Former good articleErwin Rommel was one of the History good articles, but it has been removed from the list. There are suggestions below for improving the article to meet the good article criteria. Once these issues have been addressed, the article can be renominated. Editors may also seek a reassessment of the decision if they believe there was a mistake.
On this day... Article milestones
DateProcessResult
March 6, 2006Good article nomineeListed
November 22, 2006Good article reassessmentDelisted
June 12, 2011Good article nomineeNot listed
On this day... Facts from this article were featured on Wikipedia's Main Page in the "On this day..." column on October 14, 2014, and October 14, 2019.
Current status: Delisted good article

Holocaust Categories[edit]

Pinging @CJ-Moki - The definition for the Holocaust Perpetrators indicates they should be 'notable.' I'm not sure the referenced section establishes Rommel's anti-semitic activity establishes him as "notable" for being a holocaust perpetrator? --John (User:Jwy/talk) 19:59, 22 October 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Rommel was arguably the foremost Nazi figure in North Africa, and is well-documented to have been involved in persecution of North African Jews. As I understand it, this makes him a notable Holocaust perpetrator. CJ-Moki (talk) 22:17, 22 October 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Well-documented by whom, please specify. The section that you refer to presents a range of opinions. Terracina is kept because she refers directly to Rommel, but her basic statement, that Rommel was responsible for the deportation is not supported by other sources such as Maurice Roumani. The general opinion I've seen is that Mussolini and the Italians were responsible for those orders. Proske is a questionable author who admits that he does not know what Rommel did were crimes in the legal sense or not. Some others like Der Spiegel point out the possible consequences of his actions, but do not show that he did so in an intentional manner.Deamonpen (talk) 22:47, 22 October 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

General Promotions[edit]

The article on the Fall of Tobruk lists him - incorrectly as far as I know - as still a Generalleutnant at the time. My recollection is that he had been promoted to full general early in 1942. This doesn't seem to be mentioned in the article. Don't recall whether he was ever a Colonel-General. He was made a Field Marshal after the Fall of Tobruk, but that's in the article. Paulturtle (talk) 15:34, 6 November 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

According to de:Erwin Rommel, he was made Generalmajor in August 1939, Generalleutnant January 1941, General der Panzertruppe July 1941, Generaloberst February 1942 and Generalfeldmarschall June 1942. Favonian (talk) 15:52, 6 November 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]
Remember (Ranks and insignia of the German Army (1935–1945)#General officers and marshals (Generäle)) that "full general" in the Allied terminology is equivalent to Generaloberst. Favonian (talk) 15:58, 6 November 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Thanks. My memory was slightly muddled as it's 25 years since I last read a Rommel biog. I knew that the German general ranks were "one lower" than their British or US equivalent. Perhaps somebody could add the details to the article.Paulturtle (talk) 01:59, 7 November 2022 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Categories added by Death Editor 2[edit]

To User:Death Editor 2, people should be put in categories only when the general consensus (/majority of historians) says that such people are the notable representatives of such categories. This is not the case with this article. If you have new updates, new sources... etc, please provide them and show that this is the new consensus. -Deamonpen (talk) 18:54, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

