The resistance against Adolf Hitler and the failed assassination attempt on the dictator were remembered in Berlin.

The men of July 20, mainly officers like Colonel Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg, but also the Social Democrat Julius Leber and the former Mayor of Leipzig Carl Goerdeler, tried that day to kill Hitler in his East Prussian headquarters, the "Wolfsschanze" overthrow the regime.

The attack failed, Hitler survived, and the coup was nipped in the bud. In the evening of the same day, the first resistance members were shot in the inner courtyard of the Bendler block, including Stauffenberg. Many more arrests, show trials and executions followed in the Plötzensee detention center, where relatives and survivors have been meeting for Memorial Day for many years.

The son of one of those involved in the assassination, Axel Smend, said on Tuesday: “July 20, 1944 is not only the day of the assassination attempt on Adolf Hitler, but the day of the German resistance against National Socialism. It is now the day of remembrance of Georg Elser, the Kreisau Circle, the White Rose, the group around Helmuth Hübener, the Red Orchestra, the silent heroes, the military-civil resistance, individual men and Women of both churches and many others. ”Smend, whose father, Lieutenant Colonel Günther Smend, was executed in September 1944, continued:“ The July 20 assassination attempt was not a military coup, but an attempt made jointly with civil resistance groups to remove Germany from the Liberate dictatorship and end the war immediately. The aim wasput an end to the atrocities and establish the rule of law. "

On July 20, the state will also commemorate the brave, the men and, in the background, their women who opposed the crimes of the Nazi regime, its wars and the murder of millions of European Jews.

Berlin's Governing Mayor Michael Müller (SPD) said on the memorial day: “For our free and democratic future, we have to draw the lesson again and again that every authoritarian, especially dictatorial and freedom-hostile tendency that disregards and despises law and order any racism and anti-Semitism means an existential danger for our community and for our freedom-oriented way of life. ”According to the politician, he regrets that because of the corona pandemic, there was once again no reception in the Red City Hall.

Swearing in of recruits

The Bundeswehr, which sees itself in the tradition of the German resistance, also decided not to hold a major public event.

The armed forces are committed to the military resistance of the penultimate minute against the dictator and expressly not to the Wehrmacht, whose generals and officers were overwhelmingly loyal to Adolf Hitler until the fall.

Defense Minister Kramp-Karrenbauer (CDU) hosted a swearing-in ceremony for Bundeswehr recruits in the courtyard of her Berlin office late on Tuesday afternoon, albeit to a lesser extent than usual and under strict Covid measures.

101 recruits took part in the vow in the Bendler Block.

The President of the Central Council of Jews in Germany, Josef Schuster, spoke as the guest of honor.