The Myths of the Wehrmacht

Ever since its establishment as a conscript army in 1935 and long after its destruction ten years later, the Wehrmacht has been the source of an array of myths concerning its military capacities, its political role within the Third Reich, its involvement in the criminal policies of the Nazi regime and, not least, its ideological make-up. But how many of these stand up on examination? And what motivated the ordinary soldier in Hitler's armies in the Second World War?