By using basic reasoning I can determine that Erwin Rommel was a nazi, he was a nazi general who fought for a nazi regime and was, for a time, Hitler's favorite general. Death Editor 2 (talk) 19:06, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
So, this is your personal opinion, and not based on any special sources. Sorry, but as far as I understand, that is original research.
What is your source for "Rommel inviting the Einsatzgruppen over to Africa in November 1942"? By the way, even if any other scholar said so (I doubt you can find even one), you cannot use that to link it to Clemens Vollnhals by "your reasoning", because Clemens Vollnhals does not say so. In the same section, you can see that Caron says that Nehring (who in 1942 became the commander of the Afrika Korps) was the one who was responsible for those activities. This is Caron's article in German, in which he states that Rommel was not involved in the lootings, and there is no evidence that he would have supported Rauff's Einsatzgruppen (there is no evidence Rommel knew about the mission either). "Iirc" (your reason for undoing my edit) does not come close to a scholarly consensus either. In the case you were a commander who worked with Rommel in 1942 (I suppose this is how you can still recall the whole history), please go to historians and present your evidences.
If I use "my reasoning" and a handful of scholars I cherrypick, I may add Rommel to Category:German resistance members too, but that description is not without controversies (Maurice Remy think that "he was both": Nazi and resistance fighter, while Ralph Georg Reuth thinks that he was neither). So, it's one thing if one puts him in a detailed article about forms of resistance against the Nazi government ("Controversial cases"), but using him as an example for a category will need a stronger consensus. -Deamonpen (talk) 19:43, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
So you deny that he was a nazi general who fought for a nazi regime and was hitler's favorite general? Are you denying the literal fucking facts? Death Editor 2 (talk) 21:51, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
And besides, being a 20 july plotter does not make one free from Nazism (See Eduard Wagner, Wolf-Heinrich Graf von Helldorff, and Arthur Nebe), and do you deny that there were camps set up in north africa for the jews? Death Editor 2 (talk) 21:53, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
So, only your original research matters then - this is not what the Wikipedia is about. No person should have a monopoly on "facts". I used the "resistance fighter" example to show that one cannot put historical personalities in categories based on accusations from a minority. If we do things that way, every single historical leader we know today (if they have ever commanded something for more than one week) will be put into criminal categories, because even when there is no evidence about them doing something criminal, the regime they served would have done something criminal. This is also the case with the camps in Africa:
Libyan Jews noted that in daily matters, the Germans largely acted out of pragmatic economic interest rather than adopting the political and ideological practices known elsewhere. The German authorities found Libyan Jews well equipped with goods they needed for their military activities. The Jews complied with their demands, some out of fear and others out of strict economic interest. By the end of their time in Libya, this strategic economic arrangement led the Germans to perceive the Jews as similar to the native Muslims and they therefore regarded the Jews to be less threatening than their brethren in Europe.
It was only when Italy entered the war in 1940 that Libya became subjected to direct Fascist—Nazi collaboration, and “Nazi-style” deportations, camps and polices were enacted. This collaboration initially only had an impact on foreign citizens still residing in Libya not yet directly affected by the racial laws due to their economic status and consular intervention. But in September 1940, Italy ordered the immediate imprisonment of all 7,000 citizens of enemy countries then residing in Libya. Detention camps in Tajura (near Tripoli) and in Burat al-Hasun in Sirtica (in the Vicinity of Benghazi) were established for this purpose. As was seen in other cases, this order was only partially ful?lled clue to the economic dif?culties and logistical impediments present in the imprisonment procedures. Moreover, the Italians were not capable of effectively controlling the detainees or providing them with sufficient food. This meant that over a brief period the detainees could be Visited by their relatives who supplied them with provisions and money; occasionally they would be permitted to return to their homes and later were freed. In 1941 new orders to evacuate foreign Jews from Libya sent a total of 2,315 people to Tunisia; this group reportedly included 715 Muslims and 1,600 people of “the Jewish race.” In a letter to the Italian Ministry of the Interior and the Foreign Ministry, Attilio Teruzzi asked “to interest the Vichy Government so that the 1,600 subjects and protected French of the Jewish race and 715 subjects and protected French Muslims be evacuated directly from Libya to the territories of Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco from which they came after all. thus what is left to be interned are 1900 British-Maltese, 870 British subjects of the Jewish race and others "
According to the report of the PAI (the Police of Italian Africa) of August 2, 1942, “the order was given for further removal to Tunisia of French subjects and protected Muslims and Jews. They were forced to leave in five groups
Where is Rommel in that?
The author of the above passage is Maurice M. Roumani, a renown scholar on the subject and also a Libyan Jew who had family members victimized during the relevant events (source)
Anti-Semitic measures were certainly carried out in Axis-occupied Tunisia during late 1942, when Rauff’s Einsatzkommando forced Jews to build forti?cations. At this time, however, Rommel’s forces were retreating from Egypt, and there is no evidence that Rommel himself had contact with the Einsatzkommando.”
According to Ben H. Shepherd(Source)
Are you saying that such historians are intentionally lying to us? "There were concentration camps in Africa" is one thing. That "Rommel supported them" is something you have to prove, and with a scholarly consensus, not with "facts" you imagine. -Deamonpen (talk) 23:00, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
So the guy in change of africa at that point had zero idea of the jews being forced into the camps? What's next? Are you going to go full David Irving on me and claim Hitler actually had no idea of the holocaust? Death Editor 2 (talk) 23:15, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
And we CAN put Historical personalities in categories, because Rommel again, was a Nazi general who fought for the Nazi regime. So yes, he was a Nazi. Death Editor 2 (talk) 23:18, 14 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
I do not see that it has been established that he is "notably responsible" for the Holocaust in any reliable source. He may be culpable for tolerating some anti-semitic activities in his command area, but he was no Bormann or Goering. --John (User:Jwy/talk) 03:01, 17 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
There is no evidence that Rommel had anything to do with the holocaust. On the contrary, there is evidence that he went against Hitler’s orders for the treatment of Jewish POW’s and POW’s in general. And since the high command of the Afrika Korps was convoluted (split between Italian & German officers), one cannot even say that Rommel was the supreme commander in Africa and as such was not responsible for any war crimes committed in the African theatre. Surfstud31 (talk) 15:38, 12 August 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]
yeah i'm sure the man who personally executed a french officer had nothing to do with the holocaust. Death Editor 2 (talk) 16:18, 12 August 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Length[edit]

At over 22k words of readable prose, this article is too long to read comfortably. It would be beneficial to condense and/or migrate content to subarticles to make this one more readable. Nikkimaria (talk) 19:32, 28 June 2023 (UTC)Reply[reply]

WTF is with the 'relation to Nazism' section[edit]

Who wrote this pseudo-fanfic Rommel x Hitler bromance?????? jesus i want to claw out my eyes Bonbonzilla (talk) 23:38, 18 January 2024 (UTC)Reply[reply]

Categories