Franz Halder - Wikipedia

Maj Marty Hogan wow if Hitler would have listen to him, could have been a different outcome on WWII. Wow....interesting read/share.

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Thank you, my friend Maj Marty Hogan for making us aware that June 30 is the anniversary of the birth German general and the chief of the Oberkommando des Heeres staff (OKH, Army High Command) from 1938 until September 1942 Franz Halder.
"Both on September 27, 1938 and November 5, 1939, Halder recorded his efforts to organize a revolt and arrest of Hitler, but both ultimately failed.
Franz Halder was awarded the US Meritorious Civilian Service Award in 1961 for his contributions and cooperation with the US effort at Nuremburg. The Halder Diaries were officially published in 1976, and since then the diaries have been continually referenced by top historians across the world."

Franz Halder's Diary
Recently the Robert H. Jackson Center located in Jamestown N.Y. received from Paul Cawein an original translated version of the Halder Diary which was kept by Gen. Halder as Chief of the OKH General Staff in Hitler's government from 1938-42. The Diary consists of seven volumes and over a thousand pages. The Diary was utilized at the Nuremberg Trials.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-LvLA40DYs


1. Background from ww2db.com/person_bio.php?person_id=228
Franz Halder
Born 30 Jun 1884
Died 2 Apr 1972
Franz Halder was born in Würzburg to General Max Halder. He entered service in 1902 and became a lieutenant two years later after completing military academy in Munich, Germany. Between 1906 and 1907 he attended Artillery School and 1911 to 1914 the Bavarian Staff College. During WW1, he was an ordnance officer with the Bavarian 3rd Army Corps. He was later transferred to the 2nd then the 4th Army, holding staff positions. During the inter-war years, he remained in the German military, first serving as a training officer in the 1920s then holding defensive command in East Prussia. In Oct 1934, he became the commander of the 7th Infantry Division in Munich with the rank of major general. In Aug 1936, he was promoted to the rank of lieutenant general and was placed in charge with mobilizing and training the massive German Army that was soon to be unleashed against Germany's immediate neighbors. On 1 Sep 1938, he was appointed the Chief of the General Staff of the Army. In this role, he was one of the officers responsible for the invasion plan against Czechoslovakia, though the plan was never implemented due to Adolf Hitler's political victory in the dismemberment of that country. Wilhelm Keitel noted Halder as "honest, loyal, reliable and obedient." Underneath the apparently loyalty however, Keitel failed to recognize that Halder's loyalty was to Germany and not Hitler. During the Sudetenland crisis in 1938, Halder was one of the leaders in the German Army secretly organizing in the overthrow of Hitler should a war, which he viewed as unwinnable by Germany at this stage, break out; he would fail to launch the revolt in 1938.

When Germany invaded Poland on 1 Sep 1939, Halder was responsible for overseeing the military campaign. In this capacity he had the first-hand knowledge to the atrocities the SS conducted against the Polish, but many criticize that Halder did little to stop them despite not necessarily agreeing with them. Despite his profession as a soldier, Halder was a know pacifist, and on several occasions advised against waging further wars, but the loyal general always heeded to Hitler's orders. He was promoted to the rank of colonel general on 19 Jul 1940. Subsequently, he had a role in the design of invasion plans against France and the Low Countries as well as the plans for the Balkans. In Aug 1940, he began participating in the invasion plan against the Soviet Union, but he knew it was a campaign that would be difficult to win. In 1942, he began advising Hitler that Germany was underestimating the numerical strength of the Russians. These disagreements slowly damaged his working relationship with Hitler, finally leading to Hitler forcing Halder's retirement on 24 Sep 1942. After this time, Hitler continued to use Halder as a target of demeaning jokes behind his back. Keitel recalled one incident where Hitler made a joke "at Halder's expense and labeled him a 'little fellow.'"

After the failed July Plot to assassinate Hitler, Halder was arrested immediately despite not being a part of the conspiracy. Despite non-involvement, he remained imprisoned due to Hitler's distrust of him. He was first imprisoned at Flossenbürg, then Dachau. On 31 Jan 1945, he was dismissed by Hitler from the army. After being freed on 24 Apr 1945, he surrendered to American troops on 4 May in Austria, and again became a prisoner, this time in American hands.

ww2dbaseThroughout his career, Franz Halder kept a diary rich in detail, noting not only the chronology of events but also the observed emotions of the main decision makers in Germany and other trivia that were otherwise not recorded on official documents. After the war, he cooperated with historians in constructing a view of the war through German eyes, acting as an adviser to the US Army Historical Division in the 1950s. US President John Kennedy would later award him the Medal of Freedom for his contributions in history. He passed away in 1972. His memoirs, The Halder Diaries, was published in 1976.

ww2dbaseSources:
Wilhelm Keitel, In the Service of the Reich
William Shirer, The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich
Wikipedia

Last Major Revision: May 2006

Famous Quote(s)

"The Russian colossus... has been underestimated by us?. Whenever a dozen divisions are destroyed the Russians replace them with another dozen."
» 1 Aug 1941

