Hermann Hoth conflict World War II
Hermann Hoth (12 April 1885 – 25 January 1971) was a German army commander, war criminal, and author. He served as a high-ranking panzer commander in the Wehrmacht during World War II, playing a prominent role in the Battle of France and on the Eastern Front. Contemporaries and later historians consider Hoth one of the most talented armoured warfare commanders of the war. He was a strong believer in Nazism, and units under his command committed several war crimes including the murder of prisoners of war and civilians.
Born in Prussia, Hoth embarked on a career as a military officer early in his youth. After graduating from the Royal Prussian Military Academy, he slowly rose in the ranks of the Imperial German Army. Hoth mainly served in various staff positions in World War I, and after the conflict's conclusion continued to do so in the armed forces of the newly formed Weimar Republic. Following Hitler's seizure of control in Germany, Hoth began to rapidly rise in the ranks and became known as a proponent of motorization in the Wehrmacht.
When World War II broke out, Hoth successfully led the XV Army Corps during the German invasions of Poland and France. He commanded the 3rd Panzer Group during Operation Barbarossa in 1941, a position in which he assisted in the destruction of several Soviet armies. From October 1941, Hoth headed the 17th Army, a period during which he advocated for a war of annihilation against the Soviet Union, the merciless destruction of partisans, and the murder of Jews. In the Wehrmacht's 1942 summer offensive, Hoth led the 4th Panzer Army and took part in the Battle of Stalingrad. When the German 6th Army was encircled at Stalingrad in November 1942, Hoth's army group made an unsuccessful relief attempt. Afterwards, Hoth was involved in the Third Battle of Kharkov as well as the Battle of Kursk, while increasingly suffering from near-burnout. He led the German defense in eastern Ukraine during the Battle of the Dnieper, but was sacked by Adolf Hitler due to the surprise Soviet reconquest of Kiev in November 1943. For the rest of the war, he was mostly relegated to powerless positions.
After the war, Hoth was convicted of war crimes and crimes against humanity in the High Command Trial, mainly regarding his implementation of the criminal Commissar Order and the mistreatment of POWs as well as civilians. He was sentenced to 15 years in prison, but released on parole in 1954. Hoth subsequently became an author, writing about armoured warfare, the development of West Germany's military, and in support of the myth of the clean Wehrmacht.Operation Barbarossa
Leading the 3rd Panzer Group
Hoth commanded the 3rd Panzer Group during Operation Barbarossa in 1941. This unit included the XXXIX Panzer Corps, LVII Panzer Corps, V Army Corps, and VI Army Corps which consisted of four Panzer divisions (7th, 12th, 19th, and 20th), three motorized divisions (14th, 20th, 18th), and four infantry divisions (5th, 6th, 26th, 35th). The 3rd Panzer Group fielded 626 tanks at the offensive's start. In his diaries, Hoth expressed no doubts about or opposition to the invasion, mirroring the opinion of most high-ranking German commanders. From a moral and ideological standpoint, Hoth believed that Russia had been overtaken by "Jewish Bolshevism", causing the country to turn away from its European heritage, transforming it into an expansionist, Asiatic, and despotic state as well as setting it on an unavoidable collision course with Germany. Hürter argued that Hoth's beliefs showcased remarkable similarities with Hitler's. Even after the war, Hoth continued to maintain that the invasion had been just based on these arguments. Despite his belief in the necessity of the invasion, Hoth had misgivings about its strategic planning and execution. He tried to convince his superior, Generalfeldmarschall Fedor von Bock, commander of Army Group Center, that the 3rd Panzer Group had to operate with greater flexibility and prepare to strike deeper into the Soviet Union than intended by the high command (OKH). Bock rebuffed these requests. Regardless of his misgivings, Hoth generally adhered to the decided-upon plans and Bock's commands during the invasion. Researcher Robert Kirchubel described him as a "team player" and reliable in crisis situations during Operation Barbarossa.In course of the early stages of Operation Barbarossa, Hoth's 3rd Panzer Group broke through the Soviet border defenses with relative ease. Bock consequently released Hoth from the 9th Army, allowing him to operate more freely. Guderian's 2nd Panzer Group and Hoth's 3rd Panzer Group proceeded to encircle Minsk as part of Army Group Center's operations, trapping 300,000 Red Army soldiers and capturing or destroying 2,500 tanks. At this point, Hoth again argued that the 3rd Panzer Group should move deeper into the Soviet territory and encircle more enemy troops before closing the pocket. This time he was supported by Bock, but they were overruled by the OKH. Alongside Guderian's 2nd Panzer Group, Hoth then pushed further to attack Smolensk, believing that they had to continue their advance to not allow the Red Army to reorganize. Before reaching the city, the panzer groups of Guderian and Hoth had almost outrun their supply lines, but were able to keep moving thanks to captured Soviet fuel depots. Hoth split his force into two, and secured vital crossings of the Daugava river on 3–4 July. His panzer group then kept advancing between the Daugava and Dnieper, capturing Vitebsk. The breakthrough of Hoth's 3rd Panzer Group at the Daugava-Dnieper line allowed for the encirclement of three Soviet armies.As the Wehrmacht advanced, questions arose about the treatment of suspected Red Army soldiers or deserters in civilian clothing. Hoth ordered the 3rd Panzer Group's officers to subject such individuals to a limited examination; if the officers concluded that the prisoners were Red Army soldiers, they were to be shot. Like all German armies on the Eastern Front, Hoth's Panzer Group also implemented the Commissar Order. Following the war, Hoth was the only German general who admitted that he had agreed with the order, believing that the Soviet political commissars could not be regarded as regular soldiers. According to reports from subordinate units, the order was carried out on a widespread basis.In mid-July 1941, the 3rd Panzer Group was subordinated to Army Group North to shore up the flanks and attempted to seize Velikie Luki. This was part of a larger operation aimed at