The Plots Against Hitler

Danny Orbach

• Publisher: Houghton Mifflin Harcourt
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9780544715226
• Topic: Storia
• Subtopic: Seconda guerra mondiale

The first definitive account of the anti-Nazi underground in Germany: "Superb" ( Publishers Weekly ). In 1933, Adolf Hitler became chancellor of Germany. A year later, all political parties but the Nazis had been outlawed, freedom of the press was but a memory, and Hitler's dominance seemed complete. Yet over the next few years, an unlikely cadre of conspirators emerged—schoolteachers, politicians, theologians, even a carpenter—who would try repeatedly to end the Führer's genocidal reign. This dramatic account is history at its most suspenseful, revealing the full story of those noble, ingenious, but ultimately failed efforts. Orbach's fresh research offers profound new insight into the conspirators' methods, motivations, fears, and hopes. We've had no idea until now how close they came—several times—to succeeding. The Plots Against Hitler fundamentally alters our view of World War II and sheds bright—even redemptive—light on its darkest days. "A riveting narrative of the organization, conspiracy, and sacrifices made by those who led the resistance against Hitler. Orbach deftly analyzes the mixed motives, moral ambiguities and organizational vulnerability that marked their work, while reminding us forcefully of their essential bravery and rightness. And he challenges us to ask whether we would have summoned the same courage." —Charles S. Maier, professor of history, Harvard University, and author of Among Empires "[A] gripping look at a historical counternarrative that remains relevant and disturbing." — Kirkus Reviews

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Contents
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Note on Ranks
• Introduction
• Opposition in Flames
• “That Damned Mare!”: The Army Top-Brass Scandal
• The Officer, the Mayor, and the Spy
• “In the Darkest Colors”: The Decision of General Beck
• The Bird and Its Cage: First Attempt at Coup d’État, September 1938
• Without a Network: The Lone Assassin
• The Point of No Return: Pogrom and War
• The Spirit of Zossen: When Networks Fail
• Signs in the Darkness: Rebuilding the Conspiracy
• On the Wings of Thought: Networks of Imagination
• Brokers on the Front Line: The New Strategy
• War of Extermination: The Conspirators and the Holocaust
• “Flash” and Liqueur Bottles: Assassination Attempts in the East
• Code Name U-7: Rescue and Abyss
• Count Stauffenberg: The Charismatic Turn
• Thou Shalt Kill: The Problem of Tyrannicide
• A Wheel Conspiracy: The Stauffenberg Era
• The Final Showdown: July 20, 1944
• Photos
• The Shirt of Nessus
• Motives in the Twilight
• Networks of Resistance
• EPILOGUE
• Acknowledgments
• Notes
• Select Bibliography
• Index
• About the Author
• Connect with HMH