Admiral Doenitz: From Hitlerite to Hero?

Released in 2016, author Barry Turner’s look at one of the lesser known Nazi leaders is an intriguing read. Karl Doenitz and the Last Days of the Third Reich takes an in-depth look at the time period at the very end of the Third Reich. Hitler appointed Doenitz as the new fuehrer before his suicide in a bunker as the Russians closed in on Berlin.

While it is not a biography of Doenitz, Turner does a decent job of drawing a portrait of the man responsible for the initial victory of the U-Boats in the Battle of the Atlantic – until British technology was able to defeat the dreaded Wolf Packs that caused enormous loss of life and supplies. Not a committed Nazi ideologue, Doenitz comes across as playing the professional in a variety of situations while steering clear of what he considered the “politics” of other leaders of the Reich.

Turner’s central argument is that Doenitz is not given enough credit for delaying surrender to the Allies in order to ensure civilians and soldiers from the Reich were able to evacuate across the Baltic. Turner claims this was an intentional humanitarian exercise as to have not done so would have meant that many Germans would end up at the mercy of the Russians instead of the US or the British. While Turner doesn’t go so far as to call Doenitz a “hero”, he does paint him in a sympathetic light because of this.

Unfortunately for Turner, the many quotes he highlights from Doenitz himself do not give the reader the same picture. Doenitz constantly reiterates his unwavering support for Nazism and the Third Reich and even during his trial at Nuremberg never apologizes. Turner himself points out that Doenitz had delusional ideas about possibly creating some kind of reconstituted Reich with himself at the head.  This seems to suggest that his supposed “humanitarian” gesture of moving what was left of the German army and people across the Baltic was more about preserving the volk for this future delusion and not so that they could merely survive. While it is true that the Soviets were more brutal in their treatment of prisoners than the Americans and British, the fact that he wanted to carry on with the Reich suggests he was no humanitarian.

While Turner’s argument might be faulty, the writing is very well done and it is an enjoyable read. It is always useful to explore the lesser known players in the World War Two story and analyze their impact (or not) on events with our present day hindsight.

In the end Doenitz accepted the unconditional surrender demanded by the Allies so that the German people could live to see another day. It is unclear if he envisaged a German state that had a strong resemblance to the one he served so loyally or another kind altogether. It is something he undoubtedly thought about as he served his Nuremberg sentence in full and then lived out his days in West Germany where he died aged 89 the day before Christmas 1980 – unrepentant to the end.