south, from the Norwegian coast. Two divisions were spared to strengthen the Italian push on Egypt. Revolt was fermented in Iraq and in Egypt itself. The bombing of British cities stopped and all efforts returned to destroying their airfields. Each move strengthened Germany’s position and brought them one step closer to success.
And all the while Seydlitz had his men moving back and forth through Time, reporting back to him on the progress of their machinations. Up ahead – in the time to come – things were slowly changing in their favour, but still the major thing remained the same: when the snows came the Russians would halt the German advance and throw them back. From that moment the war would be lost. Their actions – small as they were – had extended the war into the early months of 1947. Even so, defeat was inevitable.
Early on Seydlitz had been forced to show them the ‘machine’. It was a fake, of course, primed with a few gobbets of information his men had prepared elsewhere, but its focus was real enough. Seydlitz told them there were two such machines, focusing on the future. The other was somewhere in Spain, hidden where they would never find it. That was not liked, but it was understood. Hitler even smiled when Seydlitz told him.
‘You are a cautious man,’ he said.
Seydlitz nodded. More cautious than he knew.
The big changes came in August. Instead of sending the Centre Army south, Hitler ordered General Bock to press on to Moscow. On the seventeenth there was a major engagement thirty kilometres south-west of the Russian capital, and two days later Guderian swept into the city. There followed a week of hand-to-hand and street-by-street fighting. But by 28 August Moscow had been taken. Bock dug in, then sent Guderian and Hoth, his two
Panzer
commanders, north to help the attack on Leningrad.
On 30 August Seydlitz accompanied Hitler on his first visit to Moscow. There, in the Kremlin, Hitler took a march past of his triumphant army, standing where Stalin himself had stood only four months earlier.
Stalin had fled, but he had not got far. Seydlitz’s men had traced him and found him, and in a small village eighty kilometres east of Moscow they ambushed him. On the morning of 2 September, they woke Hitler at five and presented him with the body.
What did the future look like after this? Moscow and Stalin had both fallen. They had cut the head from the Russian bear, but would the bear fall? Up ahead they saw the counter-attack, led by Zhukov. There was still the possibility of failure. But then, in mid-September, Leningrad fell and Zhukov himself was taken.
For Seydlitz these were heady days, and while they unfolded there was a kind of camaraderie between Hitler and himself. But in the aftermath of Leningrad, as in the north they dug in and looked to the south for further victories, a sour note slowly crept in.
Among the small but elite group surrounding Hitler – those who knew Seydlitz’s role in events – things had changed. Subtly, almost imperceptibly, the power base had shifted. Goebbels was closest to Seydlitz, perhaps, but there were others who looked to him first and Hitler after for their lead. Goering was effusive in his praise, while Himmler, ever the follower and never an innovator, balanced precariously between obedience to the Führer and deference to Seydlitz.
For all that he did to defuse this situation – for all his humility, self-deprecation and pampering of Hitler’s monomaniacal ego – Seydlitz could not wholly deflect Hitler’s jealousy and suspicion. Memories of what Hitler had done to Strasser and Rohm in 1934 haunted him, not because he feared for his own life, but because his death might mean the failure of the whole scheme. Seydlitz had always been a rival, and though he might claim – and rightly – that such plans were Hitler’s alone, espoused as early as 1924 in
Mein Kampf
, Hitler only had to look about him to see what they truly thought. Even
And all the while Seydlitz had his men moving back and forth through Time, reporting back to him on the progress of their machinations. Up ahead – in the time to come – things were slowly changing in their favour, but still the major thing remained the same: when the snows came the Russians would halt the German advance and throw them back. From that moment the war would be lost. Their actions – small as they were – had extended the war into the early months of 1947. Even so, defeat was inevitable.
Early on Seydlitz had been forced to show them the ‘machine’. It was a fake, of course, primed with a few gobbets of information his men had prepared elsewhere, but its focus was real enough. Seydlitz told them there were two such machines, focusing on the future. The other was somewhere in Spain, hidden where they would never find it. That was not liked, but it was understood. Hitler even smiled when Seydlitz told him.
‘You are a cautious man,’ he said.
Seydlitz nodded. More cautious than he knew.
The big changes came in August. Instead of sending the Centre Army south, Hitler ordered General Bock to press on to Moscow. On the seventeenth there was a major engagement thirty kilometres south-west of the Russian capital, and two days later Guderian swept into the city. There followed a week of hand-to-hand and street-by-street fighting. But by 28 August Moscow had been taken. Bock dug in, then sent Guderian and Hoth, his two
Panzer
commanders, north to help the attack on Leningrad.
On 30 August Seydlitz accompanied Hitler on his first visit to Moscow. There, in the Kremlin, Hitler took a march past of his triumphant army, standing where Stalin himself had stood only four months earlier.
Stalin had fled, but he had not got far. Seydlitz’s men had traced him and found him, and in a small village eighty kilometres east of Moscow they ambushed him. On the morning of 2 September, they woke Hitler at five and presented him with the body.
What did the future look like after this? Moscow and Stalin had both fallen. They had cut the head from the Russian bear, but would the bear fall? Up ahead they saw the counter-attack, led by Zhukov. There was still the possibility of failure. But then, in mid-September, Leningrad fell and Zhukov himself was taken.
For Seydlitz these were heady days, and while they unfolded there was a kind of camaraderie between Hitler and himself. But in the aftermath of Leningrad, as in the north they dug in and looked to the south for further victories, a sour note slowly crept in.
Among the small but elite group surrounding Hitler – those who knew Seydlitz’s role in events – things had changed. Subtly, almost imperceptibly, the power base had shifted. Goebbels was closest to Seydlitz, perhaps, but there were others who looked to him first and Hitler after for their lead. Goering was effusive in his praise, while Himmler, ever the follower and never an innovator, balanced precariously between obedience to the Führer and deference to Seydlitz.
For all that he did to defuse this situation – for all his humility, self-deprecation and pampering of Hitler’s monomaniacal ego – Seydlitz could not wholly deflect Hitler’s jealousy and suspicion. Memories of what Hitler had done to Strasser and Rohm in 1934 haunted him, not because he feared for his own life, but because his death might mean the failure of the whole scheme. Seydlitz had always been a rival, and though he might claim – and rightly – that such plans were Hitler’s alone, espoused as early as 1924 in
Mein Kampf
, Hitler only had to look about him to see what they truly thought. Even
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