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Cohesion and Disintegrationin the Wehrmacht in

World War IIBY EDWARD A. SHILS AND MORRIS JANOWITZ

The title of this article may suggest to some that it is of interest only to the

student of military affairs. But it is of a far wider scope. The public relations ex-

pert, the opinion analyst, the propagandist, the educator, and all those who are

interested in relating attitudes to the psychology of the individual and the struc-

ture of the group will find it deserving of close attention. For the authors, in at-

tempting to determine why the German Army in World War II fought so stub-

bornly to the end, have made an intensive study of the social structure of this

army, of the symbols to which it responded, of the Nazi attempts to bolster its

morale, and the Allied attempts to brea\ it down. They have found a \ey to manyof the behavior and attitude patterns of the individual infantryman in the inter-

personal relationships within the company—his primary group. His relationship

to this primary group goes far to explain why he responds to one appeal and not

to another, why he fights, and why he surrenders. This study thus ptovides an

example of the sociological and psychological analysis which the propagandist must

ma\e if he is to obtain maximal response to his communications.

Professor Shils is a member of the faculty of the University of Chicago and

of the London School of Economics. Dr. Janowitz also teaches at the University of

Chicago. During the war, both served in the Intelligence Section of the Psycho-logical Warfare Division of SHAEF.

I. The Army as a Social Group fcrior in equipment, the German Army,

This study is an attempt to analyze on all fronts, maintained a high degree

the relative influence of primary and of organizational integrity and fighting

secondary group situations on the high effectiveness through a series of almost

degree of stability of the German Army unbroken retreats over a period of sev-

in World War II. It also seeks to eral years. In the final phase, the German

evaluate the impact of the Western Al- armies were broken into unconnectedlies' propaganda on the German Army's segments, and the remnants were over-

fighting effectiveness.1 , ,

. . . . . . . 1 For a further treatment of these problems

Although distinctly outnumbered and ^ Dk]̂ Hcary v> ̂ Money and ^

in a strategic sense quantitatively in- London: Keegan Paul Rutledge (forthcoming).

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COHESION AND DISINTEGRATION IN THE WEHRMACHT 281

run as the major lines of communica-

tion and command were broken. Nev-

ertheless, resistance which was more

than token resistance on the part ofmost divisions continued until they were

overpowered or overrun in a way which,

by breaking communication lines, pre-

vented individual battalions and com-

panies from operating in a coherent

fashion. Disintegration through deser-

tion was insignificant, while active sur-

render, individually or in groups, re-

mained extremely limited throughoutthe entire Western campaign.

In one sense the German High Com-

mand effected as complete a defense of

the "European Fortress" as its own

leadership qualities and the technical

means at its disposal permitted. Official

military analyses, including General

Eisenhower's report, have shown that

lack of manpower, equipment, and

transportation, as well as certain stra-

tegical errors, were the limiting factors.2

There was neither complete collapse nor

internally organized effort to terminate

hostilities, such as signalized the end

of the first world war.

This extraordinary tenacity of the

German Army has frequently been at-tributed to the strong National Socialist

political convictions of the German sol-

diers. It is the main hypothesis of this

paper, however, that the unity of the

German Army was in fact sustained

only to a very slight extent by the Na-

tional Socialist political convictions of

its members, and that more important

in the motivation of the determined re-sistance of the German soldier was the

steady satisfaction of certain primary

personality demands afforded by the

social organization of the army.

This basic hypothesis may be elab-

orated in the following terms.

1. It appears that a soldier's ability

to resist is a function of the capacity ofhis immediate primary group (his

squad or section) to avoid social dis-

integration. When the individual's im-mediate group, and its supporting for-

mations, met his basic organic needs,

offered him affection and esteem from

both officers and comrades, suppliedhim with a sense of power and ade-

quately regulated his relations with au-thority, the element of self-concern in

battle, which would lead to disruption

of the effective functioning of his pri-mary group, was minimized.

1. The capacity of the primary group

to resist disintegration was dependent

on the acceptance of political, ideologi-

cal, and cultural symbols (all secondary

symbols) only to the extent that thesesecondary symbols became directly as-

sociated with primary gratifications.

3. Once disruption of primary group

life resulted through separation, breaksin communications, loss of leadership,

depletion of personnel, or major and

prolonged breaks in the supply of food

and medical care, such an ascendancy

of preoccupation with physical survivaldeveloped that there was very little "last-

ditch" resistance.

4. Finally, as long as the primarygroup structure of the component units

of the Wehrmacht persisted, attempts

by the Allies to cause disaffection by

the invocation of secondary and politi-

cal symbols (e.g., about the ethical

wrongfulness of the National Socialistsystem) were mainly unsuccessful.

2 Report by the Supreme Com mander on

operations in Europe by the Allied Expedi-

tionary Force, June 6, 1944 to May 8, 1945.


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8 PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY, SUMMER 1948

By contrast, where Allied propagandadealt with primary and personal values,particularly physical survival, it was

more likely to be effective.Long before D-Day in Western

France, research was undertaken in theUnited Kingdom and North Africa onthese social psychological aspects of theenemy's forces. These studies were con-tinued after D-Day by the IntelligenceSection of the Psychological Warfare Di-vision of SHAEF. Although of course

they are subject to many scientific stric-tures, they provide a groundwork forthe evaluation of the experiences of theGerman soldier and for the analysis ofthe social organization of the GermanArmy. Methods of collecting data in-cluded front line interrogation ofprisoners of war ( P s /W ) and intensivepsychological interviews in rear areas.

Captured enemy documents, statementsof recaptured Allied military personnel,and the reports of combat observerswere also studied. A monthly opinionpoll of random samples of large num-bers of P s /W was also undertaken. Thispaper is based on a review of all thesedata.

Modes of Disintegration

Preliminary to the analysis of the

function of the primary group in the

maintenance of cohesion in the German

Army, it is necessary to classify the

modes of social disintegration found

in any modern army:

1. Desertion (deliberately going over

to the enemy lines)

a) by individual action

(1) after discussion with com-

rades

(2 ) with out prior discussion

with others

b) by groups acting in concert2. Active surrender (deliberate de-

cision to give up to the enemy as he

approaches and taking steps to facilitatecapture, e.g., by sending emissaries, bycalling out, by signalling, etc.)

a) by single individuals

b) by group as a unit(1) by mutual agreement(2 ) by order of or with approval

of NCO or officer

c) by plurality of uncoordinated

individuals3. Passive surrender

a) by individuals acting alone(1 ) non-resistance ( allowing one-

self to be taken prisonerwithout taking effectivesteps to facilitate or obstructcapture; passivity may be ameans of facilitating sur-

render)(2 ) token resistance (allowing

oneself to be taken prisonerwith nominal face-savinggestures of obstruction tocapture)

b) by plurality of uncoordinatedindividuals

4. Routine resistance: rote or mechani-

cal, but effective execution of orders asgiven from above with discontinuancewhen the enemy becomes overwhelm-ingly powerful and aggressive

5. "Last-ditch" resistance which endsonly with the exhaustion of fightingequipment and subsequent surrender ordeath. (This type of soldier is greadyunderrepresented in studies of samples

of Ps/W. Therefore the study of Ps/Walone does not give an adequate pictureof the resistive qualities of the Germansoldier.)

A more detailed description of each


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COHESION AN D DISINTEGRATION IN T H E WEH RM AC HT 283

of the above classes will be useful in thefollowing analysis:

Desertion involved positive and de-

liberate action by the German soldierto deliver himself to Allied soldiers forcapture by crossing the lines, e.g., byplanfully "losing himself while onpatrol and "blundering" into the ene-my's area of control or by deliberately

remaining behind during a withdrawalfrom a given position so that when theAllied troops came up they could take

him.In active surrender by the group as a

unit, the positive act of moving acrossto enemy lines was absent but there wasan element common with desertion inthe deliberate attempt to withdraw fromfurther combat. Like many cases of de-sertion, the decision to surrender as agroup was arrived at as a result of

group discussion and mutual agree-ment. The dividing line between activesurrender and desertion brought about

by lagging behind was shadowy. Therewere other forms of group surrenderwhich were clearly different from deser-tion, e.g., the sending of an emissary toarrange terms with the enemy, the re-fusal to carry out aggressive orders, or

to fight a way out of encirclement.In passive surrender, the intention of

a soldier to remove himself from thebattle was often not dear even to him-self. The soldier who was taken prisoner

by passive surrender might have beenimmobilized or apathetic due to anx-iety; he might have been in a stateof bewildered isolation and not have

thought of passive surrender until theperception of an opportunity brought itto his mind. Non-resistant passive sur-render frequently occurred in the caseof soldiers who lay in their foxholes or

hid in the cellars or barns, sometimesself-narcotized by fear, or sometimesdeliberately waiting to be overrun. In

both cases, they made only the mostlimited external gestures of resistancewhen the enemy approached. In thesecond type of passive surrender— tokenresistance—the surrendering soldier de-sired to avoid all the stigma of desertion

or surrender but nevertheless showedreluctance to undertake aggressive ordefensive actions which might have in-

terfered with his survival.An examination of the basic social

organization of the German Army, interms of its primary g roup structure andthe factors which strengthened andweakened its component primarygroups, is first required in order to ac-

count for the stability and cohesion ofresistance, and in order to evaluate the

impact of Allied propaganda.II . The Function of the Primary Group

8

"The company is the only trulyexistent community. This communityallows neither time nor rest for a per-sonal life. It forces us into its circle,for life is at stake. Obviously com-promises must be made and claimsbe surrendered. . . . Therefore the8 "By primary groups I mean those charac-

terized by intimate face-to-face association and

cooperation . . . it is a 'we'; it involves the

sort of sympathy and mutual identification for

which 'we' is the natural expression. One

lives in the feeling of the whole and finds the

chief aims of his will in that feeling" (p.23). . . . "The most important spheres of this

intimate association and cooperation—though

by no means the only ones—are the family,

the play group of children, and the neighbor-

hood or community group of elders" (p.

24). . . . "the only essential thing being a

certain intimacy and fusion of personalities."

(P . 26)

Cooley, Charles Horton, Social Organiza-

tion, New York, 1909.




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idea of fighting, living, and dying

for the fatherland, for the culturalpossessions of die fadierland, is but

a relatively distant diought. At leastit does not play a great role in thepractical motivations of die individu-al."4

Thus wrote an idealistic German stu-dent in die first world war. A Germansergeant, captured toward the end ofthe second world war, was asked by hisinterrogators about the political opinions

of his men. In reply, he laughed andsaid, "When you ask such a question, Irealize well that you have no idea ofwhat makes a soldier fight. The soldierslie in dieir holes and are happy if theylive through the next day. If we diinkat all, it's about the end of die war andthen home."

The fighting effectiveness of die vast

majority of soldiers in combat dependsonly to a small extent on dieir preoccu-pation with the major political valueswhich might be affected by die outcomeof die war and which are die object ofconcern to statesmen and publicists.There arc of course soldiers in whomsuch motivations are important Vol-unteer armies recruited on die basis of

ethical or political loyalties, such as dieInternational Brigade in die SpanishCivil War, are affected by dieir degreeof orientation toward major politicalgoals. In die German Army, the "hardcore" of National Socialists were sim-ilarly motivated.

