Introduction

Abstract

This chapter charts the roughly twenty-seven months that lay between the destruction of the German Sixth Army at Stalingrad in January 1943 and Germany's unconditional surrender in May 1945. Mobilized for “total war,” German civilians and military personnel experienced an unparalleled convergence of military, economic, political, and social crises. The chapter investigates the conception of such notions under the crisis conditions of the final war years. It asks how members of the militarized national community interpreted their experiences at the intersection of extreme violence perpetrated by them and against them. How did they respond to the war's rising tolls and receding fortunes? What were their visions and expectations for the future? What impact did the war's descending trajectory have on people's relationship with the Nazi regime, and what did National Socialism in decline mean to those mobilized in its defense? Ultimately, the chapter probes popular responses to the violent dissolution of the Third Reich from an inclusive perspective that considers German military and civilian populations as integral members of Germany's wartime society (Kriegsgesellschaft).