Hitler’s War
This is Volker Ullrich’s second and very long volume (848 pages in the print edition) of his very detailed biography of Adolph Hitler. (See my review of Volume 1 at https://shulmaven.blogspot.com/2016/12/my-amazon-review-of-volker-ullrichs.htm) This volume starts after Hitler’s acquisition of Memel in March 1939, his last peaceful acquisition of territory in Europe. Because Hitler’s life is so enmeshed with the war in Europe, the volume is also a history of World War II from a German perspective. Much of his accounts come from the diaries of Hitler Propaganda Minister Joseph Goebbels, who figures prominently in the book.
Hitler’s goals were to conquer Europe and the
destruction of European Jewry. He almost succeeds with the first and is very
successful in slaughtering the Jews of Europe in the holocaust. Hitler’s war in
the East is a war of annihilation starting first in Poland and then in Russia.
In the West Hitler works with generals Manstein and Guderian (the architect of
Blitzkrieg warfare) in coming up with the strike at France through the Ardennes
forest which works to destroy the French army. Far from being a dilettante, Hitler
knows his maps and military strategy. These abilities would decay as the war
went on. Thus, as victory turned to defeat Hitler would increase his
micromanagement of the war and remove generals with great alacrity.
Although Hitler never gave a direct order for the holocaust, his minions knew exactly what he wanted to be done. At the Wannsee Conference of January 1942 the order was given to kill the Jewish population of Europe. This comes after the failure of Operation Barbarossa to conquer the Soviet Union in the fall of 1941. Had Barbarossa succeeded one of he plans was to exile Europe’s Jews to the steppes of Russia. Instead the Jews went off to the camps and in late 1944 the hitherto relatively safe 400,000 Jews of Hungary were rounded up and sent off to their deaths.
Hitler knew that Germany lost the war at Stalingrad
but continues the slaughter because his war of annihilation made a negotiated
settlement with him impossible. After Stalingrad morale in Germany breaks and
Hitler’s health rapidly deteriorates.
Ullrich is very good at describing the failed Stauffenberg
plot to assassinate Hitler in July 1944 and its aftermath. However, we learn
very little about Hitler’s relationship with Eva Braun, his mistress. Both she
and Hitler commit suicide along with the Goebbels family in the bunker in 1945.
The most haunting passage in the book is Ullrich’s
description of Hitler in January 1945. He writes as follows, “several of his
character traits had become even more pronounced his egocentrism, his inability
to self-criticize, and his commensurate tendency to overestimate himself, his
lack of scruples when choosing means to his ends, his habit of betting
everything on a single card, his contempt for others and his lack of empathy.” This sounds like someone we know.
The book is a long slog, but worth it for readers who
want a better understanding of Hitler and World War II.
For the full Amazon URL see: https://www.amazon.com/gp/customer-reviews/RRHJACHZBT72K?ref=pf_ov_at_pdctrvw_srp
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