Many people beyond Germany’s borders have heard of Claus Schenk Graf von Stauffenberg (1907-1944), but fewer may have known of Ewald-Heinrich von Kleist (1922-2013).
Kleist, who has died aged 90, was the last surviving participant in this legendary main plot to kill Hitler. He had even agreed, at 22, to kill the Nazi dictator himself with a suicide vest. This alternate plan was however shelved in favor of Operation Valkyrie, which involved Stauffenberg carrying a bomb in a briefcase into a room where a meeting with Hitler was taking place. The tragic flaw in that plan emerged when the briefcase was moved by someone else beneath a table that absorbed much of the bomb’s blast.
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