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Hammerstein’s Four Types

Speaking to a friend the other day, I mentioned this quotation which is often incorrectly attributed to Rommel (including by me).

The actual source of these words is Kurt von Hammerstein-Equord, a four-star general of the German army, who described the four types of officer and their place along the axes of being 1) either clever or stupid, and 2) either hardworking or lazy.

“I distinguish four types.

There are clever, hardworking, stupid, and lazy officers. Usually two characteristics are combined.

Some are clever and hardworking; their place is the General Staff.

The next ones are stupid and lazy; they make up ninety percent of every army and are suited to routine duties.

Anyone who is both clever and lazy is qualified for the highest leadership duties, because he possesses the mental clarity and strength of nerve necessary for difficult decisions.

One must beware of anyone who is both stupid and hardworking; he must not be entrusted with any responsibility because he will always only cause damage.”

I am sure the experience of many would confirm that Hammerstein’s typology is also applicable in the civilian world.

Hammerstein was a brave man, who unsuccessfully attempted to see President Hindenburg personally in the hopes he would intervene to stop the massacre on the Night of Long Knives.

His friend and regimental comrade General Kurt von Schleicher, the last Chancellor of Germany before Hitler’s appointment, was among those murdered on the evening and Hammerstein defied army orders by attempting to attend Schleicher’s funeral only to be stopped by the SS.

Nonetheless, his reputation and skill ensured he was given command during the war, although Hitler later personally dismissed him for his opposition to national socialism.

As Hammerstein was dying of cancer in 1943 he told the art historian Udo von Alvensleben-Wittenmoor: “I am ashamed to have belonged to an army that witnessed and tolerated so many crimes”.

His family refused to allow Hammerstein to be buried with a military funeral as it would have meant his remains being draped in the swastika flag.

Despite being a conservative Protestant nobleman of the old school, two of his five children ended up as communists, though his youngest son became a Protestant theologian.

Published at 1:45 pm on Thursday 18 June 2020. Categories: Errant Thoughts Quotations Tags: , .
Comments

No doubt von Schleicher would have made a better dictator than AH! (Could anyone really have been worse?) And it’s worth remembering that it wasn’t just gay brown-shirts and former “close friends” of the Führer (including AH’s personal chaplain Fr Berhard Stempfle, who had also ghost-written Mein Kampf for him) who got it in the neck during Operation Hummingbird. But Britain and France would have been just as eager to go to war against von Schleicher as they had been against Queen Victoria’s favourite grandson, and it’s hard to imagine the course of the War would have been very different from what it was in “real life”.

— Oliver McCarthy 18 Jun 2020 7:32 pm

When I saw “Hammerstein,” I wondered what Rogers and H. were doing on your website.

I’d never heard of this man, but he must have been a stand-up guy. He wouldn’t last a month in today’s Republican party.

— Nat Kernell 22 Jul 2020 1:43 pm

BTW I think his breakdown is dead right. But “corrupt” and “crazy” might fall between the cracks. Keeping it in a Germanic military context, where would Alfred Redl turn up? Clever and hardworking, probably, but neither is a defining characteristic. And you mention Rommel, an extremely clever, hardworking general who threw in his lot with Hitler and probably owed his career to him – wasn’t he slaving in the German West Point before he realized a panzer force was really a fleet and caught the Leader’s eye?

What I notice is that “ethical” is not a criterion, though it seems to have been a defining trait for H. Despite his competence, I wonder how he survived.

— Nat Kernell 22 Jul 2020 1:56 pm

What nobody seems to have noticed is that “Clever and Lazy” is a perfect description of Hitler himself.
By the way, Germany’s political leadership is today so madly opposed to all of the traditions of the Germany that was that even a photo of this exemplary anti-Nazi was recently removed from a Bundeswehr Kaserne.
Time for the Russians to invade and liberate, lest sanity and honour disappear forever from German soil.

— Hetterscheidt 25 Aug 2020 12:36 pm
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