 10 January 1940, also known as the Mechelen affair, was an event during the Phoney War. A German aircraft with an officer on-board carrying the plans for Fall Gelb , a German attack on the Low Countries, crash-landed in neutral Belgium near Vucht, in the modern-day...
, in which an aircraft made a forced landing in Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
with copies of the German invasion plan, Göring relieved the commander of Luftflotte 2
Luftflotte 2
Luftflotte 2 was one of the primary divisions of the German Luftwaffe in World War II. It was formed February 1, 1939 in Braunschweig and transferred to Italy on November 15, 1941...
, General der Flieger Hellmuth Felmy
Hellmuth Felmy
Hellmuth Felmy was a Nazi war criminal, German military officer during World War I, the interwar period, and World War II.-Biography:On 28 May 1885, Helmuth Felmy was born in Berlin in what was then the German Empire...
, of his command, and appointed Kesselring in his place. Kesselring flew to his new headquarters at Münster
Münster
Münster is an independent city in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. It is located in the northern part of the state and is considered to be the cultural centre of the Westphalia region. It is also capital of the local government region Münsterland...
the very next day, 13 January 1940. As Felmy's chief of staff, Generalmajor Josef Kammhuber
Josef Kammhuber
Josef Kammhuber was a Career Officer in the German Air Force, and is best known as the first General of the Night Fighters in the Luftwaffe during World War II...
, had also been relieved, Kesselring brought his own chief of staff, Generalmajor Wilhelm Speidel, with him.
Army Group B
Army Group B was the name of three different German Army Groups that saw action during World War II.-Battle for France:The first was involved in the Western Campaign in 1940 in Belgium and the Netherlands which was to be aimed to conquer the Maas bridges after the German airborne actions in Rotterdam...
. He inherited from Felmy a complex air plan requiring on-the-minute timing for several hours, incorporating an airborne operation
Airborne forces
Airborne forces are military units, usually light infantry, set up to be moved by aircraft and 'dropped' into battle. Thus they can be placed behind enemy lines, and have an ability to deploy almost anywhere with little warning...
around Rotterdam
Rotterdam
Rotterdam is the second-largest city in the Netherlands and one of the largest ports in the world. Starting as a dam on the Rotte river, Rotterdam has grown into a major international commercial centre...
and The Hague
The Hague
The Hague is the capital city of the province of South Holland in the Netherlands. With a population of 500,000 inhabitants , it is the third largest city of the Netherlands, after Amsterdam and Rotterdam...
to seize airfields and bridges in the "fortress Holland" area. The paratroopers were General der Flieger Kurt Student
Kurt Student
Kurt Student was a German Luftwaffe general who fought as a fighter pilot during the First World War and as the commander of German Fallschirmjäger during the Second World War.-Biography:...
's airborne forces that depended on a quick link up with the mechanised forces. To facilitate this, Kesselring promised von Bock the fullest possible close air support
Close air support
In military tactics, close air support is defined as air action by fixed or rotary winged aircraft against hostile targets that are close to friendly forces, and which requires detailed integration of each air mission with fire and movement of these forces.The determining factor for CAS is...
. Air and ground operations, however, were to commence simultaneously, so there would be no time to suppress the defending Royal Netherlands Air Force
Royal Netherlands Air Force
The Royal Netherlands Air Force , Dutch Koninklijke Luchtmacht , is the military aviation branch of the Netherlands Armed Forces. Its ancestor, the Luchtvaartafdeling of the Dutch Army was founded on 1 July 1913, with four pilots...
.
The Battle of the Netherlands
Battle of the Netherlands
The Battle of the Netherlands was part of Case Yellow , the German invasion of the Low Countries and France during World War II. The battle lasted from 10 May 1940 until 14 May 1940 when the main Dutch forces surrendered...
commenced on 10 May 1940. While initial air operations went well, and Kesselring's fighters and bombers soon gained the upper hand against the small Dutch air force, the paratroopers ran into fierce opposition in the Battle for The Hague
Battle for The Hague
The Battle for the Hague was the first paratroop assault in history. It took place on 10 May 1940 as part of the Battle of the Netherlands between the Royal Netherlands Army and Luftwaffe Fallschirmjäger . German paratroopers dropped in and around The Hague and were given orders to capture Dutch...
and the Battle of Rotterdam
Battle of Rotterdam
The Battle of Rotterdam was a Second World War battle fought during the Battle of the Netherlands. Fought between 10–14 May 1940, it was a German attempt to seize the Dutch city. It ended in a German victory, following the bombing of Rotterdam.-Prelude:...
. On 14 May 1940, responding to a call for assistance from Student, Kesselring ordered the bombing of Rotterdam
Rotterdam Blitz
The Rotterdam Blitz refers to the aerial bombardment of Rotterdam by the German Air Force on 14 May 1940, during the German invasion of the Netherlands in World War II. The objective was to support the German troops fighting in the city, break Dutch resistance and force the Dutch to surrender...
city centre. Fires raged out of control, destroying much of the city.
After the surrender of the Netherlands
Netherlands
The Netherlands is a constituent country of the Kingdom of the Netherlands, located mainly in North-West Europe and with several islands in the Caribbean. Mainland Netherlands borders the North Sea to the north and west, Belgium to the south, and Germany to the east, and shares maritime borders...
on 14 May 1940, Luftflotte 2 attempted to move forward to new airfields in Belgium
Belgium
Belgium , officially the Kingdom of Belgium, is a federal state in Western Europe. It is a founding member of the European Union and hosts the EU's headquarters, and those of several other major international organisations such as NATO.Belgium is also a member of, or affiliated to, many...
while still providing support for the fast moving ground troops. The Battle of France
Battle of France
In the Second World War, the Battle of France was the German invasion of France and the Low Countries, beginning on 10 May 1940, which ended the Phoney War. The battle consisted of two main operations. In the first, Fall Gelb , German armoured units pushed through the Ardennes, to cut off and...
was going well, with General der Panzertruppe
General der Panzertruppe
General der Panzertruppe was a rank of German Army General introduced by the Wehrmacht in 1935. As the commander of a Panzer Corp this rank corresponds to a US Army Lieutenant-General...
Heinz Guderian
Heinz Guderian
Heinz Wilhelm Guderian was a German general during World War II. He was a pioneer in the development of armored warfare, and was the leading proponent of tanks and mechanization in the Wehrmacht . Germany's panzer forces were raised and organized under his direction as Chief of Mobile Forces...
forcing a crossing of the Meuse River
Meuse River
The Maas or Meuse is a major European river, rising in France and flowing through Belgium and the Netherlands before draining into the North Sea...
at Sedan
Sedan, France
Sedan is a commune in France, a sub-prefecture of the Ardennes department in northern France.-Geography:The historic centre is built on a peninsula formed by an arc of the Meuse River. It is around from the Belgian border.-History:...
on 13 May 1940. To support the breakthrough, Kesselring transferred Generalleutnant Wolfram von Richthofen
Wolfram von Richthofen
Dr.-Ing. Wolfram Freiherr von RichthofenIn German a Doctorate in engineering is abbreviated as Dr.-Ing. . was a German Generalfeldmarschall of the Luftwaffe during the Second World War...
's VIII. Fliegerkorps
8th Air Corps (Germany)
VIII. FliegerkorpsFor more details see Luftwaffe Organization was formed 19 July 1939 in Oppeln as Fliegerführer z.b.V. The abbreviation z.b.V. is German and stands for zur besonderen Verwendung . Fliegerführer z.b.V was renamed to VIII. Fliegerkorps on 10 November 1939...
to Luftflotte 3
Luftflotte 3
Luftflotte 3 was one of the primary divisions of the German Luftwaffe in World War II. It was formed on February 1, 1939 from Luftwaffengruppenkommando 3 in Munich and redesignated Luftwaffenkommando West on September 26, 1944...
. By 24 May, the Allied forces had been cut in two, and the German Army was only 15 kilometres (9.3 mi) from Dunkirk, the last channel port remaining in Allied hands. However, that day Generaloberst Gerd von Rundstedt
Gerd von Rundstedt
Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt was a Generalfeldmarschall of the German Army during World War II. He held some of the highest field commands in all phases of the war....
ordered a halt. Kesselring considered this decision a "fatal error". It left the burden of preventing the Allied evacuation of Dunkirk to Kesselring's fliers, who were hampered by poor flying weather and staunch opposition from the British Royal Air Force
Royal Air Force
The Royal Air Force is the aerial warfare service branch of the British Armed Forces. Formed on 1 April 1918, it is the oldest independent air force in the world...
. For his role in the campaign in the west, Kesselring was promoted to Generalfeldmarschall
Generalfeldmarschall
Field Marshal or Generalfeldmarschall in German, was a rank in the armies of several German states and the Holy Roman Empire; in the Austrian Empire, the rank Feldmarschall was used...
(field marshal
Field Marshal
Field Marshal is a military rank. Traditionally, it is the highest military rank in an army.-Etymology:The origin of the rank of field marshal dates to the early Middle Ages, originally meaning the keeper of the king's horses , from the time of the early Frankish kings.-Usage and hierarchical...
) on 19 July 1940.
Following the campaign in France, Kesselring's Luftflotte 2 was committed to the Battle of Britain
Battle of Britain
The Battle of Britain is the name given to the World War II air campaign waged by the German Air Force against the United Kingdom during the summer and autumn of 1940...
. Luftflotte 2 was initially responsible for the bombing of southeastern England and the London
London
London is the capital city of :England and the :United Kingdom, the largest metropolitan area in the United Kingdom, and the largest urban zone in the European Union by most measures. Located on the River Thames, London has been a major settlement for two millennia, its history going back to its...
area but as the battle progressed, command responsibility shifted, with Generalfeldmarschall Hugo Sperrle
Hugo Sperrle
Hugo Sperrle was a German field marshal of the Luftwaffe during World War II. His forces were deployed solely on the Western Front and the Mediterranean throughout the war...
's Luftflotte 3 taking more responsibility for the night-time Blitz attacks while the main daylight operations fell to Luftflotte 2. Kesselring was involved in the planning of numerous raids, including the Coventry Blitz
Coventry Blitz
The Coventry blitz was a series of bombing raids that took place in the English city of Coventry. The city was bombed many times during the Second World War by the German Air Force...
of November 1940. Kesselring's fliers reported numerous victories, but failed to press home attacks and achieve a decisive victory. Instead, the Luftwaffe employed the inherent flexibility of air power to switch targets.
Invasion of the Soviet Union
Although earmarked for operations against the Soviet UnionSoviet Union
The Soviet Union , officially the Union of Soviet Socialist Republics , was a constitutionally socialist state that existed in Eurasia between 1922 and 1991....
, Luftflotte 2 remained in the west until May 1941. This was partly as a deception measure, and partly because new airbases in Poland could not be completed by the 1 June 1941 target date, although they were made ready in time for the actual commencement of Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa
Operation Barbarossa was the code name for Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union during World War II that began on 22 June 1941. Over 4.5 million troops of the Axis powers invaded the USSR along a front., the largest invasion in the history of warfare...
on 22 June 1941. Kesselring established his new headquarters at Bielany
Bielany
Bielany is a district in Warsaw located in the north-western part of the city.Initially a part of Żoliborz, Bielany has been an independent district since 1994. Bielany borders Żoliborz to the south-east, and Bemowo to the south-west...
, a suburb of Warsaw
Warsaw
Warsaw is the capital and largest city of Poland. It is located on the Vistula River, roughly from the Baltic Sea and from the Carpathian Mountains. Its population in 2010 was estimated at 1,716,855 residents with a greater metropolitan area of 2,631,902 residents, making Warsaw the 10th most...
.
Luftflotte 2 operated in support of Army Group Centre
Army Group Centre
Army Group Centre was the name of two distinct German strategic army groups that fought on the Eastern Front in World War II. The first Army Group Centre was created on 22 June 1941, as one of three German Army formations assigned to the invasion of the Soviet Union...
, commanded by Fedor von Bock, continuing the close working relationship between the two. Kesselring's mission was to gain air superiority, and if possible air supremacy
Air supremacy
Air supremacy is the complete dominance of the air power of one side's air forces over the other side's, during a military campaign. It is the most favorable state of control of the air...
, as soon as possible while still supporting ground operations. For this he had a fleet of over 1,000 aircraft, about a third of the Luftwaffes total strength.
The German attack caught large numbers of Soviet Air Force
Soviet Air Force
The Soviet Air Force, officially known in Russian as Военно-воздушные силы or Voenno-Vozdushnye Sily and often abbreviated VVS was the official designation of one of the air forces of the Soviet Union. The other was the Soviet Air Defence Forces...
aircraft on the ground. Faulty tactics – sending unescorted bombers against the Germans at regular intervals in tactically unsound formations – accounted for many more. Kesselring reported that in the first week of operations Luftflotte 2 had accounted for 2,500 Soviet aircraft in the air and on the ground. Even Göring found these figures hard to believe and ordered them to be re-checked. As the ground troops advanced, the figures could be directly confirmed and were found to be too low. Within days, Kesselring was able to fly solo over the front in his Focke-Wulf Fw 189
Focke-Wulf Fw 189
|-See also:-References:NotesBibliography* Brown, Capt. Eric . Wings of the Luftwaffe. Garden City, NY: Doubleday & Company, Inc., 1978. ISBN 0-385-13521-1....
.
