German soldier, born in Kulm, SEC Germany. A leading tank expert and exponent of the Blitzkrieg theory, he created the panzer armies which overran Poland in 1939 and France in 1940. He commanded the 2nd Panzer Group in Army Group Centre under Bock in the attack on the USSR in June 1941. Recalled after the failure to take Moscow, he was chief of general staff in 1944, and after the anti-Hitler plot in the same year was made commander on the Eastern Front. He wrote Panzer Leader (1952).
Heinz Wilhelm Guderian (17 June 1888 – 14 May 1954) was a military theorist and innovative General of the German Army during the Second World War. Germany's panzer forces were raised and fought according to his works, best-known among them Achtung - Panzer! He held posts as Panzer Corps commander, Panzer Army commander, Inspector-General of Armored Troops, and chief of staff of the army (Chef des Generalstabs des Heeres). Although he never became a Field Marshal, Guderian is recognized as one of the most prominent generals of WWII.
Early career
Guderian was born in Kulm, West Prussia. From 1901 to 1907 Guderian attended various military schools. In 1911 Guderian joined the 3rd Telegraphen-Bataillon (Wireless-Battalion), Prussian Army Signal Corps. After the war, Guderian stayed in the reduced 100,000-man German Army (Reichswehr), where he came to specialize in armored warfare. Their works were translated into German by Guderian.
Achtung - Panzer!, was written in 1936-37 as an explanation of Guderian's theories on the tank and aircraft's role in modern warfare. The panzer force he created would become the core of the German Army's power during the Second World War, and fight according to what became known as blitzkrieg doctrine.
World War II
In the Second World War Guderian first served as the commander of the XIX Army Corps in the invasion of Poland and the invasion of France. Guderian's panzer group led the "race to the sea" that split the Allied armies in two, depriving the BEF and the French armies in Northern France and Belgium of their fuel, food, spare parts and ammunition.
In 1941 he commanded Panzergruppe Guderian in Operation Barbarossa, the German invasion of the Soviet Union, receiving the Knight's Cross with Oak Leaves in July of that year. Guderian's own view on the matter was that he had been victimised by Kluge and at some point so abused Kluge with accusations related to his dismissal that he provoked Kluge into challenging him to a duel, which Hitler fortunately forbade.
After the German defeat at Stalingrad, Guderian was recalled to active service and on 1 March 1943 became the Inspector-General of the Armoured Troops.
On 21 July 1944, after the failure of the July 20 Plot, he became chief of staff of the army (Chef des Generalstabs des Heeres) as a successor to Kurt Zeitzler, who had departed July 1st with a nervous breakdown. Hitler finally dismissed Guderian on 28 March 1945 after an argument over the failed counterattack of General Theodor Busse at Küstrin;
Life after the war
Despite Soviet and Polish government protests, Guderian was not charged with any war crimes during the Nuremberg Trials, as his actions and behavior were consistent with that of a professional soldier.
Poland argued that at the Battle of Wizna, Guderian had threatened the Polish commander Władysław Raginis with shooting prisoners of war if he did not order the remaining Polish forces to surrender. furthermore thousands of Red Army POWs were killed by soldiers under Guderian's command . Guderian also accepted an estate in the newly annexed Warthegau region in German territory annexed from Poland after the invasion. Guderian also received and accepted a state gift of money from Hitler after his retirement in 1942.
Guderian surrendered to American troops on May 10, 1945, and remained in U.S. custody as a prisoner of war until his release in 1948.
Guderian's son, Heinz Günther Guderian, became a prominent General in the post-war German Bundeswehr and NATO.
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