I am researching information regarding Arthur Nebe for a writing project of mine and became utterly confused with his motives/loyalties. Nebe was the leader of Einsatzgruppen B for many years during the holocaust and the second world war, responsible for the killing of tens of thousands of people, including more famously, the prisoners executed during "The Great Escape".
However at some point during the second world war, Nebe becomes involved with the July 24th Bomb Plot (which ultimately resulted in his own execution).
My question is; how did a anti-semetic leader of an infamous death squad become involved in a plot to kill Hitler? What were his motives? Why did he want Hitler dead?
Some sources have Nebe as a bonafide resistance member, while others have him as a ruthless killer. I understand that both ideals are plausible, but to this extreme? If anyone could lend a hand with this question, or any readings to look for I would greatly appreciate it!
Nebe's role in the 20 July plot is nebulous and ambiguous. The most exhaustive and recent research on the RSHA by Michael Wildt concludes that Nebe alternated between caution, opportunism and ambition in his relationship with the 20 July plotters. Much of the postwar confusion about Nebe stems from his friend Hans Bernd Gisevius, one of the few survivors of the plot. In 1966, he published a book Wo ist Nebe? Erinnerungen an Hitlers Reichskriminaldirektor that tried to paint Nebe as a reluctant member of the SS and had a more active role in the resistance. Gisevius claimed that Nebe returned from Belarus a shadow of himself and filled with self-loathing. The research of Wildt and other historians of the SS cast doubt on this account. Wildt has found that Nebe remained something of a true believer in National Socialist racialism and certainly was culpable for the mass murder of Jews through 1944.
The question of why Nebe threw his lot in the conspirators, even if half-hardheartedly, is still unclear. Part of the answer is that the 20 July plotters were far from a homogeneous lot. Postwar memorialization has painted them as motivated by the crimes and immorality of the Third Reich (see the film Valkyrie for an example), but this was actually only one strand of the 20 July plotters' motivations. In short, there was no single overarching rationale or ideology behind the conspiracy against Hitler. While moral reasons animated some plotters, others acted out of a vague right-wing reformism, whereas others were opportunists. Nebe's actions in 1944 place him into the latter category; Gisevius is one of the few sources that speaks to different motivations, but they are based on personal recollections and do not square with his actions after his Einsatzgruppen service. There were many Germans that recognized after Stalingrad that Germany had lost the war and it was imperative to have something in your biography that mitigated their culpability.
Sources
Gisevius, Hans Bernd, Richard Winston, and Clara Winston. Valkyrie: an insider's account of the plot to kill Hitler. Cambridge, MA: Da Capo Press, 2009.
Wildt, Michael, and Tom Lampert. An Uncompromising Generation: The Nazi Leadership of the Reich Security Main Office. Madison, Wis: University of Wisconsin Press, 2009.