With air supremacy attained, Luftflotte 2 turned to support of ground operations, particularly guarding the flanks of the armoured spearheads, without which the rapid advance was not possible. When enemy counterattacks threatened, Kesselring threw the full weight of his force against them. Now that the Army was convinced of the value of air support, units were all too inclined to call for it. Kesselring now had to convince the Army that air support should be concentrated at critical points. He strove to improve army–air cooperation with new tactics and the appointment of Colonel Martin Fiebig
Martin Fiebig
Martin Fiebig was a German general of Luftwaffe, serving during World War II. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves...
as a special close air support commander. By 26 July, Kesselring reported the destruction of 165 tanks, 2,136 vehicles and 194 artillery pieces.
In late 1941, Luftflotte 2 supported the final German offensive against Moscow
Moscow
Moscow is the capital, the most populous city, and the most populous federal subject of Russia. The city is a major political, economic, cultural, scientific, religious, financial, educational, and transportation centre of Russia and the continent...
, codenamed Operation Typhoon
Battle of Moscow
The Battle of Moscow is the name given by Soviet historians to two periods of strategically significant fighting on a sector of the Eastern Front during World War II. It took place between October 1941 and January 1942. The Soviet defensive effort frustrated Hitler's attack on Moscow, capital of...
. Raids on Moscow proved hazardous, as Moscow had good all-weather airfields and opposition from both fighters and anti-aircraft guns was similar to that encountered over Britain. The bad weather that hampered ground operations from October on impeded air operations even more. Nonetheless, Luftflotte 2 continued to fly critical reconnaissance, interdiction, close air support and air supply missions.
Mediterranean and North Africa
Commander-in-Chief
A commander-in-chief is the commander of a nation's military forces or significant element of those forces. In the latter case, the force element may be defined as those forces within a particular region or those forces which are associated by function. As a practical term it refers to the military...
South and was transferred to Italy along with his Luftflotte 2 staff, which for the time being also functioned as his Commander-in-Chief South staff. Only in January 1943 did he form his headquarters into a true theatre staff and create a separate staff to control Luftflotte 2. As a theatre commander, he was answerable directly to the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht
The Oberkommando der Wehrmacht was part of the command structure of the armed forces of Nazi Germany during World War II.- Genesis :...
(OKW) and commanded ground, naval and air forces, but this was of little importance at first as most German units were under Italian operational control.
Kesselring strove to organise and protect supply convoys in order to get the German-Italian panzer army the resources it needed. He succeeded in establishing local air superiority and neutralising Malta
Siege of Malta (1940)
The Siege of Malta was a military campaign in the Mediterranean Theatre of the Second World War. From 1940-1942, the fight for the control of the strategically important island of Malta pitted the air forces and navies of Fascist Italy and Nazi Germany against the Royal Air Force and the Royal...
, which provided a base from which British aircraft and submarines could menace Axis convoys headed for North Africa. Without the vital supplies they carried, particularly fuel, the Axis forces in North Africa could not conduct operations. Through various expedients, Kesselring managed to deliver a greatly increased flow of supplies to Generaloberst Erwin Rommel
Erwin Rommel
Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel , popularly known as the Desert Fox , was a German Field Marshal of World War II. He won the respect of both his own troops and the enemies he fought....
's Afrika Korps
Afrika Korps
The German Africa Corps , or the Afrika Korps as it was popularly called, was the German expeditionary force in Libya and Tunisia during the North African Campaign of World War II...
in Libya. With his forces thus strengthened, Rommel prepared an attack on the British positions around Gazala, while Kesselring planned Operation Herkules
Operation Herkules
Operation Herkules was the German code-name given to a planned but never-executed Italo-German invasion of Malta during World War II...
, an airborne and seaborne attack on Malta with the 185 Airborne Division Folgore
185 Airborne Division Folgore
185. Airborne Division Folgore or 185. Divisione Paracadutisti Folgore was an Parachute Division of the Italian Army during World War II.-History:It was formed in September 1941, as the 1 Division Paracadutisti...
and Ramcke Parachute Brigade
Ramcke Parachute Brigade
Fallschirmjäger-Brigade AfrikaFallschirmjäger-Brigade RamckeLuftwaffen-Jäger-Brigade 1The Fallschirmjäger-Brigade Ramcke was an elite German Luftwaffe Fallschirmjäger Brigade which saw action in the Mediterranean Theatre during World War II.-History:Following the costly success of Operation...
. Kesselring hoped to thereby secure the Axis line of communication
Line of communication
A line of communication is the route that connects an operating military unit with its supply base. Supplies and reinforcements are transported along the line of communication. Therefore, a secure and open line of communication is vital for any military force to continue to operate effectively...
with North Africa.
For the Battle of Gazala
Battle of Gazala
The Battle of Gazala was an important battle of the Second World War Western Desert Campaign, fought around the port of Tobruk in Libya from 26 May-21 June 1942...
, Rommel divided his command in two, taking personal command of the mobile units of the Deutsches Afrika Korps and Italian XX Motorized Corps, which he led around the southern flank of Lieutenant-General Neil Ritchie
Neil Ritchie
General Sir Neil Methuen Ritchie GBE, KCB, DSO, MC, KStJ was a senior British army officer during the Second World War.-Military career:...
's British Eighth Army
Eighth Army (United Kingdom)
The Eighth Army was one of the best-known formations of the British Army during World War II, fighting in the North African and Italian campaigns....
. Rommel left the infantry of the Italian X and XXI Corps under General der Panzertruppe
General der Panzertruppe
General der Panzertruppe was a rank of German Army General introduced by the Wehrmacht in 1935. As the commander of a Panzer Corp this rank corresponds to a US Army Lieutenant-General...
Ludwig Crüwell
Ludwig Crüwell
Ludwig Crüwell , was a German general known for his involvement with the Afrika Korps. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves . The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross and its higher grade Oak Leaves was awarded to recognise extreme battlefield bravery or...
to hold the rest of the Eighth Army in place. This command arrangement went awry on 29 May 1942 when Crüwell was taken prisoner. Lacking an available commander of sufficient seniority, Kesselring assumed personal command of Gruppe Crüwell. Flying his Fieseler Fi 156
Fieseler Fi 156
The Fieseler Fi 156 Storch was a small German liaison aircraft built by Fieseler before and during World War II, and production continued in other countries into the 1950s for the private market...
Storch to a meeting, Kesselring was fired upon by a British force astride Rommel's line of communications. Kesselring called in an air strike by every available Stuka
Junkers Ju 87
The Junkers Ju 87 or Stuka was a two-man German ground-attack aircraft...
and Jabo
Ground attack aircraft
Ground-attack aircraft are military aircraft with primary role of attacking targets on the ground with greater precision than bombers and prepared to face stronger low-level air defense...
. His attack was successful; the British force suffered heavy losses and was forced to pull back.
Kesselring and Rommel had a disagreement over the latter's conduct in the Battle of Bir Hakeim
Battle of Bir Hakeim
Bir Hakeim is a remote oasis in the Libyan desert, and the former site of a Turkish fort. During the Battle of Gazala, the 1st Free French Division of General Marie Pierre Kœnig defended the site from 26 May-11 June 1942 against attacking German and Italian forces directed by Lieutenant-General ...
. Rommel's initial infantry assaults had failed to capture this vital position, the southern pivot of the British Gazala Line, which was held by the 1st Free French brigade
1st Free French Division
The 1st Free French Division was one of the principal units of the Free French Forces during World War II, and the first Free French unit of divisional size.-World War II:...
, commanded by General Marie Pierre Koenig
Marie Pierre Koenig
Marie Pierre Kœnig was a French army officer and politician. He commanded a Free French Brigade at the Battle of Bir Hakeim in North Africa in 1942....
. Rommel had called for air support but had failed to break the position, which Kesselring attributed to faulty coordination between the ground and air attacks. Bir Hakeim was evacuated on 10 June 1942. Kesselring was more impressed with the results of Rommel's successful assault on Tobruk on 21 June, for which Kesselring brought in additional aircraft from Greece and Crete. For his part in the campaign, Kesselring was awarded the Knight's Cross with oak leaves and swords.
First Battle of El Alamein
The First Battle of El Alamein was a battle of the Western Desert Campaign of the Second World War, fought between Axis forces of the Panzer Army Africa commanded by Field Marshal Erwin Rommel, and Allied forces The First Battle of El Alamein (1–27 July 1942) was a battle of the Western Desert...
, Battle of Alam el Halfa and Second Battle of El Alamein
Second Battle of El Alamein
The Second Battle of El Alamein marked a major turning point in the Western Desert Campaign of the Second World War. The battle took place over 20 days from 23 October – 11 November 1942. The First Battle of El Alamein had stalled the Axis advance. Thereafter, Lieutenant-General Bernard Montgomery...
. Kesselring considered Rommel to be a great general leading fast-moving troops at the corps level of command, but felt that he was too moody and changeable for higher command. For Kesselring, Rommel's nervous breakdown and hospitalisation for depression at the end of the African Campaign only confirmed this.
Kesselring was briefly considered as a possible successor to Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel
Wilhelm Keitel
Wilhelm Bodewin Gustav Keitel was a German field marshal . As head of the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht and de facto war minister, he was one of Germany's most senior military leaders during World War II...
as Chief of Staff of the OKW in September 1942, with General der Panzertruppe Friedrich Paulus
Friedrich Paulus
Friedrich Wilhelm Ernst Paulus was an officer in the German military from 1910 to 1945. He attained the rank of Generalfeldmarschall during World War II, and is best known for having commanded the Sixth Army's assault on Stalingrad during Operation Blue in 1942...
replacing Generaloberst Alfred Jodl
Alfred Jodl
Alfred Josef Ferdinand Jodl was a German military commander, attaining the position of Chief of the Operations Staff of the Armed Forces High Command during World War II, acting as deputy to Wilhelm Keitel...
as Chief of the Operations Staff at OKW. The consideration demonstrated the high regard in which Kesselring was held by Hitler. Nevertheless, Hitler decided that neither Kesselring nor Paulus could be spared from their current posts. In October 1942, Kesselring was given direct command of all German armed forces in the theatre except Rommel's German-Italian Panzer Army
Panzer Army Africa
As the number of German armed forces committed to the North Africa Campaign of World War II grew from the initial commitment of a small corps the Germans developed a more elaborate command structure and placed the now larger Afrika Korps, with Italian units under this new German command structure,...
in North Africa, including General der Infantrie Enno von Rintelen, the German liaison officer at Commando Supremo, who spoke fluent Italian. Kesselring's command also included the troops in Greece and the Balkans until the end of the year, when Hitler created an army group headquarters under Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm List, naming him List Oberbefehlshaber Südost.
Tunisia
The Allied invasion of French North AfricaOperation Torch
Operation Torch was the British-American invasion of French North Africa in World War II during the North African Campaign, started on 8 November 1942....
precipitated a crisis in Kesselring's command. He ordered Walther Nehring
Walther Nehring
Walther Kurt Josef Nehring , was a German general of World War II, known for his involvement with the Afrika Korps. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords...
, the former commander of the Afrika Korps
Afrika Korps
The German Africa Corps , or the Afrika Korps as it was popularly called, was the German expeditionary force in Libya and Tunisia during the North African Campaign of World War II...
who was returning to action after recovering from wounds received at the Battle of Alam el Halfa, to proceed to Tunisia
Tunisia
Tunisia , officially the Tunisian RepublicThe long name of Tunisia in other languages used in the country is: , is the northernmost country in Africa. It is a Maghreb country and is bordered by Algeria to the west, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Its area...
to take command of a new corps (XC Corps). Kesselring ordered Nehring to establish a bridgehead in Tunisia and then to press west as far as possible so as to gain freedom to manoeuvre. By December, the Allied commander, General
General (United States)
In the United States Army, United States Air Force, and United States Marine Corps, general is a four-star general officer rank, with the pay grade of O-10. General ranks above lieutenant general and below General of the Army or General of the Air Force; the Marine Corps does not have an...
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight D. Eisenhower
Dwight David "Ike" Eisenhower was the 34th President of the United States, from 1953 until 1961. He was a five-star general in the United States Army...
, was forced to concede that Kesselring had won the race; the final phase of Operation Torch
Operation Torch
Operation Torch was the British-American invasion of French North Africa in World War II during the North African Campaign, started on 8 November 1942....
had failed and the Axis could only be ejected from Tunisia after a prolonged struggle.
With the initiative back with the Germans and Italians, Kesselring hoped to launch an offensive that would drive the Allies out of North Africa. At the Battle of the Kasserine Pass
Battle of the Kasserine Pass
The Battle of the Kasserine Pass was a battle that took place during the Tunisia Campaign of World War II in February 1943. It was a series of battles fought around Kasserine Pass, a wide gap in the Grand Dorsal chain of the Atlas Mountains in west central Tunisia...
his forces gave the Allies a beating but in the end strong Allied resistance and a string of Axis errors stopped the advance. Kesselring now concentrated on shoring up his forces by moving the required tonnages of supplies from Sicily
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
but his efforts were frustrated by Allied aircraft and submarines. An Allied offensive in April
Operation Vulcan
During the Second World War, Operation Vulcan was the final ground attack against German forces in Tunis, Cap Bon, and Bizerte, Tunisia, the last Axis toeholds in North Africa. German Field Marshal Erwin Rommel believed that the Axis position in Tunisia was untenable, and he had recommended the...
finally broke through, leading to a collapse of the Axis position in Tunisia. Some 275,000 German and Italian prisoners were taken. Only the Battle of Stalingrad
Battle of Stalingrad
The Battle of Stalingrad was a major battle of World War II in which Nazi Germany and its allies fought the Soviet Union for control of the city of Stalingrad in southwestern Russia. The battle took place between 23 August 1942 and 2 February 1943...
overshadowed this disaster. In return, Kesselring had held up the Allies in Tunisia for six months, forcing a postponement of the Allied invasion of northern France from the middle of 1943 to the middle of 1944.
