In the heartlands of Germany and Austria, there were no cases of mass desertion until the final weeks of the war. Until it became a mass phenomenon, the apparatus of terror remained effective precisely because it only had to target relatively isolated individuals. But exhortations of loyalty and patriotism were not just external demands imposed by the regime; they were maxims repeated within civilian society at all levels, ending with the most powerful and primary appeals of all – from mothers, fathers, wives and lovers.24
