So then a vote was held, and everyone agreed unanimously that Guderian should step in as the temporary leader of the German nation. It was also decided that he wouldn’t take any title. It would just be announced that he would temporarily lead Germany’s destiny while the Fuhrer was incapacitated and recuperating. While it wasn’t clear he would come back, that was the only way the generals saw that the Nazi officials within the Reich could accept it. While not happy about it, Guderian understood that he was the only man in the room with enough popularity and prestige to takeover.

  The Reich faced a grave situation, and only a miracle would save it from the pit of hell it was falling into. The Soviet nuclear attack meant that both of their main enemies had the atomic bomb, and the whole thing did not bode well for Germany. Halder informed Guderian and the rest of the assembled men of Otto Skorzeny’s plan to trigger a German bomb, giving everyone hope. The point they would make was that the Reich also had the bomb, which would entail the Allied nations to be a little more careful about dropping nuclear ordinance on the German heads, for, in theory, they could retaliate in kind. Of course, it was all a bluff since the Reich only had the uranium it had and wouldn’t be producing more for a while. But it was what these desperate men had.

  Since Guderian needed to step down from his theater command to lead Germany and that Walter Model was dead, the group of men named Erich Von Manstein to lead the new Eastern Front command that was still a very potent force with over 90 divisions. Von Paulus was thus named commander of the southern theater as he would step down from OKW. Halder was, of course, kept in place along with Von Leeb.

  The military situation was very fluid in the east, and the next few weeks would decide if the Reich either survived or disappeared in a deluge of steel and fire.

  The Battle for Warsaw

  Fighting retreat fir the Panzer Lehr, March 22nd, 1947

  The Tiger III engine groaned as it struggled up the steep slope that the tank driver was trying to overcome. The Panzer’s survival depended on it, as many enemy tanks' shells flew their way. The Panzer Lehr’s 1st Heavy Panzer Battalion was down to eight tanks, all of them new Konigstigers. The fighting of the last few weeks had been grueling and very difficult for the men of the Panzerwaffe.

  After the disaster at Konigsberg, their already difficult position on the Eastern Front had become an impossible situation. The nuclear destruction of Konigsberg meant that the Soviets poured thru in the north, so the whole Polish positions were threatened with outflanking.

  Their brand-new overall theater commander, Erich Von Manstein, was issuing desperate orders left and right for German units to move out of the fighting they were entangled in to get fresh reinforcements on the Baltic Coast and in what used to be Northern Poland and the Polish Corridor near Dantzig. This meant that the Panzer Lehr, as one of the best elite Panzer units left, was to take a double workload in the fight against the enemy. Not only were they to disentangle themselves from the Russians attacking from the east, but the Steel Division also needed to be ready for the planned counter-attack against the northern Soviet breakthrough.

  Things were not going well lately. They had not been going well for a while, in fact. But the last three days had seen the loss of over 100 000 men in Konigsberg, the city erased from the map, and the complete destruction or disintegration of Army Group Prussia (that was retreating in disarray and trying to regroup westward).

  And then the news of the Fuhrer’s illness reached the frontlines. Most did not receive it as a disaster, as not many in the Wehrmacht admired any of their political leaders, for they were responsible for their predicament. Whatever respect and admiration the soldiers had for Hitler and then Goering died somewhere in the Russian steppes in the wasted offensives of 1944 and 1945 when the German Army should have been concentrating on husbanding its forces.

  Walder opened the Panzer’s hatch to have a better view beyond the immediate farm field the Tiger had leveled onto after climbing the steep slope. He decided that the risk was worth it since they’d reached the top of the small hill and were driving downward, so the enemy would be more than extremely lucky if it could hit his Tiger. He saw the seven other surviving tanks from the heavy battalion on both sides of his own. All of them were driving full speed, churning earth and some fine dust on their sides. “Radio operator,” he yelled down the hatch. “Yes, Herr Colonel.” “Instruct everyone to head for that hedgerow a little on our left, at about 400 meters.” “Yes, Sir.”

  He'd spotted a large hedgerow of thick vegetation with a small dirt track large enough for his Panzers to get thru. Once behind the thick pines and other branches, he would be safer than in the open like he was now with his men.

  The leaves had started growing on the trees, as spring was in full swing in Poland at the end of March. He hoped it would be enough to hide his force so they could make their escape even faster. The hedgerow was a length of at least two hundred meters, so it was long enough to hide his forces for a while. Erich hoped it would be enough to get to the next hiding spot or feature in the landscape.

  For it was the only way he could think of to escape the damned Communist hordes.

  Extracts from Von Manstein's 1958 book, LOST VICTORY

  Back to Ostfront Command, March 21st, 1947.

  After leaving the OKW meeting in Wünsdorf, Brandenburg (twenty kilometers south of Berlin), I remember feeling a moment of elation as well as a moment of dread. I was finally back in an operational command where more than pure defensive warfare would be executed. At the same time, the Reich’s situation was critical, and I would have to pull more than a minor miracle to save it from the Soviet juggernaut.

