James Holland

There's one thing I hate in life.

He's faffing about.

He doesn't like faffing about.

I don't like faffing about.

Come on.

Do it or don't do it.

There's a sort of disconnect.

And this is the moment where Goering's private listening service, the Forschungsamt, which we've mentioned before.

So for those of you who haven't heard about this,

Hermann Göring, commander-in-chief of the Luftwaffe and president of Prussia, has his own private listening service, his own intelligence service, which is entirely for him and which is sanctioned by Hitler.

And occasionally he passes stuff off.

And primarily it's to kind of keep tabs on his own enemies within Germany and the Nazi hierarchy.

But occasionally, when there's something juicy, he passes it on.

And he picks up a Finnish diplomatic telegram in March revealing Allied plans for Norway, which he passes on to Hitler, who then decides to act.

So the German plan is ready by the 20th of March.

And it's then delayed because of persistent ice in the Baltic, which makes those naval operations impossible.

So Hitler is, you know, absolutely cursing and spitting and ranting and raving.

But on the 2nd of April, Hitler decides on the 9th of April

and this is as as the launch day of operation visa rubung because this is based on moon and melting of ice and so on so the operation is going to begin at 5 15 german time and would be one of the racist undertakings in the history of modern warfare which is why he likes it the

But, you know, high risk military gambles with minimal consultation or coordinated planning in any way are very much Hitler's style.