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4.29 AVERAGE
4.29 AVERAGE
slow-paced
challenging
informative
slow-paced
Shirer’s proximity and his experience as a reporter make this looong book remain a fascinating read.
dark
informative
tense
medium-paced
challenging
informative
slow-paced
challenging
dark
emotional
informative
sad
tense
slow-paced
It's crazy how fast this audiobook went by for me. I found it a compelling story from start to finish (written by a journalist, not a historian). I feel a much deeper understanding to the forces of WWII and decisions made as each event unfolded. I think the combination of a fanatical strategic genius manipulator prone to making bluffing and taking huge risks, combined with a Europe who wanted to avoid war at all costs and a traumatized and shamed Germany + new technology helped make the war such the enormous thing that it was. One piece that was missing was drugs (very few mentions), of which Blitzed is a great complement to this book imo.
Quotes
- "Except for occasional spells of depression, he [Hitler] remained confident that he would achieve his goal. Not by force, and scarcely by winning a parliamentary majority, but by the means that had carried Schleicher and Papen to the top, by backstairs intrigue, a game that two can play."
- "The cardinal error of the Germans who opposed Nazism was their failure to unite against it.... between the left and the right, Germany lacked a politically powerful middle class, which in other countries... proved to be the backbone of democracy.... but the third reich owed nothing to the fortunes of war or to foreign influence, it was inaugurated in peace time and peacefully by the Germans themselves out of both their weaknesses and their strengths."
- "Hitler had created greater Germany, he reminded them, by political bluff. It had now become necessary to test the military machine. The army must experience actual battle before the final showdown in the west."
- "[the pope], like almost everyone else in the world did not realize that the pending negotiations were but a propaganda trip by Hitler to justify his aggression."
- "It has seemed to this author.... they were caught napping not because they were not warned of what was coming, but because they did not believe the warnings in time."
- "Now in the mid-summer of 1940 they did not know what to do with their glittering success [after conquering France]..... this is one of the great paradoxes of the third reich, at the very moment where Hitler stood at the zenith of his military power, with most of the military continent at his feet....he had no idea how to go on and bring the war to its victorious conclusion... there is of course a reason for this, although it was not clear to us at the time. The Germans despite their wanted military talents lacked any grand strategic concept. Their horizons were limited, they had always been limited, to land warfare against the neighboring nations on the European continent. Hitler himself had a horror of the sea.... they were land minded, not sea minded.... thus at the height of dizzy success Hitler and his captains hesitated. They had not thought out the next step and how it was to be carried through." This is after they were so surprised Britain didn't want peace after they conquered France so quickly, they couldn't conquer Britain, and Hitler believed it was because Russia would make it a 2 front war Germany couldn't win, so he focused on attacking Russia.
- "In one fundamental sense the situation has changed since the fall of the third reich. The development of the hydrogen bomb....has rendered an old fashion conquered like Hitler obsolete... a nuclear response....would put a quick end to the German aggression, but unfortunately it would put an end to the world too."
- "It was surprising and sometimes consternating to find that notwithstanding the opportunities I had to learn the facts and despite one’s inherent distrust of what one learned from Nazi sources, a steady diet over the years of falsifications and distortions made a certain impression on one’s mind and often misled it. No one who has not lived for years in a totalitarian land can possibly conceive how difficult it is to escape the dread consequences of a regime’s calculated and incessant propaganda. Often in a German home or office or sometimes in a casual conversation with a stranger in a restaurant, a beer hall, a café, I would meet with the most outlandish assertions from seemingly educated and intelligent persons. It was obvious that they were parroting some piece of nonsense they had heard on the radio or read in the newspapers. Sometimes one was tempted to say as much, but on such occasions one was met with such a stare of incredulity, such a shock of silence, as if one had blasphemed the Almighty, that one realized how useless it was even to try to make contact with a mind which had become warped and for whom the facts of life had become what Hitler and Goebbels, with their cynical disregard for truth, said they were."
Quotes
- "Except for occasional spells of depression, he [Hitler] remained confident that he would achieve his goal. Not by force, and scarcely by winning a parliamentary majority, but by the means that had carried Schleicher and Papen to the top, by backstairs intrigue, a game that two can play."
- "The cardinal error of the Germans who opposed Nazism was their failure to unite against it.... between the left and the right, Germany lacked a politically powerful middle class, which in other countries... proved to be the backbone of democracy.... but the third reich owed nothing to the fortunes of war or to foreign influence, it was inaugurated in peace time and peacefully by the Germans themselves out of both their weaknesses and their strengths."
- "Hitler had created greater Germany, he reminded them, by political bluff. It had now become necessary to test the military machine. The army must experience actual battle before the final showdown in the west."
- "[the pope], like almost everyone else in the world did not realize that the pending negotiations were but a propaganda trip by Hitler to justify his aggression."
- "It has seemed to this author.... they were caught napping not because they were not warned of what was coming, but because they did not believe the warnings in time."
- "Now in the mid-summer of 1940 they did not know what to do with their glittering success [after conquering France]..... this is one of the great paradoxes of the third reich, at the very moment where Hitler stood at the zenith of his military power, with most of the military continent at his feet....he had no idea how to go on and bring the war to its victorious conclusion... there is of course a reason for this, although it was not clear to us at the time. The Germans despite their wanted military talents lacked any grand strategic concept. Their horizons were limited, they had always been limited, to land warfare against the neighboring nations on the European continent. Hitler himself had a horror of the sea.... they were land minded, not sea minded.... thus at the height of dizzy success Hitler and his captains hesitated. They had not thought out the next step and how it was to be carried through." This is after they were so surprised Britain didn't want peace after they conquered France so quickly, they couldn't conquer Britain, and Hitler believed it was because Russia would make it a 2 front war Germany couldn't win, so he focused on attacking Russia.
