re: #236 Joshua Cohen

BTW: History that else happens on the 20th July:

The 20 July plot of 1944 was a failed attempt to assassinate Adolf Hitler, the leader of Nazi Germany, inside his Wolfsschanze field headquarters near Rastenburg, East Prussia. The plot was the culmination of the efforts of the German Resistance to overthrow the Nazi regime. The failure of both the assassination and the military coup d’tat which was planned to follow it led to the arrest of at least 7,000 people by the Gestapo. According to records of the Fhrer Conferences on Naval Affairs, 4,980 people were executed, resulting in the destruction of the resistance movement in Germany.

The Numbers are from Wikipedia.

Right now, I’m reading John Toland’s two-volume biography of Adolf Hitler, published in 1976. It’s highly illuminating, mainly for the myths about Hitler and the Nazis it demolished over three decades ago that still crop up.

Myth 1; Nazism was a “left-wing” movement.

Fact; Nope, sorry. The National Socialist Party was virulently anti-Communist from the beginning. It was also a small group of loud talkers meeting in a beer hall until the German Army noticed it, and sent Hitler (who was acting as a V-Mann, or “trusted man”, i.e. an informant) to join the outfit and report on it. When he reported that it was hardcore anti-Red, the German Army (specifically, his immediate boss, General Ludendorff himself) urged him to become a leader, with them bankrolling him and the party. He did, they did, and the rest is unpleasant history. The Nazi Party was literally created by the German High Command.

Myth 2; Hitler was insane.

Fact; By all indications, no. He was simply a political fanatic, convinced that he had a mission to “save” Germany from various “menaces” that didn’t actually exist, but which were accepted as being the gospel truth by most Germans at the time. If Hitler was “insane”, so were 37 million+ Germans, because his beliefs (about Jews, etc.) were very common in Germany. Unfortunately for the rest of the world.

Myth 3; Hitler came from poverty.

Fact; No, he came from a well-to-do family, and several times attempted to enroll in prestigious schools of art and architecture, which his family could afford the tuition for. He also repeatedly failed to achieve much, less because of a lack of talent (he was an excellent renderer) than a chronic laziness and lack of incentive to finish anything he started. Since his family’s money was always there to fall back on, he never really bothered to develop a work ethic. His “poverty” (in Vienna during his twenties) was mainly self-inflicted.

Toland spent over a decade (1964-75) researching this book, and in the process talked to a lot of “primary source” individuals, including Hitler’s surviving relatives and members of his staff. I’d say it’s as close to a definitive work on the man who turned Europe into a nightmare three-quarters of a century ago as we’re ever likely to find, and should be required reading in European history classes. Also by political pundits; I’m pretty sure that if Jonah Goldberg had read it, he wouldn’t have drawn most of the conclusions he did in his book, Liberal Fascism.

I highly recommend it.

cheers

eon