In the Resistance


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Moltke had written his first memoranda on Germany’s political reorientation in 1933. Peter Graf Yorck von Wartenburg joined the group of opponents of the regime associated with Moltke in early 1940. Moltke and Yorck became the leading intellects of the “Kreisau Circle” that emerged from this group and took part in most of the discussions in Berlin and in Kreisau in Silesia.


Moltke sought to systematically extend his contacts to Protestant and Catholic church leaders and to leaders of the political Social Democratic opposition. He was averse to considerations of a militant coup d’état, however, and long rejected tyrannicide.


Together with his friends in the Kreisau Circle, he started inquiring in 1940 about the potentials for resistance, which could put an end to this ideological and political madness. Learning continuously, he considered a Christian conception of humanity and the world and corresponding personal and social ethics to be the sole alternative to the Nazis’ inhumane regime of terror.


Source / title


  • © Quoted from Ger van Roon: Neuordnung im Widerstand. Der Kreisauer Kreis innerhalb der deutschen Widerstandsbewegung. Munich 1967, p. 509–511.

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