What Did Von Stauffenberg Plan To Do?
On July 14, von Stauffenberg was ready to complete the mission with a bomb in his briefcase, but it was aborted at the last minute because Heinrich Himmler was not present at the meeting. The plotters had decided that they wanted to kill, Hitler, Himmler, and Goering at the same time. On the following day, von Stauffenberg was again ready to carry out the plan but once more, it was aborted; this time because Hitler was called out of the room.
On July 18, von Stauffenberg heard rumors (almost certainly false) that the Gestapo knew of the plan and were about to arrest him. On July 20, he arrived at Wolf’s Lair with the bomb in his briefcase once again. He was determined that it was now or never so he arrived in the conference room at 12.30 pm. Shortly after the meeting began, von Stauffenberg excused himself and went to Wilhelm Keitel’s washroom where he used a pair of pliers to crush the end of a pencil detonator which was inserted into a one-kilogram plastic explosive wrapped in brown paper.
The detonator included a wire copper tube that contained copper chloride. The chemical would eat through the wire in 10 minutes and release the firing pin. Von Stauffenberg’s war injuries meant he didn’t have time to prime the second bomb, so he gave it to Werner von Haeften. Von Stauffenberg entered the conference room, which contained around 20 people, and subtly placed the briefcase on the floor near Hitler. He received a planned telephone call a couple of minutes later and left the room.
Why Did the Plan Fail?
Given the obstacles he faced, von Stauffenberg carried out his plan well, but it failed due to a set of unfortunate and unforeseen circumstances. First of all, Hitler usually held his conferences in an underground bunker made of reinforced concrete. It only had one steel door and no windows. If a bomb went off in that room, it would cause carnage because the blast waves and shrapnel would bounce off the walls and back into the room. Even a small explosion in such a room could kill everyone inside.
Unfortunately for von Stauffenberg, the warm weather on the day of July 20 forced the Nazi officials to change the venue to a conference hut that had windows, a table and a variety of other items that would minimize the impact of an explosion. As I already mentioned, there were supposed to be two bombs, but he only had the chance to arm one of them. Finally, Colonel Heinz Brandt moved the briefcase with his foot. He inadvertently pushed the bomb away from Hitler and Brandt was one of the four people that died in the blast.
The bomb detonated at 12.42 pm and demolished the room. It killed a stenographer immediately while three officers died later from their injuries. The conference leg table shielded Hitler and others from the blast, so he suffered minor injuries including a perforated eardrum. Had von Stauffenberg been able to arm the second bomb, it would probably have killed everyone in the room.
Aftermath
If Operation Valkyrie had succeeded, possibly hundreds of thousands of lives would have been saved. Instead, the conspirators had to flee, but they were unable to escape the wrath of the Fuhrer for long. Von Stauffenberg and Haeften drove to the nearest airfield and flew to Berlin. Von Stauffenberg assumed the plot was successful and began to motivate others to join the next phase which was to take over the government. However, he heard Goebbels on the radio announce that Hitler had survived and once they heard him speak later, they knew the coup was a failure.
The conspirators were tracked to their offices and defeated after a brief shootout. Von Stauffenberg was shot in the shoulder and arrested. On the morning of July 21, he was executed by firing squad along with Haeften and two other officers. When it was his turn to die, von Stauffenberg said: “Long live our sacred Germany.” The following day, his body was dug up, stripped of its medals and burned. His family managed to escape, but thousands of others were not so lucky. It is estimated that 4,980 people were executed after being found guilty of participating in the July 20 plot in some fashion.