WI Hitler is captured and juged at Nuremberg?

As much as I hate Hitler I kind of wish he could have lived long enough to answer many questions about the Nazis and how Germany conducted the war. He could share many secrets about negotiations, reasons for different actions, and insights into the people around him.

I know it sounds crazy but we can learn alot from studying such a man.

By 1945 the man was deep into Parkinsonian Dementia, my father being a neurologist for decades can tell right off the bat from Hitler's hand movements that he had end stage Parkinsons well before he blew his brains out. I don't believe Hitler was mentally capable of giving the answers you are looking for at that point in time.
 
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By 1945 the man was deep into Parkinsonian Dementia, my father being a neurologist for decades can tell right off the bat from Hitler's hand movements that he had end stage Parkinsons well before he blew his brains out. I don't believe Hitler was mentally capable of giving the answers you are looking for at that point in time.

That would make an interesting trial. Would they still execute him if he was clearly brain damaged? Would the trial still be public?
 
Hitler not killing himself before the Allies got there is ASB territory. There was zero chance he would leave to try to make a deal with the Western Allies like Himmler did nor would he surrender to the Soviet's.

It was victory or death for Hitler.

The only possible way you could come up with for this to happen is Eva comes up with a plan to drug him and fly out of Berlin to South America with the help of a few others.

Even then with the loss of his Empire Hitler would most likely have killed himself soon after arriving in South America.

Another possibility that occurs is if Goering, Himmler, or one of the other top Nazis with the a vicious yet pragmatic streak decided to pull an 11th-hour coup and hand Hitler over the Allies in hopes of getting leniency for himself.
 
I know it's ASB, but if the Soviets are closing in, Hitler is say a day away from suicide, and the RAF launch a daylight alpha strike on the Bunker using Grand Slams and Tall Boys? The surrounding area is leveled, all the guards are killed, the Bunker is penetrated and everyone inside is killed or wounded? Allowing the Russians to sweep in and strike before anyone realizes what's happening? So Hitler is captured unconscious?

A lot of question marks, I know. Needing a lot of intel the Allies and Russians didn't have. And an ASB level of coordination. And accuracy. But in backgammon, sometimes you DO roll two sixes.:)
 
I don't think it's an ASB question. A wrong dose of poison or Hitler vomiting it for some reason is not impossible without supernatural event.

So, a living Hitler (well, until his hanging, even insane every allied power, resistence movment, survivors wanted him dead, and dead in an undebatable way) for Nuremberg trial maybe would have changed some decision on the verdict? By exemple, putting less charges on the OTL defandants (maybe more prison sentences?)

For the neo-nazism, critically the german one, what's his presence could have made? The NPD would be able to make good scores in the 60's? Or nothing changes really?
 
Another possibility that occurs is if Goering, Himmler, or one of the other top Nazis with the a vicious yet pragmatic streak decided to pull an 11th-hour coup and hand Hitler over the Allies in hopes of getting leniency for himself.

Hitler was pretty well surrounded by ultra loyalists in his bunker.

Rommel had that idea of getting a better peace for Germany by getting Hitler to come to France and using his troops to capture him and then surrender to the Allies, but even he had to know it most likely would have ended in a bloodbath with Rommel and/or Hitler both being killed along with many other Germans and the decision to move the location of their meeting to a well fortified command bunker convinced him to call off his likely suicidal plan.

But, lets say the plan happened and it worked and Hitler was in Allied hands. First off the political and military chaos (as well as the demoralization to the German soldier) the plan would have caused would have ended the war many months sooner so you might have had the trials in mid 1945.

Hitler still had more then enough fanatical supporters in Germany who would have slipped him pills to kill himself and unlike fat man Hitler would have taken them before he ever reached the stand.

The difference between Saddam Hussein who refused to kill himself and Hitler who did was that Saddam was a thug who while he killed hundreds of thousands of people (not counting his wars) was a blowhard who loved himself too much to kill himself. Napoleon was a similar blowhard who loved himself too much to fight to the death or kill himself.

Hitler really believed in the concept that if you failed you weren't worthy to live and should kill yourself. That wasn't just his insane orders he gave to Von Paulus, Rommel, and others he practiced what he preached.

However, in the event D-Day failed and some of the Soviet offensives in 1944 failed and the war dragged on until sometime in 1946 you might have a situation where Hitler (who by then would be a figurehead for someone like Himmler) is captured and his Parkinsonian Dementia is too advanced for him to think to take his own life or understand what is going on. In which case I suspect if he would be put on trial they would probably allow one day open to the press where you see Hitler with headphones on sitting down so the press could get pictures of him, but the rest of the case he would be absent of course he would still be convicted and put to death to appease world opinion even if they would simply be killing the mindless shell of a body at that point.
 
