The Reichsführer’s room was thick with the pine scent of the Hohenlychen forest, and his voice was low, almost confessional, as he walked beside his intelligence chief. “Schellenberg,” he said, “I don’t think that we can let the Führer go on any longer. ”
It was April 13, 1945. The war was collapsing inward, and the man who controlled the SS—an army of 900,000 men, the police, the Gestapo—was finally whispering what a handful of his top generals had been plotting for months: Hitler had to go.
But even now, at the very edge of the abyss, Heinrich Himmler couldn’t bring himself to act. The plot had been brewing since January. The spring of 1945 found Himmler, a man with no military experience, in command of Army Group Vistula on the Eastern Front, tasked with halting the Soviet advance. He failed publicly and spectacularly, resigning with a nervous illness that he blamed on stress.
The humiliation broke whatever trust remained between him and Hitler, and from that moment, Himmler began secret attempts to make a separate peace with the Western Allies behind the Führer’s back. It was in that window of disgrace that four SS generals—all Obergruppenführers—began sounding one another out. Felix Steiner, commander of the 11th SS Panzer Army, who was convinced Hitler was destroying Germany. Richard Hildebrandt, Himmler’s liaison to Army Group Center.
Curt von Gottberg, Himmler’s deputy in the Replacement Army, the same organization that had been used to crush the July Plot plotters. And Otto Ohlendorf, a former Einsatzgruppen commander and now a top SS economics advisor. They all shared the same conviction: Hitler was no longer fit to lead. They wanted Himmler to take his place.
But they couldn’t act without Himmler, and Himmler was paralyzed. Steiner worried openly about the Reichsführer’s hesitation. The SS leadership was convinced that Martin Bormann, Hitler’s powerful secretary, was the man who needed removing—Bormann had been steadily encroaching on SS power, stepping on the toes of the feared head of the Reich Main Security Office, Ernst Kaltenbrunner, and he made no secret of his dislike for Himmler. By March, the rumors had gone international.
Joseph Goebbels noted with disgust in his diary that Swedish news coverage was presenting Himmler, not Hitler, as the guarantor of peace for Germany. A powerful German clique was said to have offered the Führer’s head as surety. Even the army was circling. On March 20, Colonel General Heinz Guderian, Hitler’s advisor on the Eastern Front, confronted Himmler directly.
The war cannot be won, he told him bluntly. The only question is how quickly to end the senseless slaughter. Apart from Ribbentrop, you are the only man with contacts in neutral nations. Go with me to Hitler and urge him to agree to an armistice.
Himmler’s reply was maddening. “My dear Colonel General, it is still too early for that. ”
Guderian pressed him. “It is not now 5 minutes to 12, but 5 minutes past 12.
If we don’t negotiate now, we shall never be able to do so at all. ”
For ten more minutes, Guderian tried to move him. Himmler would not budge. Guderian concluded there was nothing to be done with the man.
He was afraid of Hitler. Two days later, Himmler told his replacement at Army Group Vistula that he had initiated peace feelers through a neutral country. Yet he hadn’t said a word to Guderian. A week later, a top-secret SOE report landed in London from a Danish agent: Himmler had initiated not one, but three peace feelers—via Sweden, Switzerland, and the Vatican.
He had hinted that the demand for Hitler’s deposition was not an obstacle, even on the basis of capitulation, but that Himmler must remain, at least for a time, because he represented the German nation and could prevent chaos. In London, Winston Churchill’s daily briefing included a decoded cable noting an intense conflict of opinion between Hitler and Himmler: the Führer still adamant on severe measures, Himmler suddenly advocating leniency to placate the United Nations. The SS conspirators believed Hitler’s increasingly obvious ill health—Schellenberg reported to the Swedish envoy Count Bernadotte that Hitler had Parkinson’s disease—was reason enough for his removal. But Himmler kept asking Schellenberg the same question, over and over: what could he do?
That same day, in Berlin, Armaments Minister Albert Speer met with the head of the V-weapons program, SS Obergruppenführer Hans Kammler. Usually supremely confident, Kammler was downcast. He bluntly told Speer that efforts were being made within the SS to get rid of the Führer. Even more incredible, he said he was prepared to hand over all files on Germany’s jet aircraft and V-weapons to the Americans in exchange for immunity from prosecution.
He invited Speer to join him. In London that day, the First Sea Lord, Admiral Sir Andrew Cunningham, recorded a remarkable exchange with Churchill. The Prime Minister mentioned that Himmler appeared to be trying to show he wasn’t so bad as painted. If it would save further expenditure of life, Churchill said, he would be prepared to spare even Himmler.
It was an astonishing admission, a recognition that the Reichsführer SS, not Hitler, now held the fate of Germany in his hands. Cunningham suggested there were plenty of islands Himmler could be sent to. As Hitler’s last birthday approached, Schellenberg pushed the plot forward. On April 19, he organized a meeting between Himmler and Finance Minister Count von Krosigk.
The Finance Minister was blunt: Himmler should seize power himself, force Hitler to read a proclamation announcing a plebiscite, the formation of a second party, and the abolition of the People’s Courts. He told Himmler that it was no longer about individuals—the substance of the entire German people was at stake. Two days later, in the shattered, Soviet-besieged capital, Hermann Göring, Hitler’s legal successor since 1941, had his last meeting with Himmler. Himmler told him that Count Bernadotte had come to see him, and he believed the Swede was a negotiator sent by General Eisenhower himself.
