Norman Ohler

I think his hatred for the French was very, very deep.

He really wanted to go to war with them.

It was an ideological, irrational decision.

That's why he didn't hate the empire.

He admired it and looked down on

But the French you really hated.

And France had been the Erbfeind, the...

genetic enemy of the German people at least right wingers would say so there had been two wars the first one Germany had won then first world war Germany had lost so Hitler wanted to kind of revenge and also stop the Versailles Treaty so he really needed to attack the West at least in his in his mindset but it was an irrational decision and that's why high command said no we're not going to do it basically and Hitler's position at the time was not that he could do anything he wanted but

I mean, high command is still a high command of the German Wehrmacht.

That's a very old, you know, it's a tradition.

They do whatever they want, you know, but also they have to obey Hitler's order.

So it's a power struggle, basically.

But to invade France was a totally stupid idea, but it changed on the morning of February 17th, 1940, right?

Hitler invited three young tank generals to his office and they had a plan, which was the plan to go through the Aden mountains.

That was the victorious idea.

So it's not the drugs, actually that idea to go through the Aden mountain.

If you think monocausal, you would say that's the reason.

That idea was genius, and Hitler immediately understood it.

Because before, the plan was to attack in the north of Belgium, which is the same as World War I. It becomes a stalemate, and they fight for months, and no one really moves, and it's bloody, and nothing's happening.

It's bad.