The Wilmington morning star. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1909-1990, 1944-07-21
Hitler Blames Generals
For Attempt On His Life
Continued from Page One)

tor that revolution has burst forth
in Germany and that part of the
eastern army is deserving and re-
turning from the front"D
Speaking on the German radio
for six minutes in coldly furious
tones, Hitler said he was "un-
harmed and WELL" even though a
bomb had exploded within six feet
of him and had injured Is men,
bers of his personal military staff,
one fatally.
Hitler went On the air ostensibly
to reassure the German people
of his health after it was official
ly announced Thursday night, at
6:28 pm. Q2:28 pm, Eastern
War Time) that an attempt had
been made to assassinate him with
explosives.
He treasured them of his per-
sonal safety but his words held
little comfort to a people fed of
late on bitter diet of defeats on
three fronts.
Instead, he declared a deadly
fractricided war on his internal
enemies and disclosed the great
est internal weakness in his
embattled regime since he as
sumed power in 1888
Reichsmarshal Hermann Goer-
ing, beefy No. 2 Nazi, went on the
air Immediately after his Fuehrer
declaring:
"A plot was made against our
fuehrer by Col. Count Won Stauf-
fenberg, at the order of a miser-
able clique of former generals
who were dismissed because of
their coWardly and bad leadership.
The fuehrer was saved by pro-
violence. These criminals try now
as a new Reichs government, or
as usurpers and by wrong orders,
to confuse the troops
Goering was followed in turn by
Adm. Karl Doenitz, chief of the
waning German navy, who init
mated that the revolt may have
spread to his arm of the service,
declaring the navy would only sac
| cept orders from its own commando
er-in-chief and its own command
ers, and that ''to avoid being mis-
led by false instructions, every
traitor will be ruthlessly Destroy
ed"
Doenitz. too, blamed the plot on
''clique of mad generals
The Goering reference to a new
Reichs government" by the dis,
sidents disclosed the breadth and
depth ct the revolt which broke
into the open just two weeks after
it was announced that Marshal
Karl Gerd Rudolf Won Rundstedt,
stiff and stern old militarist, had
been dismissed as con- mander-in-
chief of the German anti-inVasion
forces.
The accusing fingers Of Hitler
and his henchmen may well be
pointing directly at Rundstedt, who
has never been pro-Nazi and who
has disagreed violently with Hit
ler's ''intuitive'' direction of the
German forces.
Hitler minced no words in his
short and snappy statement to the
German people on what he called
"a crime that has no equal in Ger.
man history"
He declared that "an extremely
small clique Of ambitious, unscru
pulous, and at the same time fool
isb criminally stupid, officers
Matched a plot to remove me and
together with me. virtually to exter
inmate the staff of the Germ -
high command.
1.-The bomb that was placed by
Col. Graf (CounD Won Stauffen
berg exploded two meters (abou
6 feeD away from me, on my right
side. 1t wounded very seriously 6
number of my dear collaborators
One of them has died. l person
ally am entirely unhurt apart from
negligible grazes, bruises OF
burns"
Hitler and none of the othel
speakers disclosed the exact hou.
or even the approximate location
of the explosive assassination at
tempt.
Indications were that it possibly