Franz Halder Timeline
30 Jun 1884 Franz Halder was born.
1 Sep 1938 General Franz Halder was appointed Chief of the General Staff of the German Army (Oberkommando des Heeres), succeeding General Ludwig Beck. He was the first Catholic to be assigned this position.
27 Sep 1938 Franz Halder and other German Army officers set 29 Sep 1938 as the launch date of their revolt should Adolf Hitler lead Germany into a war over the Sudetenland crisis.
28 Sep 1938 Franz Halder went to see German Army chief Walther von Brauchitsch and gained some support for his planned overthrow of Adolf Hitler should there be a war over the Sudetenland crisis. At the end of the day, with Neville Chamberlain visiting Munich, Germany, and thus dramatically lessening the possibility of war between Britain and Germany, Halder called off the revolt.
5 Sep 1939 In a private conversation, Franz Halder and Walther von Brauchitsch both agreed that the war against Poland was effectively won.
25 Sep 1939 Franz Halder noted in his diary that he believed Adolf Hitler was ready to plan a war with France and Britain.
3 Nov 1939 Franz Halder sent a message to Ludwig Beck telling him to be ready to move against Adolf Hitler on or shortly after 5 Nov 1939, which was the date the plans for the invasion of France, was supposed to be made known to top German military leaders.
5 Nov 1939 A plot to arrest or even kill Adolf Hitler, hatched by of his most senior military staff, collapsed. Led by General Franz Halder, the architect of the invasion of Poland, many Generals were appalled by Hitler's plans to continue the conflict by invading Belgium and the Netherlands and feared that the adventure would founder in another Great War quagmire. Walther von Brauchitsch, who met with Hitler and was supposed to be the one to issue the order for his arrest, got cold feet and lost the opportunity to prevent Hitler from plunging Europe into another World War. However one of the conspirators, Colonel Hans Oster of German Military Intelligence, tipped off the Dutch and Belgians about Hitler's invasion intentions.
28 Mar 1941 Before dawn in Berlin, Germany, General Franz Halder completed the German invasion plan for Yugoslavia.
7 Jan 1942 Franz Halder noted that there was a very brief thought of using chemical weapons against Soviet troops, but discussions never went beyond this idea.
28 Feb 1942 Franz Halder noted in his diary that the campaign in the Soviet Union had thus far caused 1,005,636 German casualties, 202,251 of which were killed. He also noted that there were 112,627 cases of frostbite.
25 Feb 1946 Franz Halder was interrogated by US Army attorney Captain Sam Harris; during the interrogation, Halder revealed the plan and the history of the 1938 plot against Adolf Hitler (which was never launched).
2 Apr 1972 Franz Halder passed away."



2. Background from .roberthjackson.org/article/franz-halder-diaries/
"The horrendous acts of Adolf Hitler’s Third Reich leading up to and during WWII have been irreversibly engraved in the collective memory of Americans because, as Robert H. Jackson stated, “…it (humanity) cannot survive their being repeated.” However, despite the well founded condemnation of the Nazi party, not all of Hitler’s chief deputies mindlessly and heedlessly agreed with the evils of the Third Reich. Indeed, a few German officials supported, organized, and attempted the overthrow and assassination of Hitler. Most notably, Chief of the Army General Staff Franz Halder organized a revolt against Hitler in 1938, staged an arrest of the Fuhrer in 1939, and was eventually detained and imprisoned at Dachau concentration camp following his 1944 assassination attempt.
Franz Halder, the Chief of the Oberkommando des Heeres General Staff in Hitler’s Third Reich Army from 1938-1942 was in the Bavarian Army in the early 20th Century and had a profound devotion to Germany, but he did not have similar loyalties to the Nazi Party. Throughout his time as a high-ranking member of the Third Reich, Halder kept a detailed diary of everything he encountered as Chief of Army General Staff. What is now referred to as the Halder Diary gives an unprecedented look into the intricacies and evils of Hitler’s regime. Through the generosity of Paul Cawein, a local resident of the Chautauqua Institution, the Robert H. Jackson Center was given an original translated version of the diary that was used as evidence at the International Military Tribunal at Nuremberg. The seven volumes of over a thousand pages Halder wrote during his approximately four year tenure in the Nazi Army provide an uncensored look into the military structure of the Third Reich through the eyes of a man who was in constant discord with his Fuhrer.

In July 1946, General Franz Halder testified before Commissioner Ian D. McIlwraith at the IMT Nuremberg commission hearings investigating indicted Nazi organizations.
"Three times the German officers tried to kill Hitler", Halder said, "but our intentions never were successful."
Unlike many other members of Hitler’s deputies of high command, Halder was not put on trial. Rather, upon his release from Dachau concentration camp by Allied forces in 1945, Halder worked closely with the US to carefully construct an accurate military record and history of the Third Reich. Franz Halder’s diary, through close coordination with the US Army, would serve as a paramount piece of evidence in the Allies’ prosecution of Hitler’s high command at the High Command Trial (or, officially, The United States of America vs. Wilhelm von Leeb). The High Command Trial was the last of the twelve trials for war crimes the U.S. authorities held in their occupation zone in Nuremberg after the end of World War II. Indictments in the “High Command Case” were filed on November 28, 1947, and the trial opened February 5, 1948. The closing statement of the Prosecution was made August 10 and the judgment rendered October 27, 1948. Halder would testify at this trial against the high-ranking officials of the Nazi Party.

The diary’s detailed account of Hitler’s acts of aggression, the Nazi’s plans to exterminate the Jewish population in Europe, and Halder’s multiple attempts to stage Hitler’s overthrow provided the Allied prosecution with pivotal evidence needed to convict Hitler’s deputies for their crimes against humanity. For example, diary entries from June 1941 reveal Hitler’s order to round up and detain any Jews that had been living in the areas of the Soviet Union that the Nazi’s had successfully invaded. Also, both on September 27, 1938 and November 5, 1939, Halder recorded his efforts to organize a revolt and arrest of Hitler, but both ultimately failed.

Franz Halder was awarded the US Meritorious Civilian Service Award in 1961 for his contributions and cooperation with the US effort at Nuremburg. The Halder Diaries were officially published in 1976, and since then the diaries have been continually referenced by top historians across the world."

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Could have been a different outcome for Russia!