'While Berlin Burns'
As first the RAF hit Berlin and then USAAF bombers appear in daylight, Hans-Georg von Studnitz was keeping a diary in the German Foreign Ministry
Hans-Georg von Studnitz (1907-1993) came from a privileged family and enjoyed even more status as a prominent journalist. As a senior member of the Nazi Foreign Ministry, he was responsible for briefing foreign journalists. Nevertheless, his diary is far from uncritical of the Nazi regime, especially as the war progressed. The diary covering 1943-1945 was maintained at considerable risk to himself - the safest place to keep it was with official papers in the Ministry building.
All we hear from the top people is that Führer Headquarters is full of optimism, that we have ‘nerves of iron’ and a fistful of trump cards …
The following excerpt from While Berlin Burns: The Memoirs of Hans-Georg von Studnitz covers the period when the RAF heavy bombing of Berlin ended and USAAF bombing began - meanwhile the Nazi attitude to the Eastern Front looked increasingly unrealistic:
Berlin – Thursday, February 17, 1944
Tonight, according to their own statement, the British dropped 3,300 tons of bombs on Berlin. Hermann Abs’s house in Neu-Westend, Mecklenburgallee 13, where I am now living, was hit by twenty-five incendiaries. There were eight separate fires, but we managed to extinguish them all.
When I arrived about midnight, I found the electric light in the upper storey out of action, a bombed-out refugee in my bed, the room grimy with the smoke from incendiaries and the floor covered with pools of water. There is a stench of charred wood, and an icy draught whistles through the damaged roof. Abs’s bedroom has been completely burnt out. It is a miracle that the house is still standing. The refugees to whom Abs has given shelter have rewarded him handsomely for his hospitality. But for their efforts the whole villa would have been destroyed, like those of the Karstadt-Schmitzes and Mackebens next door. Every room that is still habitable has been filled with refugees, who are stumbling over each other.
There is now hardly a single undamaged house in West Berlin. In many parts of town, air-mines came hurtling down by the dozen. The Bismarckstrasse is just one heap of ruins, and the underground and overhead railways have been severely hit. This morning I thumbed my way into the city and had to change cars five times in the process. The cars which refuse to give one a lift are invariably ‘official cars’, which hurtle past half-empty. Delivery vans, greengrocers and coalmen are much more helpful. From Knie I was taken as far as the Brandenburg Gate in a car, the hood of which had been ripped off by the blast of an exploding bomb.
...
Thursday, March 9, 1944
On Saturday, March 4, American aircraft appeared for the first time in the vicinity of Berlin. The American communiqué speaks of ‘an offensive sweep’ over the German capital. On Monday, March 6, came the first American daylight raid, carried out against the south-eastern and south-western suburbs and Konigswusterhausen. After a break on the Tuesday, a heavier attack was made on Wednesday against the outskirts of the city.
The sirens usually go off at about 1.00 p.m. for these American attacks. In contrast to the British night raids, which usually last about forty-five minutes, the American daylight raids go on for two or three hours. Whereas the British prefer to attack on dark nights and in bad weather, the Americans like daylight and a clear sky. Both Monday and Wednesday were beautiful days, without a cloud in the sky. The British drop their bombs quickly and at random – ‘carpet-bombing’ is their speciality – while the Americans prefer to take their time and make two or three trial runs over the target before releasing their bombs. It is now 12.40, and the alarm has just sounded.
The official line is that we have no intention of reacting to every American trick and that the time may well come when we shall refrain from putting any fighter aircraft into the air at all!
We have just spent two hours in the shelters. The main target was the eastern sector of the city.
A sojourn in the Adlon air raid shelter is the very reverse of pleasant; the air is foul and the place overcrowded. As these attacks occur round about midday and the hotel restaurants remain closed after the all-clear, most of us have to return unfed to our offices.
...
Thursday, March 16, 1944
The Russians are now seventy-five miles from the borders of Slovakia and ninety-five miles from the Hungarian frontier. In the Ukraine we are fighting for the last square mile. Kherson has fallen, and the battle is now approaching Nikolaiev. The Russians have crossed the Bug. To the north, where fighting in the Narva bridgehead continues, the picture is a little brighter.
The daily ‘confidential’ report which we receive from Supreme Headquarters becomes daily more meaningless. If one ignored the constantly changing place-names, one might well believe that we were still holding our own at Stalingrad. It is always the same old story: the breaches have been closed, counter-attacks have driven the enemy back, enemy attacks have been caught in the concentrated fire of all weapons and repulsed, and so on. In advancing in one year from Stalingrad to Tarnopol, the Russians have covered a distance equal to that from Tarnopol to Paris.
All we hear from the top people is that Führer Headquarters is full of optimism, that we have ‘nerves of iron’ and a fistful of trump cards, that the military situation on the eastern front presents no problem and that thirty divisions will be ample to enable us to resume the offensive. And that the latter will take place, if you please, as soon as we have repulsed the invasion in the west!
The air raids on Berlin have diminished somewhat in intensity. But Brunswick, Stuttgart and Leipzig, on the other hand, have suffered very severely. Over Brunswick the Americans appeared for the first time with strong fighter escort.
The official line is that we have no intention of reacting to every American trick and that the time may well come when we shall refrain from putting any fighter aircraft into the air at all! Nobody is going to tell us when and how we are to use our fighters. English commentators say that the war in the air will be concluded in sixty days. That means the end of May, and this should coincide with the anticipated date of the invasion.
In Italy the military situation is stationary. The Russians, who have recognised the new Italy, are courting Badoglio as zealously as they have been courting de Gaulle, banking on their conviction that the Anglo-Saxons will in due course subject both of them to some humiliation.
© Hans-Georg von Studnitz and Andreas von Studnitz 2022, 'While Berlin Burns'. Reproduced courtesy of Frontline Books and Pen & Swords Publishers Ltd.