  The discussions that took place during that meeting would have been considered nothing short of treasonous only months before. Goering would have arrested us outright and probably even shot us. But be as it may, there was no more Nazi leadership strong enough to either command the Wehrmacht or else tell us what to do. The demise of every significant political figure in the Reich forced us to play politics. It was not about taking power; it was more like someone had to take it to keep the country from disintegrating in its hour of dire need.

  Even the Gestapo, typically quite restrictive and violent, received our decisions the next day with uncharacteristic apathy. I have long suspected that most Nazis officials were by then busier with either trying to erase their crimes or disappear to avoid Allied justice, which promised to be swift and brutal on war criminals.

  I was pretty happy at Guderian’s nomination as temporary head of state, as I highly respected the man and knew that he would do what was necessary to preserve Germany. Even happier that I was not considered for the position, as I have never had any political aspirations of my own at any given time during my long career.

  While the Russian forces bearing down on the Reich’s eastern border were numerous and substantial, I still entertained some hope to fend them off. After reviewing the order of battle I was given command of (90 divisions at least), I had cause for confidence. Near to ninety divisions were at my disposal.

  But the dread I felt came from the highly fluid situation, a consequence of the Russian nuclear attack on Konigsberg, where over 100 000 soldiers perished in the fire of hell. Upon arriving at Eastern Command west of Warsaw on the 21st, I immediately confirmed Guderian’s earlier orders from the day before for all forces in Poland to retire westward. I even issued additional instructions for units to move toward Dantzig, where I hoped to stop the enemy.

  In agreement with our temporary leader and Halder at OKW, I also resolved to fight the Russians where they advanced and not hunker down on another defensive line, as there were no natural features and fortification lines that could save the current situation. We were out of time and out of space to retreat into. This final fight would be one epic, fiery end where it would either be us victorious over a pile of bodies or the damned Communists.

  The following summer would be the most intense fighting period of the war.

  Extract Of Heinz Guderian 1952 Book, Panzer Leader

  In command of the Reich, March 21st, 1947

  The two unexpected events of the nuclear attack on Konigsberg and Goering's stroke created a power vacuum in the Reich. In different circumstances, it could have been filled with other Nazi Party officials like Goebbels and Speer, but on the 20th of March 1947, one was dead, and the other one was reported missing and severely injured.

  While I took the position upon the urging of my esteemed colleagues and because of the Reich’s dire situation, I was not interested in any political power whatsoever, apart from becoming chief of the general staff, a position that every staff officer dreamed of.

  The OKW decision that trusted me into Germany’s leadership role was born out of desperation because we just didn’t know what to do. Decisions had to be taken, armies moved, and frontlines needed to be defended.

  And besides, everyone presents on that day though the arrangement would be temporary, and the Fuhrer would soon resume his duties. But alas, as events would soon show, things did not go in that direction.

  So after the OKW meeting in Brandenburg, I never returned to my theater command, letting General Manstein take back the place that had so unjustly been taken from him by a frustrated Goering.

  I was instead ushered to Berlin by Halder and his suite, and it took us the better part of the next two days to assume full control of all of the Reich’s political and decisional apparatus. For if the transition was surprisingly uneventful and without any reaction from the dreaded Gestapo, a lot of negotiation and “gun diplomacy” was needed to get everyone into line.

  The country was in a state of uproar, especially with the nuclear destruction of Konigsberg, and most did not relent with happiness at seeing military men take the country’s helm.

  Others, like several of the Nazi Party regional governors (Gauleiters), did not understand why I was not seeking peace, as surely Germany could not win fighting two powers with atomic weapons. Little did they know that something was in the works on our side as well.

  Beyond March 22nd, I did not know what I was to do yet to try to save Germany from ultimate defeat. At that time, it was too early to formulate any plans beyond trying to re-establish the situation in the east while holding the rest together. The growing rift between the USSR and the Western Allies was not apparent yet, so trying to approach the Western powers for a separate peace did not enter my mind as I knew it had been tried several times by Goering since 1946, with no success.

  Change of policy

  Western Allied leader’s meeting, Washington D.C. March 22nd, 1947

  “This is interesting, to say the least,” said Truman, picking up his morning coffee. “Indeed, Mr. President,” added Churchill also with a coffee in hand. The two men were again in the Oval Office in the White House.

  The Western Allied discussions continued after the Soviet explosion of an atomic bomb and the USSR’s foreign minister Molotov's visit. The man had come to tell them of Stalin’s demand on a postwar world. The damned Russian diplomat had drawn a world where the Communists held sway in most of old Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and China, with Mao’s Tse Dong’s Communist eventual rise to power with the help of the Soviets.

  And, most unsettling, he’d left for Moscow immediately after that, without any intention to participate in the Allied discussions that were to be held in order to talk about the war’s end. Things looked quite grim from a diplomatic standpoint. Stalin gave the impression of wanting to fly away on his own and finish the war on his terms.

  The two Allied leaders had just read the short transcripts from HQ Europe. Eisenhower had just reported that Goering was not in power and that a General had taken over the Reich’s command. Not just a general; Heinz Guderian of all people. A highly skilled warrior and commander.