But in a conscript army, die criterionof recruitment is much less specializedand die army is more representative ofdie total population liable to conscrip-tion. Therefore' die values involved inpolitical and social systems or ethicalschemes do not have much impact ondie determination of a soldier to fight to

die best of his ability and to hold out aslong as possible. For die ordinary Ger-man soldier the decisive fact was diat

he was a member of a squad or sectionwhich maintained its structural integrityand which coincided roughly witii diesocial un it w hich satisfied some of hismajor primary needs.

5 He was likely

to go on fighting, provided he had thenecessary weapons, as long as the grouppossessed leadership with which hecould identify himself, and as long as

he gave affection to and received affec-tion from the odier members of hissquad and platoon. In odier words, aslong as he felt himself to be a memberof his primary group and diereforebound by die expectations and demandsof its odier members, his soldierlyachievement was likely to be good.

Modern social research has shown

that the primary group is not merelydie chief source of affection and accord-ingly die major factor in personalityformation in infancy and childhood.The primary group continues to bethe major source of social and psycho-logical sustenance through adulthood.

6

* Kricgsbrieje gefallener Studenten, 1928,pp . 167-172. Quoted by William K. Pfeiler,

War and the German Mind, New York, 1941,P- 77-8 On the relations between the technical

group and social group cf. Whitchead, T. N.,Leadership in a Free Society, Cambridge,Mass., 1936, Ch. IV.

6 Cooley, op. cit.. Part I, pp. 3-57; Freud S.,

Group Psychology and the Analysis of the Ego,Ch. IV; Mayo, Elton, The Human Problems ofan Industrial Civilization, New York, 1933;Wilson, A. T. M., "The Service Man ComesHome," Pilot Papers: Social Essays and Docu-ments, Vol. 1, No. 2 (Apr. 1946), pp. 9-28;Grinker, R. R. and Spiegel, J. P., Men UnderStress, Philadelphia, 1945, Ch. 3 ; W hitehead,T. N. , op. cit., Ch. I, X, VII; also Lindiay,A. D., The Essentials of D emocracy, Oxford,1935, 2nd ed., pp. 78-81.



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COHESION AND DISINTEGRATION IN TH E WEH RM ACH T 285

In the army, when isolated from civilianprimary groups, the individual soldier

comes to depend more and more on his

military primary group. His spontane-ous loyalties are to its immediate mem-

bers whom he sees daily and withwhom he develops a high degree ofintimacy. For the German soldier inparticular, the demands of his group,

reinforced by officially prescribed rules,had the effect of an external authority.It held his aggressiveness in check; it

provided discipline, protection, and free-dom from autonomous decision.7

Army units with a high degree ofprimary group integrity suffered little

from desertions or from individuallycontrived surrenders. In the W ehrm acht,desertions and surrenders were most

frequent in groups of heterogeneousethnic composition in which Austrians,

Czechs, and Poles were randomly inter-mixed with each other. In such groups

the difficulties of linguistic communica-tion, the large amount of individualresentment and aggressiveness about co-

ercion into German service, the weak-ened support of leadership due to theirinability to identify with German of-

ficers— all these factors hampered theformation of cohesive groups.

Sample interviews with Wehrmachtdeserters made in North Africa in 1943

and in France and Germany in 1944and 1945 showed an overwhelminglydisproportionate representation of ele-

ments which could not be assimilatedinto primary groups. A total of 443Wehrmacht Ps/W captured toward theend of the North African campaign,

consisting of 180 Germans, 200 Austri-ans and 63 others (Czechs, Poles, Yugo-

slavs, etc .), had very markedly different

tendencies towards desertion: 29 per

cent of the Germans were deserters orpotential deserters; 55 per cent of theAustrians fell into these two classes, as

did 78 per cent of the Czechs, Poles,and Yugoslavs. Of the 53 German de-serters, only one declared that he had"political" motives for desertion. In tieWestern European campaign, the bulkof the deserters came from among the"Volksdeutsche,"8 Austrians, Poles, andRussians who had been coerced intoGerman military service. It was clear

that in view of the apolitical characterof most of the deserters, the groundsfor their desertion were to be soughtamong those variables which preventedthe formation of close primary groupbonds, the chief of which were insuper-able language differences, bitter re-sentment against their coerced condi-tion, and the unfriendliness of theGermans in their units.

Among German deserters, who re-mained few until the close of the war,the failure to assimilate into the primarygroup life of the Wehrmacht was themost important factor, more importantindeed than political dissidence. Desert-ers were on the whole men who haddifficulty in personal adjustment, e.g.,in the acceptance of affection or in the

giving of affection. They were men whohad shown these same difficulties incivilian life, having had difficulties withfriends, work associates, and their ownfamilies, or having had criminal records.Political dissidents on the other hand,when captured, justified their failureto desert by invoking their sense of

1 Germ an combat soldiers almost always

stressed the high level of comraddineis intheir units. They frequently referred to their

units as "one big family."8 Individua ls of Germ an ex traction residing

outside the boundaries of Germany.



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as to embrace almost the entire groupmembership during most of the war—accounted for their greater fighting ef-fectiveness. And the fact that such a"hard core" was almost entirely lack-ing from certain Voll{sgrenadier divi-sions helped to a considerable extent toaccount for the military inferiority ofthese units.

One of the functions of the "hardcore" was to minimize the probabilityof divisive political discussions. There

was, of course, little inclination to dis-cuss political matters or even strategicaspects of the war among Germansoldiers. For diis reason widespreaddefeatism concerning the outcome ofthe war had little consequence in af-fecting behavior (until the spring of1945) because of the near impossibility—objective as well as subjective—of dis-

cussing or carrying out alternative plansof action.

In contrast with the "hard core,"which was a disproportionately largestrengthening factor in the integrity ofthe military primary group, the "softcore" was a source of infection whichwas by no means comparable in ef-fectiveness. Unlike the first world war

experience in which anti-war attitudeswere often vigorously expressed and ea-gerly listened to by men who were "goodcomrades," in the second world warthe political anti-militarist or anti-Naziwho expressed his views with frequencyand vigor was also in the main not a"good comrade." There was a completeabsence of soldiers' committees and or-ganized opposition, even in March andApril 1945 (except for the BavarianFreiheitsaktion which was constitutedby rear-echelon troops). On isolated oc-casions, the Western Allies were ableto exploit a man who had been a "good

comrade" and who, after having beencaptured, expressed his defeatism andwillingness to help end the war; he was

thereupon sent back into the Germanline to talk his comrades into going overwith him to the Allied lines. Here the"soft core" man exploited his com-radely solidarity and it was only onthat basis that he was able to removesome of the members of his group fromthe influence of the "hard core."

Community of experience as a cohe-

sive force. The factors which affectgroup solidarity in general were on thewhole carefully manipulated by the Ger-man general staff. Although during thewar Germany was more permeated byforeigners than it had ever been beforein its history, the army was to a greatextent carefully protected from disin-tegrating influences of heterogeneity of

ethnic and national origin, at least incrucial military situations. German of-ficers saw that solidarity is fostered bythe recollection of joindy experiencedgratifications and that accordingly thegroups who had gone through a vic-tory together should not be dissolvedbut should be maintained as units tothe greatest degree possible.

The replacement system of the Wehr-macht operated to the same end.

18 The

entire personnel of a division wouldbe withdrawn from the front simul-taneously and refitted as a unit withreplacements. Since new members wereadded to the division while it was out

1 8 Th is policy sometimes created a teriou s

dilemma for the Wehrmacht. Increasingly, to

preierve the sense of group identity and thebenefits of solidarity which arose from it,

regiments were allowed to become depleted

in manpower by as much as 50 to 75 per cent.

This , however, generated such feelings of

weakness diat the solidarity gains were can-

celled.

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PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY, SUMMER 1948

of line they were thereby given the op-portunity to assimilate themselves intothe group; then the group as a whole

was sent forward. This system con-tinued until close to the end of the warand helped to explain the durability ofthe German Army in the face of theoverwhelming numerical and materialsuperiority of the Allied forces.

Deterioration of group solidarity inthe Wehrmacht which began to appeartoward the very end of the war was

most frcquendy found in hastily fabri-cated units. These were made up ofnew recruits, dragooned stragglers, airforce men who had been forced intothe infantry (and who felt a loss ofstatus in the change), men transferredfrom the navy into the infantry to meetthe emergency of manpower shortage,older factory workers, concentration

camp inmates, and older married menwho had been kept in reserve through-out the war and who had remainedwith the familial primary group untilthe last moment. The latter, who werethe "catch" of the last "total mobiliza-tion" carried with them the resentmentand bitterness which the "total mobiliza-tion" produced and which prevented theflow of affection necessary for groupformation. It was clear that groups sodiverse in age composition and back-ground, and especially so mixed intheir reactions to becoming infantry-men, could not very quickly becomeeffective fighting units. They had notime to become used to one anodier andto develop the type of friendliness whichis possible only when loyalties to out-

side groups have been renounced—orat least put into the background. A pre-view of what was to occur when unitsbecame mixed was provided by the275th Fusilier Battalion which broke up

before the First U.S. Army drive in

November. Thirty-five Ps/W interro-gated from this unit turned out to have

been recendy scraped together from fif-teen different army units.

The most ineffective of all the mil-itary formations employed by die Wehr-macht during the war were the Volks-sturm units. They ranged in age fromboys to old men, and were not evengiven basic training in the weaponswhich they were supposed to use. Th eir

officers were Nazi local functionarieswho were already objects of hostility

and who were dierefore unable to re-lease a flow of affection among equa ls.They had moreover not broken theirfamily ties to the slightest extent. Theystill remained members of a primarygroup which did not fuse into the mil-itary primary group. Finally, diey had

no uniforms. They had only brassardsto identify tnem and through which toidentify themselves widi one anodier.The mutual identification function ofthe uniform which plays so great a role

in military units was thereby lost. Assoon as they were left to their own de-vices, diey disintegrated from within,deserting in large numbers to dieir

homes, hiding, permitting themselvesto be captured, etc.

Factors Weakening PrimaryGroup Solidarity

Isolation. The disintegration of a pri-

mary group depends in part on die

physical and spatial variables which

isolate it from the continuous pres-

sure of face-to-face contact. The factorof spatial proximity in the maintenance

of group solidarity in military situations

must not be underestimated. In Febru-

ary and March of 1945, isolated rem-




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nants of platoons and companies weresurrendering in groups with increasingfrequency. The tactical situation of de-

fensive fighting under heavy Americanartillery bombardment and the deploy-ment of rear outposts forced soldiers totake refuge in cellars, trenches, andodier underground shelters in smallgroups of three and four. This pro-longed isolation from the nucleus ofthe primary group for several daysworked to reinforce die fear of destruc-

tion of die self, and thus had a disin-tcgrative influence on primary group re-lations.1* A soldier who was isolated ina cellar or in a concrete bunker for sev-eral days and whose anxieties aboutphysical survival were aggravated bythe tactical hopelessness of his situation,was a much more easily separable mem-ber of his group tJian one who, dioughfearing physical destruction, was stillbound by die continuous and vital tiesof working, eating, sleeping, and beingat leisure togedier with his fellow sol-diers.

