Carl Szokoll is best known for his active role in the liberation of
Vienna from the Nazis in 1945.
After school, Szokoll attended the Military Academy in Wiener Neustadt.
When Austria was occupied by Nazi Germany in 1938, he was incorporated
into the German Wehrmacht in the rank of a Captain. An opponent of the
Nazi regime, he soon became the Austrian liaison of Count Stauffenberg,
the conspirator against Hitler; when the assassination plot against
Hitler on 20 July 1944 failed, Szokoll was one of the few conspirators
whose involvement went undiscovered. Soon afterward, he was promoted to
Major.
When it was obvious that Soviet troops would invade Vienna in 1945, the
Wehrmacht had orders to completely destroy Vienna. Szokoll used old
orders left over from the 1944 assassination plot to assume control of
part of the Wehrmacht troops stationed in Vienna and prepared the
peaceful surrender of the city to the Soviet troops, thus saving it
from destruction.
After World War II, Szokoll became a writer and film producer.