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For the neo-nazism, critically the german one, what's his presence could have made? The NPD would be able to make good scores in the 60's? Or nothing changes really?
I think the effect on Neo-Nazism is going to depend on what Hitler's state would be during the trial. Would his mental and physical health have degenerated to the point where he was an empty, broken man, or would he have recovered enough under proper medical care (instead of the quack remedies he was getting from Nazi doctors) to regain some of his old fire?

Needless to say, a Hitler who stands proud and defiant Nuremburg would be a boost to the livelihood of the neo-nazi movement, while a weak, broken Hitler would probably weaken the movement a bit compared to OTL.
 

Orsino

Banned
I think its nonsense to say that Hitler failing to kill himself is inherently ASB, the world is full of people who have failed to kill themselves, all that needs to happen is for him to be incapacitated, betrayed, or taken by surprise.

If captured alive, the security surrounding Hitler would have been pretty substantial, so he may well be deprived of the chance to kill himself while in custody. Assuming this to be the case he would no doubt stand trial at Nuremberg, the suggestion that Stalin would have put some sadistic desire to keep Hitler in a private dungeon above the political and public importance of a international trial misjudges the man.

Which takes us to the root of the question, how would the trial of Adolf Hitler go? How would he behave on the stand? I think the answer to that is probably some varying degree of non-cooperation. This isn't like after the beer hall putsch, Hitler has nothing to gain by extravagnt rhetoric, broken and defeated, humilliated, mentally unstable, betrayed by everyone and disillusioned with the German people themselves he will be unrepentant, depressed, angry, and likely just want the whole thing over so he can go to his inevitable death.

So I think he's either going to just sit there and completely refuse to acknowledge the court, or he may take the opportunity to launch one final tirade against, well, pretty much everyone in the world at this point. Then he dies.

As for the affect on neo-nazis and people who glorify Hitler, I'm inclined to think that no matter how incoherent he is on the stand they'll be able to look past it so shouldn't damage his standing too much. You'd probably find modern neo-nazis raging against the injustice of his trial, and if he managed to say anything halfway memorable during his defense such a phrase would be seized on by neo-nazis and repeated ad nauseum as the fuhrer's glorious final words.

As much as I hate Hitler I kind of wish he could have lived long enough to answer many questions about the Nazis and how Germany conducted the war. He could share many secrets about negotiations, reasons for different actions, and insights into the people around him.

I know it sounds crazy but we can learn alot from studying such a man.
Hitler would have zero interest in explaining anything to anyone, so the only way you're going to get any kind of information would be torture following his capture, which does not always give the best insights.
 
This isn't like after the beer hall putsch, Hitler has nothing to gain by extravagnt rhetoric, broken and defeated, humilliated, mentally unstable, betrayed by everyone and disillusioned with the German people themselves he will be unrepentant, depressed, angry, and likely just want the whole thing over so he can go to his inevitable death.

Hard to say for sure though, given his taciturn personality; this is a man who could go from manic raving to deep depression in the course of a few minutes. IMO, odds are he would spend most of the trial being sullen and uncooperative, but would go into rant-mode a few times in response to some random comment.
 
if the pod is april or may 1945, it would be difficult to try him since he was such a complete mess

his lucidity was basically zero at that point... he had tremors in an arm and a leg

all the years of awful sleep habits, bad diet, high stress, the psycological and physical damage of the july 20th attack had all more than caught up to him (to say nothing of the various drug cocktails he was on)

he had been steadily declining even without the big shock of the bomb attack

IMO the last time he was lucid for any prolonged period of time (ie more than a single day) was in March 1944 when he ordered the successful Kaments offensive and put a lid on Hans Valentine Hube and listened to Manstein and Model

However, this brief period of sanity where he was using his last bit of adult decision making ability quickly wore off

the trigger was Manstein suggesting, that since his Kaments offensive was very successful and that Hitler's deferrence to him had allowed him to rescue the 1st panzer army, that it might be a good idea to name him commander of the eastern front and give him a free hand. Hitler sunk into HYPER paranoia that never left him or receeded again, he fired Manstein over the unanimous opposition of the general staff... he fired Kliest over the unanimous opposition of the general staff (Zietzler resigining in disgust)

his whole handeling of the western campaign was the effect of his paranoia and control freak issues which got completely out of control after march to say nothing of the rampent recklessness the eastern front was run with after july 20

I think by May 1945 no amound of allied forced medical care was going to allow hitler to be mentally fit to stand trial
 
His chances of being found not guilty weren't very good.

If he took the stand, I think that he would come across very badly. He'd lose control, rant and give unresponsive answers. If it could have been captured on camera, the Germans would wonder what they had seen in him for so long.
 
I think by May 1945 no amound of allied forced medical care was going to allow hitler to be mentally fit to stand trial

It's hard to be sure how he'll react to such radical changes in his circumstances though. That's not to mention that I'm pretty sure Hitler would still stand trial if he thought Goering was a gigantic pink elephant named Harvey; after all, Hess was both far less guilty and probably crazier than Hitler.
 