This proposition regarding the highsignificance of the spatial variable forprimary group solidarity and die main-tenance of the fighting effectiveness ofan army is supported by die behavior of

die retreadng German Army in NorthAfrica in 1943, and in France and Ger-many in September-October 1944 andMarch 1945. As long as a retreat is or-derly and the structure of die com-ponent units of an army is maintained,strategic difficulties do not break up diearmy. An army in retreat breaks uponly when the retreat is poorly organ-

ized, when command is lost over themen, so that diey become separatedfrom their units and become stragglers,or when enemy penetrations isolate larg-

er or smaller formations from die main

group."Stragglers first became a moderately

serious problem in die German Armyin October 1944. On October 22, 1944,General Keitel ordered diat a maximumof one to three days be allowed forstragglers to reattach themselves to tieirunits. The previous limit had been fivedays. The aggravation of die stragglerproblem was further documented byGeneral Blaskowitz's order of March 5,

1945, according to which die categoryof stragglers was declared to have ceasedto exist. Soldiers who lost contact wididieir own units were directed to attachthemselves immediately to die "firsttroops in die line which he can con-tact. . . ."

Familial ties and primary groupdisintegration. Prisoners of war re-marked widi considerable frequency

diat discussions about alternative padisof action by groups of soldiers who wereentirely defeatist arose not from discus-sions about die war in its political orstrategic aspects, but radier from discus-sions about die soldiers' families.16 Therecollection of concrete family experi-

1 4 Th is pro position is in opposition to thefrequently asserted view that social solidarity

of an intense sort is positively and linearlyrelated to fear of threat from the outside.1 8 The G erm an in the Channel ports were

able to resist so long partly because the menremained together where they were constantly

in each other's presence. Thus the authorityof the group over the individual was con-

stantly in play.1 8 A 3 6-year-old soldier—a Berlin radio-

worker—who surrendered prematurely, said:

"During one month in a bunker without lightand without much to do, the men often dis-

cujsed capture. Conversation usually suitedabout families: who was married and what

was to become of his family? The subject be-came more acute as the Americans ap-

proached."



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enccs reactivated sentiments of depend-ence on the family for psychological sup-port and correspondingly weakened the

hold of the military primary group. Itwas in such contexts that German sol-diers toward the end of the war werewilling Co discuss group surrender.

To prevent preoccupation with familyconcerns, the families of German sol-diers were given strict instructions toavoid references to family deprivationsin letters to the front. In the winter andspring of 1945, when Allied air raidsbecame so destructive of communal life,all telegrams to soldiers at the front hadto be passed fey party officials in order toinsure that no distracting news reachedthe soldiers. On the other hand, carewas taken by party and army authori-ties that soldiers should not be left ina state of anxiety about their familiesand to this end vigorous propaganda

was carried on to stimulate corre-spondence with soldiers at the front.For those who had no families andwho needed the supplementary affectionwhich the army unit could not provide,provisions were made to obtain mailfrom individuals (including party offi-cials) who would befriend unmarriedor family-less soldiers, with the result

that the psychic economy of the soldierwas kept in equilibrium.

There was, however, a special typeof situation in which the very strengthof familial ties served to keep the armyfrom further disintegration. This arosetowards the end of the war, when sol-diers were warned that desertion wouldresult in severe sanctions being inflicted

on the deserter's family.

17

Toward the end of the war, soldierstended to break away from the armymore often while they were on leaveand with their families, and therefore

isolated from personal contact with theirprimary group fellows. When soldiersreturned to visit their families, then the

conflict between contradictory primarygroup loyalties became acute. The holdof the military primary group becamedebilitated in the absence of face-to-facecontacts. The prospect of facing, on re-turn to the front, physical destructionor a prolonged loss of affection fromthe civilian primary group, especiallythe family, prompted an increasingnumber of desertions while on furlough.

All of these factors contributed toloosen the solidarity of the GermanArmy, especially when the prospect ofphysical destruction began to weighmore heavily. Severe threats to the safe-ty of the civilian primary group createdanxiety which often weakened the holdof the military primary group. Whenthe area of the soldier's home was oc-

cupied by the enemy or when the sol-dier himself was fighting in the area,there was strong disposition to deserthomew ard. One such soldier said: "NowI have nothing more for which to fight,because my home is occupied."

The strong pull of the civilian pri-mary group became stronger as thecoherence of the army group weakened.

But sometimes, the former worked tokeep the men fighting in their units,i.e., when they reasoned that the short-est way home was to keep the groupintact and to avoid capture or desertion.Otherwise there would ensue a long

1 1 This threat was never actually carried out.

Furthermore, the Sichcrheiudicnft (Security

Service) admitted the impossibility of taking

sanctions against the deserter's family becauseof the difficulty of locating them in the dis-

order of German civilian life. As the German

soldiers became aware of the impotence of the

SD in this respect, this barrier against deser-

tion weakened.



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period in an enemy P/W camp. Onthe other hand, in event of the defeat ofa still intact army, there would be only

a short period of waiting before de-mobilization.

Demand for physical survival. Theindividual soldier's fear of destructionultimately pressed to weaken primarygroup cohesion; nevertheless it is strik-ing to note the degree to which demandsfor physical survival could be exploitedby Wehrmacht authority to the end of

prolonging resistance. Where the socialconditions were otherwise favorable, theprimary bonds of group solidarity weredissolved only under the most extremecircumstances of threat to the individu-al organism—in situations where thetactical prospects were utterly hopeless,under devastating artillery and air bom-bardment, or where the basic food and

medical requirements were not beingmet. Although aware for a long timeof the high probability of German de-feat in the war and of the hopelessnessof the numerous individual battles, verymany German soldiers continued to re-sist without any serious deterioration inthe quality of their fighting skill. Butwhere the most basic physiological de-mands of the German soldier werethreatened with complete frustration, thebonds of group solidarity were broken.

Concern about food and about healthalways reduces the solidarity of a group.Throughout the war, and until the pe-riod just before the end, German armymedical services were maintained at ahigh level of efficiency; the decline intheir efficiency coincides with the de-terioration in the morale of the men.Special care was also observed in themanagement of the food supply andaccordingly few German soldiers feltthat the food supplies were inadequate.

Indeed, as late as October 1944, only15 per cent of a sample of 92 Ps/W de-clared that they were at all dissatisfied

with army food. By January, however,the situation changed and Ps/W re-ported increased preoccupation withphysical survival, with food, and theshortage of clothing. Soldiers in certainunits were beginning to "scrounge."The extreme cold of the winter of '44-'45 also began to tell on the men whosemilitary self-esteem was being reduced

by the raggedncss of their uniforms andthe failure to obtain replacements forunsatisfactory equipment.

Thus, to keep groups integral, it wasnecessary not only to provide positivegratifications but also to reduce to aminimum the alternative possibilities ofincreasing the chances for survival byleaving the unit. For this reason the

Nazis sought to counteract the fear ofpersonal physical destruction in battleby telling the men that accurate recordswere kept on deserters and that notonly would their families and propertybe made to suffer in the event of theirdesertion, but that after the war, upontheir return to Germany, they, too,would be very severely punished. Theywere also told by their officers that Ger-man agents were operating in Americanand British P/W cages in order to re-port on violations of security and ondeserters. A Wehrmacht leaflet to Ger-man soldiers mentioned the names oftwo deserters of the 980th Volksgrena-diere who were alleged to have divulgedinformation and stated that not onlywould their families be sent to prison

and suffer the loss of their property andration cards, but that the men them-selves would also be punished after thewar. In actuality, they were often pun-ished in the P / W camps by the extreme


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Nazis who exercised some control incertain camps.

For the same reason, as long as the

front was relatively stable, the Wehr-macht officers increased the natural haz-ards of war by ordering mine fields tobe laid, barbed wire to be set up, and

special guards to be posted to limit thefreedom of movement of isolated andpsychologically unattached individualswho, in situations which offered thechance of safely withdrawing from the

war, wou ld have moved over to die ene-my's lines. Although die number ofavowedly would-be deserters remained

very small until near the end of the war,even they were frequendy immobilizedfor fear of being killed by die devices

set up to prevent tiieir separation fromthe group. The danger of destruction

by die Allies in event of desertion also

played a part in keeping men attachedto dieir military units. As one P /W who

had thought of desertion but who nevertook action said, "by day our own peo-

ple shoot at us, by night yours do."Anodier physical narcissistic element

which contributed somewhat to resist-

ance on the Western front was fear ofcastration in event of die loss of die

war. (This was effective only amonga minority of the German soldiers.) Theguilt feelings of die Nazi soldiers who

had slaughtered and marauded on theEastern front, and elsewhere in Europe,and dieir projection onto the enemy of

their own sadistic impulses, heightenedtheir narcissistic apprehensiveness about

damage to their vital organs and to their

physical organism as a whole. Rumorsof castration at the hands of the Rus-

sians circulated in the German Armythroughout die last diree years of diewar and it is likely that diey were large-

ly die result of rudiless methods on bodisides.

The Nazis perceived die function of

fear of personal destruction in theevent of capture as a factor in keepinga group intact after die internal bondshad been loosened. There were accord-ingly situations in which SS detach-ments deliberately committed atrocitieson enemy civilians and soldiers in orderto increase die anxieties of German sol-diers as to what would befall them in

die event of dieir defeat and capture.This latter policy was particularly dras-tically applied by die Waffen-SS in dievon Rundstedt counter-offensive. It ap-pears to have been an effort to convinceGerman soldiers diat there were noalternatives but victory or resistance todie very end and tliat surrender or de-sertion would end widi slaughter of die

German soldiers, as it had in the casesof die Allied soldiers. This was noteffective for die mass of the Germansoldiers, however, who were becomingconvinced that the law-abiding Britishand Americans would not in most situa-tions harm them upon capture.

The dread of destruction of die self,

and die demand for physical survival,while breaking up die spontaneous soli-darity of die military primary group inmost cases, thus served under certainconditions to coerce die soldier intoadherence to his group and to die ex-ecution of the orders of his superiors.

I I I . The Role of "Soldierly Honor"

American and British soldiers tendto consider dieir wartime service as a

disagreeable necessity, as a task whichhad to be performed because there wereno alternatives. For the German, beinga soldier was a more dian acceptablestatus. It was indeed honorable. The


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COHESION AND DISINTEGRA TION IN TH E WEHR MA CHT 293

King's Regulations which govern theBritish Army (1940) begin with thestatement that the army consists of

officers and men serving for variouslengths of time. The German equivalentin the Defense Laws of 1935 openswith a declaration that "military serv-ice is a service of honor for the Germanpeople, the Wehrmacht is the armedbarrier and the soldierly school of theGerman people."

