Oberkommando der Wehrmacht

But this idea that that was some kind of flex... intended to signal the uk i mean it's ridiculous the reason why this was critical is for the reasons why i said like the entire balkan campaign of the wehrmacht um it owed entirely like germany's security concerns like conceptually orbited entirely around the soviet union in like existential terms okay it's not in political terms obviously yeah like the uk's unwillingness to come to terms and it's you know, unrelenting posture of bellicosity, like, yes, that, that was hugely impactful in kind of the course of, of, um, of policy in Germany.

Um, you know, from the foreign ministry to the OKW and everything else, but in, in, um, in raw strategic terms, um, what I, what I just said is not impeachable.

Um, the, uh, if the RAF had gotten a toehold to, I mean, again, like they could have basically, they could have, they could have laid Romania to waste.

Um, it was, you know, um, those four engine bombers that ultimately were turned loose on Germany's civilian population, you know, um, if, if, if put to, if, if put to, um, that purpose, um, you know, what, uh, it would have been devastating.

You know, and that's the point I make to people again and again.

You know, like, the Germans...

Whether you're talking about the OKW, whether you're talking...

Like, this is a rare example of a quorum.

Its first commander, Hauptsturmführer Krause, appears by this point to have given way to Hauptsturmführer Friedrich Richter.

Richter checks their orders from the Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, the German Armed Forces High Command, and learns they intend to destroy the bridge with a 500-kilogram sea mine.

He passes them on to the company stationed beside the Meuse-Escore Canal under his adjutant, Obersturmführer Heinz Damaske.

A truck carries the swimmers and their mine to a farm near the front, once darkness falls, and there the plan comes apart.

But, you know, basically, who was going to get it first? Like, hadn't been decided.

You know, was it just going to be squirreled away and given to the, you know, given to the OKW to basically sit on so nobody else could have it? You know, was it going to be given to, you know, this, you know, what was basically going to be given to like, you know, the, the bargaining kind of committee that, uh, or the burden kind of quorum that attended the conference at Jenna, like what, what would become of it? Um, but it, uh, what they had allowed was a uranium sample had, had been dispatched to got the gin for special analysis.

And, um, The special analyst who was dispatched, you know, essentially to report his findings was a guy from the War Office.

OK.

Um, he issued this circular condemning, you know, the Kristallnacht, demanding a ha- a halt to, uh, what he referred to as future outrages.

Um, beyond that, you know, owing to his role, which was not a military or police role, uh, he was not a participant in any of the secret conferences that the Führer held with, uh, the OKW, you know, the military high command.

If you accept, uh, the narrative of what became c- called in the '70s, 1970s, the Holocaust, you know, if you accept the, that there was a specific intent, um, conspiracy to, uh, of, of ethnic cleansing and homicide, um, the narrative of that posits that, uh, you know, the Wannsee conference in, in 1942 was, uh, was where that policy was decided upon and, and ultimately implemented.

Well, I mean, Hess, not only did Hess not sit in on a conference, Hess was incarcerated in the United Kingdom at, at the time that that occurred.

But the point being, subsequently, you know, and even through, other than some instances on the Western Front in the final year of the war, You know, the Wehrmacht proceeded according to Westphalian custom in fighting the British and the French and others.

You know, I mean, obviously all bets were off on the Ostfront, but that was the OKW, Hitler himself, the SS and SD, they spoke openly about that.

You know, how the barbarian other is outside of moral consensus you know and he's not just a racial other in their view um but this this absolute um this this this morality propaganda becoming the core of the narrative that that's the key aspect of the nuremberg system and it really is without deep precedent outside of localized instances so the answer is you know 1945.

Okay, moving on.

You know, that's not any different.

I mean, I'd argue that it was a lot more inhumane what the Pentagon was doing, contra OKW.

No, no, no regular army guys in the German army who got drafted or being ordered to do this kind of stuff.

You know, you, you were, you were asked to volunteer, and if you couldn't handle it and you refused to do it, no one was...

This is when it became clear that war with Poland was inevitable.

Um, Hitler called a meeting.

Um, he summoned a bunch of elements from OKW, as well as, uh, Himmler and some of the higher SS leaders.

And, uh, Von Bock, Fedor von Bock, who's a Feldmarschall, he said Hitler openly stated that the coming war, there's things are gonna be done of which German generals would not approve.