- "In one fundamental sense the situation has changed since the fall of the third reich. The development of the hydrogen bomb....has rendered an old fashion conquered like Hitler obsolete... a nuclear response....would put a quick end to the German aggression, but unfortunately it would put an end to the world too."
- "It was surprising and sometimes consternating to find that notwithstanding the opportunities I had to learn the facts and despite one’s inherent distrust of what one learned from Nazi sources, a steady diet over the years of falsifications and distortions made a certain impression on one’s mind and often misled it. No one who has not lived for years in a totalitarian land can possibly conceive how difficult it is to escape the dread consequences of a regime’s calculated and incessant propaganda. Often in a German home or office or sometimes in a casual conversation with a stranger in a restaurant, a beer hall, a café, I would meet with the most outlandish assertions from seemingly educated and intelligent persons. It was obvious that they were parroting some piece of nonsense they had heard on the radio or read in the newspapers. Sometimes one was tempted to say as much, but on such occasions one was met with such a stare of incredulity, such a shock of silence, as if one had blasphemed the Almighty, that one realized how useless it was even to try to make contact with a mind which had become warped and for whom the facts of life had become what Hitler and Goebbels, with their cynical disregard for truth, said they were."
challenging
dark
informative
slow-paced
Holy doorstops Batman! 1,700+ pages. I made a few previous stabs at this and finally made it with an audiobook assist.
This is filled with interesting things:
- The Nazis were horrible people, but the early Nazis were horrible in ways I hadn't expected. Many of Hitler's most loyal early supporters were gay. He stuck up for them for years, not in an accepting way, but by saying that morals took a back seat to the politics of national socialism.
- There was a lot more internal party discipline than I had previously known. Hitler happily killed off his supporters as soon as it suited him to do so.
- Hitler was a pretty good organizer. He made a lot of stuff happen. I think my impression had been colored by the end of the war when he was trying to micromanage his way to defeating the allies. That was a tall order for anyone. His organization of the party and ascent to the chancellorship prove he was more canny and energetic than the average bear.
Could Germany have stopped itself? It seems like they could have, but that a Hitler who could have stopped himself wouldn't be the same Hitler who could come to power. If he had taken a break after Sudetenland, or even after Poland, he might have improved Germany's global situation politicly and militarily, but his own domestic rhetoric and party support seems likely to have resulted in war eventually.
I found myself thinking about Trump on occasion. Thankfully, Trump is no Hitler. I do think he would have been a supporter and an opportunistic Nazi. He is also an awful person and a canny climber who probably could have made it into the upper ranks of the party. He doesn't have the chops or the organizational talent to produce industrial scale evil.
There were both a lot more generals plotting against Hitler than I had believed prior to reading, but given his instability and awful strategic situation there should have been far more plots. The generals know how bad things are. Why aren't they bailing on the Nazis in droves?
- If I were a German officer, would I have been morally courageous?
- Why didn't more German Jews leave, or at least send their children abroad? The Nazis weren't shy about the message and began implementing restrictions on Jews very quickly, but it seems that many could still have sent relatives abroad. I can see not giving up everything, but there is a lot of appeal to having the wife and kids go to London while the adult males close things up in Berlin. Was it an exchange rate problem? Was it just tooo expensive for many families to try? I know a lot of countries weren't exactly welcoming them, but it seems like there was an opportunity for more Jews to have slipped out before major deportations to concentration camps began.
This is filled with interesting things:
- The Nazis were horrible people, but the early Nazis were horrible in ways I hadn't expected. Many of Hitler's most loyal early supporters were gay. He stuck up for them for years, not in an accepting way, but by saying that morals took a back seat to the politics of national socialism.
- There was a lot more internal party discipline than I had previously known. Hitler happily killed off his supporters as soon as it suited him to do so.
- Hitler was a pretty good organizer. He made a lot of stuff happen. I think my impression had been colored by the end of the war when he was trying to micromanage his way to defeating the allies. That was a tall order for anyone. His organization of the party and ascent to the chancellorship prove he was more canny and energetic than the average bear.
Could Germany have stopped itself? It seems like they could have, but that a Hitler who could have stopped himself wouldn't be the same Hitler who could come to power. If he had taken a break after Sudetenland, or even after Poland, he might have improved Germany's global situation politicly and militarily, but his own domestic rhetoric and party support seems likely to have resulted in war eventually.
I found myself thinking about Trump on occasion. Thankfully, Trump is no Hitler. I do think he would have been a supporter and an opportunistic Nazi. He is also an awful person and a canny climber who probably could have made it into the upper ranks of the party. He doesn't have the chops or the organizational talent to produce industrial scale evil.
There were both a lot more generals plotting against Hitler than I had believed prior to reading, but given his instability and awful strategic situation there should have been far more plots. The generals know how bad things are. Why aren't they bailing on the Nazis in droves?
- If I were a German officer, would I have been morally courageous?
- Why didn't more German Jews leave, or at least send their children abroad? The Nazis weren't shy about the message and began implementing restrictions on Jews very quickly, but it seems that many could still have sent relatives abroad. I can see not giving up everything, but there is a lot of appeal to having the wife and kids go to London while the adult males close things up in Berlin. Was it an exchange rate problem? Was it just tooo expensive for many families to try? I know a lot of countries weren't exactly welcoming them, but it seems like there was an opportunity for more Jews to have slipped out before major deportations to concentration camps began.
challenging
informative