Germany remembers the plot to kill Hitler

[steve2470]

http://www.dw.de/germany-remembers-the-plot-to-kill-hitler/a-17792469

July 20 marks the 70th anniversary of Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg's attempt to assassinate German Nazi dictator Adolf Hitler. His son and a former guard still have vivid memories of that day.

Berlin, July 20, 1944: Colonel Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg headed to Adolf Hitler's Wolf's Lair field headquarters. It was still early, just before 8 a.m., on the day Stauffenberg planned to kill Adolf Hitler with a bomb. It was too good an opportunity to miss: Stauffenberg was supposed to brief Hitler as part of his military duties.

Kurt Salterberg, now 91, was a guard at the Wolf's Lair, near what was then Rastenburg in East Prussia and today is the Polish town of Ketrzyn, some 600 kilometers (370 miles) east of Berlin. Back then, 21-year-old Salterberg was part of the team protecting the inner area.

At around 11 a.m. Stauffenberg and two co-conspirators, Major General Helmuth Stieff and First Lieutenant Werner von Haeften, entered the command headquarters of the Nazi regime. It was where the most powerful military figures would meet and where Hitler would hand out orders to his officers.