He Defied Hitler—and Paid for It: Nazi Germany’s General Hans Oster JJ

20 July 1944, Nazi Germany. Adolf Hitler  meets Italy’s fascist leader Benito Mussolini   even though just a few hours earlier German  military officers attempted to assassinate   him at the Wolf’s Lair, his East Prussian  headquarters in Rastenburg. The plot marked   the culmination of efforts by several groups  within the German resistance, who hoped that   Hitler’s death would trigger an anti-Nazi  revolt and overthrow the Nazi government.

As part of the plan, in the confusion of Hitler’s  death, other major Nazi leaders would be arrested,   and a new government would be established.  This government was intended to negotiate   an armistice to end the war on more favourable  terms for Germany. However the plot failed. In   the days that follow, Hitler orders  a massive hunt for conspirators,   and their executions will continue until the last  days of the war.

One of these conspirators is the   Deputy Chief of the Abwehr, Germany’s secret  military intelligence. His name is Hans Oster. Hans Paul Oster was born on 9 August 1887 in  Dresden, then part of the German Empire. Thought   Oster grew up in a Protestant family, with his  father serving as pastor for the Reformed French   congregation in Dresden, he chose a different  path.

After completing his secondary education,   he pursued a military career as a professional  officer, joining the artillery in 1907. In 1912,   he married Gertrud Knoop, and the  marriage produced three children. When the First World War began on 28 July 1914,  Oster served on the Western Front and in 1916   within the German General Staff he was promoted  to hauptmann which was equivalent to captain.

The First World War ended on 11 November  1918, and like many other Germans, Oster   was dismayed by the harsh conditions imposed  on his country by the Treaty of Versailles.  The Treaty, signed on 28 June 1919, placed Germany  under strict restrictions that deeply affected   its economy, military, and sense of sovereignty.

Forced to accept full responsibility for the war,   Germany faced enormous reparations  payments to the Allied powers,   which strained an already weakened economy.  Additionally, Germany lost valuable territories,   including Alsace-Lorraine, which was rich in coal  and iron ore, as well as all overseas colonies,   leading to widespread resentment.

The treaty also  imposed severe military restrictions, limiting   Germany’s army to 100,000 troops, prohibiting  submarines, an air force, and conscription.   After the war, Hans Oster continued to serve in  the German army even though the officer corps   was restricted to just 4,000 members. In the following years, he rose through   the ranks in the army and was promoted to  Major in 1929.

However, three years later   Oster was forced to resign from service  due to an affair with a comrade’s wife. On 30 January 1933,   Adolf Hitler was appointed Chancellor of  Germany by President Paul von Hindenburg. Oster initially supported the Nazi regime,  believing in their promise to restore the   glory of the former German Empire, elevate  the German people back to prominence,   and secure a dignified place for Germany  on the world stage.

Several months after   the Nazis took power, he joined the Abwehr,  Germany’s secret military intelligence service. After taking power in 1933, the Nazis swiftly  dismantled Germany’s democratic institutions,   establishing a totalitarian state under Adolf  Hitler’s leadership. Political opponents,   particularly communists and socialists, were  violently suppressed, with many imprisoned in   the first concentration camps, such as Dachau,  which was established in March 1933.

These   camps became a tool to intimidate and silence  those who opposed the regime. The Nazis also   launched cultural purges, with the infamous book  burnings of May 1933 symbolizing their attempt to   eradicate “un-German” ideas, targeting works by  Jewish, Marxist, and liberal authors. Moreover,   conflict with the Christian churches arose as  the Nazis sought to align religious institutions   with Nazi ideology, arresting dissenting  priests and restricting church activities.

While Oster was growing increasingly disillusioned  with the Nazi regime and its oppressive policies,   the last straw came with the Night of the Long  Knives, which occurred between 30 June and 2 July   1934.

During this purge, the SS assassinated many  members of the rival SA, a paramilitary wing of   the Nazi party, including its leader, Ernst Röhm. Moreover, several of Hitler’s political opponents   were killed, among them General Kurt von  Schleicher, who had preceded Hitler as Chancellor   and had criticized his cabinet, and Major  General Ferdinand von Bredow, the former head   of the Abwehr and Oster’s friend.

The Night of the  Long Knives deeply affected Oster, strengthening   his resolve to undermine the Nazi regime. In 1935, under the new head of the Abwehr,   Wilhelm Canaris, he began building a network  of contacts with opponents of the Nazis   within the state, administration, and security  organizations. Following the Blomberg–Fritsch   affair, his antipathy toward the Nazis turned into  hatred, as Hitler consolidated his grip on power.

