Talk:Alpine Fortress

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There appears there was confusion/conflation during World War II on the Allies' part (which has largely carried over since) between: A) the notion of an "Alpine Redoubt" (or lack of it); B) allegedly pure propaganda claims one was being created made by Joseph Goebbels; and C) a very real combination of circumstances which included:

• Military hospitals located well out of harm's way (as in Garmisch-Partenkirchen and Bad Tolz);
• Relocated POWs and conscript laborers (again often out of harm's way, or as potential hostages);
• Nazi/SS officer schools/training facilities located in the Bavarian/Austrian Alps (as described in Stephen Harding's The Last Battle);
• Actual relocation of Nazi/German government/SS, et al facilities again out of harm's way (as that of the Party's FA signals intelligence and cryptanalytic agency from Berlin to Kaufbeuren);
• and who knows how much other similar unrelated or only tangentially related activity;

With: D) the lack of actual defensive military infrastructure build-up in the Bavarian and Austrian Alps (and combat units being driven there by advancing U.S. forces versus anticipated retreat of senior Party and military officials to continue the fight).

A good start on teasing it out can be gotten from:

• The Last Battle: When U.S. and German Soldiers Joined Forces in the Waning Hours of World War II in Europe, by Stephen Harding (ISBN 978-0-306-82209-4)
• United States Army in World War II, Special Studies, Chronology 1941-1945 (April 27-May 5, 1945)
• The End of the War by LTC Fredrick P. A. Hammersen
• Five Years, Five Countries, Five Campaigns with the 141st Infantry Regiment, Chapter 14, The Last Ten Days of the War

Wikiuser100 (talk) 02:01, 5 June 2015 (UTC)

8 years later and this still applies 174.57.159.242 (talk) 04:42, 13 October 2023 (UTC)

References

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Self contradiction

If the Alpine Fortress never existed, why were orders given to evacuate personnel to it on multiple occasions? Either it existed in some form, or those orders didn't exist either. - Keith D. Tyler ¶ 10:01, 26 October 2022 (UTC)

Towards the end of the war Hitler gave orders for formations to attack which existed only on paper. Historian932 (talk) 00:59, 22 January 2023 (UTC)

Allies knew it wasn't real?

Has any historian looked into the serious possibility that the western Allies knew the Redoubt wasn't real and used it as an excuse to send their armies away from Berlin? As the article states, it saved them a lot of casualties and also avoided a potential showdown with Stalin over who got credit for capturing Berlin. With the Allies reading Enigma and having penetrated German intelligence networks it seems strange they would be so fooled at this stage, also in a regime where things happened when Hitler wanted them to, the fact that he showed almost no interest means it can't have had that much momentum. Having said that who actually knows what Canaris and the Abwehr were really up to.