The Battle of Britain Five Months That Changed History, May—October 1940 by James Holland (z-lib.org).epub

Arriving at Felsennet at around 6 a.m. was General Franz Halder, the 55-
year-old, crop-haired and bespectacled Chief of the General Staff of the
army supreme command, the Oberkommando des Heeres, or OKH; the
man, above all, responsible for the minutiae of the German operational plan
of attack. At 7 a.m., the first reports began coming in. The Belgians, it
seemed, had been warned of the attack at around 3 a.m., but the Dutch had
been taken by surprise. Nonetheless, it seemed the Dutch had been quick to
respond by blowing a number of bridges vital to the advance of Army
Group B. Then better news: little resistance had been met at the
Luxembourg border in the Ardennes, and border bridges had been captured
according to plan.
It had been a particularly stressful time for Halder, who had been trying
to manage the mercurial – and frankly, at times, insane – demands of the
Führer, whilst also attempting to produce a plan for an offensive in the West
that would not lead to the rapid annihilation of Germany. It was an
extremely difficult hand to juggle, and one that had led him to consider
leading a coup d’état and assassination attempt on Hitler. All positions of
high command include their share of stresses and strains, but the pressure
Halder found himself under was particularly intense. There were times
when he had come very close to complete nervous collapse.
Born in Würzburg, in Bavaria, Halder came from a family with a long
tradition of military service dating back some 300 years. Despite this, he
had spent his career in a series of staff jobs, so that, although he had served
throughout the First World War, he had never experienced frontline action
or command himself. With a fastidious eye for detail and a reputation as an
expert on training, he had first caught Hitler’s eye during the army
manoeuvres of 1937. A year later, in September 1938, he was asked by
General Walter von Brauchitsch, the Commander-in-Chief of the OKH, to
become Chief of the General Staff. In light of his well-known anti-Nazi
attitude, he had to think hard about whether to accept the post. Von
Brauchitsch, however, who had worked with him in the Training Branch in
1930, appealed to him to accept.
After some soul-searching Halder did so, and by the summer of 1939
had developed a strong team with which he and von Brauchitsch hoped they
could rival the combined armed forces high command – the
Oberkommando der Wehrmacht, or OKW – for influence. Halder was far
from being alone in the army in his contempt for the Nazi High Command.