Günther von Kluge occupation military officer
Early life and career
Kluge was born on 30 October 1882 in Posen, then in the German state of Prussia (now in western Poland). His father, Max von Kluge, was from an aristocratic Prussian military family. A distinguished commander, Max was a lieutenant general in the German Army who served in the First World War. He married Elise Kühn-Schuhmann in 1881. Günther von Kluge was one of two children, having a younger brother named Wolfgang (1892–1976). Wolfgang served in both world wars, rising to the rank of lieutenant general by 1943, and was commander of Fortress Dunkirk between July and September 1944.In 1901, Günther von Kluge – sometimes called Hans Günther von Kluge or Der kluge Hans ("Clever Hans") after an alleged performing horse – was commissioned in the German Army's 46th Field Artillery Regiment. He served on the General Staff between 1910 and 1918, reaching the rank of captain on the Western Front during the First World War. He remained in the postwar Reichswehr (national army) following during the Weimar era, becoming a colonel in 1930, major general in 1933, and lieutenant general a year later. On 1 April 1934, Kluge took command of the 6th Division in Münster. In 1935, Adolf Hitler's proclamation of the Wehrmacht – the enlarged German Army – precipitated Kluge's appointment to the 6th Corps and then the 6th Army Group, which subsequently became the 4th Army.Kluge believed Hitler's "crude militarism" would lead Germany into disaster. During the Sudetenland Crisis, he was a member of a secret anti-war faction lead by Ludwig Beck and Ernst von Weizsäcker, hoping to avoid armed conflict over the disputed territory. The crisis was averted by the Munich Agreement on 30 September 1938. Although he was privately critical of the Nazis, Kluge believed in the principle of Lebensraum and took pride in the rearmament of the Wehrmacht.
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