Ever since they seized the power in Germany  the Nazis were trying to take control of the   army and it came in very useful when it turned  out that Defense Minister Werner von Blomberg   had married a prostitute. In January 1938  von Blomberg was forced to resign from his   position after revelations about his wife’s  past, leading to concerns about his judgment.

Around the same time, Werner von Fritsch,  Commander-in-Chief of the German Army,   was falsely accused of engaging in homosexual  activities. In February 1938 he was also forced   to resign but Canaris and other military  officers were appalled at the mistreatment   of Fritsch and eventually were successful in  proving his innocence.

After Werner von Blomberg   and Werner von Fritsch were removed from their  positions Hitler assumed the position of Supreme   Commander of the Armed Forces, consolidating  military and political power in his hands.  During the Blomberg–Fritsch affair,  Oster met Colonel General Ludwig Beck,   the Chief of the General Staff, for the first  time.

This meeting laid the groundwork for the   first military conspiracy to overthrow Hitler  if Germany went to war with Czechoslovakia over   the Sudetenland, a border region with  a significant ethnic German majority.  In August 1938, Beck openly expressed his  opposition to a potential war with the Western   powers over Czechoslovakia during a meeting of  army generals in Berlin.

When Hitler learned of   his stance, he demanded Beck’s resignation. Beck,  a highly respected figure within the military,   was succeeded as Chief of Staff by Franz  Halder, who stayed in contact with both   Beck and Oster and privately described  Hitler as ‘the incarnation of evil.’  Oster and other conspirators believed that Germany  was not ready to fight another war and pressured   Halder and Beck to take action against Hitler.

Their plan involved overthrowing Hitler and the   Nazi regime by storming the Reich Chancellery  with forces loyal to them. Once in control of   the government, they intended to either arrest or  assassinate Hitler and restore the monarchy under   Prince Wilhelm of Prussia, the grandson of Wilhelm  II, the last German Emperor and King of Prussia.  However, the army generals argued that support  among the officer corps could only be mobilized   if Hitler made overt moves toward war.

Halder  tasked Oster with drawing up plans for a coup,   and it was eventually agreed that Halder would  act when Hitler took a definitive step toward war.  Oster’s position in the Abwehr proved  invaluable to the conspirators. The   Abwehr provided false documents and access to  restricted materials, masked conspiratorial   activities as intelligence work, connected  various resistance cells, and supplied critical   intelligence to support the plot.

Emissaries of the conspirators,   with Oster’s assistance and the resources of  the Abwehr, even traveled to Britain to urge   the British government to stand firm against  Hitler during the Sudeten crisis. British Prime   Minister Neville Chamberlain agreed to meet in  Munich, where, however, along with French Prime   Minister Édouard Daladier on 29–30 September 1938,  he accepted the dismemberment of Czechoslovakia.

This destroyed any chance of the plot  succeeding, as Hitler was then seen   in Germany as the “greatest statesman of all  time” at the height of his greatest triumph.  On 30 September 1938 the British Prime Minister  Neville Chamberlain, on his return from Munich,   made a “Peace for our time” declaration believing  he had averted war. However, he was wrong.

The Second World War started on 1 September  1939 when Nazi Germany invaded Poland.  After the outbreak of the war, opposing Hitler  within the army became increasingly risky, as it   could jeopardize Germany’s chances of victory.  When Hitler announced plans to attack France   shortly after the Polish campaign, Halder and  other senior generals deemed the idea hopelessly   unrealistic and once again considered staging a  coup, encouraged by Oster and Canaris.

However,   when Hitler vowed to eradicate defeatist  attitudes within the Army High Command,   Halder feared the conspiracy might be uncovered  and destroyed all incriminating evidence. However, this atmosphere of fear and escalating  pressure did not deter Hans Oster from continuing   his resistance.

Determined to undermine  Hitler’s plans, Oster took a bold and   unprecedented step by secretly sharing critical  military intelligence with his trusted friend,   Bert Sas, the Netherlands’ military attaché  in Berlin. Oster informed Sas of the postponed   invasion date of the Netherlands more  than twenty times. In one warning,   he referred to Hitler as “the pig, who  has departed for the front in the West,”   implying that Hitler had finalized plans for  the German invasion of the Netherlands and   Belgium. Sas passed the information to his  government, but they did not believe him.

The German invasion of France, Belgium,  Luxembourg, and the Netherlands started   on 10 May 1940 and became known as  the Battle of France. These countries,   along with France were conquered within 6 weeks. Between 1940 and 1942, German resistance reached   its lowest point.