  The electrifying news had been announced a few hours earlier over the radio waves. Goering, the German Fuhrer, was not dead but unable to lead for the moment, so the radio address to the Fatherland blared to all that would hear that a temporary leader had been named in this difficult hour for the Third Reich.

  Truman was not an expert of anything foreign and didn’t know Guderian other than by the reports he’d read. Churchill was better informed. “So, Winston. What about this Guderian fellow,” said Truman, taking another sip of his coffee. “Well, Mr. President, for starters, he is a very decent gentleman. I have met him in the 1930s. Good fellow. Fair, smart, honest. Like most military people. Typical Prussian officer.” Churchill sat backward on the couch. “He was the Reich’s foremost expert of tank tactics and has since been a commander in most of their operations.” “Wasn’t he the commander in 1941 in our Middle Eastern debacle?” asked Truman. “Correct, Mr. President,” answered Churchill.

  The two men were developing the same idea at the same time. With the obvious deepening rift between Anglo-Saxons and the Russians, the General’s arrival represented quite a change. Could they deal with the man? In fact, could they deal with Germany and its leaders? The obvious question glared at both men.

  “His he a Nazi,” asked the U.S. leader. “I don’t believe so, Mr. President, but I am not certain I will need to have my people look into it,” answered Churchill. “Do we want to deal with the Third Reich?” added the Englishman. “Well, Winston. I am not at all certain I want to do that, but it is a definite possibility now that that pig Goering isn’t in power anymore. We have not fought a war against Fascist oppression just to have it replaced by world Communism.”

  “Well, Mr. President, as I outlined a few days ago, I propose we send discreet inquiries thru our agents in Switzerland to see if we can start discussing with the Germans…..” Churchill let his words hang for a second since he was aware of Truman’s reluctance to think about dealing with the Nazis. The President didn’t counter anything, so he decided that he was getting somewhere with Truman’s state of mind. Churchill was many things, but like most British, he was a realist and was not as naïve as the Americans. The young nation only started to set out in the world and did not always understand the reality of politics in Europe. They were naïve. But once you got the Americans roused up about something, good luck…

  Letting Stalin win was simply replacing an oppressive ideology (Fascism) with another one (Communism). While he wasn’t sure if one was better (or worse) than the other, his long experience filled him with a certainty. You never let a bully get away with it.

  In the 1930s, the democracies had let the Nazis get away with conquering territory. They’d even tried to accommodate the Germans and believed in their empty promises. They rearmed quickly, prepared for war, while France and the United Kingdom were content to have peace at all cost. And when it was too late to do anything about it, Hitler had attacked, and the free world had for a moment edged very close to the abyss. They’d been lucky to have the mighty United States on their side.

  Back then, he’d told the British government (under Chamberlain) that something needed to be done against the Third Reich, but no one listened to him. Then the war came and the serious defeats of 1939-1941. Churchill was determined that history would not repeat itself with the Soviets.

  “Mr. President. I think we both agree that we need to be firm against Stalin. We also need to be realistic. The world will not be safer with the Soviet hordes. We simply cannot accept anything else than a return to pre-war borders. Do we agree?”

  Truman sighed heavily for a moment. The man was a little reluctant to the possibility of a renewed war, this time against the Soviet Union. “Damn stupid Stalin! We have a war to finish before we bicker for the spoils….”

  Battleship Schleswig-Holstein fights its last battle

  Gun duel in Dantzig Harbor, March 23rd, 1947

  Battleship Schleswig-Holstein was the last of the five Deutschland-class battleships built by the German Kaiserliche Marine before World War One. The ship, named for the province of Schleswig-Holstein, was laid down in the Germaniawerft dockyard in Kiel in August 1905 and commissioned into the fleet nearly three years later. The ships of her class were already outdated by the time they entered service, being inferior in size, armor, firepower, and speed to the new generation of dreadnought battleships.

  While most of the fleet was interned by the British at Scapa Flow at the end of the war, Germany was permitted to keep the Schleswig-Holstein as a coastal defense ship since it was anyway outdated in 1918 and not really a naval threat to the United Kingdom.

  Schleswig-Holstein fired the first shots of World War II when she bombarded the Polish base at Danzig's Westerplatte in the early morning hours of 1st September 1939. And since then, it stayed in Dantzig proper as a coastal defense ship and because there wasn’t any mission for the ship. But by the time the Russians approached the city, it again became helpful to the Germans.

  After the explosion in Konigsberg that obliterated the city and the troops defending it, the Soviet forces waited several hours before launching their troops forward on the 20th.

  The Russian soldiers found devastation of the likes never seen even by these hardened men. Most received high radiation levels, so they started to get sick after crossing the no man’s land that used to he the German city of Konigsberg. These details hardly mattered to the Red Army leaders, pushing their troops onward. By the 23rd, they approached the town of Dantzig, where it all started in 1939.

  After the German conquest during the early phase of the war, the Axis troops moved on and conquered new lands east, north and south. But the old battleship remained in the bay as a coastal gun platform because it just didn’t have any other work. In 1946, the warship was also called for the evacuation of Finland. It transported some troops and escorted the barges and other transports, making Model’s move from Helsinki to Konigsberg possible.