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Erwin Rommel

German field marshal

Erwin Johannes Eugen Rommel (15 November 1891 – 14 October 1944) was a German Field Marshal and commander of the Deutsches Afrika Korps in World War II, widely referred to as The Desert Fox (Der Wüstenfuchs). Linked to a conspiracy to assassinate Adolf Hitler, he was ordered to commit suicide with a cyanide pill, in return for assurances that his family would not be persecuted following his death.

Mortal danger is an effective antidote for fixed ideas.
Be an example to your men in your duty and in private life. Never spare yourself, and let the troops see that you don't, in your endurance of fatigue and privation. Always be tactful and well-mannered and teach your subordinates to be the same. Avoid excessive sharpness or harshness of voice, which usually indicates the man who has shortcomings of his own to hide.
“In a man to man fight, the winner is he who has one more round within himself.”
I shall be dead in a quarter of an hour. … To die by the hand of one's own people is hard. But the house is surrounded and Hitler is charging me with high treason. "In view of my services in Africa" … I am to have the chance of dying by poison. … If I accept, none of the usual steps will be taken against my family … It is very much in their interest to see that the affair does not come out into the open. ~ Rommel to his son.

Quotes

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  • Krieg ohne Haß
    • War without Hate
      • The title he chose for his memoirs of the North Africa Campaign, published in 1950.
  • The art of concentrating strength at one point, forcing a breakthrough, rolling up and securing the flanks on either side, and then penetrating like lightning, before the enemy has time to react, deep into his rear.
    • Strategies he promoted which have been called Blitzkrieg (Lightning War), as quoted in Europe Since 1914 (1966) by Gordon Alexander Craig
  • One must not judge everyone in the world by his qualities as a soldier: otherwise we should have no civilization.
    • As quoted in Dirty Little Secrets : Military Information You're Not Supposed To Know (1990) by James F. Dunnigan and Albert A. Nofi, p. 50
  • Gentlemen, you have fought like lions and been led by donkeys.
    • Said to captured British officers during the Siege of Tobruk, as quoted in The Guinness History of the British Army (1993) by John Pimlott, p. 138
  • Be an example to your men in your duty and in private life. Never spare yourself, and let the troops see that you don't, in your endurance of fatigue and privation. Always be tactful and well-mannered and teach your subordinates to be the same. Avoid excessive sharpness or harshness of voice, which usually indicates the man who has shortcomings of his own to hide.
    • Address as Director of the Military School in Wiener Neustadt at the passing out parade of the 1938 class of cadets.
    • A note by General Bayerlein in the Rommel Papers (1953), edited by Basil Henry Liddell Hart. p. 241.
       
      War without Hate

Infanterie greift an (1937)

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  • Lieber zuviel als zu wenig Spatengebrauch! Diese Arbeit spart Blut.
    • Better too much spade work than too little! This work saves blood.
      • p. 28.
  • Den Kampf Mann gegen Mann gewinnt bei gleichwertigen Gegnern, wer eine Patrone mehr im Lauf hat.
    • “In a man on man fight between comparable opponents, the winner is he who has put one more bullet through the barrel.”
      • p. 62.

The Rommel Papers (1953)

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The Rommel Papers (1953) edited by Basil Henry Liddell Hart
  • When a commander has won a decisive victory - and Wavell's victory over the Italians was devastating - it is generally wrong for him to be satisfied with too narrow a strategic aim. For that is the time to exploit success. It is during the pursuit, when the beaten enemy is still dispirited and disorganised, that most prisoners are made and most booty captured. Troops who on one day are flying in a wild panic to the rear, may, unless they are continually harried by the pursuer, very soon stand in battle again, freshly organised as fully effective fighting men.
    • Ch. V : Graziani's Defeat - Cause and Effect, p. 96.
  • Mortal danger is an effective antidote for fixed ideas.
    • Ch. XI : The Initiative Passes, p. 244.
  • The Italian command was, for the most part, not equal to the task of carrying on war in the desert, where the requirement was lightning decision followed by immediate action. The training of the Italian infantryman fell far short of the standard required by modern warfare. ... Particularly harmful was the all pervading differentiation between officer and man. While the men had to make shift without field-kitchens, the officers, or many of them, refused adamantly to forgo their several course meals. Many officers, again, considered it unnecessary to put in an appearance during battle and thus set the men an example. All in all, therefore, it was small wonder that the Italian soldier, who incidentally was extraordinarily modest in his needs, developed a feeling of inferiority which accounted for his occasional failure and moments of crisis. There was no foreseeable hope of a change for the better in any of these matters, although many of the bigger men among the Italian officers were making sincere efforts in that direction.
    • Ch. XI : The Initiative Passes, p. 262.
       