Sicily
Sicily
Sicily is a region of Italy, and is the largest island in the Mediterranean Sea. Along with the surrounding minor islands, it constitutes an autonomous region of Italy, the Regione Autonoma Siciliana Sicily has a rich and unique culture, especially with regard to the arts, music, literature,...
, as a landing could be made there under fighter cover from Tunisia and Malta. He reinforced the six coastal and four mobile Italian divisions there with two mobile German divisions, the 15th Panzergrenadier Division and the Hermann Göring Panzer Division
Fallschirm-Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring
The Fallschirm-Panzer-Division 1. Hermann Göring was an élite German Luftwaffe armoured division. The HG saw action in North Africa, Sicily, Italy and on the Eastern front...
, both rebuilt after being destroyed in Tunisia. Kesselring was well aware that while this force was large enough to stop the Allies from simply marching in, it could not withstand a large scale invasion. He therefore pinned his hopes on repelling the Allied invasion of Sicily
Allied invasion of Sicily
The Allied invasion of Sicily, codenamed Operation Husky, was a major World War II campaign, in which the Allies took Sicily from the Axis . It was a large scale amphibious and airborne operation, followed by six weeks of land combat. It launched the Italian Campaign.Husky began on the night of...
on an immediate counterattack, which he ordered Colonel Paul Conrath
Paul Conrath
General Paul Conrath was a German General der Fallschirmtruppe during World War II and a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves.-Awards:* Iron Cross 2nd and 1st Class...
of the Hermann Göring Panzer Division to carry out the moment the objective of the Allied invasion fleet was known, with or without orders from the island commander, Generale d'Armata Alfredo Guzzoni
Alfredo Guzzoni
Alfredo Guzzoni was an Italian military officer who served in both World War I and World War II.-Italian Army:Guzzoni joined the Italian Royal Army and fought in World War I....
.
Kesselring hoped that the Allied invasion fleet would provide good targets for U-boat
U-boat
U-boat is the anglicized version of the German word U-Boot , itself an abbreviation of Unterseeboot , and refers to military submarines operated by Germany, particularly in World War I and World War II...
s, but they had few successes. U-953 sank two American LSTs and with U-375 sank three vessels from a British convoy on 4–5 July, while U-371 sank a Liberty ship
Liberty ship
Liberty ships were cargo ships built in the United States during World War II. Though British in conception, they were adapted by the U.S. as they were cheap and quick to build, and came to symbolize U.S. wartime industrial output. Based on vessels ordered by Britain to replace ships torpedoed by...
and a tanker
Tank ship
A tanker is a ship designed to transport liquids in bulk. Major types of tankship include the oil tanker, the chemical tanker, and the liquefied natural gas carrier.-Background:...
on 10 July. Pressure from the Allied air forces forced Luftflotte 2, commanded since June by von Richthofen, to withdraw most of its aircraft to the mainland.
The Allied invasion of Sicily on 10 July 1943 was stubbornly opposed. A Stuka attacked and sank the ; an Bf 109 destroyed an LST; and a Liberty ship filled with ammunition was bombed by Ju 88s and caught fire, later exploding without loss of life. Unaware that Guzzoni had already ordered a major counterattack on 11 July, Kesselring bypassed the chain of command to order the Hermann Göring Panzer Division to attack that day in the hope that a vigorous attack could succeed before the Americans could bring the bulk of their artillery and armoured support ashore. Although his troops gave the Americans "quite a battering", they failed to capture the Allied position.
Kesselring flew to Sicily himself on 12 July to survey the situation and decided that no more than a delaying action was possible and that the island would eventually have to be evacuated. Nonetheless, he intended to fight on and he reinforced Sicily with the 29th Panzergrenadier Division on 15 July. Kesselring returned to Sicily by flying boat
Flying boat
A flying boat is a fixed-winged seaplane with a hull, allowing it to land on water. It differs from a float plane as it uses a purpose-designed fuselage which can float, granting the aircraft buoyancy. Flying boats may be stabilized by under-wing floats or by wing-like projections from the fuselage...
on 16 July to give the senior German commander, General der Panzertruppe
General der Panzertruppe
General der Panzertruppe was a rank of German Army General introduced by the Wehrmacht in 1935. As the commander of a Panzer Corp this rank corresponds to a US Army Lieutenant-General...
Hans-Valentin Hube
Hans-Valentin Hube
Hans-Valentin Hube was a German general who served in the German Army during the First and Second World Wars. He was one of 27 people to be awarded the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves, Swords and Diamonds...
, his instructions. Unable to provide much more in the way of air support, Kesselring gave Hube command of the heavy flak units on the island, although this was contrary to Luftwaffe doctrine. In all, Kesselring managed to delay the Allies in Sicily for another month and the Allied conquest of the Sicily was not complete until 17 August.
Kesselring's evacuation of Sicily, which began a week earlier on 10 August, was perhaps the most brilliant action of the campaign. In spite of the Allies' superiority on land, at sea, and in the air, Kesselring was able to evacuate not only 40,000 men, but also 96,605 vehicles, 94 guns, 47 tanks, 1,100 tons of ammunition, 970 tons of fuel, and 15,000 tons of stores. He was able to achieve near-perfect coordination between the three services under his command while his opponent, Eisenhower, could not.
Allied invasion of Italy
With the fall of Sicily, OKW feared that Italy would withdraw from the war, but Kesselring remained confident that the Italians would continue to fight. OKW regarded Kesselring and von Rintelen as too pro-Italian and began to bypass him, sending Rommel to northern Italy, and Student to RomeRome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, where his I Parachute Corps was under OKW orders to occupy the capital in case of Italian defection. Benito Mussolini
Benito Mussolini
Benito Amilcare Andrea Mussolini was an Italian politician who led the National Fascist Party and is credited with being one of the key figures in the creation of Fascism....
was removed from power on 25 July 1943 and Rommel and OKW began to plan for the occupation of Italy and the disarmament of the Italian Army. Kesselring remained uninformed of these plans for the time being.
Alfred Jodl
Alfred Josef Ferdinand Jodl was a German military commander, attaining the position of Chief of the Operations Staff of the Armed Forces High Command during World War II, acting as deputy to Wilhelm Keitel...
, Hitler decided that the Italian Peninsula
Italian Peninsula
The Italian Peninsula or Apennine Peninsula is one of the three large peninsulas of Southern Europe , spanning from the Po Valley in the north to the central Mediterranean Sea in the south. The peninsula's shape gives it the nickname Lo Stivale...
could not be held without the assistance of the Italian Army. Kesselring was ordered to withdraw from southern Italy and consolidate his Army Group C with Rommel's Army Group B in Northern Italy, where Rommel would assume overall command. Kesselring was slated to be posted to Norway
Norway
Norway , officially the Kingdom of Norway, is a Nordic unitary constitutional monarchy whose territory comprises the western portion of the Scandinavian Peninsula, Jan Mayen, and the Arctic archipelago of Svalbard and Bouvet Island. Norway has a total area of and a population of about 4.9 million...
. Kesselring was appalled at the prospect of abandoning Italy. It would expose southern Germany to bombers operating from Italy; risk the Allies breaking into the Po Valley; and was completely unnecessary, as he was certain that Rome could be held until the summer of 1944. This assessment was based on his belief that the Allies would not conduct operations outside the range of their air cover, which could only reach as far as Salerno
Salerno
Salerno is a city and comune in Campania and is the capital of the province of the same name. It is located on the Gulf of Salerno on the Tyrrhenian Sea....
. Kesselring submitted his resignation on 14 August 1943.
SS
Schutzstaffel
The Schutzstaffel |Sig runes]]) was a major paramilitary organization under Adolf Hitler and the Nazi Party. Built upon the Nazi ideology, the SS under Heinrich Himmler's command was responsible for many of the crimes against humanity during World War II...
Obergruppenführer
Obergruppenführer
Obergruppenführer was a Nazi Party paramilitary rank that was first created in 1932 as a rank of the SA and until 1942 it was the highest SS rank inferior only to Reichsführer-SS...
Karl Wolff
Karl Wolff
Karl Friedrich Otto Wolff was a high-ranking member of the Nazi Schutzstaffel , ultimately holding the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer and General of the Waffen-SS. He became Chief of Personal Staff to the Reichsführer and SS Liaison Officer to Hitler until his replacement in 1943...
, the highest SS and police Führer
Führer
Führer , alternatively spelled Fuehrer in both English and German when the umlaut is not available, is a German title meaning leader or guide now most associated with Adolf Hitler, who modelled it on Benito Mussolini's title il Duce, as well as with Georg von Schönerer, whose followers also...
in Italy, intervened on Kesselring's behalf with Hitler. Wolff painted Rommel as "politically unreliable" and argued that Kesselring's presence in southern Italy was vital to prevent an early Italian defection. On Wolff's advice, Hitler refused to accept Kesselring's resignation.
Italy withdrew from the war on 8 September. Kesselring immediately moved to secure Rome, where he expected an Allied airborne and seaborne invasion. He ordered the 3rd Panzergrenadier Division and 2nd Parachute Division to close on the city, while a detachment made an unsuccessful attempt to seize the Italian Army staff at Monterotondo
Monterotondo
-History:According to some historians, Monterotondo is the heir of ancient Sabine town of Eretum, although the modern settlement appeared in the 10th-11th centuries in a different location...
in a coup de main
Coup de main
A coup de main is a swift attack that relies on speed and surprise to accomplish its objectives in a single blow. The United States Department of Defense defines it as:The literal translation from French means a stroke or blow of the hand...
. Kesselring's two divisions were faced by five Italian divisions, two of them armoured, but he managed to overcome the opposition, disperse the Italian forces and secure the city in two days.
All over Italy, the Germans swiftly disarmed
Operation Achse
Operation Achse , also called Operation Alaric, were the codenames of the German plans to forcibly disarm the Italian armed forces after their expected armistice with the Allied forces...
Italian units. Rommel deported Italian soldiers, except for those willing to serve in German units, to Germany for forced labor, whereas Italian units in Kesselring's area were initially disbanded and their men permitted to go home. One Italian commander, General Gonzaga, refused German demands that his 222nd Coastal Division disarm, and was promptly shot. A significant part of the 184 Airborne Division Nembo
184 Airborne Division Nembo
184 Airborne Division Nembo or 184 Divisione Paracadutisti Nembo was an Airborne Division of the Italian Army during World War II....
went over to the German side, eventually becoming the basis of the 4th Parachute Division
4th Parachute Division (Germany)
The 4th Parachute Division, , was a formation in the Luftwaffe during World War II. It was formed in Venice, Italy, in November 1943, from elements of 2 Fallschirmjäger Division and volunteers from the Italian 184 and 185 Airborne Division Folgore parachute divisions...
. On the Greek Island of Kefalonia
Kefalonia
The island of Cephalonia, also known as Kefalonia, Cephallenia, Cephallonia, Kefallinia, or Kefallonia , is the largest of the Ionian Islands in western Greece, with an area of . It is also a separate regional unit of the Ionian Islands region, and the only municipality of the regional unit...
– outside Kesselring's command – some 5,000 Italian troops of the 33 Mountain Infantry Division Acqui
33 Mountain Infantry Division Acqui
The 33rd Mountain Infantry Division Acqui was a Mountain Infantry Division of the Italian Army during World War II. The Acqui Division was mobilized for war in October 1939, and took part in the Battle of France...
were massacred
Massacre of the Acqui Division
The Massacre of the Acqui Division , also known as the Cephalonia Massacre , was the mass execution of the men of the Italian 33rd Acqui Infantry Division by the Germans on the island of Kefalonia, Greece, in September 1943, following the Italian armistice during the Second World War. About 5000...
. Mussolini was rescued by the Germans in Operation Oak (Unternehmen Eiche
Unternehmen Eiche
The Gran Sasso raid refers to Operation Eiche , the rescue of Italian dictator Benito Mussolini by German paratroopers and Waffen-SS commandos in September 1943, during World War II...
), a raid planned by Kurt Student and carried out by Obersturmbannführer
Obersturmbannführer
Obersturmbannführer was a paramilitary Nazi Party rank used by both the SA and the SS. It was created in May 1933 to fill the need for an additional field grade officer rank above Sturmbannführer as the SA expanded. It became an SS rank at the same time...
Otto Skorzeny
Otto Skorzeny
Otto Skorzeny was an SS-Obersturmbannführer in the German Waffen-SS during World War II. After fighting on the Eastern Front, he was chosen as the field commander to carry out the rescue mission that freed the deposed Italian dictator Benito Mussolini from captivity...
on 12 September. The details of the operation were deliberately, though unsuccessfully, kept from Kesselring. "Kesselring is too honest for those born traitors down there" was Hitler's assessment.
Italy now effectively became an occupied country, as the Germans poured in troops. Italy's decision to switch sides created contempt for the Italians among both the Allies and Germans, which was to have far-reaching consequences.
Salerno
Allied invasion of Italy
The Allied invasion of Italy was the Allied landing on mainland Italy on September 3, 1943, by General Harold Alexander's 15th Army Group during the Second World War. The operation followed the successful invasion of Sicily during the Italian Campaign...
in September 1943, he launched a full-scale counterattack against the Allied landings there with Generaloberst Heinrich von Vietinghoff
Heinrich von Vietinghoff
Heinrich Gottfried Otto Richard von Vietinghoff genannt Scheel was a German Colonel-General of the German Army during the Second World War....