Göring was skeptical. “I can’t believe that. Don’t take offense, but I doubt whether they will accept you as a negotiator. ”
Himmler replied airily that he had undeniable proof he was considered abroad to be the only man who could maintain peace and order.
Over the course of the two-to-three-hour meeting, Himmler returned to the same subject at least ten times: the succession following Hitler’s death. What would happen if Göring were unable to take over? Could Himmler then have the job? Eventually, he asked Göring to nominate him as Chancellor upon becoming Hitler’s successor.
Göring said he couldn’t legally do that. Himmler pressed: if anything should prevent Göring from becoming the successor, could he have the job then? It was a bizarre exchange, revealing that Himmler was seeking a legal path to ultimate power rather than mounting a military coup. But two days later, Göring was arrested by the SS on Hitler’s orders, charged with attempting to take power while the Führer was still alive—a charge that was completely false.
Göring appealed to Himmler to order the SS guards at his Obersalzberg home to release him. Himmler said the detention had been ordered by the Führer and it must all be a mistake. Just sit tight. Himmler believed Hitler was about to name him as his new legal successor.
He wasn’t. On April 22, as Hitler tried to control the battle for Berlin from his bunker, General Steiner refused categorically to attack with his forces to relieve the city, citing lack of troops and armor. In reality, as a plotter, he had no reason to see Hitler survive. Let the Soviets finish the job.
Himmler was also reluctant to aid the Führer in his hour of greatest need. At his Hohenlychen headquarters, with his 600-man escort battalion, he seemed paralyzed, unsure what to do. The loyalist Gottlob Berger was aghast. “You go straight to Berlin, Herr Reichsführer, and your escort battalion, of course, right with you,” he shouted.
“What kind of Reichsführer are you? Why don’t you speak to the Führer in person? ”
Himmler telephoned Hitler, then went to the bunker himself the next day. He claimed he tried to get Hitler to leave Berlin, but the Führer refused, saying he would die in the capital.
Himmler then returned to Hohenlychen, leaving his battalion behind to defend the government quarter. That same day, Schellenberg met again with Bernadotte in Flensburg. He told the Swede that Hitler was finished, that he wouldn’t live more than a couple of days. Himmler had decided to bring about a meeting with Eisenhower to inform him he was willing to order the German forces in the west to capitulate.
Schellenberg asked Bernadotte to carry the message. The following day, Britain’s ambassador to Sweden telegraphed London. Himmler, though tired and admitting Germany was finished, was still calm and coherent. He said Hitler was desperately ill, might be dead already, and would be within two days.
While Hitler was alive, Himmler said, he couldn’t take the step he now proposed. But as the Führer was finished, he was now in a position of full authority to act. He wanted to meet Eisenhower to capitulate the entire Western Front, while continuing to fight the Soviets—at least for a time. Bernadotte told him this was not acceptable to the Allies.
That day, Speer visited Himmler at his headquarters and found him drawing up plans for his future governance. “Europe cannot manage without me in the future,” Himmler said. “You will go on needing me as Minister of Police. After I’ve spent an hour with Eisenhower, he’ll approve that fact.
” He claimed he and Göring had a long-standing agreement that Himmler would be his premier—a lie. He was organizing his cabinet, he said, and many people had come to see him, including Grand Admiral Dönitz. He invited Speer to join. As Speer left, he overheard Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel swearing complete loyalty to the Reichsführer SS.
Himmler was convinced he was about to be named Hitler’s successor. Then, on April 27, the British deliberately leaked details of Himmler’s secret peace negotiations. By the next day, the German people knew. The British did it to preserve Allied unity with the Soviets and to destabilize the Nazi regime.
Churchill had led Himmler up the garden path and now slammed the door in his face. Martin Bormann seized the moment, presenting Himmler’s actions to Hitler as barefaced treason. On April 28, Himmler was officially stripped of all his offices of state and completely disgraced. Yet the SS continued to follow his orders.
General Ohlendorf saw him shortly afterward. “He was no longer the same man,” he wrote. “He asked me the queerest questions and made the most absurd proposals and plans. I could no longer understand him.
He seemed to have lost his self-confidence, his aim, and ambition. ”
On April 30, Himmler summoned Dönitz to a meeting in Lübeck. The building was full of senior SS leaders. Himmler kept the Grand Admiral waiting, seeming to regard himself as head of state.
Dönitz asked whether reports were true that he had sought contact with the Allies through Bernadotte. Himmler denied it, saying it was essential that discord among themselves not create further chaos. They parted amicably. Then the hammer fell.
At 18:07, Bormann’s message arrived from the Führerbunker. Hitler was dead. He had named his new successor as Reich President: Grand Admiral Karl Dönitz. Later that evening, Dönitz telephoned Himmler and asked him to come to Plön.
Himmler arrived about midnight, escorted by six heavily armed SS officers. Dönitz handed him Bormann’s telegram. “Please read this. ”
As Himmler read, an expression of astonishment, of consternation, spread over his face.
All hope seemed to collapse within him. He went very pale. Finally, he stood up and bowed. “Allow me to become the second man in your state,” he said.
Dönitz replied that it was impossible. Himmler left at 1:00 a. m. on May 1, 1945.
After Hitler had bestowed his mantle upon the Grand Admiral, Himmler did not attempt to assert his claim to the succession. He placed himself unreservedly at Dönitz’s disposal. But he wasn’t quite done. In the days that followed, as Dönitz consolidated power and Himmler fled south, he made one last desperate effort to find a role for himself in a world without Hitler.
It was an effort that would end, just 22 days after that midnight meeting in Plön, in a bizarre and much-disputed demise in British custody.
