Wilhelm Keitel
 |
Generalfeldmarschall Wilhelm Keitel |
Wilhelm Bodewin Johann Gustav Keitel (
September 22,
1882 –
October 16,
1946) was a
German Field Marshal (
Generalfeldmarschall) and a senior military leader during
World War II.
The son of Carl Keitel, a middle-class landowner, he was born in Helmscherode,
Brunswick,
Germany. After completing his education in Göttingen, he embarked on a military career in
1901, becoming a
Fahnenjunker (Cadet Officer), joining the 6th Lower-Saxon Field Artillery Regiment. He married Lisa Fontaine in
1909. During
World War I Keitel served on the Western front with the Field Artillery Regiment No. 46. In September
1914, during the fighting in
Flanders, he was seriously wounded in his right forearm by a shell fragment.
He recovered, and thereafter was posted to the
German General Staff in early
1915. After World War I ended, he stayed in the newly created
Reichswehr, and played a part in organizing
Freikorps frontier guard units on the
Polish border. Keitel also served as a divisional general staff officer, and later taught at the Hanover Cavalry School for two years.
In late
1924, he was transferred to the Reich Defence Ministry (
Reichswehrministerium), serving with the Troop Office (
Truppenamt), the post-
Versailles disguised
General Staff. He was soon promoted to the head of the organizational department, a post he retained after the
Nazi seizure of power in
1933. In
1935, based on a recommendation by
Werner von Fritsch he became chief of the newly-created Armed Forces Office (
Wehrmachtamt).
|
Keitel, signing the ratified surrender terms for the German Army in Berlin, 8/9 May 1945 |
In 1937, Keitel received a promotion to General, and in the following year, in the wake of the
Blomberg-Fritsch Affair and the replacement of the
Reichskriegsministerium (Reich War Ministry) with the
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, a.k.a.
OKW (Supreme Command of the Armed Forces), he assumed the position of Chief of the Supreme Command of the Armed Forces. Accordingly, in 1940 he became a "
Generalfeldmarschall" (Field Marshal).
During World War II, Keitel proved a weak and cautious commander: he advised
Hitler against invading
France and opposed
Operation Barbarossa. Both times he backed down in the face of Hitler and tendered his resignation: the
Führer refused to accept it. In 1942 he again stood up to Hitler over Field Marshal
Wilhelm von List. Keitel's defence of List was his last act of defiance to Hitler, for after that he never again challenged one of Hitler's orders and was referred to by his colleagues as
"Lakaitel" ("Lackey-tel" or "Little Lackey"). He signed numerous orders of dubious legality under the laws of war, the most infamous of which being the notorious
Commissar order, and unquestionably allowed
Himmler a free hand with his racial controls and ensuing terror in captured
Russian territory. Another was the order to have any of the French pilots fighting for the
Normandie-Niemen fighter regiment in and on behalf of the
USSR to be executed instead of their being treated as prisoners of war. Keitel was also instrumental in foiling the attempted
coup of the
July 20 Plot in 1944, whose objectives were the assassination of
Hitler and the replacement of the current upper hierarchy in the Army, and sat on the following Army
Court of Honour that handed many officers, including Field Marshal
von Witzleben, over to
Roland Freisler's notorious
People's Court.
On
May 8,
1945, Keitel signed Nazi Germany's surrender to the
Red Army. Four days later he was arrested, and soon faced the
International Military Tribunal, which charged him with a number of offences: conspiracy to commit crimes against peace; planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression; war crimes; and, finally, crimes against humanity. The IMT rejected Keitel's defence that he was following orders in conformity to the
Führerprinzip or leadership principle. Instead he was found guilty on all charges. To underscore the criminal, rather than military, nature of Keitel's acts the Allies denied his request to be shot by firing squad and
hanged him instead. His last words were "I call on God Almighty to have mercy on the German people. More than 2 million German soldiers went to their death for the fatherland before me. I follow now my sons - all for Germany."
Keitel was portrayed by actor
Dieter Mann in the 2004 film
Der Untergang.
*
War crimes of the Wehrmacht
