continue to make “the Jewish brothers Löbl” available as inform-
ers. Göring approved, but Fräulein Limberger noted the caveat
he uttered thus: “Lohse must see he doesn’t do it in any way
that might link the Reichsmarschall’s name with Jews! If possible,
do it clandestinely.”
By late November , , it would have become plain to
Göring were he not in Paris that his air force had bitten off
more than it could chew at Stalingrad. In theory, five or six
transport squadrons could airlift five hundred tons of supplies a
day. But given the worsening weather conditions, the lift would
in practice call for to squadrons, or between and
Junkers transport planes. Göring had lost hundreds of them
at Crete. They had only Ju s left, and Hitler had recently
committed most of these to the supply of Rommel’s armies in
Africa. Richthofen had predicted this all along, but what could
he now do to discourage the airlift? “I urge Jeschonnek and
Zeitzler to tell the Führer my view, and to harness the
Reichsmarschall,” he dictated to his diary on November , “but
he’s in Paris.”*
By the time Göring arrived back in East Prussia, the Stalin-
grad situation was beyond repair. Tempers flared. “Manstein,”
recorded Richthofen on November , “[is] desperate about the
decisions taken at top level.”
Incredibly, Hitler’s staff were less concerned with Stalin-
grad than with North Africa. At : .. on November to
everybody’s astonishment Field Marshal Rommel appeared in
person at Hitler’s headquarters and demanded his permission to
- This diary entry, and the Rosenberg documents cited above, render most
suspect the General Gerhard Engel “diary” published by Professor Martin
Broszat’s Institute of Contemporary History in Munich, which has Engel
“witnessing” a row between Hitler and Göring at East Prussia this same day!