Jeschonnek, General Hans

Jeschonnek, General Hans (1899–1943),chief of the Luftwaffe General Staff from February 1939 who was an ardent admirer of Hitler. At least initially, he was also a willing subordinate of Göring, though his relationship with Göring's deputy, Milch, was poor. He was an enthusiastic supporter of the dive-bomber which was one of the foundation stones of the blitzkrieg, but he neglected the other forms of air power in which a protracted war soon involved the ill-prepared Luftwaffe. He failed to support the development of a strategic air force—he had no enthusiasm for the He177, the Luftwaffe's only four-engined bomber—or an air transport command, choosing instead to concentrate on medium bombers. He saw no reason to increase the production of fighters so that his ability to counter the Allied strategic air offensive against Germany was quite inadequate. When this offensive began to gather pace, and after the failure to supply the beleaguered troops at Stalingrad by air, an operation Jeschonnek had sanctioned, Hitler increasingly turned on Göring, and Göring increasingly blamed Jeschonnek. On 18 August 1943, the day after the Americans had bombed Schweinfurt and the British Peenemünde, he prepared a paper aimed at discrediting Göring. He then wrote a note which said, ‘I can no longer work together with the Reichsmarschall. Long live the Führer!’, and shot himself.