Emphasis on the element of honor in

the military profession has led in Ger-many to the promulgation of elaboraterules of conduct regulating the be-havior of both officers and men in agreat variety of specific military andextra-military situations.18 The explicitand implicit code of soldierly honor,regulating the responsibilities of officersfor their men, determined behavior inbattle and established conditions underwhich surrender was honorable. It alsoprovided a very comprehensive body ofetiquette. T his elaborate ritualization ofthe military profession had a significant-ly positive influence on group solidarityand efficiency during periods of stress."Honor" rooted in a rigid conscience(superego) served in the German Armyto keep men at their tasks better than in-

dividual reflection and evaluation couldhave done. When the individual wasleft to make decisions for himself, thewhole host of contradictory impulses to-ward authority of officers and of thegroup as an entity was stimulated.

Domination by higher authority waseagerly accepted by most ordinary sol-diers, who feared that if they were al-

lowed to exercise their initiative their in -nere Schweinhunde, i.e., their own nar-cissistic and rebellious impulses, wouldcome to the fore. On the other hand,rigorous suppression of these impulses

constituted an appeasement of the super-ego which allowed the group machineryto function in an orderly manner.

The belief in the efficacy and moralworth of discipline and in the inferior-ity of the spontaneous, primary reactionsof the personality was expressed in thejettisoning of the German Army Psychi-atric Selection Services in 1942. Whenthe manpower shortage became strin-gent and superfluities had to be scrapped,the personnel selection system based on

personality analyses was one of thoseactivities which was thought to be dis-pensable. Apparently taking individualpersonality differences into account wasthought to be too much of a concessionto moral weakness which could and inany case should be overcome by hard,soldierly discipline.

Strength as an element in honor. Forpersons who have deep-lying uncertain-ties over their own weaknesses, whofear situations which will reveal theirweakness in controlling themselves andtheir lack of manliness, membership inan army will tend to reduce anxieties.Subjugation to discipline gives such per-sons support; it means that they do nothave to depend on themselves, thatsomeone stronger than themselves is

guiding and protecting them. Amongyoung males in middle and late adoles-cence, the challenges of love and voca-tion aggravate anxieties about weak-ness. At this stage fears about potencyare considerable. When men who havepassed through this stage are placed inthe entirely male society of a militaryunit, freed from the control of adult

civilian society and missing its gratifica-1 8

Demeter , Kar l , Das deutschc Heer und

seine Offiziere, Berlin, n.d., Ch. 3 and 5;

Broch, Hermann, The Sleepwalkers, London,

n.d.

a t Y a l e Uni v e r s i t y o

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tions, they tend to regress to the adoles-cent condition. The show of "tough-ness" and hardness which is regarded

as a virtue among soldiers is a responseto these reactivated adolescent anxietiesabout weakness.

In the German Army, all these tend-encies were intensified by the m ilitarycode, and they accounted for a con-siderable share of the cohesion and re-sistance up to the very last stages of thewar. Among those at the extreme endof the scale—the "hard core" of Nazilast-ditch resisters—in whom the pre-occupation with strength and weaknessis to be found in most pronounced form—this attitude was manifested in un-willingness of some to acknowledge de-feat even after capture.

The honor of the officer. To controlthe behavior of officers and to protectsoldierly honor, the Court of Honor

procedure of the Imperial Army wasreestablished when the Nazis c^me intopower. Its function was to adjudicatedisagreements and quarrels between of-ficers in an authoritative way, and itdid succeed in minimizing disagree-ments and unpleasant tensions amongofficers in both professional and privateaffairs which might otherwise have en-

dangered solidarity of the group bydivision among those in immediate au-thority. The settlement, which was ar-rived at in secret by officers of the samerank as those involved in the dispute,was almost always accepted without amurmur by both parties. Its minutelydetailed procedural and substantive rulesreduced to a minimum the possibilitythat an officer might feel that the col-

lective authority which ruled over himwas weak, negligible, or impotent inany sphere. The code went so far asto empower the court to recomm end

suspension from duty simply on thegrounds of unehrliche Gesinnung (dis-honorable attitude) derogatory to the

status of the officer class. External dis-cipline penetrated thus into even themost private sphere to give assurancethat soldierly honor would be operativeeven in the recesses of the individualmind.10 The officers' court of honor,not only served as an "external super-ego," but by its continuous emphasis on"honor" and "dishonor," it heightenedthe sensibilities of the officers to the de-mands of their own superego.

One of the most elaborated aspectsof soldierly honor as related to combatbehavior dealt with the conditions un-der which surrender could be honor-ably performed. In this respect, greatstress was laid on the oath which boundsoldiers not to desert or surrender, andmuch casuistical effort was expended to

make surrender compatible with sol-dierly honor. In some cases soldiers ar-ranged circumstances in such a way aswould appear to others, as well as tothemselves, that they had been capturedagainst their will. In other cases, sur-render was excused as legitimate ac-cording to accepted military standards.In a few cases, fortification command-

ers required that a token round ofphosphorous shells be fired against theirposition in order to satisfy the require-ments of their honor. Deserters oftenattempted to appease their conscienceby ingenious arguments to the effectthat the oaths which they took weresigned with pencil, or that the sergeantwho administered the oath turned hisback on them, or that they had been

1 9 Indee d, a well known Germ an general

during the period of captivity felt to strongly

the pressure of soldierly honor that he always

went to sleep wearing hi« monocle.



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Nonetheless, desertion by German of-ficers was extremely rare, and only oc-

casionally did they bring about the

group surrender of their men; moretypically they protected their soldierlyhonor by allowing themselves to beoverrun.

Senior non-commissioned officers dis-played a sense of military honor very

similar to that of junior officers, buteven closer identification with theircomrades precipitated a crisis in loyal-

ties which weighed still more heavily ontheir consciences. Ordinarily, soldierlyhonor and primary group solidarity are

not only congruous with one anotherbut actually mutually supporting. Incrisis situations, however, the diver-gence between them begins to appearand loyalty to the larger army group(the strategically relevant unit), which

is an essential component of soldierlyhonor, enters into contradiction toloyalty to the primary group.

Until the failure of von Rundstedt'scounter-offensive, soldierly honor on

the part of senior NCO's tended to out-weigh primary group solidarity where-ever they came into conflict with eachother. As the final Allied drive against

the homeland developed, they becameless disposed to carry out "last-ditch"

resistance, but when captured theyshowed signs of having experiencedguilt feelings for not having done so.The recognition of the overwhelmingAllied strength in their particularsectors, together with physical absence

from the immediate environment of

their superior officers (which was afunction of the decreasing ratio of of-ficers to men) made it possible for themto offer only token resistance or to allow

themselves to be overrun. They relieved

their consciences by declaring that fur-

ther bloodshed would have served nofurther military purpose.

The infantry soldier s honor. Th e codeof soldierly honor and its ramificationstook a deep root in the personality ofthe German soldiers of the line—even

those who were totally apolitical.Identification with the stern authorityassociated with the symbols of Statepower gave the ordinary Germansoldier a feeling that he became strong

and morally elevated by submitting todiscipline. For these people a militarycareer was a good and noble one, en-joying high intrinsic ethical value. Evenapathetic and inarticulate soldiers some-times grew eloquent on the values of

the military life.

The most defeatist soldier, who in-sisted that he longed to be captured and

that he offered little or no resistance,was careful to point out th at he was not

a deserter, and showed anxiety lest theconditions under which he was capturedmight be interpreted as desertion. Thiswas of course to some extent the resultcf the fear that German police would

retaliate against his family if his com-pany commander reported that he had

deserted and that the Nazis would seekrevenge against him, either in the P/Wcamp, or after the war in Germany.But at least of equal significance was his

desire to maintain his pride in havingbeen a good soldier who had done hisduty.20 Anti-Nazi German soldiers who

2 0 Frequently G erman soldiers who were

reluctant to desert separated1 themselves from

battle by hiding in cellars or dugouts, waiting

to be overrun. Such soldiers often thought itmorally necessary to volunteer the explanation

for their capture that they had been found

by the enemy because they had fallen asleep

from exhaustion and had been taken against

their will.


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went to some length to inform the in-terrogators of their anti-Nazi politicalattitudes felt no inconsistency in in-

sisting that despite everything theywere "100 per cent soldiers." Only avery small minority admitted freely thatthey deserted.

IV, Relations with Authority:Officer-Man Relations

The basis of the officers' status. The

primary group relations in modern

armies, especially in the German Army,depend as much on the acceptance of

the various authorities to which the

soldier is subjected as on mutual respect

and love between individuals of equal

rank. The non-commissioned and the

junior officers are the agents on whom

the individual soldier depends in his

relationships with the rest of the army

outside his immediate group, and in hisrelations with the outer world (the

home front and the enemy). They have

charge of his safety, and they are the

channels through which flow food,

equipment, and other types of supplies

as well as chance symbolic gratifica-

tions such as decorations, promotions,

leave, etc. For the German soldier, with

his authoritarian background, the of-ficer-m an relation is one of submission

to an overriding authority.

An exceptionally talented regular

German Army officer, bred in the

German military tradition, once tried

to summarize to his interrogator what

made the German Army "work": polit-

ical indoctrination and "pep talks" were

"all rot"; whether the men would fol-low him depended upon the person-

ality of the officer. The leader must be

a man who possesses military skill: then

his men will know that he is protecting

them. He must be a model to his men;he must be an all-powerful, and still

benevolent, authority.

He must look after his men's needs,and be able to do all the men's dutiesbetter than they themselves in trainingand under combat conditions. The menmust also be sure that their officer isduly considerate of their lives: they

must know that he does not squanderhis human resources, that the losses oflife which occur under his command

will be minimal and justified. In thetraining of NCO's for officers, theGerman Army acted on the basis of

such maxims, despite the Nazi Party'spropagandistic preoccupation with suchsecondary aspects of morale as politicalideology.

The positions of the officer and of theNCO were dependent on discipline and

on the sanctions by which discipline ismaintained and enforced. During train-ing the Wehrmacht laid down the mostsevere disciplinary rules. In combat,even before Germany's military fortunesbegan to contract, life and death powers

over the troops were vested in lowercommanders. At the same time elab-orate precautions were taken to control

and even to counteract their severity incertain spheres of behavior. Officers

were warned against senseless and un-necessary insults directed against theirmen. Special orders were issued andparticular attention was paid in thetraining of officers to fatherly and con-siderate behavior in relations with their

men; the combination of sternness and

benevolence was strongly counseled.Numerous small indications of affectionsuch as congratulations on birthdaysand on anniversaries, and fatherlymodes of address, e.g., Kinder (chil-


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dren) , were recommended as helping to

build the proper relations between of-ficers and men.

The results of this approach to statusrelationships appear to have been good.Differences in privileges between of-

ficers and enlisted men in combat unitsalmost never emerged as an object ofcomplaint on the part of enlisted P s/W .

On the contrary, complaints of "soft-

ness" were more frequently directed

against officers and enlisted men in the

rear. The infantry soldier seldom at-tempted to attribute deficiencies inmilitary operations to his immediate

superiors. Spontaneous praise, in fact,was frequent.