His chances of being found not guilty weren't very good.

If he took the stand, I think that he would come across very badly. He'd lose control, rant and give unresponsive answers. If it could have been captured on camera, the Germans would wonder what they had seen in him for so long.

Or they might suspect that it was not really him.
 

Orsino

Banned
Hard to say for sure though, given his taciturn personality; this is a man who could go from manic raving to deep depression in the course of a few minutes. IMO, odds are he would spend most of the trial being sullen and uncooperative, but would go into rant-mode a few times in response to some random comment.
This is pretty much how I see it going down. Hitler's whole reason for being is gone at this point so I see him tending towards the sullen and uncooperative, but I imagine there would be moments of hate-filled ranting, he might even manage some small part of his former rhetorical skill.

BlairWitch749 said:
his lucidity was basically zero at that point... he had tremors in an arm and a leg

all the years of awful sleep habits, bad diet, high stress, the psycological and physical damage of the july 20th attack had all more than caught up to him (to say nothing of the various drug cocktails he was on)

he had been steadily declining even without the big shock of the bomb attack

IMO the last time he was lucid for any prolonged period of time (ie more than a single day) was in March 1944 when he ordered the successful Kaments offensive and put a lid on Hans Valentine Hube and listened to Manstein and Model

However, this brief period of sanity where he was using his last bit of adult decision making ability quickly wore off

the trigger was Manstein suggesting, that since his Kaments offensive was very successful and that Hitler's deferrence to him had allowed him to rescue the 1st panzer army, that it might be a good idea to name him commander of the eastern front and give him a free hand. Hitler sunk into HYPER paranoia that never left him or receeded again, he fired Manstein over the unanimous opposition of the general staff... he fired Kliest over the unanimous opposition of the general staff (Zietzler resigining in disgust)

his whole handeling of the western campaign was the effect of his paranoia and control freak issues which got completely out of control after march to say nothing of the rampent recklessness the eastern front was run with after july 20

I think by May 1945 no amound of allied forced medical care was going to allow hitler to be mentally fit to stand trial
I think you're conflating strategic judgement with lucidity. The reality is that although Hitler may have been paranoid and delusional by the end of the war, he was also still capable of making his own personal decisions according to most sources, he was still capable of lucidity, and of facing trial. And I think Adolf Hitler would be made to stand trial regardless of his mental state. I don't doubt Hitler will be in poor health and unstable on the stand, but not to the degree where a trial is impossible.
 

Orsino

Banned
Who do they find to be Hitler's lawyer?
I don't know that much about the process of procuring defence counsel for the Nuremberg trials, I guess it could be any of a number of German lawyers, and I could see Hitler rejecting counsel anyway, what interest would he have in legal defence? He would be certain to go to his death, and wouldn't have given a crap about legal arguments.
 
It's hard to be sure how he'll react to such radical changes in his circumstances though. That's not to mention that I'm pretty sure Hitler would still stand trial if he thought Goering was a gigantic pink elephant named Harvey; after all, Hess was both far less guilty and probably crazier than Hitler.

Hitler was far far far more guilty of war crimes then Hess, but by 1945 I really think alot of people here are vastly underestimating how insane/demented Hitler was. I would say he was much worse off mentally then Hess at that point. The movie Downfall showed Hitler much more sane then the reports I have read of Hitler in early 1945.
 
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I think you're conflating strategic judgement with lucidity. The reality is that although Hitler may have been paranoid and delusional by the end of the war, he was also still capable of making his own personal decisions according to most sources, he was still capable of lucidity, and of facing trial.

Not to mention that Hitler being paranoid and prone to occasional delusions was hardly anything unusual; this is a man who believed the world was controlled by a secret Judeo-Bolshevik conspiracy, and 1944 was far from the first time he fired generals for disagreeing with him or overrode their orders because he was convinced that he knew better.

Hitler was far far far more guilty of war crimes then Hess, but by 1945 I really think alot of people here are vastly underestimating how insane/demented Hitler was. I would say he was much worse off mentally then Hess at that point. The movie Downfall showed Hitler much more sane then the reports I have read of Hitler in early 1945.

Sources?
 
In OTL I heard that Goering was in a bad state when captured through morphine addiction and the allies actively helped him get into a better state.

It may be that this was not medically possible with Schicklegruber. If it could have been done would it have
 
In OTL I heard that Goering was in a bad state when captured through morphine addiction and the allies actively helped him get into a better state.

It may be that this was not medically possible with Schicklegruber. If it could have been done would it have

Hitler was demented by 1945 (at least Downfall did show that he was at that point delusional talking about divisions that didn't exist and air fleets that didn't exist), and there were many more reports of him being even more delusional then that.

Take away the cocaine and amphetamines and put him on put him on morphine or some other drug to keep him in his seat and from talking in the court room (and keep the camera's out) which is probably what they would have done and he would have been ready for the hangman's noose.
 
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