      Courage which goes against military expediency is stupidity, or, if it is insisted upon by a commander, irresponsibility.
  • Anyone who has to fight, even with the most modern weapons, against an enemy in complete command of the air, fights like a savage against modern European troops, under the same handicaps and with the same chances of success.
    • Ch XIII : Now or Never - Alam Halfa, p. 285.
  • The military career of most of the people who aimed these accusations at us was notable for a consistent absence from the front, on the principle of "weit vom Schuss gibt alte Kreiger" - "far from the battle makes old soldiers."
    • Ch XV : Alamein in Retrospect, p. 327.
  • But courage which goes against military expediency is stupidity, or, if it is insisted upon by a commander, irresponsibility.
    • Ch XVI : The Great Retreat, p. 347.
  • Thus the British lost the very able and adaptable commander David Stirling of the desert group SAS which had caused us more damage than any other British unit of equal strength.
    • Ch XVIII : Back to Tunisia, p. 393.
  • In Tunisia the Americans had to pay a stiff price for their experience, but it brought rich dividends. Even at that time, the American generals showed themselves to be very advanced in the tactical handling of their forces, although we had to wait until the Patton Army in France to see the most astonishing achievements in mobile warfare.
    • Ch. XXIII : The Sky Has Grown Dark, p. 523.


Disputed

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  • Don't fight a battle if you don't gain anything by winning.
    • This is cited to to Rommel‎'s Infanterie Greift An [Infantry Attacks] (1937) in World War II : The Definitive Visual History (2009) by Richard Holmes, p. 128, and Timelines of History (2011) by DK Publishing, p. 392, but to George S. Patton, in Patton's Principles : A Handbook for Managers Who Mean It! (1982) by Porter B. Williamson as well as Leadership (1990) by William Safire and Leonard Safir, p. 47
  • Good soldiers, bad officers; however don't forget that without them we would not have any Civilization.
    • On Italians, sometimes cited to The Rommel Papers (1953) edited by Basil Henry Liddell Hart, but without specific chapter or page citations; it seems to summarize an attitude indicated by Rommel in Ch. 11 of that work, but no published occurrence of this has actually been located.
  • Krieg ohne Haß (War without Hate)
    • In the preamble written by his wife of the 1953 edition published by the publishing house "Heidenheimer Zeitung", she clearly states that all the chapter titles as well as the book title were chosen by the editors, thus not Erwin Rommel himself.

Quotes about Rommel

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Alphabetized by author
 
I am not jealous of Rommel. ~ Sir Claude Auchinleck
 
Self-restraint, even chivalry... distinguished the combatants on both sides throughout the North Africa campaign... The leading exemplar of this code was Rommel himself. ~ Steven Pressfield
 
He seemed to know just what the enemy were like and how they would probably react. His plans were often startling, instinctive, spontaneous and not infrequently obscure. ~ Theodor Werner
 
He was ordered several times by Hitler to "Stand and Die." To fight to the last bullet, the last man. To execute and torture prisoners. He defied those orders. ~ Steven Pressfield
 
We have a very daring and skillful opponent against us, and, may I say across the havoc of war, a great general. ~ Sir Winston Churchill
 