German soldiers—both officers andmen—greatly appreciated the ceremo-

nial acknowledgment of hierarchicaldifferences as expressed, for example, in

the military salute. Captured Germanswho saw the American Army in Great

Britain before D-Day were often con-temptuous of an enemy who was ob-

viously so lax in dress and salute. Manyof diem said that the American Army

could not be expected to fight wellsince the relations between officers and

enlisted men were so informal. "This is

no army." Such views of the value ofthe ceremonial aspects of discipline per-

sisted in defeat. Ps/W taken late in thewar, when they commented on Ameri-

can officer-man relations, often remarkedwith incredulous wonderment: "I don't

see how it works "

Not only was the position of Germanofficers strengthened by their mixture

of severe dominion and benevolence,but additional support for their author-

ity came from the provision for theblameless gratification of primitive

impulses and from die sanctioning of

all types of aggressive social behavior

outside the army group. Private per-sonal transgressions of "civil" ethics

were regarded as of slight importance,since they were outside the limits ofthe "manly com radeship" of the military

primary group. Drunkenness and hav-ing women in the barracks were crimes

which the officers overlooked; in oc-cupied and enemy countries the latitude

in personal and private transgressionswas even greater. Provision was made

for official houses of prostitution inwhich soldiers could reassure them-

selves about their manliness withoutdisrupting the disciplinary structure of

the Wehrmacht. This combination ofpractices lowered the probability of

tensions in officer-man relationships.

NCO's and junior officers. In batde,

leadership responsibility devolved in

actuality on the senior NCO's (the op-posite numbers of American platoonsergeants) and on the company grade

officers. Only seldom did a line soldiersee his battalion commander and even

less frequendy was he spoken to byhim. Thus battalion commanders and

other higher officers played a lesscentral role in the personality system

of the G-erman soldier. They weretherefore less direcdy related to diesolidarity of the military primary group.

Nearly all non-commissioned and

commissioned officers of the companygrade level were regarded by the Ger-

man soldier throughout the Westerncampaign as brave, efficient, and con-

siderate. It was only in the very final

phases of the war diat Ps/W occa-sionally complained diat diey had beenabandoned by their officers, and there

was reason to believe that such com-plaints were justified not by facts but


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by the resurgence of uninhibited hos-

tility against officers who, having beendefeated, could now be looked upon

as having shown weakness.In addition, the slight increase in

anti-officer sentiment which occurredduring the last two months of the war,

may be related not to the decline incompetence, courage, or devotion on

the part of the officers, but rather to thefact that the heavy losses of the Wehr-

macht's trained junior officers had led

to a large reduction in the ratio of thejunior officers to men. In consequence,in order to use the available officers

most economically, it was necessary to"thin" them out.31 This resulted in a

reduction in the amount of face-to-facecontact between officers and men and

in reduced feeling of the officers' pro-tective function. And this, in turn,

sometimes tipped the balance of thesubmissiveness-rebelliousness scale, inthe successful manipulation of which

lay the secret of the effective control ofthe German Army.

The junior officers of the Wehrmacht

were, in general, very well selected.They were better educated than the

average German, and had received ex-

tensive preliminary training. AlthoughNazi Party politics played a role in thegeneral selection of officers (despite the

facade of a non-political Wehrmacht)the junior officer ranks never became afield of patronage. High technical and

personality requirements were made ofall candidates for officership, Nazi and

non-Nazi.

These facts were appreciated bymany of the more intelligent enlisted

Ps/W who testified that the influenceof highly placed friends or of Party con-

nections had practically no effect on an

officer candidate's chances for selection,

if he lacked the necessary qualifications

for making a good officer.

Equally important in the provision offirm, "hard," and protective leadership,

were the senior non-commissioned of-

ficers, who were everywhere appreciated

as the most solid asset of the Wehr-

macht. Until 1943, more than half of

the NCO's who became Ps/W had

belonged to the pre-1935 German

Army. These men were neither very

interested in politics nor very aggressive,but were thoroughly trained, solid men

who were doing their job out of a

deeply-rooted sense of duty to the

soldierly profession.

As the war progressed, their numbers

declined and less well-trained men took

their place. In the last stages of the

war, when the speed in reforming units

was increased, the top non-commis-sioned officers often did not have suf-

ficient time to promote the growth of

strong identifications between them-

selves and their men. In February 1945,

for the first time, Ps/W began to com-

plain that "they didn't even have time

to learn our names." The disintegration

which set in in the Wehrmacht at this

time was in part due to the decliningvalue of the NCO as a cohesive factor

in the military primary group.

Senior officers. The High Command

and the senior officers, although gen-

2 1 The absence of officers relaxed disciplinary

controls. Thus soldiers who lay in bunkers and

who "didn't see any officers for weeks" were

more likely to desert or to allow themselves

to be captured. The presence of the officer hadthe same function as other primary group

members—he strengthened the superego by

granting affection for duties performed and by

threatening to withdraw it for duties disre-

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erally esteemed, were not directly rel-evant in the psychological structure of

the military primary group. They were

in the main less admired than thejunior officers because their physicalremoteness made it easier to expresshostile sentiments against them; they

stood between the Fiihrer and thejunior officers and NCO's. And whilethe latter three obtained a positive affectfrom the ambivalent attitude towardauthority of so many of the soldiers,

the general officers themselves weremade to some extent into the recipientsof the hostile component of the soldier'sauthority-attitude. The failure of thePutsch of July 20 served to lower theesteem in which the High Command

was held, although in general there wasnot a very lively reaction to that in-cident. Stalwart Nazis viewed it as a

case of treason, and for the time beingthe concentration of their hostility ongenerals whose names were announced

in public increased their confidence inthose generals whom the Fiihrer leftin charge. Other soldiers, less passion-ately political, were inclined to turntheir backs on the unsuccessful plottersbecause of the weakness manifested in

their failures. But the situation was onlytemporary, and in any case the officerson whom the men in the field felt theydepended were but little affected. Theloss of prestige of the immediate of-

ficers was too small to make any differ-ence in batde behavior, while seniorofficers in whom confidence had de-clined to a greater extent were too re-

mote in the soldier's mind to make muchdifference in his combat efficiency.

V. Secondary Symbols

From the preceding section it is ap-parent that the immediately present

agents and symbols of political authority—junior officers, NCO's, and concep-tions of soldierly honor—were effective

because of their consistency with thepersonality system of the individual

soldier. In this section, we shall ex-amine the effectiveness of the remoter—or secondary—agents and symbols ofstate audiority.

Strategic aspects of the war. For themass of the German Army, the strategicphases of the war were viewed apatheti-

cally. The ignorance of the Germantroops about important military events,even on their own front, was partly aresult of the poverty of informationabout the actual course of the war—it-self a part of Nazi policy.22 But the de-

liberate management of ignorance neednot always result in such far-reachingindifference as the German soldiers

showed. Deliberately maintained igno-rance would have resulted in a flood

of rumors, had the German soldiersbeen more eager to know about thestrategic phases of the war. As it was,there were very few rumors on thesubject—merely apathy. Three weeksafter the fall of the city of Aachen, there

were still many prisoners being taken

in the adjoining area who did not knowthat the city had fallen. For at least aweek after the beginning of von Rund-stedt's counter-offensive, most of thetroops on the northern hinge of the

bulge did not know that the offensivewas taking place and were not muchinterested when they were told aftercapture. Of 140 Ps/W taken between

December 23-24, 1944, only 35 per centhad heard of the counter-offensive and

I s Naz i propagandists, w ith their hyper-

political orientation, tended to overestimate the

German soldier's responsiveness to politics.



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only 7 per cent said that they thoughtit significant.28

Some exception to this extensive stra-tegic indifference existed with respect tothe Eastern front. Although the Ger-man soldiers were extremely ignorantof the state of affairs on that front andmade little attempt to reduce their ig-norance, still the question of Russianswas so emotionally charged, so much thesource of anxiety, that it is quite likelythat fear of the Russians did play a role

in strengthening resistance. National So-cialist propaganda had long worked onthe traditional repugnance and fear ofthe German towards the Russian. Theexperience of the German soldiers inRussia in 1941 and 1942 increased thisrepugnance by direct perception of theprimitive life of the Russian villager.But probably more important was the

projection onto the Russians of theguilt feelings generated by the ruthlessbrutality of the Germans in Russia dur-ing the occupation period. The shudderof horror which frequently accompanieda German soldier's remarks about Rus-sia was a result of all of these factors.These attitudes influenced German re-sistance in the West through the shift

of soldiers from East to West and theconsequent diffusion of their attitudesamong their comrades. They also tookeffect by making soldiers worry aboutwhat would happen to their families ifthe Russians entered Germany. Ofcourse, it should also be mentioned thatthis fear of the Russians also made someGerm an soldiers welcome a speedier col-lapse on the Western front in the hopethat a larger part of Germany wouldfall under Anglo-American control.

Before the actual occupation, only asmall minority expressed fear of the

consequences of an Anglo-American oc-

cupation. The continuing monthly opin-

ion poll conducted by the Psychological

Warfare Branch, mentioned elsewhere,

never showed more than 20 per cent of

the prisoners answering "yes" to the

question, "Do you believe that revenge

will be taken against the population

after the war?" Those who feared retri-

bution were confirmed Nazis. Yet the

general absence of fear of revenge did

not cause a diminution of German re-

sistance.

Neither did expectations about the

outcome of the war play a great role

in the integration or disintegration of

the German Army. The statistics re-

garding German soldier opinion cited

below show that pessimism as to final

triumph was quite compatible with ex-

cellence in fighting behavior. The far

greater effectiveness of considerationsof self-preservation, and their vast pre-

ponderance over interest in the outcome

of the war and the strategic situation, is

shown by German prisoner recall of the

contents of Allied propaganda leaflets

(see Table 1). In the last two months

of 1944 and the first two months of

1945, not less than 59 per cent of the

sample of prisoners taken each monthrecalled references to the preservation

of the individual, and the figure rose to

76 per cent in February of 1945. On the

other hand, the proportion of prisoners

recalling references to the total strategic

situation of the war and the prospect

of the outcome of the war seldom

1 8

The fart that the High Com mand madeno attempt to explain away the defeat of the

counter-offensive may have been due, among

other thingf, to its conviction of the irrelevance

of itrategic consideration in the morale of the

ordinary soldier.



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example, only 5 per cent of a sample of634 Ps/W said that they were worried

about anything other than personal or

familial problems, while in the verysame survey, more than half of thePs/W said they believed that Germany

was losing the war or that they were atbest uncertain of the war's outcome. In

brief, fear for Germany's future as a na-tion does not seem to have been very

important in the ordinary soldier's out-look and in motivating his combat be-

havior. As a matter of fact, as the warbecame more and more patently a th reat

to the persistence of the German na-tional state, the narcissism of the Ger-man soldier increased correspondingly,

so that the idea of national survival didnot become an object of widespread pre-

occupation even when it might havebeen expected to become so.24

Ethical-religious scruples seem to haveplayed an equally small role. Although

there were a few interesting cases of Ro-man Catholic deserters, Roman Cath-

olics (except Austrians, Czechs andPolish nationals) do not seem to have

deserted disproportionately. Prisonersseldom expressed remorse for Nazi

atrocities, and practically no case was

noted of a desertion because of moralrepugnance against Nazi atrocities.