's Tenth Army. The counterattack inflicted heavy casualties on the Allied forces, forced them back in several areas, and, for a time, made Allied commanders contemplate evacuation. The short distance from German airfields allowed Luftflotte 2 to put 120 aircraft over the Salerno area on 11 September 1943. Using Fritz X
Fritz X
Fritz X was the most common name for a German guided anti-ship glide bomb used during World War II. Fritz X was a nickname used both by Allied and Luftwaffe personnel. Alternate names include Ruhrstahl SD 1400 X, Kramer X-1, PC 1400X or FX 1400...
anti-ship missile
Anti-ship missile
Anti-ship missiles are guided missiles that are designed for use against ships and large boats. Most anti-ship missiles are of the sea-skimming type, many use a combination of inertial guidance and radar homing...
s, hits were scored on the battleship
Battleship
A battleship is a large armored warship with a main battery consisting of heavy caliber guns. Battleships were larger, better armed and armored than cruisers and destroyers. As the largest armed ships in a fleet, battleships were used to attain command of the sea and represented the apex of a...
and cruiser
Cruiser
A cruiser is a type of warship. The term has been in use for several hundreds of years, and has had different meanings throughout this period...
s and , while a Liberty ship was sunk on 14 September and another damaged the next day. The offensive ultimately failed to throw the Allies back into the sea because of the intervention of Allied naval gunfire which decimated the advancing German units, stubborn Allied resistance and the advance of the British Eighth Army. On 17 September 1943, Kesselring gave Vietinghoff permission to break off the attack and withdraw.
Kesselring had been defeated but gained precious time. Already, in defiance of his orders, he was preparing a series of successive fallback positions on the Volturno Line
Volturno Line
The Volturno Line was a German defensive position in Italy during the World War II.The line ran from Termoli in the east, along the Biferno River through the Apennine Mountains to the Volturno River in the west....
, the Barbara Line
Barbara Line
During World War II, the Barbara Line was a series of German military fortifications in Italy, some south of the Gustav Line, and a similar distance north of the Volturno Line. Near the eastern coast, it ran along the line of the Trigno river. The line mostly consisted of fortified hilltop...
and the Bernhardt Line
Bernhardt Line
The Bernhardt Line was a German defensive line in Italy during World War II. Having reached the Bernhardt Line at the start of December 1943, it took until mid-January 1944 for U.S. 5th Army to fight their way to the next line of defenses, the Gustav Line. The line was defended by XIV Panzer Corps...
. Only in November 1943, after a month of hard fighting, did the Allies reach Kesselring's main position, the Gustav Line
Winter Line
The Winter Line was a series of German military fortifications in Italy, constructed during World War II by Organisation Todt. The primary Gustav Line ran across Italy from just north of where the Garigliano River flows into the Tyrrhenian Sea in the west, through the Apennine Mountains to the...
. According to his memoirs, Kesselring felt that much more could have been accomplished if he had access to the troops held "uselessly" under Rommel's command.
In November 1943, Kesselring met with Hitler. Kesselring gave an optimistic assessment of the situation in Italy and gave reassurances that he could hold the Allies south of Rome on the Winter Line
Winter Line
The Winter Line was a series of German military fortifications in Italy, constructed during World War II by Organisation Todt. The primary Gustav Line ran across Italy from just north of where the Garigliano River flows into the Tyrrhenian Sea in the west, through the Apennine Mountains to the...
. Kesselring further promised that he could prevent the Allies reaching the Northern Apennines
Apennine mountains
The Apennines or Apennine Mountains or Greek oros but just as often used alone as a noun. The ancient Greeks and Romans typically but not always used "mountain" in the singular to mean one or a range; thus, "the Apennine mountain" refers to the entire chain and is translated "the Apennine...
for at least six months. As a result, on 6 November 1943, Hitler ordered Rommel and his Army Group B headquarters to move to France to take charge of the Atlantic Wall
Atlantic Wall
The Atlantic Wall was an extensive system of coastal fortifications built by Nazi Germany between 1942 and 1944 along the western coast of Europe as a defense against an anticipated Allied invasion of the mainland continent from Great Britain.-History:On March 23, 1942 Führer Directive Number 40...
and prepare for the Allied attack that was expected there in the Spring of 1944. On 21 November 1943, Kesselring resumed command of all German forces in Italy, combining Commander-in-Chief South, a joint command, with that of Army Group C, a ground command. "I had always blamed Kesselring", Hitler later explained, "for looking at things too optimistically ... events have proved Rommel wrong, and I have been justified in my decision to leave Field Marshal Kesselring there, whom I have seen as an incredible political idealist, but also as a military optimist, and it is my opinion that military leadership without optimism is not possible."
The Luftwaffe scored a notable success on the night of 2 December 1943 when 105 Ju88 bombers struck the port of Bari
Air Raid on Bari
The air raid on Bari was an air attack by German bombers on Allied forces and shipping in Bari, Italy on 2 December 1943 during World War II. In the attack, 105 German Junkers Ju 88 bombers of Luftflotte 2, achieving complete surprise, bombed shipping and personnel operating in support of the...
. Skilfully using chaff
Chaff (radar countermeasure)
Chaff, originally called Window by the British, and Düppel by the Second World War era German Luftwaffe , is a radar countermeasure in which aircraft or other targets spread a cloud of small, thin pieces of aluminium, metallized glass fibre or plastic, which either appears as a cluster of secondary...
to confuse the Allied radar
Radar
Radar is an object-detection system which uses radio waves to determine the range, altitude, direction, or speed of objects. It can be used to detect aircraft, ships, spacecraft, guided missiles, motor vehicles, weather formations, and terrain. The radar dish or antenna transmits pulses of radio...
operators, they found the port packed with brightly lit Allied shipping. The result was the most destructive air raid on Allied shipping since the attack on Pearl Harbor
Attack on Pearl Harbor
The attack on Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike conducted by the Imperial Japanese Navy against the United States naval base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, on the morning of December 7, 1941...
. Hits were scored on two ammunition ships and a tanker. Burning oil and exploding ammunition spread over the harbour. Some 16 ships were sunk and eight damaged, and the port was put out of action for three weeks. Moreover, one of the ships sunk, SS John Harvey, had been carrying mustard gas, which enveloped the port in a cloud of poisonous vapours.
Cassino and Anzio
Battle of Monte Cassino
The Battle of Monte Cassino was a costly series of four battles during World War II, fought by the Allies against Germans and Italians with the intention of breaking through the Winter Line and seizing Rome.In the beginning of 1944, the western half of the Winter Line was being anchored by Germans...
in January 1944 met with early success, with the British X Corps
X Corps (United Kingdom)
The X Corps was a British Army formation in the First World War and was later reformed in 1942 during the North African campaign of the Second World War as part of the Eighth Army.- First World War :...
breaking through the line held by the 94th Infantry Division and imperilling the entire Tenth Army front. At the same time, Kesselring was receiving warnings of an imminent Allied amphibious attack. Kesselring rushed his reserves, the 29th and 90th Panzergrenadier Divisions, to the Cassino front. They were able to stabilise the German position there but left Rome poorly guarded. Kesselring felt that he had been out-generalled when the Allies landed at Anzio
Operation Shingle
Operation Shingle , during the Italian Campaign of World War II, was an Allied amphibious landing against Axis forces in the area of Anzio and Nettuno, Italy. The operation was commanded by Major General John P. Lucas and was intended to outflank German forces of the Winter Line and enable an...
.
Although taken by surprise, Kesselring moved rapidly to regain control of the situation, summoning Generaloberst Eberhard von Mackensen
Eberhard von Mackensen
Friedrich August Eberhard von Mackensen was a German general who served in World War II, and one of 882 German recipients of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves...
's Fourteenth Army headquarters from northern Italy, the 29th and 90th Panzergrenadier Divisions from the Cassino front, and the 26th Panzer Division from Tenth Army. OKW chipped in some divisions from other theatres. By February, Kesselring was able to take the offensive at Anzio but his forces were unable to crush the Allied beachhead, for which Kesselring blamed himself, OKW and von Mackensen for avoidable errors.
Meanwhile, costly fighting at Monte Cassino
Monte Cassino
Monte Cassino is a rocky hill about southeast of Rome, Italy, c. to the west of the town of Cassino and altitude. St. Benedict of Nursia established his first monastery, the source of the Benedictine Order, here around 529. It was the site of Battle of Monte Cassino in 1944...
in February 1944 brought the Allies close to a breakthrough into the Liri Valley. To hold the bastion of Monte Cassino, Kesselring brought in the 1st Parachute Division
1st Parachute Division (Germany)
The German 1st Parachute Division was a German elite military parachute-landing Division that fought during World War II. A division of paratroopers was termed a Fallschirmjäger Division...
, an "exceptionally well trained and conditioned" formation, on 26 February. Despite heavy casualties and the expenditure of enormous quantities of ammunition, an Allied offensive in March 1944 failed to break the Gustav Line position.
On 11 May 1944 General Sir Harold Alexander
Harold Alexander, 1st Earl Alexander of Tunis
Field Marshal Harold Rupert Leofric George Alexander, 1st Earl Alexander of Tunis was a British military commander and field marshal of Anglo-Irish descent who served with distinction in both world wars and, afterwards, as Governor General of Canada, the 17th since Canadian...
launched Operation Diadem
Operation Diadem
Operation Diadem, also referred to as the Fourth Battle of Monte Cassino was an offensive operation undertaken by the Allies in May 1944, as part of the Italian Campaign. It was launched at 2300 Hours on 11 May 1944 to break the German defenses on the western half of the Winter Line and open up...
, which finally broke through the Gustav Line and forced the Tenth Army to withdraw. In the process, a gap opened up between the Tenth and Fourteenth Armies, threatening both with encirclement. For this failure, Kesselring relieved von Mackensen of his command, replacing him with General der Panzertruppe Joachim Lemelsen
Joachim Lemelsen
Joachim Hermann August Lemelsen was a German general during the Second World War. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves...
. Fortunately for the Germans, Lieutenant General
Lieutenant General (United States)
In the United States Army, the United States Air Force and the United States Marine Corps, lieutenant general is a three-star general officer rank, with the pay grade of O-9. Lieutenant general ranks above major general and below general...
Mark Clark
Mark Wayne Clark
Mark Wayne Clark was an American general during World War II and the Korean War and was the youngest lieutenant general in the U.S. Army...
, obsessed with the capture of Rome, failed to take advantage of the situation and the Tenth Army was able to withdraw to the next line of defence, the Trasimene Line
Trasimene Line
The Trasimene Line was a German defensive line during the Italian Campaign of World War II. It was also sometimes known as the Albert Line...
, where it was able to link up with the Fourteenth Army and then conduct a fighting withdrawal.
For his part in the campaign, Kesselring was awarded the Knight's Cross with oak leaves, swords and diamonds by Hitler at the Wolfsschanze
Wolfsschanze
Wolf's Lair is the standard English name for Wolfsschanze, Adolf Hitler's first World War II Eastern Front military headquarters, one of several Führerhauptquartier or FHQs located in various parts of Europe...
near Rastenburg, East Prussia
East Prussia
East Prussia is the main part of the region of Prussia along the southeastern Baltic Coast from the 13th century to the end of World War II in May 1945. From 1772–1829 and 1878–1945, the Province of East Prussia was part of the German state of Prussia. The capital city was Königsberg.East Prussia...
on 19 July 1944. The next day, Hitler was the target of the 20 July plot. Informed of this event that evening by Göring, Kesselring, like many other senior commanders, sent a telegram to Hitler reaffirming his loyalty.
Throughout July and August 1944, Kesselring fought a stubborn delaying action, gradually retreating to the formidable Gothic Line
Gothic Line
The Gothic Line formed Field Marshal Albert Kesselring's last major line of defence in the final stages of World War II along the summits of the Apennines during the fighting retreat of German forces in Italy against the Allied Armies in Italy commanded by General Sir Harold Alexander.Adolf Hitler...
north of Florence
Florence
Florence is the capital city of the Italian region of Tuscany and of the province of Florence. It is the most populous city in Tuscany, with approximately 370,000 inhabitants, expanding to over 1.5 million in the metropolitan area....
. There, he was finally able to halt the Allied advance. Casualties of the Gothic Line battles in September and October 1944 included Kesselring himself. On 25 October 1944, his car collided with an artillery piece coming out of a side road. Kesselring suffered serious head and facial injuries and did not return to his command until January 1945.
Measures for the protection of Italy's population and culture
Kesselring strove tirelessly to avoid the physical destruction of many artistically important Italian cities, including Rome, Florence, SienaSiena
Siena is a city in Tuscany, Italy. It is the capital of the province of Siena.The historic centre of Siena has been declared by UNESCO a World Heritage Site. It is one of the nation's most visited tourist attractions, with over 163,000 international arrivals in 2008...
and Orvieto
Orvieto
Orvieto is a city and comune in Province of Terni, southwestern Umbria, Italy situated on the flat summit of a large butte of volcanic tuff...
. In some cases, historic bridges – such as the Ponte Vecchio
Ponte Vecchio
The Ponte Vecchio is a Medieval stone closed-spandrel segmental arch bridge over the Arno River, in Florence, Italy, noted for still having shops built along it, as was once common. Butchers initially occupied the shops; the present tenants are jewellers, art dealers and souvenir sellers...
(literally "Old Bridge") – were booby trap
Booby trap
A booby trap is a device designed to harm or surprise a person, unknowingly triggered by the presence or actions of the victim. As the word trap implies, they often have some form of bait designed to lure the victim towards it. However, in other cases the device is placed on busy roads or is...
ped rather than blown up. However, other historic Florentine bridges were destroyed on his orders and, in addition to booby-trapping the old bridge, he ordered the demolition of the ancient historical central borough at its two ends, in order to delay the Allied advance across the Arno
Arno
The Arno is a river in the Tuscany region of Italy. It is the most important river of central Italy after the Tiber.- Source and route :The river originates on Mount Falterona in the Casentino area of the Apennines, and initially takes a southward curve...
river. In the same vein, Kesselring supported the Italian declaration of Rome, Florence and Chieti
Chieti
Chieti is a city and comune in Central Italy, 200 km northeast of Rome. It is the capital of the Province of Chieti in the Abruzzo region...
as open cities
Open city
In war, in the event of the imminent capture of a city, the government/military structure of the nation that controls the city will sometimes declare it an open city, thus announcing that they have abandoned all defensive efforts....
