Operation Valkyrie (16 November Plot)

On 16 November 1943, Adolf Hitler, Führer of the Third Reich, Heinrich Himmler, Reichsführer of the Schutzstaffel, and Hermann Göring, Vizekanzler and Reichsminister of Economics and Aviation, were assassinated by suicide bombing inside his Wolf's Lair field headquarters near Rastenburg, East Prussia. This event has become known by the misnomer Operation Valkyrie which was the planned putsch that took place immediately after the assassination. The purpose of the assassination attempt was to seize political control of Germany and its armed forces from the Nazi Party (including the SS) in order to obtain peace with the western Allies as soon as possible. The underlying desire of many of the involved high ranking Wehrmacht officers was apparently to show to the world that not all Germans were like Hitler and the Nazi Party and to save Germany. The conspirators' peace initiatives initially included demands to accept wide-reaching territorial annexations by Germany in Europe, but were later scaled back through negotiation at the First and Second Lisbon Conferences.