now a field marshal from Luftflotte on Manstein’s front in
Russia to Luftflotte in Italy until the invasion crisis there was
over. He called Richthofen to see him on the Obersalzberg on
June .
Reichsmarschall pretty critical of Kesselring’s direc-
tion of the battle [recorded the Luftflotte commander
in his diary] but emphasizes that there is still the same
old trust between them (or so he says).... I have to
point out that the net result for me is less pleasant. I
haven’t the faintest idea whether I can run the war
any differently and stress that any new arrangement
in the south is bound to take time.Citadel, Hitler’s ground-shaking final attempt to regain the
strategic initiative in the east, was about to begin. Spring vaca-
tion in Bavaria over, Göring followed him back to East Prussia
and sat in on the speech that Hitler delivered on the first day of
July to his Citadel commanders. He promised that they would
have sixteen hundred tanks, but they knew that the Russians
had three thousand. The room was icy and unheated, and Hit-
ler found it difficult to rouse enthusiasm. Several generals al-
lowed their gaze to wander. General Otto von Knobelsdorff re-
called two years later that the Reichsmarschall looked “goofier”
(mehr verblödet) than ever. “Hermann Göring,” he told fellow
prisoners, “sat next to [Hitler], wilting more and more from one
quarter-hour to the next, until his face looked downright
sheepish. He kept stuffing himself with pills and then perked u p
again for a while.” Manstein picked a fight with Göring, de-
manding the immediate return of the irreplaceable Richthofen
at least for the duration of Citadel. Göring jealously refused.
Still seething, he summoned all his own field marshals to
the hunting lodge at Rominten for the next two days. He thus