66. Hitler is saluted by the Party’s ‘Old Guard’ in the Löwenbräukeller in Munich on 8 November 1943, the twentieth anniversary of the Beerhall Putsch. Göring is to Hitler’s right. It was to be the last time that Hitler would appear in person at this symbolic ritual, a high point in the Nazi calendar.67. Martin Bormann, head of the Party Chancellery (following the flight of Rudolf Heß to Scotland in May 1941). From the beginning of the war onwards he was invariably at Hitler’s side, and in April 1943 was officially appointed Secretary to the Führer. This proximity, together with his control of the Party, gave him great power.68. Hitler and Goebbels, still capable of raising a smile despite military disasters and mounting domestic problems, photographed during a walk on the Obersalzberg above Berchtesgaden in June 1943.69. The Eastern Front in spring and autumn. A German vehicle bogged down in heavy mud.70. The Eastern Front in winter. Tanks and armoured vehicles, unusable in the conditions, had to be dug in at strategic points to secure them against Soviet attacks.71. The Eastern Front in summer. Limitless space. A Waffen-SS unit treks across seemingly unending fields.72. The ‘Final Solution’. French Jews being deported in 1942. Frightened faces peer out from behind the barbed-wire covering the slats of the railway-wagon.73. The ‘Final Solution’. Polish Jews forced to dig their own grave, 1942.74. The ‘Final Solution’. Incinerators at Majdanek with skeletons of camp-prisoners murdered on the approach of the Red Army and liberation of the camp on 27 July 1944.75. Hitler and Himmler take a wintry walk on the Obersalzberg in March 1944.76. The ‘White Rose’ resistance group of Munich students. Christoph Probst with Sophie and Hans Scholl in July 1942. On 22 February the following year, they were sentenced to death and beheaded on the same day for distributing leaflets in Munich University, in the wake of the disaster at Stalingrad, condemning the inhumanity of the Nazi regime.77. The brilliant tank commander Heinz Guderian. Though he clearly recognized that Hitler was leading Germany to catastrophe, he condemned the attempt to assassinate him on 20 July 1944. A day later, Guderian was appointed Chief of the General Staff, retaining the position until his dismissal on 28 March 1945.
