In the sixth Countdown to D-Day officer bio, Peter Margaritis presents the wartime exploits of the Johannes Blaskowitz, the general who spearheaded the invasion of Poland and had a tense relationship with the Führer himself.
Johannes Blaskowitz was a veteran of World War I, an elder from the Prussian officer corps, even-tempered, happily married, and devout. He commanded the Third Reich’s annexation of the Sudetenland, Austria and then Czechoslovakia. His Eighth Army led in the invasion of Poland in 1939 and captured Warsaw. It was in this campaign that he fell into disfavour with Hitler.
The first time was when the Führer visited him less than two weeks after the invasion had started. A Polish counterattack had staggered Blaskowitz’s left flank. In the middle of their struggle to stabilize that side and still continue advancing on Warsaw, the Führer suddenly showed up. Vexed by the Polish counterattack, he came to blame the enemy threat on Blaskowitz’s carelessness.
During Blaskowitz’s briefing, the Führer was tense, scowling whenever negative points were brought up. He seemed ready to dismiss Blaskowitz because the general had not properly prepared for a possible cross-attack. Blaskowitz though defended his actions, explaining that he had to keep up with the Tenth Army on his right, and still be able to march on Warsaw, all while being short on transport, panzers, and reconnaissance.
Eventually, enemy resistance collapsed. The remnants of three Polish armies surrendered to him. Then on October 5th, Hitler flew into Warsaw for a grand victory parade, a triumph staged for both the victors and vanquished. This elaborate celebration was prepared by Blaskowitz reluctantly. There were still corpses around, the area was still in shambles, and Warsaw had not been secured.
Hitler’s motorcade pulled up and the three-hour parade began. Each division that had been involved in taking the city was reviewed. As Hitler saluted each passing division, its commander left the parade and joined him up on the review stand, until they all proudly stood next to him.
In capturing Warsaw, Blaskowitz had commanded Hitler’s personal Waffen SS escort, the motorized regiment SS Leibstandarte Adolf Hitler. During the victory procession, as it marched past the grandstand, Hitler with a smile asked Blaskowitz how his namesake unit had performed in combat. Blaskowitz was like von Rundstedt―a Prussian aristocrat and never one to flatter. Although Blaskowitz had commanded this regiment, he’d never known where they were or what they were doing. Like any SS unit, it was headstrong; he never had much control over them. So he replied to the Führer (tactlessly) that “It was an average unit, still inexperienced, with no unusual qualifications.” Hitler’s smile immediately vanished, taking, of course, the remark personally.
Then after the parade came a grand lunch back at the Warsaw airfield. Hitler had ordered the field kitchens set up to feed the men who had been in the parade. Blaskowitz had been in charge. Knowing the Führer would visit, he felt that a festive occasion was warranted. So he took considerable effort to spice up the `atmosphere’ in the hangars with tablecloths, flowers, decorations, and extra benches.
The strategy though backfired. Hitler arrived in the middle of the afternoon, saw the elaborate fanfare, and immediately asked on whose authority all the decorations had been made. The culprit was, of course, the unsuspecting Blaskowitz. Hitler grumbled in a sarcastic voice, “Is there a WAR going on here, or did someone schedule a state dinner?!”
General Walter von Brauchitsch, panicking, tried to get Hitler to attend the formal meal, but to no avail. Hitler walked outside to the field kitchen and shared a little soup with the men out there, laughing, swapping stories. Hitler’s pilot explained that the Führer just preferred unpretentious meals. But the snub was real, especially when Hitler then immediately departed for Berlin. Blaskowitz again took the blame.
Still, the Warsaw conqueror was promoted to military governor of occupied Poland. However, he soon became mortified by the brutal, inhuman practices the SS was committing there. He angrily protested their actions in a scathing November report to von Brauchitsch, who in turn passed them on to Hitler.
Hitler reacted angrily to the report, making derisive comments about this general’s “childish attitude.” Blaskowitz fell into even more disfavour with subsequent complaints. They caught the attention of the generals, senior Nazi party leaders, the international press, Western leaders, and even the Swiss Red Cross. Finally, on May 29, 1940, he was relieved. Luckily, Blaskowitz had supporters in high places; fellow officers of the Generalstab, his friend, von Rundstedt, and Alfred Jodl, who thought highly of him. So he was transferred to the West and given command of the small First Army in the backwater area of southern France. Still, he oversaw the German occupation of Vichy France in November. 1942.
Blaskowitz kept a low profile in his headquarters in Bordeaux. First Army had to protect the French coast from the Loire River to the Spanish border. He remained in disfavour. On July 10, 1943, he turned 60, his 40th year in uniform. Most senior officers received a write-up in the papers and a special letter and gift from the Führer. Blaskowitz got nothing. He was the only general left in the Wehrmacht who had carried the rank of Generaloberst at the beginning of the war and had not been appointed a field marshal.
In May 1944, the First and the Nineteenth Armies were combined, and Blaskowitz was given overall command. Again he was insulted though, because it was designated as an Armeegruppe, and not a full Heeresgruppe, which qualified for a larger staff. Even so, his divisions were not enough to stop an invasion, and when the Allies landed in southern France in mid-August, Blaskowitz’s men were overwhelmed. He was given various commands in the subsequent months, retreating, ending up in May 1945 surrendering his army to the British in Holland.
On February 5, 1948, having been charged with war crimes, he fell to his death from a balcony in the Nuremberg prison. The question of whether he committed suicide or was pushed by SS hit men was never solved. Ironically, he was later acquitted on all counts.
Johannes Blaskowitz and his role in the defence of the Atlantic Wall is explored in the new book, Countdown to D-Day, due to be released June 2019.
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