HAUCK: We must succeed in halting this invasion.
ANNACKER: Yes, that’s what I keep on saying. It’s all over if we don’t succeed.
HAUCK: That would be the end.
ANNACKER: If we were to succeed in halting this invasion, GERMANY would have a basis for negotiation.456
A Captain Gundlach, who had defended his bunker in the small coastal town of Ouistreham to the very last, shared similar hopes:
GUNDLACH: It is presumed that our leadership could never be so careless, or supposing our FÜHRER was not convinced—that’s to say, if the prospect of still winning the war by some means did not exist—then it is known that he would be honest enough to say: “Here people, condemn me!” If he was not still convinced of having something up his sleeve which could still prove the deciding factor of the war, he would put a bullet through his head, in order not to experience what could no longer be carried out rather than plunge his people into an abyss.457
In this statement, we can observe the convergence of faith in final victory and faith in the Führer.
Yet no matter how much energy the Nazi leadership or German soldiers themselves put into mobilizing their last reserves of confidence, the massive material advantage of Allied troops, and especially their aerial and artillery dominance, crushed any remaining hopes. Soldiers no longer talked about setbacks on the front or battles that had been lost; their entire world collapsed like a house of cards. The path was freed for the sort of fundamental criticism that had previously been lacking—a Private First Class Hirst even opined, “I’ll do anything I can to end the war and see that Germany is completely defeated”458—and not just among foot soldiers, but officers as well.
Typical in this regard was a conversation between Majors Arnold Kuhle and Sylvester von Saldern, both of whom had fought on the front lines as infantry commanders and had been taken prisoner in June 1944 on the Cotentin Peninsula:
