Hero or villain?
Should we consider the Desert Fox to be a self-serving Nazi whose military prowess was greatly exaggerated, or was he really the white knight of the Wehrmacht?
Was Erwin Rommel actually the white knight of the Wehrmacht?
Better known by his nickname the ‘Desert Fox’, Field Marshal Erwin Rommel is one of the more famous and polarising military commanders of World War II. Instantly recognisable by his trademark leather jacket and scarf, his command of the German Afrika Korps in their fight against General ‘Monty’ Montgomery and the 8th Army has seen his memory attain legendary status in the public eye.
A member of the armed forces under the leadership of a powerful eugenicist, he is often held up as one of the few chivalrous men in an otherwise toxic leadership. But do his character and actions reflect this, or has propaganda — both Axis and Allied — muddled our view of a power-hungry man who was willing to further the schemes of the Nazi regime by any means necessary?
Rommel came out of World War I a respected and highly decorated infantry commander, winning the Pour le Mérite, the highest Prussian military medal that could be awarded. This was the same honour bestowed on wartime celebrities like Manfred von Richthofen, better known as the Red Baron. With this honour, Rommel entered the interwar years with a high military celebrity status, making his ambitious climb through the ranks much easier.
From his experiences in World War I, Rommel published a military stratagem named Infantry Attacks in 1937, which gained him the attention of another Great War veteran, Adolf Hitler. The Führer was drawn to Rommel’s daring and aggressive command style and their friendship would flourish.
Rommel was appointed commander of Hitler’s security detachment during the opening months of war when German forces pushed into Poland. This close proximity to the Führer meant that the two became close, impressing each other and finding mutual respect. As dismissive as he was of other high-ranking Nazi officials, Rommel seems to have idolised Hitler and separated him from the rest of the party.
This mutual respect was also partly based on the fact that Rommel did not come from the Prussian
“This close proximity to the Führer meant that the two became close, impressing each other and finding mutual respect”
elite like many other German generals, something Hitler, with his own background, could empathise with. This also led to friction between Rommel and other high-ranking officers, but the Desert Fox distrusted the officers directly under his command.
The German officer corps in World War II prized individual initiative and Rommel’s micromanaging of each of his subordinates created resentment in the ranks. There are extreme examples of him directing individual machinegun fire, undermining the authority of the noncommissioned officers under his command. This hands-on approach did win him the support and admiration of the rankand-file, however.
Not one to avoid the action, Rommel was known in both world wars to always be on the frontline. A saying that started during World War I and carried over to World War II and beyond went ‘Where Rommel is, there is the front’. He also respected his opponents, singing the praises of both Patton and Monty. Rommel’s military record, his defining legacy, is filled with highs and lows. His exploits as an infantry commander in World War I served as a springboard to launch his career. Winning the
Pour le Mérite was a very prestigious honour, with only just under 700 awarded throughout the entire conflict.
His command of the Ghost Division in the invasion of France in 1940 showed a firm grasp of tactics and a sense of initiative, but it has been criticised by military historians who point out that having an entire division vanish from your battle plans is never useful when devising an entire campaign. This streak of insubordination would become part and parcel of Rommel’s tactics.
When facing down the superior Allied forces at Tobruk, he disobeyed orders to hold the line and went on the offensive. His stunning victory eased the ruffled feathers, but while the move was a bold one it was destined to fail. Outrunning his supply lines meant no fuel for his tanks or food for his men. To highlight the dire supply situation, the Afrika Korps’ reliance on captured Allied equipment saw the vast majority of their motorised force being made up of captured vehicles. American-made Jeeps were a premium and were snatched up by the Germans whenever they were spotted.
In the end the field marshal didn’t die on the battlefield. Instead, he was implicated in the failed 20 July Plot to kill Hitler. The extent to which Rommel was actually involved is disputed. On the day the bomb was detonated inside the Wolf’s Lair (Hitler’s Eastern Front headquarters) Rommel was otherwise engaged. He was injured in a car crash and was recovering in a French hospital.
However, several plotters named him as a conspirator during interrogation and he was specifically mentioned in several of the group’s documents. While this was damning enough for the Nazis, it’s not actually hard proof. His close friendship with the Führer would suggest that he would have had no part in it, while his wife maintained even after the war that he opposed killing Hitler, believing it would spark civil war. But by 1944 the Desert Fox’s faith that the war could be won was shaken. He was also shrewd enough to know, had the plot succeeded, his popularity would have made him indispensable to stabilisation of the country after Hitler’s death.
“Rommel was known in both world wars to always be on the frontline”
On 14 October 1944 Rommel was given the choice of a public trial or committing suicide. If he spared the state the controversy of putting a military celebrity on trial for treason, his family would be safe. The soldier took the cyanide pill.
However, the Desert Fox’s lived on. After the war the shattered remains of the German army needed someone to rally around. As Rommel had fought against famous generals like Montgomery, Eisenhower and Patton, but was not linked to any high-profile atrocities, he was perfect. He could be held up as a German commander who fought a ‘clean’ war; a chivalric opponent with no innocent blood on his hands. He had died saving his family and no posthumous charges were brought against him at the Nuremberg Trials.
Bringing his military failings into focus would diminish the image of the Allied commanders who had fought against him. He had been involved in many of the same theatres as them, especially in North Africa and western France, and this image of the Desert Fox as a highly skilled opponent was a perfect fit for propaganda — if you beat him, you must have been the best.
His reputation in wartime was buffed by people like Winston Churchill, who said in one of his speeches to the House of Commons, “We have a very daring and skilful opponent against us… and, may I say across the havoc of war, a great general.” Rommel was a complex character. On the one hand he was seen as an honourable enemy who was a far cry from other German figures and units linked to atrocities being committed across Europe. There is evidence of Rommel being in contact with Einsatzgruppen Africa for them to start conducting operations in North Africa, but thankfully this never came to be when German forces were pushed out. This, coupled with the fact he used Jewish slave labour to construct defences, muddies the water of the ‘war without hate’, as the North African campaign has become known. He was also a close personal friend of Hitler and actively tried to further the aims of a regime hellbent on wiping out entire peoples from the face of the Earth.
The fact that Rommel was mostly deployed to second-rate theatres, often with depleted or undersupplied forces, highlights both his military capabilities and shortcomings. While he was able to achieve victories by using aggressive tactics against stronger enemies, he also ignored his superiors and often outran his supply lines, meaning his attacks ground to a halt. Tanks and other vehicles cannot run without fuel, men cannot fight without food, and guns are useless without ammunition.
Praise from Allied leaders can do little to change the fact that Rommel lost in North Africa and categorically failed to stop the Allies gaining a foothold in France in Operation Overlord.