"Do you believe it?" I interrupted. "Yes," he replied. "I believe it. It is very much in their interest to see that the affair does not come out into the open. By the way, I have been charged to put you under a promise of the strictest silence. If a single word of this comes out, they will no longer feel themselves bound by the agreement."
I tried again. "Can't we defend ourselves…" He cut me off short. "There's no point," he said. "It's better for one to die than for all of us to be killed in a shooting affray. Anyway, we've practically no ammunition." ~ Manfred Rommel
  • He was a tactician of the greatest ability, with a firm grasp of every detail of the employment of armour in action, and very quick to seize the fleeting opportunity and the critical turning point of a mobile battle. I felt certain doubts, however, about his strategic ability, in particular as to whether he fully understood the importance of a sound administrative plan. Happiest while controlling a mobile force directly under his own eyes he was liable to overexploit immediate success without sufficient thought for the future.
    • British General Harold Alexander, commander, Allied forces in the Middle East, as quoted in London Gazette (3 February 1948)
  • There exists a real danger that our friend Rommel is becoming a kind of magical or bogey-man to our troops, who are talking far too much about him. He is by no means a superman, although he is undoubtedly very energetic and able. Even if he were a superman, it would still be highly undesirable that our men should credit him with supernatural powers.
    I wish you to dispel by all possible means the idea that Rommel represents something more than an ordinary German general. ... I am not jealous of Rommel.
  • He was a splendid military gambler, dominating the problems of supply and scornful of opposition ... His ardour and daring inflicted grievous disasters upon us, but he deserves the salute which I made him — and not without some reproaches from the public — in the House of Commons in January 1942, when I said of him, "We have a very daring and skilful opponent against us, and, may I say across the havoc of war, a great general." He also deserves our respect because, although a loyal German soldier, he came to hate Hitler and all his works, and took part in the conspiracy of 1944 to rescue Germany by displacing the maniac and tyrant. For this, he paid the forfeit of his life. In the sombre wars of modern democracy chivalry finds no place ... Still, I do not regret or retract the tribute I paid to Rommel, unfashionable though it was judged.
  • Rommel was jumpy, wanted to do everything at once, then lost interest. Rommel was my superior in command in Normandy. I cannot say Rommel wasn't a good general. When successful, he was good; during reverses, he became depressed.
  • Hitler might have accepted his military leaders' advice (notably that of Admiral Raeder) and focused his attention on winning the war in the Mediterranean in 1941, before invading the Soviet Union. He might, for example, have struck across the Eastern Mediterranean to Cyprus, Lebanon and Syria; or through Turkey (violating her neutrality) towards the Caucasus; or across Egypt to Suez and beyond. Even as it was, the British positions in Malta and Egypt were acutely vulnerable. Rommel might well have been able to drive the British out of Egypt if he had been sent the twenty-nine German divisions that were sitting more or less idle in Western Europe.
    • Niall Ferguson, The War of the World: Twentieth-Century Conflict and the Descent of the West (2006), p. xliii
  • Rommel's presence, as ever, acted as a tonic on his troops. Anybody who once came under the spell of his personality, a brother officer wrote, turned into a "real soldier". However tough the strain Rommel seemed inexhaustible, seemed to know exactly how the enemy would probably react. The same officer wrote that Rommel had an exceptional imagination, seemed to know no fear whatsoever, and that his men "idolized him".
    • David William Fraser, on Rommel's role on the battlefields of World War I, in Knight's Cross : A Life of Field Marshal Erwin Rommel‎ (1994), Ch. 3, Gebirgsbataillon, p. 40
  • Beyond dispute, Rommel was a master of manoeuvre on the battlefield and a leader of the purest quality. Wherever he appeared he inspired. His speed of perception and decision, his energy of execution and his boldness of concept placed him among the great; and his military exploits have left a footprint in history as clear as that of Prince Rupert, to whom Montgomery once, in a somewhat uncharacteristic flight of imagery, likened him. Certainly he erred badly at times. The first attack on Tobruk was hasty and ill-prepared, the 'dash to the wire' was prompted by a misreading of the situation, Alam Halfa offered only improbable chances of success (and was called off early), Medenine was a disaster. But the victories, generally with the dice loaded against him, display a very recognizable quality of command, a quintessential 'Rommel'.