Political ideals. The significance ofpolitical ideals, of symbols of political

systems, was rather pronounced in thecase of the "hard core" minority of

fervent Nazis in the German Army.Their desire for discipline under a

strong leader made them enthusiasts

for the totalitarian political system.Th eir passionate aggressiveness also pro-moted projective tendencies which fa-

cilitated their acceptance of the Nazipicture of an innocent and harmless

Germany encircled by the dark, threat-ening cloud of Bolsheviks, Jews, Ne-

groes, etc., and perpetually in danger

from inner enemies as well. But formost of the German soldiers, the politi-cal system of National Socialism was of

little interest.

The system was indeed of very slight

concern to German civilians also, eventhough dissatisfaction increased to a

high pitch towards the end of the war.Soldiers on the whole were out of

touch with the operation of the Partyon the home front. Hence the politicalsystem impinged little on their con-

sciousness. Thus, for example, of 53potential and actual deserters in the

Mediterranean theater, only one allegedpolitical grounds for his action. The

irrelevance of party politics to effec-tive soldiering has already been treated

above: here we need only repeat thestatement of a German soldier, "Nazism

begins ten miles behind the front line."

Nor did the soldiers react in any

noticeable way to the various attemptsto Nazify the army. When the Nazi

Party salute was introduced in 1944, itwas accepted as just one more armyorder, about equal in significance to

an order requiring the carrying of gasmasks. Th e introduction of the National

Sodalistische Fuh rungsoffiziere (Guid-

ance, or Indoctrination Officer), usually

known as the NS FO, was regarded apa-

2 4 The proposition often asserted1 during the

war that the Allies' refusal to promise a

"soft peace" to the Germans was prolonging

the war, i.e., that German military resistance

was motivated by fear of what the Allies

would do to Germany in event of its defeat,

scarcely finds support in the fact that in Oc-

tober 1944, when the German front was stiff-

ening, 74 per cent of a sample of 345 Ps/W

said they did not expect revenge to be taken

against the German population after the war.


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PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY, SUMMER 1948 4

thetically or as a joke. The contempt forthe NSFO was derived not from hisNazi connection but from his status as

an "outsider" who was not a real sol-dier. The especially Nazified WafienSS divisions were never the object ofhostility on the part of the ordinary sol-dier, even when the responsibility foratrocities was attributed to them. On thecontrary, the Waffen SS was highly es-teemed, not as a Nazi formation, butfor its excellent fighting capacity. W ehr-

macht soldiers always felt safer whenthere was a Wafien SS unit on theirflank.

Devotion to Hitler. In contrast to theutterly apolitical attitude of the Ger-man infantry soldier towards almostall secondary symbols, an intense andpersonal devotion to Adolph Hiderwas maintained in the German Army

throughout the war. There could belittle doubt that a high degree of iden-tification widi the Fuhrer was an im-portant factor in prolonging Germanresistance. Despite fluctuations in ex-pectations as to the outcome of the warthe trust in Hider remained at a veryhigh level even after die beginning ofthe serious reverses in France and Ger-many. In monthly opinion polls of Ger-man Ps/W opinion from D-Day untilJanuary 1945, in all but two samplesover 60 per cent expressed confidence inHider,25 and confidence in January wasnearly as high as it was in the preced-ing June. During diis same period con-siderably more dian half of the Germansoldiers in seven out of eight polls saidthey believed that it was impossible for

the German Army to defeat the Alliesin France. Only when die German Ar-my began to break up in the face ofoverwhelming Allied fire power and

deep, communications-cutting penetra-tions, did confidence in Hider fall tothe unprecedentedly low level of 30

per cent. Even when defeatism was ris-ing to the point at which only one-tendi of the prisoners taken as of March1945 believed diat die Germans had anychance of success, still a diird retainedconfidence in Hider.26

Belief in die good intentions of dieFuhrer, in his eminent moral qualities,in his devodon and contributions to

die well-being of die German people,continued on an even higher level. Thisstrong attachment grew in large partfrom die feeling of strength and protec-tion which die German soldier got fromhis conception of die Fuhrer personality.

For older men, who had liveddirough die unemployment of the clos-ing years of die Weimar Republic and

who experienced the joy of being rein-stated in gainful employment by Nazifull-employment policies, Hider wasabove all die man who had providedeconomic security. This attitude extend-ed even to left wing soldiers of diisgeneration, who denounced die Na-tional Socialist political system, butfound occasion to say a good word forHider as a man who had restored orderand work in Germany. For men of diegeneration between 22-35, who had firstexperienced Hider's charisma in diestruggles to establish their manlinessduring late adolescence, Hider was dieprototype of strength and masculinity.

2S See Gurfein, M. I., and Janowitz, Mor-

rii, "Trendj in Wehrmacht Morale," The

Public Opinion Quarterly, Vol. 10, No. i

(1946), p. 78.2 9 M uch of the reduction of trust in Hitle r

which occurred in this final period was limply

a dim inution in esteem for Hitler' technical

ikill as a strategist and; as a diplomat.

a t Y a l e Uni v e r s i t y on

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For the younger Nazi fanatics, he wasa father substitute, providing the vigi-

lant discipline and the repression of

dangerous impulses both in the indi-vidual and in the social environment;

for them he had the additional meritof legitimating revolt against the family

and traditional restraints.

Prisoners spoke of Hitler with enthu-siasm, and even those who expressed re-

gret over the difficulties which his poli-

cies had brought on G ermany by engen-

dering a two-front war and by allowingthe Jews to be persecuted so fiercely asto arouse world hatred—even these men

retained their warm esteem for his good

intentions. They found it necessary to

exculpate him in some way by attribut-ing his errors to dishonest advisors who

kept the truth from him, or to certain

technical difficulties in his strategic doc-

trines which did not in any way reflecton his fundamental moral greatness ornobility.

It was difficult for German soldiers,

as long as they had this attitude toward

Hider, to rebel mentally against the

war. Time after time, prisoners who

were asked why Hitler continued thewar when they themselves admitted it

was so obviously lost, said he wouldn'tcontinue the war and waste lives if he

did not have a good, even though un-disclosed, strategic reason for doing so,

or if he didn't have the resources to

realize his ends. Nazis as well as non-

Nazis answered in this way. Or else

they would say, "the Fiihrer has neverdeceived us," or, "he must have a good

reason for doing what he does."There was obviously a fear of render-

ing an independent judgment of eventsamong the German soldiers and a de-

sire for some strong leader to assume

the responsibility for determining their

fate. American and British soldiers often

complained that the complexity of the

army organization and strategy was sogreat and their own particular part was

so small that they could not see the role

of their personal missions. Their failureto see the connection made them miser-

able because it reduced their sense of

personal autonomy. In the German Ar-

my, on the other hand, there was no

difficulty for soldiers who were used

throughout their lives to having otherpersons determine their objectives for

them.

It is also possible that the very high

devotion to Hitler under conditions of

great stress was in part a reaction for-mation growing from a hostility against

lesser authorities, which emerged as the

weakness of these authorities became

more manifest. In the last year of thewar, hostility and contempt on the partof the German soldiers toward Nazi

Party functionaries and toward Nazi

Party leaders below Hitler (particularly

Goebbels and Goering) was increasing.After the Putsch of July 20, hostility to-

ward senior Wehrmacht officers also in-

creased somewhat, although it never

reached the levels of hostility displayedby civilians against local civilian Partyofficials and leaders. It is possible, there-

fore, that guilt created in ambivalent

personalities by giving expression, even

though verbally, to hostility againstsubordinate agents of authority, had to

be alleviated by reaffirmed belief in the

central and highest authority.

Weakening of the Hitler symbol. Asthe integral pattern of defense was

broken down, however, and as danger

to physical survival increased, devotionto Hitler deteriorated. The tendency to



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attribute virtue to the strong and im-morality to the weak took hold increas-

ingly, and while it did not lead to a

complete rejection of Hider, it reacheda higher point than at any odier stage

in the history of National Socialism.The announcement of Hider's deadi

met an incapacity to respond on thepart of many soldiers. There seemed tobe no willingness to question the truth

of the report, but the great upsurge ofpreoccupation with physical survival as

a result of disintegration of die militaryprimary group, the loss of contact withjunior officers and the greatly intensified

threat of destruction, caused a deaden-ing of the power to respond to thisevent. For the vast horde of dishevelled,

dirty, bewildered prisoners, who werebeing taken in the last weeks of the war,

Hider was of slight importance along-

side die problem of dieir own biologi-cal survival and tie welfare of their

families. For die small minority whostill had sufficient energy to occupythemselves widi "larger problems," the

news of Hider's death released a sort ofamorphous resentment against the fallen

leader whose weakness and immoralityhad been proven by the failure of his

strategy. But even here, die resentmentwas not expressed in explicit denuncia-tions of Hider's character or personal-

ity. The emphasis was all on technicaldeficiencies and weaknesses.

The explanation of the deteriorationand final—diough probably only tem-porary—hostility toward Hider may in

part be sought in die average Germansoldier's ambivalence toward the sym-

bols of authority. This psychologicalmechanism, which also helps to explainthe lack of a significant resistance move-

ment inside Germany, enables us to un-

derstand die curve of Hider's fameamong die German people. Hider, diefadier symbol, was loved for his power

and his great accomplishments an|dhated for his oppressiveness, but die lat-ter sentiment was repressed. While he

remained strong it was psychologicallyexpedient—as well as politically expedi-

ent—to identify widi Hider and to dis-place hostility on to weaker minoritygroups and foreigners. But once Hider's

audiority had been undermined, die

German soldiers rejected it and tendedto express dieir hostility by projecdngtheir own weakness on to him.

Thus die only important secondarysymbol in motivating die behavior of

die German soldiers during die recentwar also lost its efficacy when die pri-

mary group relations of comradeliness,solidarity and subordination to juniorofficers broke down, and widi it the

superego of die individual, on whichdie effective functioning of die primary

group depends.27

VL Nari Machinery for MaintainingArmy Solidarity and FightingEffectiveness

Adm inistrative machinery and per-

sonnel. Even before die outbreak of diewar, die Nazi Party took an activehand in die internal high policy of theWehrmacht and in die selection of die

37 Th e m ixture of apathy and resentment

against Hitler persisted through the first part

of the demobilization period following the end

of the war, but as life began to reorganize

and to take on new meaning and the attitudes

toward authority, which sustain and are sus-

tained by the routines of daily life, revived,esteem for Hitler also began to revive. It is

likely to revive still further and to assume a

prominent place in German life once more,

if the new elite which is being created under

the Allied occupation shows weakness and

lack of decisiveness and self-confidence.



