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I just watched the movie, "The Bunker" starring Anthony Hopkins. In the movie, there is constant mention of a place where Hilter could have escaped to if he was willing to flee Berlin. The movie made it sound like it was a more defensable place that the Germans could have held out a little longer. I could not make out the pronouncation of this place. Where exactly, based on the movie, could the Third Reich moved its HQ to if it was willing to abandon Berlin? What was this place in historical reality?
The Nazis had pushed the existence of what they called (if memory serves) an Alpine Redoubt where remnants would fight a guerilla war. I might be mistaken but I think it was to be based in the area around Berchestegaden where Hitler had his mountain home. The whole thing was propaganda but the US detailed troops to the area to ensure it didn't form or to fight if it was real.
Not to mention that in that non-PC era....the allies would have just driven up 1000 gallons of fuel oil to any "bunker" and let them burn\suffocate like they did in the phillipeans.
Hitler in fact could have fled but it's likely to have turned out like it did for most of the top Nazi leaders who where captured. Some of the smaller fish did escape but many their were no flyer's on to recognize;but the top people there were.After what happened to Mussolini; Hitler was worried that the same may happen to him and its said it effect him toward the end of the war.
Fleeing Berlin would have sent a very bad message to pretty much everyone in Germany, from senior generals to front line troops. The entire resistance might have collapsed upon hearing the news.
That said, I think Norway would have been an interesting place to Hitler to flee to. It would have taken the Allies weeks to plan and organize an operation to land there. (Again, assuming the German troops in Norway didn't throw in the towel.)
Fleeing Berlin would have sent a very bad message to pretty much everyone in Germany, from senior generals to front line troops. The entire resistance might have collapsed upon hearing the news.
That said, I think Norway would have been an interesting place to Hitler to flee to. It would have taken the Allies weeks to plan and organize an operation to land there. (Again, assuming the German troops in Norway didn't throw in the towel.)
The people in Norway may have killed Hitler and his helpers. A friend of mine from there says they didn't like the Nazis that much.
The second poster got it right. There was a chance for Hitler to leave Berlin and head to Bavaria, possibly around his retreats around the Eagles Nest. This was Hitler's home - mountanoues, easily defendible, easy for fanatical nazi guerella fighters to hide out. Hitler would not leave Berlin however, and the allies had anticipated this - capturing The Eagles Nest and other Bavarian stongholds while the Russians were moving into Berlin.
But even that was a fanciful dream, he would have been like Sadam hiding in a spider hole for a few months until the Russians dug him up.
I just watched the movie, "The Bunker" starring Anthony Hopkins. In the movie, there is constant mention of a place where Hilter could have escaped to if he was willing to flee Berlin. The movie made it sound like it was a more defensable place that the Germans could have held out a little longer. I could not make out the pronouncation of this place. Where exactly, based on the movie, could the Third Reich moved its HQ to if it was willing to abandon Berlin? What was this place in historical reality?
What they are referring to was one of the greatest deceptions the Germans engineered during the war. So good, that it persists to this day. Hitler had a retreat that was known as Berchtesgaden (roughly pronounced "bear-chis-goddin"). This was located deep in the Bavarian Alps near the Austrian border. Many of the more famous photos and videos of Hitler show him at this home.
As early as 1943 Himmler began advocating for the creation of an "Alpenfestung" or "Alpine Fortress" to be created in the area around Berchtesgaden and include most of Bavaria, western Austria and northern Italy. Hitler never endorsed the plan and no serious plans were ever made to constuct such a "national redoubt".
In late 1944 and early 1945 it was becoming obvious that the war was lost and senior German planners started advocating to move what was left of the government to this area and assign what was left of the cream of their forces to defend it. The idea was that they could hold out for quite sometime given the defensible terrain. Enter propaganda minister Joseph Goebbels.
Goebbels created a special unit whose sole purpose was the creation and spread of rumors about the existence of the "Alpenfestung". The unit created everything from blueprints for construction at the site to fake orders showing troops movements and supplies being stockpiled. They even leaked rumors to neutral countries about the anticipated move to the area and the intention of the Germans to fight to the bitter end.
In reality nothing was really ever done. On April 24th Hitler issued an order for all remaining government officials to leave Berlin and head to the Alpenfestung. Hitler himself had long insisted that he would stay in Berlin and not leave the city, primarily because he knew it wouldn't matter as there was no actual "national redoubt" for him to flee to. He also considered a completion of his legacy that he would die defending Berlin. When the American armies arrived in Bavaria in force several days later, they found nothing but sporadic resistance and nothing even approaching the levels of the "national redoubt" they expected.
What is interesting is the influence this rumor had on Allied planning. While the overall commanders were always in favor of a broadfront approach versus Pattons focused drive, their planning was influenced by the belief that the Germans were preparing a massive redoubt in Bavaria to serve as their last stand. The belief in its existence led Allied planners to shift the focus of their advance further south then they would have gone otherwise, dilluting forces that were heading towards Berlin.
No less than Omar Bradley himself has commented on how total the deception was. He stated that in hingsight it was far too fantastic to actually think the Germans built such a redoubt to the scale the intelligence reports claimed. However, the mere rumor of its existence and the threat it posed meant that the Allies had to take it seriously and plan for its capture. They touch on some of that planning in the final episodes of Band of Brothers when the airborne divisions were planning for a jump against Berlin and then suddenly get packed up and shipped south to drive into Bavaria.
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