20 July Plot - Alternative Possibilities

Alternative Possibilities

In 2005, the Military Channel's show Unsolved History aired an episode titled Killing Hitler in which each scenario was re-created using live explosives and test dummies. The results supported the conclusion that Hitler would have been killed had any of the three other scenarios occurred:

• both bombs detonated;
• the meeting was held inside Hitler's bunker;
• the briefcase was not moved.

A 2010 episode of the Discovery Channel show MythBusters explored the possible consequences of the bomb exploding inside the bunker, re-creating the scenario using explosives, test dummies, and pressure sensors. Hosts Adam Savage and Jamie Hyneman concluded that Hitler could have survived in either the conference room or the bunker. The episode employed two shipping containers to compare the effects of an explosive in an above-ground conference room to an equal explosive in an in-ground room of the same size. Differences between the MythBusters in-ground test and the historical bunker include the construction of the walls and the placement of the structure. The MythBusters sheet-metal shipping container was placed in a trench cut into dirt, with a thin layer of dirt on top and railroad ties placed against the doors. The explosive force threw away the covering layer of dirt and railroad ties. The result found the force in the in-ground test was higher than above-ground but the difference was not enough to be fatal.

Had Hitler in fact been killed by the 20 July plotters, most mainstream historians agree that the plot would have unfolded (and failed) in relatively the same fashion, but with Hermann Göring taking Hitler's place, and in turn ordering Major Remer to switch sides and arrest the plotters. A Nazi State under Göring would have been more receptive to peace with the allies and might also have "cleaned house" of several fanatical Nazis, including many senior SS and Nazi Party leaders.