. In the case of Rome, this was in spite of there being considerable tactical advantages to be had from defending the Tiber
Tiber
The Tiber is the third-longest river in Italy, rising in the Apennine Mountains in Emilia-Romagna and flowing through Umbria and Lazio to the Tyrrhenian Sea. It drains a basin estimated at...
bridges. These declarations were never agreed to by the Allies as the cities were not demilitarised and remained centres of government and industry. Despite the repeated declarations of "open city", Rome was bombed more than fifty times by the Allies, whose air forces hit Florence as well. In practice, the open city status was rendered meaningless.Among several relevant documents available at the National Archives of the United Kingdom – all of which clarify beyond any doubt that the "open city" status was never operative in Rome – the , which contains a number of filed documents about the Allied policy towards Rome, is of most interest. The file n. 400 is a message sent to the Foreign Office by D'Arcy Osborne, Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary to the Holy See, in which he transmits the latest German proposal for declaring Rome "open city", relayed to him by the German Ambassador in Rome, via the Vatican Undersecretary of State; the message was then urgently retransmitted to Washington, and is dated 4 June 1944, the same day General Mark Clark's tanks entered Rome. Up to the very last minute, the Germans had used Rome and the diplomatic delusion of the never-ending talks about the "open city" in order to take any possible advantage out of it, including using the Italian capital to cover their ordered retreat behind a safer defence line.
Kesselring tried to preserve the monastery of Monte Cassino
Monte Cassino
Monte Cassino is a rocky hill about southeast of Rome, Italy, c. to the west of the town of Cassino and altitude. St. Benedict of Nursia established his first monastery, the source of the Benedictine Order, here around 529. It was the site of Battle of Monte Cassino in 1944...
by avoiding its military occupation even though it offered a superb observing point over the battlefield. Ultimately this was unsuccessful, as the Allies never believed the monastery would not be used to direct the German artillery against their lines. On the morning of 15 February 1944, 142 B-17 Flying Fortress, 47 B-25 Mitchell
B-25 Mitchell
The North American B-25 Mitchell was an American twin-engined medium bomber manufactured by North American Aviation. It was used by many Allied air forces, in every theater of World War II, as well as many other air forces after the war ended, and saw service across four decades.The B-25 was named...
and 40 B-26 Marauder
B-26 Marauder
The Martin B-26 Marauder was a World War II twin-engine medium bomber built by the Glenn L. Martin Company. First used in the Pacific Theater in early 1942, it was also used in the Mediterranean Theater and in Western Europe....
medium bombers deliberately dropped 1,150 tons of high explosives and incendiary bombs on the abbey, reducing the historic monastery to a smoking mass of rubble. Kesselring was aware that some artworks taken from Monte Cassino for safekeeping wound up in the possession of Hermann Göring. Kesselring had some German soldiers shot for looting. German authorities avoided giving the Italian authorities control over artworks because they feared that "entire collections would be sold to Switzerland". A 1945 Allied investigation reported that Italian cultural treasures had suffered relatively little war damage. Kesselring received regular updates on efforts to preserve cultural treasures and his personal interest in the matter contributed to the high proportion of art treasures that were saved.
War crimes
On 22–23 March 1944, a 15-man American Office of Strategic ServicesOffice of Strategic Services
The Office of Strategic Services was a United States intelligence agency formed during World War II. It was the wartime intelligence agency, and it was a predecessor of the Central Intelligence Agency...
(OSS) Operational Group landed in inflatable boat
Inflatable boat
An inflatable boat is a lightweight boat constructed with its sides and bow made of flexible tubes containing pressurised gas. For smaller boats, the floor and hull beneath it is often flexible. On boats longer than , the floor often consists of three to five rigid plywood or aluminium sheets fixed...
s from US Navy PT boats on the Liguria
Liguria
Liguria is a coastal region of north-western Italy, the third smallest of the Italian regions. Its capital is Genoa. It is a popular region with tourists for its beautiful beaches, picturesque little towns, and good food.-Geography:...
n coast as part of Operation Ginny II, a mission to blow up the entrances of two vital railway tunnels. Their boats were discovered and they were captured by a smaller group of Italian and German soldiers. On 26 March, they were executed under Hitler's "Commando Order
Commando Order
The Commando Order was issued by Adolf Hitler on 18 October 1942 stating that all Allied commandos encountered by German forces in Europe and Africa should be killed immediately, even if in uniform or if they attempted to surrender...
", issued after German soldiers had been shackled during the Dieppe Raid
Dieppe Raid
The Dieppe Raid, also known as the Battle of Dieppe, Operation Rutter or later on Operation Jubilee, during the Second World War, was an Allied attack on the German-occupied port of Dieppe on the northern coast of France on 19 August 1942. The assault began at 5:00 AM and by 10:50 AM the Allied...
. General Anton Dostler
Anton Dostler
Anton Dostler was a General of the Infantry in the regular German army during World War II. In the first allied war trial after the war, Dostler was tried and found guilty of war crimes and sentenced to death by firing squad.-Military career:Anton Dostler joined the German Army in 1910 and served...
, who had signed the execution order, was tried after the war, found guilty, and executed by firing squad on 1 December 1945.
In Rome on 23 March 1944, 33 policemen of the Polizeiregiment Bozen from the German
German language
German is a West Germanic language, related to and classified alongside English and Dutch. With an estimated 90 – 98 million native speakers, German is one of the world's major languages and is the most widely-spoken first language in the European Union....
-speaking population of the Italian province of South Tyrol
South Tyrol
South Tyrol , also known by its Italian name Alto Adige, is an autonomous province in northern Italy. It is one of the two autonomous provinces that make up the autonomous region of Trentino-Alto Adige/Südtirol. The province has an area of and a total population of more than 500,000 inhabitants...
and three Italian civilians were killed by a bomb blast and the subsequent shooting. In response, Hitler approved the recommendation of Generaloberst Eberhard von Mackensen
Eberhard von Mackensen
Friedrich August Eberhard von Mackensen was a German general who served in World War II, and one of 882 German recipients of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves...
, the commander of the Fourteenth Army who was responsible for the sector including Rome
Rome
Rome is the capital of Italy and the country's largest and most populated city and comune, with over 2.7 million residents in . The city is located in the central-western portion of the Italian Peninsula, on the Tiber River within the Lazio region of Italy.Rome's history spans two and a half...
, that 10 Italians should be shot for each policeman killed. The task fell to SS Obersturmbannführer Herbert Kappler
Herbert Kappler
Herbert Kappler , was the head of German police and security services in Rome during World War II...
who, finding there were not enough condemned prisoners available, made up the numbers as he thought best, using Jewish prisoners and even civilians taken from the streets. The result was the Ardeatine massacre
Ardeatine massacre
The Fosse Ardeatine massacre was a mass execution carried out in Rome on 24 March 1944 by German occupation troops during the Second World War as a reprisal for a partisan attack conducted on the previous day in central Rome....
.
The fall of Rome on 4 June 1944 placed Kesselring in a dangerous situation as his forces attempted to withdraw from Rome to the Gothic Line
Gothic Line
The Gothic Line formed Field Marshal Albert Kesselring's last major line of defence in the final stages of World War II along the summits of the Apennines during the fighting retreat of German forces in Italy against the Allied Armies in Italy commanded by General Sir Harold Alexander.Adolf Hitler...
. That the Germans were especially vulnerable to Italian partisans was not lost on General Alexander, who appealed in a radio broadcast for Italians to kill Germans "wherever you encounter them". Kesselring responded by authorising the "massive employment of artillery, grenade
Granatwerfer 42
The Granatwerfer 42 was a mortar used by Germany during World War II....
and mine throwers
Minenwerfer
Minenwerfer is the German name for a class of short range mortars used extensively during the First World War by the German Army...
, armoured cars, flamethrower
Flamethrower
A flamethrower is a mechanical device designed to project a long controllable stream of fire.Some flamethrowers project a stream of ignited flammable liquid; some project a long gas flame. Most military flamethrowers use liquids, but commercial flamethrowers tend to use high-pressure propane and...
s and other technical combat equipment" against the partisans. He also issued an order promising indemnity to soldiers who "exceed our normal restraint". Whether or not as a result of Kesselring's hard line, massacres were carried out by the Hermann Göring Panzer Division
Fallschirm-Panzer Division 1 Hermann Göring
The Fallschirm-Panzer-Division 1. Hermann Göring was an élite German Luftwaffe armoured division. The HG saw action in North Africa, Sicily, Italy and on the Eastern front...
at Stia
Stia
Stia is a comune in the Province of Arezzo in the Italian region Tuscany, located about 40 km east of Florence and about 40 km northwest of Arezzo. The village of Stia is often called the "source of the Arno", although the real source is some 1200 metres higher up on the slopes of Monte...
in April, Civitella in Val di Chiana
Civitella in Val di Chiana
Civitella in Val di Chiana , often also Civitella di Val di Chiana, is a comune in the province of Arezzo, south of Arezzo in Tuscany, Italy. It is one of the best-preserved of the network of Lombard fortresses of the 6th and the 7th century in central Italy, strategically placed to control the...
in June and Bucine in July 1944, by the 26th Panzer Division at Padule di Fucecchio
Fucecchio
Fucecchio is a town and comune of the province of Firenze in the Italian region of Tuscany. The main economical resources of the city are the leather industries, shoes industry and other manufacturing activities, although in the recent years their number has been decreasing because of a slight...
on 23 August 1944, and by the 16th SS Panzergrenadier Division Reichsführer-SS
16th SS Panzergrenadier Division Reichsführer-SS
The 16th SS Panzergrenadier Division Reichsführer-SS was a Panzergrenadier formation of the Waffen-SS during World War II.-History:Formed in November 1943 when Volksdeutsche recruits were added to the Sturmbrigade Reichsführer SS, which was used as the cadre in the formation of the new division...
at Sant'Anna di Stazzema
Sant'Anna di Stazzema massacre
The Sant'Anna di Stazzema massacre was a Nazi German atrocity in the village of Sant'Anna di Stazzema, Italy, in the course of an operation against the Italian resistance movement in 1944, during the Italian Campaign of World War II.-Facts:...
in August 1944 and Marzabotto
Marzabotto massacre
The Marzabotto massacre was a World War II mass murder of at least 770 civilians by Germans, which took place in the territory around the small village of Marzabotto, in the mountainous area south of Bologna...
in September and October 1944.
In August 1944 Kesselring was informed by Rudolf Rahn, the German ambassador to the RSI
Italian Social Republic
The Italian Social Republic was a puppet state of Nazi Germany led by the "Duce of the Nation" and "Minister of Foreign Affairs" Benito Mussolini and his Republican Fascist Party. The RSI exercised nominal sovereignty in northern Italy but was largely dependent on the Wehrmacht to maintain control...
, that Mussolini had filed protests about the killing of Italian citizens. In response, Kesselring issued another edict to his troops on 21 August, deploring incidents that had "damaged the German Wehrmachts reputation and discipline and which no longer have anything to do with reprisal operations" and launched investigations into specific cases that Mussolini cited. Between 21 July and 25 September 1944, 624 Germans were killed, 993 wounded and 872 missing in partisan operations, while some 9,520 partisans were killed.
Kesselring used the Jews of Rome as slave labour on the construction of fortifications – as he had earlier done with those of Tunis. He needed a large labour force, given the magnitude of the logistical challenges he was facing. When ordered to deport the Roman Jews, Kesselring resisted. He announced that no resources were available to carry out such an order. Hitler then transferred responsibility to the SS and around 8,000 Roman Jews were ultimately deported. During the German occupation of Italy, the Germans were believed to have killed some 46,000 Italian civilians, including 7,000 Jews.
Central Europe
Once recovered from the car accident, Kesselring relieved Generalfeldmarschall Gerd von RundstedtGerd von Rundstedt
Karl Rudolf Gerd von Rundstedt was a Generalfeldmarschall of the German Army during World War II. He held some of the highest field commands in all phases of the war....
as OB West
OB West
The German Army Command in the West The German Army Command in the West The German Army Command in the West (Oberbefehlshaber West (German: initials OB West) was the overall command of the Westheer, the German Armed Forces on the Western Front during World War II. It was directly subordinate to...
on 10 March 1945. On arrival, he told his new staff, "Well, gentlemen, I am the new V-3", referring to the Vergeltungswaffe
Vergeltungswaffe
V-weapons also, known in the original German as Vergeltungswaffen , were a particular set of long range artillery weapons designed for strategic bombing during World War II, particularly terror bombing and/or aerial bombing of cities. They comprised the V-1 flying bomb, the V-2 rocket and the V-3...
("vengeance" weapons) and, in particular, to the V-3 cannon
V-3 cannon
The V-3 was a German World War II supergun working on the multi-charge principle whereby secondary propellant charges are fired to add velocity to a projectile....
