A Bomb For Hitler: "Valkyrie," 2008 Tom Cruise Movie

I've done a few articles on the subject of the attempt on Hitler's life and this one provides an overview to the actual historical events, if you are interested: http://pontificating-randy.blogspot.com/2011/08/german-question-part-one-hundred-fifty_29.html

The problem with these kinds of pictures is that they are based upon historical events; thus, we already know the overall outcome. It's like with the various pictures about the Titanic, the ship hits an iceberg and sinks. It always ends the same. Damn! You'd think after the first movie, they'd know to stay away from icebergs! With the July 20, 1944 attempt on Hitler's life, the subject has been covered, in whole or in part, in numerous films dating back decades. Perhaps we need to have new versions to continue to show younger generations that resistance to fascism did exist, even in a totalitarian system like that of Germany under the Nazis. Notice too, I said, "based upon historical events." This doesn't mean that the movies are documentaries, but rather, that they contain scenes depicting, "to some degree," events that actually took place historically.* Movies are written, filmed and released to make money and in many cases the overall real historical events wouldn't keep people in their seats or make them want to buy tickets to a movie theater, so..... things get spiced up to hold the attention of the audience; or at least, that's what the movie studios hope. So it is with this film, "Valkyrie," although you must admit, planting a bomb near Hitler and then trying to take control of Germany from the Nazis is a story that should hold the attention of most viewers.  

"Valkyrie" (German: "Walküre")** comes from that word's use as a German code name for a military plan to secure parts or all of Germany due to any threat to German government control for any reason, including rebellion. A number of the officers with responsibilities for carrying out any such military operation were anti-Nazis, and they cleverly decided to use the plan to take over the German government FROM the Nazis, once Hitler was either arrested or killed.     

There is a large cast for this movie, and some of  the main cast members are: American actor Tom Cruise as Colonel Claus von Stauffenberg, British actor (from Northern Ireland) Kenneth Branagh, as Colonel (later General) Henning von Tresckow, English actor Bill Nighy as General Friedrich Olbricht, English actor Terence Stamp as General Beck,*** English actor Tom Wilkinson as Colonel General Friedrich Fromm, German actor Thomas Kretschmann as Major Otto Remer,**** English actor Jamie Parker as Stuaffenberg's military aide, Werner von Haeften, and last, but not least, The Wacko-in-Chief, Hitler, is played by English actor David Bamber.

This version of the nearly successful attempt to kill Hitler begins with Claus von Stauffenberg serving with the German army in Tunisia, where he is severely wounded. The scene shifts to Hitler visiting a group of officers, including then Colonel, and soon to be General, Henning von Tresckow,  on the Eastern Front in Russia. When Hitler boards his plane to leave, Tresckow asks one of the officers who will accompany Hitler on the flight to take a package containing a bottle of liquor with him to be delivered to another officer. The package indeed contains a liquor bottle, but it is specially fitted with a bomb. The plane flies off, and later Tresckow learns that it lands safely; that the bomb failed to go off for some reason. The bomb must now be retrieved, lest the plan by Tresckow and others be discovered. He contacts the man with the "package" and he then makes the trip to get the bomb back into his possession. When he arrives, he learns from General Friedrich Olbricht, that one of the other conspirators has been arrested for unknown reasons, but Tresckow retrieves the package containing the bomb without incident. This whole segment shows how dangerous it could be to plot against Hitler.

The badly wounded Stauffenberg is released from the hospital, minus his right hand, two fingers on his left hand and his left eye. Stauffenberg, a devout Catholic, meets General Olbricht in church, where Olbricht tells him the resistance movement needs someone like him. Stauffenberg tells him that as he lay on the ground badly wounded in North Africa, and thinking he would die, he hung on because he says he thought, "If I die, I will leave my children nothing but shame," but he also tells Olbricht that if any plot against Hitler fails, that he fears for what will happen to his wife and children at the hands of the Nazis. Stauffenberg goes to a meeting of a number of army officers of the German resistance, but he doesn't like their lack of a plan for what they will do if Hitler is successfully removed from power, as other Nazi leaders will be able to step in; so, he leaves the meeting without making a commitment to the resistance. Afterwards, Stauffenberg sees his wife and children, but the air raid sirens sound and Allied aircraft drop bombs in the area, which helps to convince Stauffenberg that something has to be done.

