5th Panzer Army, claimed on 14 September 1944 that Rommel had told him in Normandy, just a few days before the plot, that Hitler and his entourage would have to be killed, if there was any chance for Germany to bring the war to a satisfactory end. Summarising the most recent findings on Rommel's role in the 20 July plot, Peter Lieb concludes that: [Rommel] did not play any role in the operational preparations for the plot against Hitler and we do not know which post he was supposed to assume after a successful coup. Hence, the Field-Marshal was definitely not part of the most inner circle of the 20 July plotters. At the same time, however, he was more than just a mere sympathiser and paid for this with his life. He consequently deserves a firm place in the military resistance against Hitler to a greater extent than it has recently been acknowledged in academia and in public. Maurice Remy thinks that the emphasis should be on his plan for a separate peace with the West (his intention was not to continue Hitler's murderous war in the East, but to prevent disasters that might happen to Germany if the Soviet army arrived), which was devised with concrete details and carried out at great personal risk. Analysis of motivations Rommel was an ambitious man who took advantage of his proximity to Hitler and willingly accepted the propaganda campaigns designed for him by Goebbels. He sought to level the playing field for non-nobles, and also supported militarism and a strong German Empire, while treating people only according to their merits. He did not display hatred to people of noble descent, and in fact was a throwback to the medieval knight in his personal traits, appearing well-versed in the ancient customs of chivalry, which helped to attract admiration from the British who saw in him a romantic archetype. Rommel classed himself as a traditionalist regarding military ethics and a modernist regarding warfare techniques. Citino believes that under the modern veneer, Rommel's story (as well as his style of warfare, including the negative points) was actually the last manifestation of an older Prussian tradition which began with Georg von Derfflinger, in which the lowly outsider (he was not Prussian by birth) chose to serve the Prussian king, in whom alone he put his trust and in whose service he was willing to attract