, prototypes of which were fired on the Western Front
Western Front (World War II)
The Western Front of the European Theatre of World War II encompassed, Denmark, Norway, Luxembourg, Belgium, the Netherlands, France, and West Germany. The Western Front was marked by two phases of large-scale ground combat operations...
in late 1944 and early 1945. Given the desperate situation of the Western Front, this was another sign of Kesselring's proverbial optimism. Kesselring still described as "lucid" Hitler's analysis of the situation, according to which the Germans were about to inflict a historical defeat upon the Soviets, after which the victorious German armies would be brought west to crush the Allies and sweep them from the continent. Therefore, Kesselring was determined to "hang on" in the west until the "decision in the East" came. Kesselring endorsed Hitler's order that deserters should be hanged from the nearest tree. When a staff officer sought to make Kesselring aware of the hopelessness of the situation, Kesselring told him that he had driven through the entire army rear area and not seen a single hanged man.
The Western Front at this time generally followed the Rhine river with two important exceptions: the American bridgehead over the Rhine at Remagen
Remagen
Remagen is a town in Germany in Rhineland-Palatinate, in the district of Ahrweiler. It is about a one hour drive from Cologne , just south of Bonn, the former West German capital. It is situated on the River Rhine. There is a ferry across the Rhine from Remagen every 10–15 minutes in the summer...
, and a large German salient
Salients, re-entrants and pockets
A salient is a battlefield feature that projects into enemy territory. The salient is surrounded by the enemy on three sides, making the troops occupying the salient vulnerable. The enemy's line facing a salient is referred to as a re-entrant...
west of the Rhine, the Saar
Saarland
Saarland is one of the sixteen states of Germany. The capital is Saarbrücken. It has an area of 2570 km² and 1,045,000 inhabitants. In both area and population, it is the smallest state in Germany other than the city-states...
–Palatinate triangle. Consideration was given to evacuating the triangle, but OKW ordered it held. When Kesselring paid his first visit to the German First and Seventh Army headquarters there on 13 March 1945, the army group commander, Oberstgruppenführer
Oberstgruppenführer
Oberst-Gruppenführer was the highest commissioned SS rank with the exception of Reichsführer-SS, which was a special rank held by Heinrich Himmler...
Paul Hausser
Paul Hausser
Paul "Papa" Hausser was an officer in the German Army, achieving the high rank of lieutenant-general in the inter-war Reichswehr. After retirement from the regular Army he became the "father" of the Waffen-SS and one of its most eminent leaders...
, and the two army commanders all affirmed the defence of the triangle could only result in heavy losses or complete annihilation of their commands. General der Infanterie Hans Felber
Hans Felber
Hans Felber was a German infantry general and staff officer.Felber started his military career as Fahnenjunker on March 17, 1908. On August 17, 1909 he was elevated to Lieutenant of the 117th Infantry Regiment. On April 1, 1932 Felber became a Lieutenant Colonel. On July 1, 1935 he found himself...
of the Seventh Army considered the latter the most likely outcome. Nonetheless, Kesselring insisted that the positions had to be held.
The triangle was already under attack from two sides by Lieutenant General George Patton's Third Army and Lieutenant General Alexander Patch
Alexander Patch
General Alexander McCarrell "Sandy" Patch was an officer in the United States Army, best known for his service in World War II. He commanded Army and Marine forces during the invasion of Guadalcanal, and the U.S...
's Seventh Army. The German position soon crumbled and Hitler reluctantly sanctioned a withdrawal. The First and Seventh Armies suffered heavy losses: around 113,000 Germans casualties at the cost of 17,000 on the Allied side. Nonetheless, they had avoided encirclement and managed to conduct a skilful delaying action, evacuating the last troops to the east bank of the Rhine on 25 March 1945.
As Germany was cut in two, Kesselring's command was enlarged to include Army Groups Centre
Army Group Centre
Army Group Centre was the name of two distinct German strategic army groups that fought on the Eastern Front in World War II. The first Army Group Centre was created on 22 June 1941, as one of three German Army formations assigned to the invasion of the Soviet Union...
, South
Army Group South
Army Group South was the name of a number of German Army Groups during World War II.- Poland campaign :Germany used two army groups to invade Poland in 1939: Army Group North and Army Group South...
and South-East on the Eastern Front
Eastern Front (World War II)
The Eastern Front of World War II was a theatre of World War II between the European Axis powers and co-belligerent Finland against the Soviet Union, Poland, and some other Allies which encompassed Northern, Southern and Eastern Europe from 22 June 1941 to 9 May 1945...
, and Army Group C in Italy, as well as his own Army Group G
Army Group G
The German Army Group G fought on the Western Front of World War II and was a component of OB West.When the Allied invasion of Southern France took place, Army Group G had eleven divisions with which to hold France south of the Loire...
and Army Group Upper Rhine
Army Group Oberrhein (Germany)
The Upper Rhine High Command , also incorrectly referred to as Army Group Upper Rhine , was a short-lived headquarters unit of the German Armed Forces created on the Western Front during World War II. The Upper Rhine High Command was formed on 26 November 1944 and was inactivated on 25 January 1945...
. On 30 April, Hitler committed suicide in Berlin. On 1 May, Karl Dönitz
Karl Dönitz
Karl Dönitz was a German naval commander during World War II. He started his career in the German Navy during World War I. In 1918, while he was in command of , the submarine was sunk by British forces and Dönitz was taken prisoner...
was designated German President (Reichspräsident
Reichspräsident
The Reichspräsident was the German head of state under the Weimar constitution, which was officially in force from 1919 to 1945. In English he was usually simply referred to as the President of Germany...
) and the Flensburg government
Flensburg government
The Flensburg Government , also known as the Flensburg Cabinet and the Dönitz Government , was the short-lived administration that attempted to rule the Third Reich during most of May 1945 at the end of World War II in Europe...
was created. One of the new president's first acts was the appointment of Kesselring as Commander-in-Chief of Southern Germany, with plenipotentiary powers.
Chaotic surrender
Meanwhile, Wolff and von Vietinghoff, now commander of Army Group C, had almost concluded a preliminary surrender agreement with the OSS chief in SwitzerlandSwitzerland
Switzerland name of one of the Swiss cantons. ; ; ; or ), in its full name the Swiss Confederation , is a federal republic consisting of 26 cantons, with Bern as the seat of the federal authorities. The country is situated in Western Europe,Or Central Europe depending on the definition....
, Allen Dulles. Known as Operation Sunrise
Operation Crossword
During World War II, Operation Crossword or Operation Sunrise was a series of secret negotiations conducted in March 1945 in Switzerland between representatives of Nazi Germany and the Western Allies to arrange a local surrender of German forces in northern Italy...
, these secret negotiations had been in progress since early March 1945. Kesselring was aware of them, having previously consented to them, although he had not informed his own staff. He did, however, later inform Hitler.
At first he did not accept the agreement and, on 30 April, relieved both Vietinghoff and his Chief of Staff, Generalleutnant Hans Röttiger
Hans Röttiger
General Hans Röttiger was a Panzer General in the German army during World War II and the first Inspector of the Bundeswehr....
, putting them at the disposition of the OKW for a possible court martial. They were replaced by General Friedrich Schulz
Friedrich Schulz
Karl Friedrich "Fritz" Wilhelm Schulz was a German general of infantry, serving during World War II and recipient of the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves and Swords...
and Generalmajor Friedrich Wenzel respectively. The next morning, 1 May, Röttinger reacted by placing both Schulz and Wenzel under arrest, and summoning General Joachim Lemelsen
Joachim Lemelsen
Joachim Hermann August Lemelsen was a German general during the Second World War. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves...
to take Schulz's place. Lemelsen initially refused, as he was in possession of a written order from Kesselring which prohibited any talks with the enemy without his explicit authorization. By this time, Vietinghoff and Wolff had concluded an armistice with the Allied Commander in Chief of the Mediterranean Theatre, Field Marshal
Field Marshal (UK)
Field Marshal is the highest military rank of the British Army. It ranks immediately above the rank of General and is the Army equivalent of an Admiral of the Fleet and a Marshal of the Royal Air Force....
Alexander, which became effective on 2 May at 14:00. Lemelsen reached Bolzano, and Schulz and Wenzel regained control, this time agreeing with the officers pushing for a quick surrender. The German armies in Italy were now utterly defeated by the Allies, who were rapidly advancing from Garmisch towards Innsbruck
Innsbruck
- Main sights :- Buildings :*Golden Roof*Kaiserliche Hofburg *Hofkirche with the cenotaph of Maximilian I, Holy Roman Emperor*Altes Landhaus...
. Kesselring remained stubbornly opposed to the surrender, but was finally won over by Wolff on the late morning of 2 May after a two-hour phone call to Kesselring at his headquarters at Pullach
Pullach
Pullach, officially Pullach i. Isartal, is a municipality in the district of Munich in Bavaria in Germany. It is serviced by the S 7 line of the Munich S-Bahn, at the Großhesselohe Isartalbahnhof, Pullach and Höllriegelskreuth railway stations....
.
North of the Alps, Army Group G followed suit on 6 May. Kesselring now decided to surrender his own headquarters. He ordered SS Oberstgruppenführer
Oberstgruppenführer
Oberst-Gruppenführer was the highest commissioned SS rank with the exception of Reichsführer-SS, which was a special rank held by Heinrich Himmler...
Paul Hausser
Paul Hausser
Paul "Papa" Hausser was an officer in the German Army, achieving the high rank of lieutenant-general in the inter-war Reichswehr. After retirement from the regular Army he became the "father" of the Waffen-SS and one of its most eminent leaders...
to supervise the SS troops to ensure that the surrender was carried out in accordance with his instructions. Kesselring then surrendered to an American major at Saalfelden
Saalfelden
Saalfelden is a town in the Austrian state of Salzburg and is the administrative centre of the Pinzgauer Saalachtal...
, near Salzburg
Salzburg
-Population development:In 1935, the population significantly increased when Salzburg absorbed adjacent municipalities. After World War II, numerous refugees found a new home in the city. New residential space was created for American soldiers of the postwar Occupation, and could be used for...
, in Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
on 9 May 1945. He was taken to see Major General Maxwell D. Taylor
Maxwell D. Taylor
General Maxwell Davenport "Max" Taylor was an United States Army four star general and diplomat of the mid-20th century, who served as the fifth Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff after having been appointed by the President of the United States John F...
, the commander of the 101st Airborne Division
101st Airborne Division (United States)
The 101st Airborne Division—the "Screaming Eagles"—is a U.S. Army modular light infantry division trained for air assault operations. During World War II, it was renowned for its role in Operation Overlord, the D-Day landings on 6 June 1944, in Normandy, France, Operation Market Garden, the...
, who treated him courteously, allowing him to keep his weapons and field marshal's baton, and to visit the Eastern Front headquarters of Army Groups Centre and South at Zeltweg
Zeltweg
Zeltweg is a town in Styria, Austria. It is located in the Aichfeld basin of the Mur River in Upper Styria. Larger municipalities in the vicinity are Judenburg, Knittelfeld and Fohnsdorf.-History:...
and Graz
Graz
The more recent population figures do not give the whole picture as only people with principal residence status are counted and people with secondary residence status are not. Most of the people with secondary residence status in Graz are students...
unescorted. Taylor arranged for Kesselring and his staff to move into a hotel at Berchtesgaden
Berchtesgaden
Berchtesgaden is a municipality in the German Bavarian Alps. It is located in the south district of Berchtesgadener Land in Bavaria, near the border with Austria, some 30 km south of Salzburg and 180 km southeast of Munich...
. Photographs of Taylor and Kesselring drinking tea together created a stir in the United States. Kesselring met with Lieutenant General Jacob L. Devers
Jacob L. Devers
General Jacob "Jake" Loucks Devers , commander of the 6th Army Group in Europe during World War II. He was the first United States military officer to reach the Rhine after D-Day.-Biography:...
, commander of the Sixth United States Army Group, and gave interviews to Allied newspaper reporters.
With the end of the war, Kesselring was hoping to be able to make a start on the rehabilitation of Germany. Instead, he found himself placed under arrest. On 15 May 1945, Kesselring was taken to Mondorf-les-Bains
Mondorf-les-Bains
Mondorf-les-Bains is a commune and town in south-eastern Luxembourg. It is part of the canton of Remich, which is part of the district of Grevenmacher. Mondorf-les-Bains is a spa town , and has the only casino in Luxembourg....
where his baton and decorations were taken from him and he was incarcerated. He was held in a number of American POW camps before being transferred to British custody in 1946. He testified at the Nuremberg trial
Nuremberg Trials
The Nuremberg Trials were a series of military tribunals, held by the victorious Allied forces of World War II, most notable for the prosecution of prominent members of the political, military, and economic leadership of the defeated Nazi Germany....
of Hermann Göring, but his offers to testify against Soviet, American, and British commanders were declined.
Trial
The Moscow Declaration
Moscow Declaration
The Moscow Declaration was signed during the Moscow Conference on October 30, 1943. The formal name of the declaration was "Declaration of the Four Nations on General Security". It was signed by the foreign secretaries of the Governments of the United States, the United Kingdom and the Soviet Union...
of October 1943 promised that "those German officers and men and members of the Nazi party who have been responsible for or have taken a consenting part in the above atrocities, massacres and executions will be sent back to the countries in which their abominable deeds were done in order that they may be judged and punished according to the laws of these liberated countries and of free governments which will be erected therein." However, the British, who had been a driving force in moulding the war crimes trial policy that culminated in the Nuremberg Trials, explicitly excluded high-ranking German officers in their custody. Thus, Kesselring's conviction became "a legal prerequisite if perpetrators of war crimes were to be found guilty by Italian courts".