  • But he was more than a tactical commander of bravery and genius. He was reflective. He evolved from his own experience and observations solderly lessons which he committed to paper and from which all learned and continue to learn. Wherever he went, as has been remarked, he taught; and he teaches still. Rommel was not only a master practitioner; he deduced theory from practice and the military art benefited therefrom.
  • Montgomery claimed that his own achievements derived from the fact that he never fought an unsuccessful battle, and for Montgomery this was both an accurate statement and a wise policy. It was, however, a policy only available to one with both time and resources. Rommel, more often than not, had insufficient of either. Nor was he ever in a position to wait until his situation and the odds improved. He fought at a numerical disadvantage again and again, and his exploits can only be measured against that fact. He relied on skill to offset quantitative inferiority. The bitter exclamation, already quoted, comes to mind: 'If one considers what the German Marshal could have achieved with the superiority enjoyed by his opponents...' War is usually an option of difficulties. Again and again Rommel could choose inactivity or take a calculated risk. He believed that inactivity is seldom forgiven a general by fate.
  • Of course, Rommel, ultimately, was beaten. He lost. But, although what matters in war is to win, that truism cannot provide the sole criterion for judgment of military talent. War may also be considered as a business, but its conduct is also an art. Ultimately Napoleon was beaten. So was Montrose. So was Lee. Few could deny their genius. With all his imperfections, Rommel as a leader of men in battle stands in their company.
  • Until I delved into Rommel's own papers I regarded him as a brilliant tactician and great fighting leader, but did not realize how deep a sense of strategy he had — or at any rate, developed in reflection.
  • He was the best leader of fast-moving troops but only up to army level. Above that level it was too much for him. Rommel was given too much responsibility. He was a good commander for a corps of army but he was too moody, too changeable. One moment he would be enthusiastic, next moment depressed.
  • Born in southern Germany to middle-class parents, Rommel had won acclaim during World War I for his personal heroism as a young officer who specialized in tactics of infiltration behind enemy lines. Hitler's willingness to adopt new and unorthodox military ideas quickly won Rommel's admiration, and Rommel's relatively humble origins endeared him to the Fuehrer, who often felt uncomfortable in the presence of aristocratic generals. Hitler appointed Rommel to command his personal bodyguard in 1938. Until 1939, Rommel had always been an infantry officer, but the success of the Blitzkrieg in Poland made him a true believer in armored warfare. Soon afterward, Hitler helped him obtain command of a panzer division. Despite his lack of previous experience with tanks, Rommel mastered armored operations in a remarkably brief time. Indeed, his division performed with conspicuous success during the 1940 campaign in Western Europe. Like Guderian, he believed in he swiftest possible exploitation of a breakthrough. This continued to be his philosophy when he took over his new command in Libya.
    • Michael J. Lyons, World War II: A Short History (2004), 4th edition, p. 111
  • Self-restraint, even chivalry... distinguished the combatants on both sides throughout the North Africa campaign... The leading exemplar of this code was Rommel himself. When orders from Hitler mandated the execution of captured British commandos, Rommel tossed the document in the trash. He insisted that the Allied prisoners receive the same rations he was given. He even wrote a book about the conflict called Krieg ohne Haß (War Without Hate). Memoirs of the North Africa campaign attest that, fierce and brutal as much of the fighting was, relations between individual enemies retained a quality of forbearance that seems, today, almost impossible to imagine.
  • Rommel had gained the world's respect for his military genius. He was a legend. ... Rommel was reminiscent of the more romantic, chivalrous days of old — and was a genuinely humane military officer. Rommel was Germany's best General. You have to remember all of Europe was in Nazi hands at the time. The Americans hadn't entered the war yet. Russia was being attacked by 166 Nazi divisions. Things were grim. And Rommel, the greatest desert fighting general of all time, and his Africa Korps, were kicking the British's butt, pushing them back to Cairo. It became a case where the war might have been lost right there.