Stauffenberg is assigned to the German Replacement Army (German: Ersatzheer), which the Germans used to induct, train, equip and then dispatch men to combat units in need of replacements. This substantial military force also acted as a "home army," with the general assignment to help keep public order or quell any rebellion. Several officers of the Replacement Army were anti-Nazis, with some being active members of the resistance. Stauffenberg meets with a couple of high ranking resistance officials and proposes using the army plan for securing Germany during a rebellion, but to use the plan AGAINST the Nazis. The idea was that once Hitler was killed, that the resistance would tell the German military and the German public that the Nazis and Heinrich Himmler, the head of the notorious Nazi SS, are the ones responsible for Hitler's death; thus, the army will oppose the Nazis and the SS out of German patriotism. One person they will need is Colonel General Friedrich Fromm, as he is the head of the Replacement Army and he will be needed to issue orders if this plan is to be put into operation. Stauffenberg and Olbricht go to see Fromm and they make "obvious hints" about him becoming a high official in any post-Hitler army. Fromm listens, understands the "hints," but he tells them that they have all sworn an oath of loyalty to Hitler, and that as long as Hitler is alive, he will remain loyal, and that he will forget that this meeting has ever taken place. This leaves a major lose end, but the plotters move on with their plan for the use of the army to suppress the Nazis and the SS and they lay out an actual assassination plan to kill Hitler. Further, they establish who will form the new German government to replace the Nazis.
  
Stauffenberg goes to meet Hitler and takes a bomb along in his briefcase. The plotters hope to kill Hitler, Göring and Himmler at the meeting, but Himmler is not present, so the plan is canceled.***** A few days later, however, on July 20, 1944, Stauffenberg attends another meeting with the intention of carrying out the assassination, regardless of which other Nazi leaders are there. Stauffenberg puts his bomb laden briefcase under the conference table with Hitler nearby and then he leaves the room for a prearranged telephone call. The bomb goes off and Stauffenberg and his aide, Werner von Haeften, manage to get through security and head to a waiting plane to fly to Berlin, where Stauffenberg believes that "Valkyrie" is being put into effect. Once back in Berlin, nothing has happened, as none of the leading conspirators were bold enough to act, because there was no confirmation that Hitler was dead. In fact, reports come in saying that Hitler is alive. The order for Valkyrie is given without Colonel General Fromm's actual signature, and in fact, Fromm is arrested by the conspirators. Various scenes show the army forces rounding up Nazis and SS personnel, but Berlin itself is not under the control of the army as yet. An order goes out to arrest Joseph Goebbels, the Nazi propagandist and one of Hitler's chief subordinates. The "Grossdeutschland" Battalion is mobilized to take Goebbels into custody and to help secure Berlin.****** As the unit arrests Nazi officials, the unit's commander, Major Otto Remer, receives a new, but conflicting order to arrest Colonel Stauffenberg. Remer and his battalion go to the Goebbels residence to arrest the Nazi. Goebbels watches the army troops arrive and he places a poison capsule into the side of his mouth. He then telephones Hitler's headquarters so that, when Remer comes into the office, Goebbels hands him the phone. On the other end is Hitler himself, who orders Remer to take the conspirators alive. When Remer leaves, Goebbels pulls the poison capsule from his mouth and swallows hard.

Like Remer had been, other army officers are left with a decision to follow the orders coming from Stauffenberg and his associates in the War Ministry in Berlin, or to follow orders from Hitler's headquarters, where communications to elsewhere have resumed after being shut down in the aftermath of the explosion. More and more officers choose the latter, as word spreads that Hitler is not dead, as Stauffenberg had believed, although Stauffenberg at first remains in denial. The army communications center cuts the phone lines from the War Ministry and the main participants of the plot are now isolated. Remer and his men arrive and take the anti-Nazi officers into custody. Colonel General Fromm is released and he orders that the arrested officers be shot. The men are taken outside and one by one they face a firing squad. (Note: I've read somewhere, but I don't recall where, that before filming of the scene began, the film crew and actors observed a moment of silence for the real plotters executed in the scene, as the scene was filmed on the exact location of the executions in Berlin.)