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Chief of Staff and his entourage. FromSeptember 1939 to the signing of thecapitulation in May 1945 this process of

Nazification continued steadily until theWehrmacht was finally rendered pow-

erless to make its own decisions. NaziParty control over the Wehrmacht wasdesigned to insure (1) that Nazi stra-tegic intentions would be carried out(2) that capitulation would be madeimpossible and (3) that internal solidar-ity down to the lowest private would

be maintained.

Most ambitious and successful of theearly efforts at Nazification were therecruitment and training of the specialWaffen SS (Elite) Divisions. Theseunits initially contained only fanaticallydevoted Nazi volunteers and had officerstaffs which were thoroughly permeatedwith Nazi stalwarts. They became theNazi Party army within the Wehr-macht, and their military prowess great-ly enhanced the prestige of the NaziParty and weakened the position of the

General Staff.

At the outbreak of the war, the do-mestic security and police services in-side the Reich were completely unifiedunder the command of Himmler. Al-

though the Wehrmacht had its ownelaborate system of security, elementsof the Sicherheitsdienst operated in oc-cupied areas, in conjunction with theWehrmacht. As the fortunes of wardeclined, the Nazi Party accelerated theextension of its security and indoctrina-

tion services over the Wehrmacht. Thesecurity net around the German High

Command was drawn most tighdy inresponse to the 20th of July Putsch.

In addition to those officers who wereexecuted, a large number of doubtfulloyalty were removed or put into com-

mands where they could be closely su-pervised.

As the German troops retreated into

Germany, SS and state police units, in-stead of the Wehrmacht military police,were given the normal military functionof maintaining the line of demarcationbetween the front lines and the rearareas. A captured order, issued by theCO of the SS forces in the West onSeptember 21, 1944, indicated that theseunits would have the task of preventing

contact between the civilian populationand the troops, as well as the arrest andexecution of deserters from the army.

18'

In addition to these security procedures,the Nazis made effective use of ex-ploiting the individual Germ an soldier'sfear of physical destruction as was de-scribed above in the section, Demandfor physical survival.

But these measures were of a nega-tive nature. In order to strengthen thetraditional Wehrmacht indoctrinationefforts, the Nazi Party appointed in thewinter of 1943 political indoctrinationofficers, called National Socialistischc

Fuhrungsoffiziere (NSFO), to all mili-tary formations. Later in September1944, when the Nazis felt the need for

intensifying their indoctrination efforts,the position of these officers was strength-ened by the establishment of an inde-pendent chain of command which en-abled tiiem to communicate with higherheadquarters without Wehrmacht inter-ference.

28 The NSFO's were given the

power, in cases of "particular politicalsignificance or where delay implies dan-ger" to report immediately and directly

2 8 Order of Commanding Officer of SS

Forces in the West, September 21, 1944.2 9

Th is step was regarded as sufficiently

important to be promulgated in an Order

appearing over Hider's signature.


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minded the garrison at Le Havre thatthe "enemy resorts to propaganda as aweapon which he used in the last stages

of the first world war," in order topoint out that German victory dependedon the determination of the Germansoldier to resist Allied propaganda.

In the fall and winter of 1944, thecampaign to counteract Allied propa-ganda by "exposing" it was intensifiedand elaborated. (This method had theobvious advantage that direct refuta-

tions of Allied claims could largely beavoided.) Mitteilung fur die Truppe(October 1944), a newspaper for of-ficer indoctrination, reviewed the majorweapons in the "poison offensive." Theyincluded: attacks against the Party andits predominant leaders ("this is not sur-prising as the enemy will, of course, at-tack those institutions which give us

our greatest strength"); appeals to theAustrians to separate themselves fromthe Germans ("the time when we weresplit up in small states was the time ofour greatest weakness") sympathy withthe poor German women who work inhellish factories ("the institution mustbe a good one, otherwise the enemywould not attack it").

Other themes "exposed" in leafletswere: the enemy attempts to separatethe leaders from the people ("Just asthe Kaiser was blamed in 1918, it nowis Hitler who is supposed to be re-sponsible") the enemy admits his ownlosses in an exaggerated way in orderto obtain the reputation of veracity andto lie all the more at the opportunemoment.

Even earlier in the Western cam-paign, the Germans followed the policyof stamping Allied leaflets with theimprint, "Hostile Propaganda," andthen allowing them to circulate in lim-

ited numbers. This was being carriedout at the same time that mutually con-tradictory orders for the complete de-

struction of all enemy propaganda werebeing issued. The explanation, in part,is that the Nazis realized that it wouldbe impossible to suppress the flood ofAllied leaflets, and therefore sought toclearly label them as such and to em-ploy them as a point of departure forcounter-propaganda.

The procedure of overstamping Al-

lied leaflets was linked with follow-upindoctrination talks. Such indoctrina-tion lectures, which were conducted bythe Nazi NSFO's, became towards theend of the war one of the main vehiclesof Nazi indoctrination of their owntroops. Ps/W claimed, although it wasprobably not entirely correct, that theyusually slept through such sessions, or

at least paid little attention, until theclosing Sieg Heil was sounded. At thislate date in the war, emphasis on oralpropaganda was made necessary by themarked disruption of communications.Radio listening at the front was almostnon-existent due to the lack of equip-ment; when in reserve, troops listenedmore frequendy. Newspapers were dis-tributed only with great difficulty. More

important were the leaflets which wereeither dropped by air on their owntroops or distributed through commandchannels.

Strength through fear. Major linesof the negative approach employed bythese leaflets in indoctrination talks, inthe rumors circulated by NSF officers,stressed "strength through fear," partic-

ularly fear of Russia and the generalconsequences of complete destructionthat would follow defeat.

Because of the German soldier's con-cern about the welfare of his family



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living inside Germany, Nazi agencieswere constantly issuing statements aboutthe successful evacuation of German

civilians to the east bank of the Rhine.Equally stressed in the strength

through fear theme were retaliationthreats against the families of deserters,mistreatment of prisoners of war inAnglo-American prison camps, and theultimate fate of prisoners. The phraseSieg oderr Sibirien (Victory or Siberia)was emphasized and much material was

released to prove that the Anglo-Ameri-cans planned to turn over dheir prison-ers to the Russians. When the U.S.Army stopped shipping German Ps/Wto the United States, Nazi propagandaofficers spread the rumor among Ger-man soldiers "that the way to Siberiais shorter from France than from theUnited States."

Statements by Ps/W revealed thatshortly before the Rundstedt counter-attack, speeches by NSFO's were in-creased. One of the main subjects seemsto have been weapons. In retrospect,the intent of the directives under whichthey were working was obvious. At-tempts were made to explain the ab-sence of the Luftwaffe, while the arrivalin the near future of new and better

weapons was guaranteed.Psychological preparation for the

December counter-offensive was builtaround the Rundstedt order of the daythat "everything is at stake." Exhorta-tions were backed -up with exaggeratedstatements by unit commanders thatlarge amounts of men and materialwere to be employed. Immediately there-

after, official statements were issuedthat significant penetrations had beenachieved; special editions of troop pa-pers were prepared announcing that40,000 Americans had been killed.

Such announcements received littleattention among the troops actually en-gaged in the counter-offensive because

of the obvious difficulties in disseminat-ing propaganda to fighting troops.

Nevertheless, after the failure of thecounter-attack, the Nazis felt calledupon to formulate a plausible line toexplain the sum total result of that mil-itary effort, especially for those who feltthat better military judgment wouldhave resulted in a purely defensive

strategy against Russia. On January 25,Front und Heitnat announced that theDecember offensive had smashed theplan for a simultaneous onslaught: "TheEast can hold only if the West doestoo. . . . Every fighting man in theWest knows that the Anglo-Americansare doing all they can, although be-latedly, to start the assault on the For-tress Germany. Our task in the West

now is to postpone that time as long aspossible and to guard the back of ourArmies in the East."

Despite the obvious limitations onthe efficacy of propaganda during M archand April 1945, the Nazis continued tothe very end to keep up their propa-ganda efforts. Due to the confusionwithin the ranks of the Wehrmacht

and the resulting difficulties of dissemi-nation, the task devolved almost whollyon the NSFO's who spent much of theirtime reading to the troops the most re-cent orders governing desertion. Leafletscalled largely on the Landser's militaryspirit to carry on. One even demandedthat he remain silent (zu schweigen).The Nazis taxed their fancy to createrumors as the last means of bolsteringmorale. Here a favorite technique forstimulating favorable rumors was forCO's to read to their men "classified"documents from official sources which



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COHESION AND DISINTEGRATION IN THE W E H R M A C H T 311

contained promises of secret weaponsor discussed the great losses being in-

flicted upon the Allies.

VI I . The Impact of Allied Propagandaon Wehrmacht Solidarity

The system of controls which the so-

cial structure of the Wehrmacht ex-

ercised over its individual membersgreatly reduced those areas in whichsymbolic appeals of the Allies couldwork. But the millions of leaflets which

were dropped weekly and the "round-the-clock" broadcasts to the Germantroops certainly did not fail to producesome reactions.

The very first German Ps/W who

were interrogated directly on their re-

actions to Allied propaganda soon re-

vealed a stereotyped range of answerswhich could be predicted from their de-

gree of Nazification. The fanatical Naz iclaimed, No German would believeanything the enemy has to say, whilean extreme attitude of acceptance was

typified by a confirmed anti-Nazi who

pleaded with his captors: Now is the

moment to flood he troops with leaflets.You have no idea of the effect soberand effective leaflets have on retreatingtroops." But .these extreme reactions of

soldiers were of low frequency; Nazisoldiers might admit the truth of our

leaflets but usually would not accepttheir conclusions and implications.

The fundamentally indifferent reac-tion to Allied propaganda was most in-

terestingly shown in an intensive studyof 150 Ps/W captured in October 1944

of whom 65 per cent had seen our leaf-

lets and for the most part professedthat they believed their contents. Thiswas a group which had fought very ob-

stinately, and the number of active de-

serters, if any, was extremely small.

Some forty of these Ps/W offered ex-

tended comments as to what they m eant

when they said they believed the con-

tents of Allied leaflets.

Five stated outright that they be-

lieved the messages and that the leaf-

lets assisted them and their comradesto surrender.

Seven declared they believed the

leaflets, but were powerless to do any-

thing about appeals to surrender.

Eight stated that they believed the

contents, but nevertheless as soldiersand decent individuals would neverthink of deserting.

Twenty-two declared that eventsjustified belief in the leaflets, but

they clearly implied that this had

been of litde importance in theirbattle experiences.

In Normandy, where the relatively

small front was blanketed with printedmaterial, up to 90 per cent of the Ps/W

reported that they had read Allied leaf-

lets, yet this period was characterized

by very high German morale and stiffresistance.