The British held two major trials against the top German war criminals who had perpetrated crimes during the Italian campaign. For political reasons it was decided to hold the trials in Italy, but a request by Italy to allow an Italian judge to participate was denied on the grounds that Italy was not an Allied country. The trials were held under the Royal Warrant of 18 June 1945, thus essentially under British Common Military Law. The decision put the trials on a shaky legal basis, as foreign nationals were being tried for crimes against foreigners in a foreign country. The first trial, held in Rome, was of von Mackensen and Generalleutnant Kurt Mälzer
Kurt Mälzer
Kurt Mälzer was a General of the German Luftwaffe during World War II. In 1944, Mälzer was appointed the military commander of the city of Rome, under the overall command of Field Marshal Albert Kesselring...
, the Commandant of Rome, for their part in the Ardeatine massacre. Both were sentenced to death on 30 November 1946.
Kesselring's own trial began in Venice on 17 February 1947. The British Military Court was presided over by Major General Sir Edmund Hakewill-Smith
Edmund Hakewill-Smith
Major-General Sir Edmund Hakewill-Smith KCVO, CB, CBE, MC was a South African-born British General.-Early life:Hakewill-Smith was born in Kimberley, Northern Cape, South Africa, on the 17 March 1896, he was educated at the Diocesan College in Rondebosch, Cape Town, South Africa and at the RMC...
, assisted by four lieutenant colonels. Colonel Richard C. Halse – who had already obtained the death penalty for von Mackensen and Mältzer – was the prosecutor. Kesselring's legal team was headed by Hans Laternser
Hans Laternser
Hans Laternser was a prominent German Lawyer who specialised in Anglo-Saxon law. In the immediate aftermath of the Second World War, this made him especially qualifed to defend Germans prosecuted for war crimes by the victorious Allies. He had represented several defendants at the Nuremberg Trials,...
, a skilful German lawyer who specialised in Anglo-Saxon law, had represented several defendants at the Nuremberg Trials, and would later go on to represent Generalfeldmarschall Erich von Manstein
Erich von Manstein
Erich von Manstein was a field marshal in World War II. He became one of the most prominent commanders of Germany's World War II armed forces...
. Kesselring's ability to pay his legal team was hampered because his assets had been frozen by the Allies, but his legal costs were eventually met by friends in South America
South America
South America is a continent situated in the Western Hemisphere, mostly in the Southern Hemisphere, with a relatively small portion in the Northern Hemisphere. The continent is also considered a subcontinent of the Americas. It is bordered on the west by the Pacific Ocean and on the north and east...
and relatives in Franconia
Franconia
Franconia is a region of Germany comprising the northern parts of the modern state of Bavaria, a small part of southern Thuringia, and a region in northeastern Baden-Württemberg called Tauberfranken...
.
Kesselring was arraigned on two charges: the shooting of 335 Italians in the Ardeatine massacre and incitement to kill Italian civilians. Kesselring did not invoke the "Nuremberg defence". Rather, he maintained that his actions were lawful. On 6 May 1947 the Court found him guilty of both charges and sentenced him to death by firing squad, which was considered more honourable than hanging. The court left open the question of the legality of killing innocent persons in reprisals.
The planned major trial for the campaign of reprisals never took place, but a series of smaller trials was held instead in Padua
Padua
Padua is a city and comune in the Veneto, northern Italy. It is the capital of the province of Padua and the economic and communications hub of the area. Padua's population is 212,500 . The city is sometimes included, with Venice and Treviso, in the Padua-Treviso-Venice Metropolitan Area, having...
between April and June 1947 for SS Brigadeführer Willy Tensfeld, Kapitänleutnant
Captain Lieutenant
Captain lieutenant or captain-lieutenant is a military rank, used in a number of different navies worldwide.It is generally equivalent to the Commonwealth or US rank of lieutenant, and has the NATO rank code of OF-2, though this can vary....
Waldemar Krummhaar, the 26th Panzer Division's Generalleutnant Eduard Crasemann
Eduard Crasemann
Eduard Crasemann was a highly decorated General der Artillerie in the Wehrmacht during World War II who commanded several divisions. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves...
and SS Gruppenführer Max Simon
Max Simon
Max Simon was a German SS-Gruppenführer und Generalleutnant der Waffen-SS during World War II, who was awarded the Knight's Cross with Oakleaves. Simon was a private in the Prussian Army during World War I and was one of the first members of the SS in the early 1930s...
of the 16th SS Panzergrenadier Division Reichsführer-SS. Tensfeld was acquitted; Crasemann was sentenced to 10 years; and Simon was sentenced to death, but his sentence was commuted. Simons's trial was the last held in Italy by the British. By 1949, British military tribunals had sentenced 230 Germans to death and another 447 to custodial sentences. None of the death sentences imposed between the end of 1946 and 1948 were carried out. A number of officers, all below the rank of General, including Herbert Kappler
Herbert Kappler
Herbert Kappler , was the head of German police and security services in Rome during World War II...
, were transferred to the Italian courts for trial. These applied very different legal standards to the British – ones which were often more favourable to the defendants. Ironically, in view of the repeated attempts by many senior Wehrmacht commanders to shift blame for atrocities onto the SS, the most senior SS commanders in Italy, Karl Wolff
Karl Wolff
Karl Friedrich Otto Wolff was a high-ranking member of the Nazi Schutzstaffel , ultimately holding the rank of SS-Obergruppenführer and General of the Waffen-SS. He became Chief of Personal Staff to the Reichsführer and SS Liaison Officer to Hitler until his replacement in 1943...
and Himmler's personal representative in Italy, SS Standartenführer Eugen Dollmann
Eugen Dollmann
Eugen Dollmann was a German Diplomat member of the SS.-Early life and family:The son of Paula Dollmann, born Schummerer and Stefan Dollmann, Eugen Dollmann graduated in 1926 at the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München as Doktor der Philosophie...
, escaped prosecution.
Commutation, pardon and liberation
The death verdict against Kesselring unleashed a storm of protest in the United Kingdom. Former British Prime MinisterPrime Minister of the United Kingdom
The Prime Minister of the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern Ireland is the Head of Her Majesty's Government in the United Kingdom. The Prime Minister and Cabinet are collectively accountable for their policies and actions to the Sovereign, to Parliament, to their political party and...
Winston Churchill
Winston Churchill
Sir Winston Leonard Spencer-Churchill, was a predominantly Conservative British politician and statesman known for his leadership of the United Kingdom during the Second World War. He is widely regarded as one of the greatest wartime leaders of the century and served as Prime Minister twice...
immediately branded it as too harsh and intervened in favour of Kesselring. Field Marshal Alexander, now Governor General of Canada
Governor General of Canada
The Governor General of Canada is the federal viceregal representative of the Canadian monarch, Queen Elizabeth II...
, sent a telegram to Prime Minister Clement Attlee
Clement Attlee
Clement Richard Attlee, 1st Earl Attlee, KG, OM, CH, PC, FRS was a British Labour politician who served as the Prime Minister of the United Kingdom from 1945 to 1951, and as the Leader of the Labour Party from 1935 to 1955...
in which he expressed his hope that Kesselring's sentence would be commuted. "As his old opponent on the battlefield", he started, "I have no complaints against him. Kesselring and his soldiers fought against us hard but clean." Alexander had expressed his admiration for Kesselring as a military commander as early as 1943. In his 1961 memoirs Alexander paid tribute to Kesselring as a commander who "showed great skill in extricating himself from the desperate situations into which his faulty intelligence had led him". Alexander's sentiments were echoed by Lieutenant General Sir Oliver Leese
Oliver Leese
Lieutenant-General Sir Oliver William Hargreaves Leese, 3rd Baronet, KCB, CBE, DSO was a British general during World War II.-Early years:...
, who had commanded the British Eighth Army
Eighth Army (United Kingdom)
The Eighth Army was one of the best-known formations of the British Army during World War II, fighting in the North African and Italian campaigns....
in the Italian campaign. In a May 1947 interview, Leese said he was "very sad" to hear of what he considered "British victor's justice" being imposed on Kesselring, an "extremely gallant soldier who had fought his battles fairly and squarely". Lord de L'Isle
William Sidney, 1st Viscount De L'Isle
William Philip Sidney, 1st Viscount De L'Isle and 6th Baron De L'Isle and Dudley VC KG GCMG GCVO KStJ PC , was the 15th Governor-General of Australia and the final non-Australian to hold the office...
, who had been awarded the Victoria Cross
Victoria Cross
The Victoria Cross is the highest military decoration awarded for valour "in the face of the enemy" to members of the armed forces of various Commonwealth countries, and previous British Empire territories....
for gallantry at Anzio, raised the issue in the House of Lords
House of Lords
The House of Lords is the upper house of the Parliament of the United Kingdom. Like the House of Commons, it meets in the Palace of Westminster....
.
The Italian government flatly refused to carry out death sentences, as the death penalty had been abolished in Italy in 1944 and was regarded as a relic of Mussolini's Fascist
Fascism
Fascism is a radical authoritarian nationalist political ideology. Fascists seek to rejuvenate their nation based on commitment to the national community as an organic entity, in which individuals are bound together in national identity by suprapersonal connections of ancestry, culture, and blood...
regime. The Italian decision was very disappointing to the British government because the trials had partly been intended to meet the expectations of the Italian public. The War Office notified Lieutenant General Sir John Harding
John Harding, 1st Baron Harding of Petherton
Field Marshal Allan Francis John Harding, 1st Baron Harding of Petherton, GCB, CBE, DSO, MC was a British Army officer and Governor of Cyprus from 1955 to 1957, Cyprus being a British colony at that time....
, who had succeeded Alexander as commander of British forces in the Mediterranean in 1946, that there should be no more death sentences and those already imposed should be commuted. Accordingly, Harding commuted the death sentences imposed on von Mackensen, Mältzer and Kesselring to life imprisonment on 4 July 1947. Mältzer died while still in prison in February 1952, while von Mackensen, after having his sentence reduced to 21 years, was eventually freed in October 1952. Kesselring was moved from Mestre
Mestre
Mestre is a city part of the comune of Venice, in Veneto, northern Italy.The city is connected to Venice by a large rail and road bridge, called Ponte della Libertà ....
prison near Venice to Wolfsberg, Carinthia, in May 1947. In October 1947 he was transferred for the last time, to Werl
Werl
Werl is a town located in the district of Soest in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany.-Geography:Werl is easily accessible because it is located between the Sauerland, Münsterland, and the Ruhr Area...
prison, in Westphalia
Westphalia
Westphalia is a region in Germany, centred on the cities of Arnsberg, Bielefeld, Dortmund, Minden and Münster.Westphalia is roughly the region between the rivers Rhine and Weser, located north and south of the Ruhr River. No exact definition of borders can be given, because the name "Westphalia"...
.
In Wolfsberg, Kesselring was approached by a former SS major who had an escape plan prepared. Kesselring declined the offer on the grounds that he felt it would be seen as a confession of guilt. Other senior Nazi figures did manage to escape from Wolfsberg to South America or Syria
Syria
Syria , officially the Syrian Arab Republic , is a country in Western Asia, bordering Lebanon and the Mediterranean Sea to the West, Turkey to the north, Iraq to the east, Jordan to the south, and Israel to the southwest....
.
Kesselring resumed his work on a history of the war that he was writing for the US Army's Historical Division. This effort, working under the direction of Generaloberst Franz Halder
Franz Halder
Franz Halder was a German General and the head of the Army General Staff from 1938 until September, 1942, when he was dismissed after frequent disagreements with Adolf Hitler.-Early life:...
in 1946, brought together a number of German generals for the purpose of producing historical studies of the war, including Gotthard Heinrici
Gotthard Heinrici
Gotthard Heinrici was a general in the German Army during World War II.-Personal life:Heinrici's was born in Gumbinnen , East Prussia, on Christmas Day, 1886, to Paul Heinrici, a local Lutheran minister of the Prussian Church, and his wife Gisela, née von Rauchhaupt, who was of recent Jewish descent...
, Heinz Guderian
Heinz Guderian
Heinz Wilhelm Guderian was a German general during World War II. He was a pioneer in the development of armored warfare, and was the leading proponent of tanks and mechanization in the Wehrmacht . Germany's panzer forces were raised and organized under his direction as Chief of Mobile Forces...
, Lothar Rendulic
Lothar Rendulic
Generaloberst Lothar Rendulic was an Austro-Hungarian and Austrian Army officer of Croatian origin who served as a German general during World War II. He commanded the 14. Infanterie-Division, 52. Infanterie-Division, XXXV Armeekorps, 2. Panzer-Armee, 20...
, Hasso von Manteuffel
Hasso von Manteuffel
Hasso-Eccard Freiherr von Manteuffel was a German soldier and liberal politician of the 20th century.He served in both world wars, and during World War II was a distinguished general...
and Georg von Küchler
Georg von Küchler
Georg Karl Friedrich Wilhelm von Küchler was a German Field Marshal during the Second World War. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross with Oak Leaves...
. Kesselring contributed studies of the war in Italy and North Africa and the problems faced by the German high command. Kesselring also worked secretly on his memoirs. The manuscript was smuggled out by Irmgard Horn-Kesselring, Rainer's mother, who typed it up at her home.
An influential group assembled in Britain to lobby for his release from prison. Headed by Lord Hankey
Maurice Hankey, 1st Baron Hankey
Maurice Pascal Alers Hankey, 1st Baron Hankey, GCB, GCMG, GCVO, PC was a British civil servant who gained prominence as the first Cabinet Secretary and who later made the rare transition from the civil service to ministerial office.-Life and career:The third son of R. A...
, the group included politicians Lord de L'Isle and Richard Stokes
Richard Stokes
Major Sir Richard Rapier Stokes MC was a British Labour politician who served briefly as Lord Privy Seal in 1951....
, Field Marshal Alexander and Admiral of the Fleet
Admiral of the Fleet (Royal Navy)
Admiral of the fleet is the highest rank of the British Royal Navy and other navies, which equates to the NATO rank code OF-10. The rank still exists in the Royal Navy but routine appointments ceased in 1996....