* While not terribly important, I caught a mistake early on in the film. The scene showing Stauffenberg being wounded comes before the scene of the attempt to blow up Hitler's plane with a bomb hidden in a liquor bottle. In fact, the attempt on Hitler's life came in March 1943 and Stauffenberg was wounded in Tunisia in April 1943, just 4 to 5 weeks before the surrender of the Germans and Italians in North Africa to the British and American forces there. 

** "Valkyrie" is a term from Old Germanic, "perhaps" more specifically from Old Norse, for female subjects of the god "Odin"/"Wotan" who led selected fallen warriors to "Valhalla," a large hall ruled by Odin; thus, they are "super heroes." The Old Norse mythology has endured to the present, but it seems that the various gods and characters in these stories were widespread among the Germanic tribes, not just the Norse. English once had several words for "Valkyrie," including "wælcyrie," and "wælcyrge." Just my opinion, but the first seems to be more of a true English form, while the second may have come from the closely related Old Norse form "valkyrja." Old Norse and English are related languages, and Old Norse had many influences on English, as the Norse and the English often clashed. Norse speakers conquered and settled in large parts of northern and eastern England; thus, many Norse forms of existing English words, and some new words, came into English.      

*** Terence Stamp became a sensation in his first major film in the title role of "Billy Budd," a movie I went to see with my father when it was released in the early 1960s.

**** Remer survived the war and promoted right wing, fascist-like, political stances.

***** This part of the movie goes partially against history, as Stauffenberg did indeed meet Hitler, but it was at his villa above the town of Berchtesgaden in the Bavarian/Austrian Alps, not at his military headquarters in a forested area near Rastenburg in northeastern Germany. Hitler had remained at his villa, because his headquarters was being strengthened against attack. The meeting took place, but the bomb plan was called off, because Heinrich Himmler was not at the meeting. Not long thereafter, Hitler did, indeed, leave for his military headquarters where the assassination attempt would take place a few days later.

****** The "Grossdeutschland" Battalion was an elite German army unit that provided security in Berlin. It also provided personnel for ceremonial purposes in the capital. It was part of a very large overall military formation that also provided Hitler with an army security detail, as well as combat units for the front during the war. The name is usually rendered as "Greater Germany" in English, but it literally means, "Large Germany," as it goes back in German history to the debate over whether the German states would unite into a modern nation with Austria (known as the "large Germany" plan) or without Austria as a constituent part (known as the "small Germany" plan; "Kleindeutschland"). The Habsburg family that then ruled Austria had amassed a large number of territories populated by non Germans, which made this a contentious issue. After Austria was incorporated into Germany in March 1938, the term "Grossdeutschland" came into more use.     

Photo is from the 2009 2 disc Special Edition United Artists/MGM DVD 

WORD HISTORY:
Cost-This word is a contracted form of a previously prefixed word beginning with the common Latin prefix "co/con/com," which had the general meaning, "with, together." The second part is from Indo European "sta," which meant, "to stand," and it is the ancestor of a whole series of words in English and other Indo European languages, including original English word "stand," which is from its Germanic roots. The two parts gave Latin "constare," which meant, "to stand at/with;" thus also, "to consist of," ("components which makes it stand/be firm") and "to cost" ("a set/standing price or cost for something"). This then became "costare," and it passed into Latin-based French as "co(u)ster" (to cost) and the noun "co(u)st." English borrowed the noun in the early 1200s, but when the verb was borrowed is unclear to me (1390s?). An interesting tidbit: German also borrowed the verb, as "kosten," with the same meaning, "to cost," but the noun form, "Kost," by its older meaning in German of "a cost in money or effort for food" saw the meaning transfer to "food," and it is one of German's words for "food."