While some officers felt  reassured that their fears of military disaster   had not materialized, others remained opposed to  Hitler but believed his overwhelming popularity   made resistance efforts impossible. However,  despite these challenges, Oster tirelessly   worked to rebuild a resistance network. In  1941, after the invasion of the Soviet Union   marked the start of the systematic extermination  of European Jews, Oster established contact with   the resistance network led by then-Colonel  Henning von Tresckow in Army Group Centre.

Oster’s network later provided British-made  bombs to Tresckow’s team for their assassination   attempts on Hitler in 1943. At this time Hans  Oster held a rank of Generalmajor to which   he was promoted on 16 November 1942 with  effect from 1 December of the same year.  The first attempt, in March 1943, involved  a bomb smuggled onto Hitler’s plane,   but a faulty detonator caused it to fail.

Days  later, Colonel Rudolf von Gersdorff carried   explosives in a Berlin museum, intending  to kill Hitler during a tour. However,   Hitler left abruptly, forcing Gersdorff  to disarm the bomb and abort the mission.  In April of the same year, the Gestapo, the Nazi  Secret Police, grew suspicious of Oster’s behavior   following the arrest of Hans von Dohnanyi, who  had joined the Abwehr shortly before the war.

Initially, the investigation focused on currency  violations against Dohnanyi, who had smuggled 14   Jews into Switzerland by disguising them as  Abwehr agents and providing them with foreign   currency. During his arrest, Dohnanyi failed to  hide incriminating documents lying openly on his   desk and whispered “note!” to Oster, who tried  to remove them.

However, Oster was immediately   confronted and forced to return the documents. He  was placed under house arrest and dismissed from   his position in the Abwehr a few days later. Oster’s dismissal marked a severe blow to the   resistance, leaving the network in disarray at a  critical time. Despite this setback, the resolve   to oppose Hitler continued to grow elsewhere.

From early 1942, several military officers such   as Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg became  convinced that Germany was being led to   disaster and that Hitler’s removal from power  was necessary. After the Battle of Stalingrad   in December 1942, despite his religious  scruples, Claus von Stauffenberg concluded   that the Führer’s assassination was a lesser  moral evil than Hitler’s remaining in power.

On 20 July 1944, Stauffenberg placed one of  two bombs in a briefcase under the table in   Hitler’s briefing room in the Wolf’s Lair.  However, he was unable to arm the second bomb   in time and after Stauffenberg left the room,  the briefcase was coincidentally moved under   the heavy support of the table leg. It detonated  but failed to kill Hitler.

This was not, however,   immediately known to the conspirators. An  ally at Hitler’s headquarters cut off all   communication as Stauffenberg returned to Berlin  to coordinate the implementation of the plan   code-named Operation Valkyrie. At first, the plan  seemed to go smoothly as the Reserve Army began   to take action, but delays, confusion, and poor  communication robbed the coup of its initiative.

Eventually, the fact of Hitler’s survival was  broadcasted, and the plot quickly unravelled.  As a result of the failed coup, every member of  the Wehrmacht – the German Armed Forces – was   required to re-swear his loyalty oath, by name,  to Hitler and on 24 July 1944 the military salute   was replaced throughout the armed forces with the  Hitler Salute in which the arm was outstretched,   and the salutation Heil Hitler was given.

In the days that followed, Hitler ordered   a massive hunt for conspirators  which continued for months.  Oster was arrested one day after the failed  assassination attempt. On 4 April 1945,   Admiral Canaris’s diaries were discovered,  and in a manic rage upon reading them,   Hitler ordered that all current and past  conspirators—Oster among them—be executed.

In the grey morning hours of 9 April 1945, just  a month before the end of the war in Europe,   gallows were erected hastily in the courtyard of  Flossenbürg concentration camp. Hans Oster, then   57 years old, was ordered to remove his  clothing and was led to the gallows naked.   By Hitler’s direct orders he was hanged  with a meat hook and a thin hemp rope,   which the people called a  piano wire.

In some cases,   this barbaric method of execution caused  the death struggle to last for 20 minutes. Following his execution, Oster was buried in the   Nordfriedhof cemetery in Dresden. After  the war Oster has often been cited as a   principled opponent of Hitler who  acted despite great personal risk.  Fabian von Schlabrendorff, one of the few senior  anti-Nazis to survive the war, described Oster   as “a man such as God meant men to be, lucid  and serene of mind, imperturbable in danger”.

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