Throughout the Western campaign,with the exception of periods of ex-

tremely bad weather or when the frontwas fluid, the cumulative percentageof exposure ranged between 60 and

80 per cent. (This cumulative percent-age of exposure was based on state-

ments by Ps/W that they had seenleaflets sometime while fighting on

the Western front after D-Day. A few

samples indicated that penetration dur-

ing any single month covered about

20 per cent of the prisoners.) Radio lis-

tening among combat troops was con-

fined to a minute fraction due to the

lack of equipment; rear troops listenedmore frequently. In the case of both



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3 1 2 PUBLIC OPINION QUARTERLY, SUMMER 1948

leaflets and radio it was found thatthere was widespread but desultory com-ment on the propaganda, much of which

comment distorted the actual contents.Not only was there wide penetration

by Allied leaflets and newssheets, butGerman soldiers frequently circulatedthem extensively among their com-rades. A readership study of Nachricht-en fiir die Truppe, a daily newssheetpublished by the Allied PsychologicalWarfare Division, showed that each

copy which was picked up had an av-erage readership of between four andfive soldiers—a figure which is extreme-ly large in view of the conditions ofcombat life. No t only were leaflets wide-ly circulated, but it became a widespreadpractice for soldiers to carry Alliedleaflets on their person, especially the"safe conduct pass" leaflets which borea statement by General Eisenhowerguaranteeing the bearer swift and safeconduct through Allied lines and theprotection of the Geneva convention.There is evidence that in certain sectorsof the front, German soldiers even or-ganized black-market trading in Alliedpropaganda materials.

It is relevant to discuss here the differ-ences in effectiveness between tactical

and strategic propaganda. By tacticalpropaganda, we refer to propagandawhich seeks to promise immediate re-sults in the tactical situation. Theclearest example of this type of propa-ganda is afforded by "across the lines"loudspeaker broadcasts, which some-times facilitated immediate capture ofthe prisoners of war—not by propa-

ganda in the ordinary sense, bu t by giv-ing instructions on how to surrendersafely, once the wish to surrender waspresent.

No sufficiently accurate estimate is

available of the total number of prison-ers captured by the use of such tech-niques, but signal successes involving

hundreds of isolated troops in the Nor-mandy campaign have been credited topsychological warfare combat teams.Even more successful were the loud-speaker-carrying tanks employed in theRhine River offensive, when the firstsigns of weakening resistance were en-countered. For example, the FourthArmored Division reported that its psy-

chological warfare unit captured over500 prisoners in a four-day dash fromthe Kyll River to the Rhine. Firsthandinvestigation of these loudspeaker mis-sions, and interrogation of prisonerscaptured under such circumstances, es-tablish that Allied propaganda was effec-tive in describing the tactical situationto totally isolated and helpless soldiersand in arranging an Allied cease

fire and thereby presenting an assuranceto the German soldier of a safe sur-render. The successful targets for suchbroadcasts were groups where solidarityand ability to function as a unit werelargely destroyed. Leaflets especiallywritten for specific sectors and droppedon pin point targets by fighter-bom bswere used instead of loudspeakers where

larger units were cut off. This methodproved less successful, since the unitsto which they were addressed wereusually better integrated and the neces-sary cease fire conditions could not bearranged.

Less spectacular, but more extensive,was strategic propaganda. Allied direc-tives called for emphasis on four themes

in this type of propaganda: (1) Ideolog-ical attacks on the Nazi Party and Ger-many's war aims, (2) the strategicalhopelessness of Germany's military andeconomic position, (3) the justness of


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the United Nations war aims and theirunity and determination to carry themout (unconditional surrender, although

made known to the troops, was neverstressed), (4) promises of good treat-ment to prisoners of war, with appealsto self-preservation through surrender.

Although it is extremely difficult,especially in view of the lack of essen-tial data, to assess the efficacy of thesevarious themes, some tentative cluesmight be seen in the answers given

to the key attitude questions in themonthly Psychological Warfare opinionpoll of captured German soldiers.81

Thus, there was no significant declinein attachment to Nazi ideology untilFebruary and March 1945. In otherwords, propaganda attacks on Naziideology seem to have been of littleavail, and attachment to secondary sym-

bols, e.g., Hitler, declined only whenthe smaller military units began tobreak up under very heavy pressure.

Since the German soldier was quiteignorant of military news on otherfronts, it was believed that a great dealof printed material should contain fac-tual reports of the military situation,stressing the strategical hopelessness of

the German position. As a result, thethird most frequently recalled items ofour propaganda were the military newsreports. It seems reasonable to believethat the emphasis on these subjects didcontribute to the development of de-featist sentiment.

Despite the vast amount of space de-voted to ideological attacks on German

leaders, only about five per cent of thePs/W mentioned this topic—a factwhich supported the contention as tothe general failure of ideological or sec-ondary appeals. Finally, the presenta-tion of the justness of our war aims

was carried out in such a way as toavoid stressing the unconditional sur-render aspects of our intentions, while

emphasizing postwar peace intentionsand organizational efforts; much wasmade of United Nations unity. All thisfell on deaf ears, for of this materialonly a small minority of Ps/W (about5 per cent) recalled specific statementsabout military government plans for theGerman occupation.

As has been pointed out previously,

the themes which were most successful,at least in attracting attention and re-maining fixed in the memory, werethose promising good treatment as pris-oners of war. In other words, propa-ganda referring to immediate concretesituations and problems seems to havebeen most effective in some respects.

The single leaflet most effective in

communicating the promise of goodtreatment was the "safe conduct pass."Significantly, it was usually printed onthe back of leaflets which contained noelaborate propaganda appeals exceptthose of self-preservation. The rankand file tended to be favorably disposedto its official language and legal, docu-ment-like character. In one sector where

General Eisenhower's signature was leftoff the leaflet, doubt was cast on itsauthenticity.

Belief in the veracity of this appealwas no doubt based on the attitude thatthe British and the Americans wererespectable law-abiding soldiers whowould treat their captives according tointernational law. As a result of thispredisposition and the wide use of thesafe conduct leaflets, as well as ouractual practices in treating prisonerswell, the German soldier came to have

3 1 Ct Gurfcin, M. I., and Janowitz, Mor-rij, op. cit.




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no fear of capture by British or Ameri-can troops. T he most tha t can be claimedfor this lack of fear was that it may

have decreased or undercut any tend-ency to fight to the death; it producedno active opposition to continued hos-tilities.

As an extension of the safe-conductapproach, leaflets were prepared instruct-ing non-commissioned officers in de-

tailed procedures by which their mencould safely be removed from battle so

as to avoid our fire and at the same timeavoid evacuation by the German field

police. If the Germans could not be in-duced to withdraw from combat ac-tively, Allied propaganda appealed to

them to hide in cellars. This in fact be-came a favorite technique of surrender,since it avoided the need of facing the

conscience-twinging desertion problem.As a result of psychological warfare

research, a series of leaflets was pre-pared whose attack was aimed at prima-

ry group organization in the GermanArmy, without recourse to ideologi-cal symbols. Group organization de-

pended on the acceptance of immediateleadership and mutual trust. Thereforethis series of leaflets sought to stimu-late group discussion among die men

and to bring into dieir focus of atten-tion concerns which would loosen soli-darity. One leaflet declared, "Do not

take our (the Allies) word for it; askyour comrade; find out how he feels."Thereupon followed a series of ques-tions on personal concerns, family prob-

lems, tactical consideration and supplyproblems. Discussion of diese problems

was expected to increase anxiety. It wasassumed that to die degree that the sol-dier found tiiat he was not isolated inhis opinion, to that degree he would be

strengthened in his resolve to end hos-

tilities, for himself at least.

ConclusionAt die beginning of die second world

war, many publicists and specialists inpropaganda attributed almost supremeimportance to psychological warfare op-

erations. The legendary successes ofAllied propaganda against die GermanArmy at die end of die first world warand die tremendous expansion of die

advertising and mass communicationsindustries in the ensuing two decadeshad convinced many people diat human

behavior could be extensively manipu-lated by mass communications. Theytended furthermore to stress diat mili-

tary morale was to a great extent afunction of die belief in die lightness ofdie "larger" cause which was at issue

in die war; good soldiers were there-fore those who clearly understood diepolitical and moral implications of whatwas at stake. They explained die strik-

ing successes of die German Army indie early phases of die war by die "ideo-logical possession" of die German sol-

diers, and diey accordingly diought that

propaganda attacking doctrinal concep-tions would be defeating this army.

Studies of the German Army's morale

and fighting effectiveness made duringthe last three years of die war throwconsiderable doubt on these hypothesesThe solidarity of die German Army was

discovered by these studies—which leftmuch to be desired from the standpointof scientific rigor—to be based only

very indirecdy and very partially on

political convictions or broader ethicalbeliefs. Where conditions were such as

to allow primary group life to functionsmoodily, and where the primary group



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developed a high degree of cohesion,morale was high and resistance effectiveor at least very determined, regardless

in the main of the political attitudesof the soldiers. The conditions of pri-mary group life were related to spatialproximity, the capacity for intimatecommunication, the provision of pater-nal protectiveness by NCO's and juniorofficers, and the gratification of certainpersonality needs, e.g., manliness, by themilitary organization and its activities.

The larger structure of the army servedto maintain morale through the provi-sion of the framework in which po-tentially individuating physical threatswere kept at a minimum—through theorganization of supplies and throughadequate strategic dispositions.

The behavior of the German Armydemonstrated that the focus of atten-

tion and concern beyond one's immedi-ate face-to-face social circles might beslight indeed and still not interfere withthe achievement of a high degree ofmilitary effectiveness. It also showedthat attempts to modify behavior bymeans of symbols referring to eventsor values outside the focus of attentionand concern would be given an indif-

ferent response by the vast majority ofthe German soldiers. This was almostequally true under conditions of pri-mary group integrity and under condi-tions of extreme primary group disinte-gration. In the former, primary needswere met adequately th rough the gratifi-cations provided by the other membersof the group; in the latter, the individualhad regressed to a narcissistic state in

which symbols referring to the outerworld were irrelevant to his first con-cern—"saving his own skin."

At moments of primary group disin-tegration, a particular kind of propa-

ganda less hortatory or analytical, butaddressing the intensified desire to sur-vive, and describing the precise pro-

cedures by which physical survival couldbe achieved, was likely to facilitatefurther disintegration. Furthermore, insome cases aspects of the environmenttowards which the soldier might hither-to have been emotionally indifferentwere defined for him by prolonged ex-posure to propaganda under conditionsof disintegration. Some of these wider

aspects, eg., particular strategic con-siderations, then tended to be taken intoaccount in his motivation and he wasmore likely to implement his defeatistmood by surrender than he would havebeen without exposure to propaganda.

It seems necessary, therefore, to re-consider the potentialities of propagandain the context of all the other variables

which influence behavior. The errone-ous views concerning the omnipotenceof propaganda must be given up andtheir place must be taken by much moredifferentiated views as to the possibili-ties of certain kinds of propaganda un-der different sets of conditions.

It must be recognized that on themoral plane most men are members of

the larger society by virtue of identifica-tions which are mediated through thehuman beings with whom they are inpersonal relationships. Many are boundinto the larger society only by primarygroup identifications. Only a small pro-portion possessing special training orrather particular kinds of personalitiesare capable of giving a preponderantshare of their attention and concern to

the symbols of the larger world. Theconditions under which these differentgroups will respond to propaganda willdiffer, as will also the type of propa-ganda to which they will respond.


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