orders, in the first days of the war Göring issued orders that
sharply limited the operations of his crews forbidding them to
use poison gas, to attack civilian targets, or to sink Red Cross
ships, and flatly embargoing London as a bombing target.
This misplaced sentimentality accented his “farewell con-
versation” with Dahlerus at Kurfürst on September , .
“Whatever happens,” the field marshal said, with a ponderous
attempt at sincerity, “the efforts of the German government as
well as myself will be directed to waging war in the most humane
manner possible.” Germany, he emphasized, would take no ini-
tiative whatever against either Britain or France.
He gave the same assurances to the British ambassador later
that day. “And what if a bomb should hit my own person acci-
dentally?” inquired Henderson.
“Then,” replied Göring slapping him on the back, “I shall
send a special plane to drop a wreath at your funeral.”
He probably meant it, too. He was still living amid the
fantasies of the Richthofen era, when chivalrous aviators did
that sort of thing.
Field Marshal Göring had planned to open his assault on Britain
with an immediate surprise attack on the British Fleet anchored
at Scapa Flow, its base in the north Scottish isles. Hitler forbade
it. Each side still hoped to restore the peace, and the British also
remained initially inactive, as did the French. The Deutsche
Reichsbahn’s crack “Rheingold” express train shuttled un-
scathed the length of the French front each day, from Amster-
dam to Basel.
For all his bombast and bellicose utterances, Göring de-
tested the senseless destruction of war, as he was about to dem-
onstrate, and this increased the mutual contempt between him
and the career soldiers like Manstein, Rommel, and Halder.