seizing Leningrad. Hoth's forces were driven back on 20 July when Red Army forces broke through the German lines, prompting criticism from Bock for unnecessarily striking out too far to the north east. In early August, Hitler ordered a southward diversion of the German advance at Bryansk to the objection of many leading German officers, including Hoth, who advocated for a continued direct drive to Moscow. In mid to late August, Hoth's forces faced another setback owing to heavy losses and dispersal of efforts: facing the heavily reinforced Soviet 19th Army, he committed the 7th Panzer Division without infantry support, which resulted in what the historian David Stahel describes as a "debacle". The division's attack ran into fortified Soviet lines and was repulsed with the loss of 30 tanks. By September, the constant fighing had heavily depleted Hoth's force, as the 3rd Panzer Group had only about 250 tanks remaining. Hoth's panzer group subsequently assisted in Operation Typhoon, the offensive to capture Moscow. Stationed on the left flank, his force and the 9th Army were supposed to attack from Dukhovshchina toward Vyazma. As the plans for Operation Typhoon were discussed by the OKH and frontline commanders, Hoth argued for a delay of one day regarding the offensive, but was overruled.At the start of Operation Typhoon, the 3rd Panzer Group made good progress, though was slowed down by Soviet air attacks and the worn-down state of some of its units. Hoth's force and the 9th Army successfully captured two bridges across the Dnieper east of Kholm-Zhirkovsky and were just 60 kilometres (37 mi) from Vyazma, close to achieving another encirclement, when they were stopped by counter-attacks ordered by General Ivan Konev on 3 October. The resulting fighting and the exhaustion of its fuel supplies pinned down the 3rd Panzer Group until 6 October, when Hoth was able to restart the advance and sealed the Vyazma-Bryansk pockets. He was then redirected north to capture Rzhev and Kalinin, even though this effectively removed the 3rd Panzer Group from the Battle of Moscow. Hitler and the OKH believed that the "fatal blow" to the Red Army had been already delivered at Vyazma-Bryansk, and hoped for more great encirclements.Hoth's evidence
During his testimony he sought to explain his November 1941 order as being only aimed at the elimination of the "Bolshevik-Jewish resistance". He denied any knowledge of the Holocaust, and claimed that his instructions only meant that his troops should be vigilant and were intended to improve morale: "The German soldier in his good nature ... easily forgot that he was still in enemy territory" and that the "power of Bolshevism [had to be] broken". He insisted that no physical harm came to civilians as the result of this measure, which his troops executed with "clean hands". Hoth maintained that if any Jews had been killed it was due to their connection to crimes against the German forces. "It was a matter of common knowledge in Russia that it was the Jew in particular who participated in a very large extent in sabotage, espionage, etc.," Hoth claimed. However, he also maintained that the Russians were instinctually adjusted to a severe form of leadership, regarding leniency as weakness. Hoth believed this argument to sufficiently justify the brutality of the German occupation.In regards to the criminal Commissar Order, Hoth claimed that he had been "compelled" to transmit it to the troops under his command, as otherwise he would have been replaced by a more compliant officer. He also denied having demanded that the Commissar Order be carried out, maintaining that he had opposed it. He expressed the view that his subordinates would have known of his disapproval of the order even though he had never actually voiced any opposition to it. Despite this, he made contradictory remarks as well. For once, he argued that Hitler would not have ordered his commanders to do anything criminal, claiming that the Führer had only wanted to "protect" soldiers from the commissars who had been "bloodthirty beast[s]". Hoth also maintained that any orders by Hitler superseded Section 48 of the German Military Penal Code which affirmed that soldiers were under no obligation to adhere to clearly criminal orders. In response to evidence of his troops killing hostages, Hoth denied this as well. He instead posited that only partisans were executed, while blaming the brutality of partisan warfare on Soviet leader Joseph Stalin. Furthermore, he stated that Soviet prisoners of war had always been treated well, arguing that the usage of the nickname "Ivan" for the POWs showcased the "family-like relationship that our soldiers had to the Russian prisoners of war". In an attempt to sway the tribunal, Hoth's attorney submitted 92 affidavits testifying to his good character.The International Military Tribunal found Hoth's arguments unconvincing. According to Stein, "apart of Wöhler, no other general was subject to more mockery" during the High Command Trial. Relating to Hoth's alleged lack of knowledge of the massacre of Jews, the tribunal pointed out the Artemovsk massacre. On 14 December 1941, the Sicherheitsdienst (SD) had murdered 1,224 Jews and 93 other prisoners at Artemovsk in an area of Hoth's command; he admitted that he had been informed of the mass killing. The tribunal concluded that he was thus fully aware of the SD's murder of Jews, but the 17th Army under Hoth still continued to hand over prisoners to the SD and continued to cooperate with the agency.Furthermore, there was clear evidence that Hoth had transmitted the Commissar Order with his full knowledge and approval, and several reports confirmed that he had been aware of the execution of hundreds of captured commissars. There was also a large amount of evidence showcasing Hoth's knowledge and approval of the mass execution of not just partisans, but also "partisan suspects or sympathizers". Relating to the mistreatment of POWs under Hoth's commamd, the tribunal referenced a report by the 17th Army's Oberquartiermeister (chief quartermaster) to Hoth on 25 November 1941, outlining cases of murder, deliberate starvation, usage as human shields, and a general neglect of the POWs' welfare. The tribunal admitted that "not all of these conditions" could be attributed to Hoth, but that the commander had made no efforts to counteract and in some cases approved the mistreatment. Hoth had also ordered POWs to be used for forced labour and as ammunition loaders.
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