[Skybird]

There is also another story about him, from the times he was mayor in Hamburg. In the 60s, there was a major springtide, causing a flood that spilled through most of the metropole, it was a major disaster with many lives at risk. The bureaucratic hierarchies of the officcial administration as well as the federal state were not prepared to handle this crisis quickly and competently, got nothing done and wasted plenty of precious time. Until Schmidt arrived back in the city. He immediately bypassed the whole hierarchy, switched all the bureaucratic narcissists into "off" mode, did not care for their threats that this would cost him his career, and did not bother to ask for help with the obviously incompetent German services. Instead he immediately and directly called the SACEUR and demanded him to be called out of a conference at Brussel, broughgt himself back to the general's memory (they had met just some time before at a diplomatic event), and talked to him from former soldier to active soldier, as he once put it. After his plea ("General, I am the mayor of Hamburg, and the people of my city are dying") SACEUR was convinced enough to start immediately to get American and NATO logistical help (boats, aid, pioneers) moving from several NATO garrisons in central europe, to Hamburg. For the Bundeswehr, it showed the limits of it'S capacities. For the German government or better: the Hamburg administration and organisation of services, it was a demostration of its own shame and dilletantism. For Schmidt - it was a triumph. Since then, every German knew who he was, and the Hamburgers love him until today, obviously. The threatened career consequences - never realised. Nobody dared to publicly confronted Schmidt over his unconventionel way to get the issue solved, and very fast.

This story is very illustrative for Schmidt's character.