The Earl of Cork and Orrery
William Boyle, 12th Earl of Cork
Admiral of the Fleet William Henry Dudley Boyle, 12th Earl of Cork, 12th Earl of Orrery GCB GCVO RN was a career Royal Navy officer who had achieved the rank of full Admiral before succeeding a cousin in 1934 to the family titles, chief of which is Earl of Cork...
, and military historians Basil Liddell Hart
Basil Liddell Hart
Sir Basil Henry Liddell Hart , usually known before his knighthood as Captain B. H. Liddell Hart, was an English soldier, military historian and leading inter-war theorist.-Life and career:...
and J. F. C. Fuller. Upon re-gaining the prime ministership in 1951, Winston Churchill, who was closely associated with the group, gave priority to the quick release of the war criminals remaining in British custody.
Meanwhile, in Germany, the release of military prisoners had become a political issue. With the establishment of West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
in 1949, and the advent of the Cold War
Cold War
The Cold War was the continuing state from roughly 1946 to 1991 of political conflict, military tension, proxy wars, and economic competition between the Communist World—primarily the Soviet Union and its satellite states and allies—and the powers of the Western world, primarily the United States...
between the former Allies and the Soviet Union, it became inevitable that the Wehrmacht would be revived in some form, and there were calls for amnesty for military prisoners as a precondition for German military participation in the Western Alliance. A media campaign gradually gathered steam in Germany. Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung
The Westdeutsche Allgemeine Zeitung is a leading commercial newspaper from Essen, Germany, published by WAZ-Mediengruppe.It was founded by Erich Brost and first published 3 April 1948....
published an interview with Liny Kesselring and Stern
Stern (magazine)
Stern is a weekly news magazine published in Germany. It was founded in 1948 by Henri Nannen, and is currently published by Gruner + Jahr, a subsidiary of Bertelsmann. In the first quarter of 2006, its print run was 1.019 million copies and it reached 7.84 million readers according to...
ran a series about Kesselring and von Manstein entitled "Justice, Not Clemency". The pressure on the British government was increased in 1952, when the German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer
Konrad Adenauer
Konrad Hermann Joseph Adenauer was a German statesman. He was the chancellor of the West Germany from 1949 to 1963. He is widely recognised as a person who led his country from the ruins of World War II to a powerful and prosperous nation that had forged close relations with old enemies France,...
made it clear that West German ratification of the European Defence Community
European Defence Community
The European Defense Community was a plan proposed in 1950 by René Pleven, the French President of the Council , in response to the American call for the rearmament of West Germany...
Treaty was dependent on the release of German military figures.
In July 1952, Kesselring was diagnosed with a cancerous growth in the throat. During World War I, he had frequently smoked up to twenty cigars per day but he quit smoking in 1925. Although the British were suspicious of the diagnosis, they were concerned that he might die in prison like Mältzer, which would be a public relations disaster. Kesselring was transferred to a hospital, under guard. In October 1952, Kesselring was released from his prison sentence on the grounds of ill-health.
Later life
In 1952, while still in the hospital, Kesselring accepted the honorary presidency of three veterans' organisations. The first was the Luftwaffenring, consisting of Luftwaffe veterans. The Verband deutsches Afrikakorps, the veterans' association of the Afrika Korps, soon followed. More controversial was the presidency of the right-wing veterans' association, the Stahlhelm, Bund der FrontsoldatenStahlhelm, Bund der Frontsoldaten
The Stahlhelm, Bund der Frontsoldaten also known in short form as Der Stahlhelm was one of the many paramilitary organizations that arose after the defeat of World War I in the Weimar Republic...
. Leadership of this organisation tarnished his reputation. He attempted to reform the organisation, proposing that the new German flag
Flag of Germany
The flag of Germany is a tricolour consisting of three equal horizontal bands displaying the national colours of Germany: black, red, and gold....
be flown instead of the old Imperial Flag; that the old Stahlhelm greeting Front heil! be abolished; and that members of the Social Democratic Party of Germany
Social Democratic Party of Germany
The Social Democratic Party of Germany is a social-democratic political party in Germany...
be allowed to join. The response was very unenthusiastic.
Kesselring's memoirs were published in 1953, as Soldat bis zum letzten Tag (A Soldier to the Last Day). They were reprinted in English as A Soldier's Record a year later. Although written while he was in prison, without access to his papers, the memoirs formed a valuable resource, informing military historians on topics such as the background to the invasion of the Soviet Union. When the English edition was published, Kesselring's contentions that the Luftwaffe was not defeated in the air in the Battle of Britain and that Operation Sea Lion– the invasion of Britain–was thought about but never seriously planned were controversial. In 1955, he published a second book, Gedanken zum Zweiten Weltkrieg (Thoughts on the Second World War).
Interviewed by the Italian journalist Enzo Biagi
Enzo Biagi
Enzo Biagi was an Italian journalist and writer.-Biography:Biagi was born in Lizzano in Belvedere, and began his career as a journalist in Bologna. Active in journalism for six decades and author of some eighty books, Biagi won numerous awards, among which the 1979 Saint Vincent prize and the...
soon after his release in 1952, Kesselring defiantly described the Marzabotto massacre
Marzabotto massacre
The Marzabotto massacre was a World War II mass murder of at least 770 civilians by Germans, which took place in the territory around the small village of Marzabotto, in the mountainous area south of Bologna...
–in which almost 800 innocent Italian civilians had been killed–as a "normal military operation". Since the event was considered to be the worst massacre of civilians committed in Italy during World War II, Kesselring's definition caused outcry and indignation in the Italian Parliament. Kesselring reacted by raising the provocation and affirming that he had "saved Italy" and that the Italians ought to build him "a monument". In response, on 4 December 1952, Piero Calamandrei
Piero Calamandrei
Piero Calamandrei was an Italian author, jurist, soldier, university professor and politician. He was one of Italy's leading authorities on the law of civil procedure....
, an Italian jurist, soldier, university professor, and politician, who had been a leader of the Resistance, penned an antifascist poem, Lapide ad ignominia ("A Monument to Ignominy"). In the poem, Calamandrei stated that if Kesselring returned he would indeed find a monument, but one stronger than stone, composed of Italian Resistance fighters who "willingly took up arms, to preserve dignity, not to promote hate, and who decided to fight back against the shame and terror of the world". Calamandrei's poem appears in monuments in the towns of Cuneo
Cuneo
Cuneo is a city and comune in Piedmont, Northern Italy, the capital of the province of Cuneo, the third largest of Italy’s provinces by area...
and Montepulciano
Montepulciano
Montepulciano is a medieval and Renaissance hill town and comune in the province of Siena in southern Tuscany, in Italy. Montepulciano, with an elevation of 605 m, sits on a high limestone ridge. By car it is 13 km E of Pienza; 70 km SE of Siena, 124 km SE of Florence, and...
.
After release from prison, Kesselring protested against what he regarded as the "unjustly smirched reputation of the German soldier". In November 1953, testifying at a war crimes trial, he warned that "there won't be any volunteers for the new German army if the German government continues to try German soldiers for acts committed in World War II". He enthusiastically supported the European Defence Community
European Defence Community
The European Defense Community was a plan proposed in 1950 by René Pleven, the French President of the Council , in response to the American call for the rearmament of West Germany...
and suggested that the "war opponents of yesterday must become the peace comrades and friends of tomorrow". On the other hand, he also declared that he found "astonishing" those who believe "that we must revise our ideas in accordance with democratic principles ... That is more than I can take."
In March 1954, Kesselring and Liny toured Austria
Austria
Austria , officially the Republic of Austria , is a landlocked country of roughly 8.4 million people in Central Europe. It is bordered by the Czech Republic and Germany to the north, Slovakia and Hungary to the east, Slovenia and Italy to the south, and Switzerland and Liechtenstein to the...
ostensibly as private citizens. He met with former comrades-in-arms and prison-mates, some of them former SS members, causing embarrassment to the Austrian government, which ordered his deportation. He ignored the order and completed his tour before leaving a week later, as per his original plan. His only official service was on the Medals Commission, which was established by President
President of Germany
The President of the Federal Republic of Germany is the country's head of state. His official title in German is Bundespräsident . Germany has a parliamentary system of government and so the position of President is largely ceremonial...
Theodor Heuss
Theodor Heuss
Theodor Heuss was a liberal German politician who served as the first President of the Federal Republic of Germany after World War II from 1949 to 1959...
. Ultimately, the commission unanimously recommended that medals should be permitted to be worn—but without the swastika
Swastika
The swastika is an equilateral cross with its arms bent at right angles, in either right-facing form in counter clock motion or its mirrored left-facing form in clock motion. Earliest archaeological evidence of swastika-shaped ornaments dates back to the Indus Valley Civilization of Ancient...
. He was an expert witness for the "Generals' Trials". The Generals' Trials were trials of German citizens before German courts for crimes committed in Germany, the most prominent of which was that of Generalfeldmarschall Ferdinand Schörner
Ferdinand Schörner
Ferdinand Schörner was a General and later Field Marshal in the German Army during World War II.-Early life:Schörner was born in Munich, Bavaria...
.
Kesselring died at Bad Nauheim
Bad Nauheim
Bad Nauheim is a town in the Wetteraukreis district of Hesse state of Germany. , Bad Nauheim has a population of 30,365. The town is located approximately 35 kilometers north of Frankfurt am Main, on the east edge of the Taunus mountain range. It is a world-famous resort, noted for its salt...
, West Germany
West Germany
West Germany is the common English, but not official, name for the Federal Republic of Germany or FRG in the period between its creation in May 1949 to German reunification on 3 October 1990....
, on 16 July 1960 at the age of 74. He was given a quasi-military Stahlhelm funeral and buried in Bergfriedhof Cemetery in Bad Wiessee
Bad Wiessee
Bad Wiessee is a spa town on Lake Tegernsee, Bavaria, Germany. The name "Bad" means for "spa" or "baths", while "Wiessee" derives from "West See", meaning "western part of the lake"....
. Members of Stahlhelm acted as his pall bearers and fired a rifle volley over his grave. His former chief of staff, Siegfried Westphal
Siegfried Westphal (general)
Siegfried Westphal was a highly decorated General der Kavallerie in the Wehrmacht during World War II. He was also a recipient of the Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross. The Knight's Cross of the Iron Cross was awarded to recognise extreme battlefield bravery or successful military leadership...
, spoke for the veterans of North Africa and Italy, describing Kesselring as "a man of admirable strength of character whose care was for soldiers of all ranks". General Josef Kammhuber
Josef Kammhuber
Josef Kammhuber was a Career Officer in the German Air Force, and is best known as the first General of the Night Fighters in the Luftwaffe during World War II...
spoke on behalf of the Luftwaffe and Bundeswehr
Bundeswehr
The Bundeswehr consists of the unified armed forces of Germany and their civil administration and procurement authorities...
, expressing the hope that Kesselring would be remembered for his earlier accomplishments rather than for his later activities. Also present were the former SS Oberstgruppenführer
Oberstgruppenführer
Oberst-Gruppenführer was the highest commissioned SS rank with the exception of Reichsführer-SS, which was a special rank held by Heinrich Himmler...
Sepp Dietrich
Sepp Dietrich
Josef "Sepp" Dietrich was a German SS General. He was one of Nazi Germany's most decorated soldiers and commanded formations up to Army level during World War II. Prior to 1929 he was Adolf Hitler's chauffeur and bodyguard but received rapid promotion after his participation in the murder of...
, the ex-Chancellor Franz von Papen
Franz von Papen
Lieutenant-Colonel Franz Joseph Hermann Michael Maria von Papen zu Köningen was a German nobleman, Roman Catholic monarchist politician, General Staff officer, and diplomat, who served as Chancellor of Germany in 1932 and as Vice-Chancellor under Adolf Hitler in 1933–1934...
, Generalfeldmarschall Ferdinand Schörner
Ferdinand Schörner
Ferdinand Schörner was a General and later Field Marshal in the German Army during World War II.-Early life:Schörner was born in Munich, Bavaria...
, Grossadmiral and former Reichspräsident
Reichspräsident
The Reichspräsident was the German head of state under the Weimar constitution, which was officially in force from 1919 to 1945. In English he was usually simply referred to as the President of Germany...
Karl Dönitz
Karl Dönitz
Karl Dönitz was a German naval commander during World War II. He started his career in the German Navy during World War I. In 1918, while he was in command of , the submarine was sunk by British forces and Dönitz was taken prisoner...
, Otto Remer, SS Standartenführer
Standartenführer
Standartenführer was a Nazi Party paramilitary rank that was used in the so-called Nazi combat-organisations: SA, SS, NSKK and the NSFK...
Joachim Peiper
Joachim Peiper
Joachim Peiper , more often known as Jochen Peiper, was a field officer in the Waffen-SS during World War II, convicted of war crimes in Belgium and accused of war crimes in Italy. He was Reichsführer-SS Heinrich Himmler's personal adjutant . In 1945, he was an SS-Standartenführer, the Waffen-SS's...
, and former Ambassador Rudolf Rahn.
In 2000, a memorial event was held in Bad Wiessee marking the fortieth anniversary of Kesselring's death. No representatives of the Bundeswehr attended, on the grounds that Kesselring was "not worthy of being part of our tradition". Instead, the task of remembering the Generalfeldmarschall fell to two veterans groups, the Deutsche Montecassino Vereinigung (German Monte Cassino Association) and the Bund Deutscher Fallschirmjäger (Association of German Paratroopers). To his ageing troops, Kesselring remained a commander to be commemorated.