  • He was ordered several times by Hitler to "Stand and Die." To fight to the last bullet, the last man. To execute and torture prisoners. He defied those orders.
    • Steven Pressfield, in "Leaders with Character, Chivalry and Courage – Relics of the Past?" at Knol
  • Rommel had a feel for the battlefield like no other man.
  • At about twelve o'clock a dark-green car with a Berlin number stopped in front of our garden gate. The only men in the house apart from my father, were Captain Aldinger [Rommel's aide] , a badly wounded war-veteran corporal and myself. Two generals — Burgdorf, a powerful florid man, and Maisel, small and slender — alighted from the car and entered the house. They were respectful and courteous and asked my father's permission to speak to him alone. Aldinger and I left the room. "So they are not going to arrest him," I thought with relief, as I went upstairs to find myself a book.
    A few minutes later I heard my father come upstairs and go into my mother's room. Anxious to know what was afoot, I got up and followed him. He was standing in the middle of the room, his face pale. "Come outside with me," he said in a tight voice. We went into my room. "I have just had to tell your mother," he began slowly, "that I shall be dead in a quarter of an hour." He was calm as he continued: "To die by the hand of one's own people is hard. But the house is surrounded and Hitler is charging me with high treason. 'In view of my services in Africa'," he quoted sarcastically, "I am to have the chance of dying by poison. The two generals have brought it with them. It's fatal in three seconds. If I accept, none of the usual steps will be taken against my family, that is against you. They will also leave my staff alone."
    "Do you believe it?" I interrupted. "Yes," he replied. "I believe it. It is very much in their interest to see that the affair does not come out into the open. By the way, I have been charged to put you under a promise of the strictest silence. If a single word of this comes out, they will no longer feel themselves bound by the agreement."
    I tried again. "Can't we defend ourselves…" He cut me off short. "There's no point," he said. "It's better for one to die than for all of us to be killed in a shooting affray. Anyway, we've practically no ammunition."
  • "Rommel, Rommel, Rommel!" Churchill had cried, as he paced up and down his room in the Cairo Embassy. "What else matters but beating him!" The Rommel magic had become legend even among British troops. A shake-up might help break the spell, Churchill reasoned. General Sir Claude Auchinleck was a much admired soldier, but his command seemed poorly coordinated and his troops lacking in confidence in their leaders. "To take or destroy" Rommel was now the assigned task of [two men], the very able General Sir Harold Alexander and the then little known General Bernard Montgomery.
    • C.L. Sulzberger, in his book The American Heritage Picture History of World War II (1966), p. 234
  • Rommel was bitter afterward about Hitler's "victory or death" order, which, he said, kept him fighting at El Alamein twenty-four hours longer than he should have. As a result, a large part of Rommel's infantry and motorized troops were lost. After Axis forces began withdrawing on November 2, Montgomery sent armor sweeping around behind them, and two days later Rommel's escape road was blocked; yet somehow he slipped his forces around the barrier. Sudden, heavy rains that bogged down vehicles in mud were all, according to Montgomery, that saved his foe from annihilation. The R.A.F. constantly bombed Rommel; Montgomery's armor slashed at his columns. Rommel abandoned every non-essential, including his Italian infantry. His route was littered with burned-out vehicles and other debris of war. The Nazi leader had no choice but to try to continue his retreat some one thousand miles until he could link up with German forces in Tunisia and with them turn on Montgomery- and on the American forces newly landed in North Africa.
    • C.L. Sulzberger, in his book The American Heritage Picture History of World War II (1966), p. 241
  • Rommel was a military phenomenon that can occur only at rare intervals; men of such bravery and daring survive only with exceptional fortune. He was as brave on the battlefield as Ney, with much better brains; as dashing as Murat, with better balance; as cool and as quick a tactician as Wellington.
  • Anybody who came under the spell of his personality turned into a real soldier. However tough the strain he seemed inexhaustible. He seemed to know just what the enemy were like and how they would probably react. His plans were often startling, instinctive, spontaneous and not infrequently obscure.
    • Theodor Werner, an officer who, during World War I, served under Rommel, as quoted in The Trail of the Fox (1977) by David Irving, p. 15
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