Skorpio #99 (1984), story page 12 by Arias

"La Última Misión del Barón Rojo" ("The Last Mission of the Red Baron"). Cover date March 1984.

The story flashes forward to 1945 to show a bustling, undamaged Berlin of 1945. Wait, wasn't Berlin destroyed during the Second World War and in ruins by 1945?!? Queue Rod Serling and Twilight Zone music. In this alternate history, the Red Baron has strafed and killed Corporal Adolf Hitler, who indeed was a German foot soldier in the First World War. History is changed, Hitler doesn't come to power, and Europe doesn't suffer a Second World War.

Historical note: Hitler was a message runner in a regimental headquarters several miles behind the lines, which may account for his survival during four years of service during the First World War and despite up to 75% regimental casualties in battle. Message runners were less important in trench warfare with telephone lines connecting the static front lines with their commanders. Phone lines could get cut, however, leaving the regiment only runners, sometimes under artillery barrage, for communications. Hitler was wounded in the thigh by artillery in 1916 when a shell exploded at the entrance to the dispatch runners' dugout. He also was temporarily blinded by a British mustard gas attack in 1918. He was in the hospital when he learned of Germany's defeat, causing a return of temporary blindness. He twice received the Iron Cross for bravery.

He considered the war the best years of his life. Soldiers described him as aloof, quiet, and a loner, never receiving mail from home, but regularly reading pamphlets and literature. He often expressed outrage at his fellow soldiers visiting French prostitutes, both for their nationality as well as the immorality of the act. However, despite them considering him odd, Hitler was liked and accepted by his peers. His letters also began to contain political, right-wing commentary by late 1914. He mused about the necessity to purge Germany of foreign influences and the destruction of internationalism. These he considered more important than any territorial conquests.

He was outraged by the 1918 Armistice ending the war and the subsequent Treaty of Versailles limiting the military and removing territories from and imposing reparations on Germany. As payback the French had to sign the 1940 armistice during the Second World War in the same train car where a defeated Germany signed the prior war armistice. He had the train car returned from a museum to its 1918 location and during the armistice talks sat in the same chair as the French army marshal in 1918. He rubbed more salt in the wound when he walked out after the armistice preamble was read and left the French leadership to negotiate with his army chief of staff.

His wartime service was a major influence on his military thinking during World War II. He was convinced that Germany could win the Second World War as long as it maintained its willingness to fight. He believed that he and the rest of the soldiers in the First World War had been stabbed in the back by the generals and the home front because they lost their will to fight. He also boasted that he knew more about strategy and tactics than his generals, overruling and micromanaging them with often disastrous results.

Source: Wikipedia