Tapping Hitler's Generals

Then we all drove out from POSEN to see HITLER. This is what the lunch with Adolf HITLER was like: obviously they couldn’t have two-hundred-and-fifty Generals all sitting down to table together, so half of them were there. I was among those told to come to lunch and I sat next to SCHMUNDT.[72] Adolf HITLER came into the room–looked round–dug MANSTEIN[73] in the paunch with his elbow, without saying: ‘Good morning’ to him. The two ‘Feldmarschälle’ were not seated beside him. He sat down at the table and looked round quite nervously, thinking he was going to be stabbed in the back any moment and was happy only when he had sat down and his SS waiter was behind him. I watched him closely and the man didn’t say a word for seven minutes, he didn’t speak, he just drank and incidentally ate a great deal. He had four different things to drink, including cold tea and rum (sic). I said to the fellow near me: ‘The atmosphere here is unbearable. The fellow comes in without greeting anybody. What’s the matter with him, he’s so ill-tempered?’ ‘I don’t know.’ Then he spoke very shortly and jumped up after ten minutes and ran away out of the room, breathing fire, scared and shaking. He didn’t say a word to anyone and that was what we had hurried out from POSEN for. Then came that famous speech. (Giggling) Adolf HITLER stood up in front of the stand and delivered a lecture–you must remember it was to two-hundred-and-fifty Generals who had all been rushed by air from the front. MANSTEIN and HOLLIDT[74] had only just arrived beforehand; they had had their lunch. As is usual with men of our age, everyone likes to have a moment’s rest after a meal. Unfortunately, that clashed with Adolf HITLER’s speech. We were in a barn, which was the HQ ‘Quartiermeister’s’ Mess and the outer room where the orderlies wash the dishes, and they’d overheated the room beyond all description. We sat in that barn in the sweltering heat and Adolf HITLER talked and talked; after about seven minutes 40 per cent of the Generals were snoring. (General laughter). I thought, if the man’s in his right mind at all he ought to say: ‘Let’s go out for a few physical jerks.’ (Laughter all round). But, as usual, once he’s worked up, he notices nothing.

THOMA: Well, what did he say, still the same old things?