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The Hitler I Knew: The Memoirs of the Third Reich's Press Chief Kindle Edition

by Otto Dietrich (Author), Roger Moorhouse (Introduction) Format: Kindle Edition
4.0 out of 5 stars 113 ratings
A biography of Hitler by his long-serving press chief and close associate.

"Up to the last moment, his overwhelming, despotic authority aroused false hopes and deceived his people and his entourage. Only at the end, when I watched the inglorious collapse and the obstinacy of his final downfall, was I able suddenly to fit together the bits of mosaic I had been amassing for twelve years into a complete picture of his opaque and sphinx-like personality." - Otto Dietrich

When Otto Dietrich was invited in 1933 to become Adolf Hitler's press chief, he accepted with the simple, uncritical conviction that Adolf Hitler was a great man, dedicated to promoting peace and the welfare for the German people. At the end of the war, imprisoned and disillusioned, Dietrich sat down to write what he had seen and heard in twelve years of the closest association with Hitler, requesting that it be published after his death.

Dietrich's role placed him in a privileged position. He was hired by Hitler in 1933, and was a confidant until 1945, and he worked and clashed with Joseph Goebbels. His direct, personal experience of life at the heart in the Reich makes for compelling reading.
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  1. Print length
    253 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Greenhill Books
  4. Publication date
    April 6, 2023
  5. File size
    3.9 MB
  6. Page Flip
    Enabled
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Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

A member of Hitler's staff who monitored foreign press for the dictator, Dietrich began this memoir within months of Nazi Germany's defeat. The audience clearly on Dietrich's mind was the German people, to whom, as a Hitler associate, he felt obligated to offer an explanation of the author of their trauma in 1945. There are sound reasons why Dietrich's recollections (which were originally published in the 1950s; this is the first American edition) never became as well known as Albert Speer's Inside the Third Reich (1970). Long on philosophy and anecdotes, Dietrich's narrative and factual utility to a historian would be limited. Nevertheless, his character observations accord with historian Ian Kershaw's biography and so may engage general interest in what Hitler's haunts and habits were like. Amid details about physical surroundings, Dietrich imparts the tedium of listening to Hitler's repetitive nocturnal monologues, from which palaver Dietrich theorizes a dual personality of superficial affability concealing aggressive willfulness. However postwar Germans reacted to Dietrich's portrait, his work shows present readers an insider's first-draft exegesis of Hitler. --Gilbert Taylor

Review

However postwar Germans reacted to Dietrich’s portrait, his work shows present readers an insider’s first-draft exegesis of Hitler. (Booklist )

Product details

  • ASIN ‏ : ‎ B0CCM7RKFF
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Greenhill Books (April 6, 2023)
  • Publication date ‏ : ‎ April 6, 2023
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • File size ‏ : ‎ 3.9 MB
  • Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
  • Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
  • Print length ‏ : ‎ 253 pages
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.0 out of 5 stars 113 ratings

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4 out of 5 stars
113 global ratings

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Customers say

Customers find the book informative and well-written, with one noting it provides deep insight into the workings of the Third Reich. Moreover, the memoir offers a valuable perspective on Hitler, and customers find it interesting enough to read. However, the value for money receives mixed reviews, with one customer describing it as a self-serving piece of rubbish.

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30 customers mention "Insight"23 positive7 negative

Customers find the book insightful and informative, with one customer noting it provides deep insight into the workings of the Third Reich.

"...There are several good little nuggets of information in here that should ring a bell or stand out if you’re familiar with events that coincide with..." Read more

"I give the book 5 stars automatically for it's historical significance but it is also a well written book...." Read more

"...It is clear that he wrote this book for posterity, and so that others might understand the personality that was Hitler...." Read more

"...A worthwhile book for any serious student of history." Read more

28 customers mention "Readability"25 positive3 negative

Customers find the book well written and excellent to read, describing it as a wonderful addition to one's library.

"...The book is well written, published after the author’s death in the early 1950’s." Read more

"...of Hitler from the viewpoint of his entourage, this is a valuable addition to your library." Read more

"...As for Otto's book, you can tell he's well educated and writes well, yet, he takes no responsibility for the atrocities he perpetrated and almost..." Read more

"...He died in 1952 at the age of 55. Interesting book, and if you like to read the dirt on the Nazi leadership, you will like this one." Read more

16 customers mention "Insight into hitler"16 positive0 negative

Customers find the book provides an interesting and valuable perspective on Hitler.

"...I appreciate little known events as it gives more depth to Hitler than the standard scenes one becomes overly familiar with if you are enamored of..." Read more

"...It gives a few insights on Hitler himself, but is a not a significant commentary or history of the man- er - monster...." Read more

"This book is excellent. It describes Hitler like no other book...." Read more

"...however is written by a well educated man and he gives deep thought to his subject Adolph Hitler...." Read more

7 customers mention "Interest"7 positive0 negative

Customers find the book interesting, with one describing it as surprisingly refreshing and another noting it is breath-taking.

"...It is breath-taking. Here was a man who wrote after having done his porridge and sought no self-exculpatory results a la Speer...." Read more

"Interesting read if you find the Nazis or Hitler worth reading about...." Read more

"Hitler up close and personal. Interesting." Read more

"Surprisingly Refreshing..." Read more

6 customers mention "Value for money"0 positive6 negative

Customers find the book's value for money negative, with one customer describing it as a waste of time and another noting its repetitive nature.

"Having read Ian Kershaw's vacuous, endless and pedantic tome and having been thoroughly disappointed by its shrill, patronising truisms I decided to..." Read more

"...The attempt doesn't seem insincere or impress me like he's evading responsibility or guilt. Simply detached, like a fly on the wall...." Read more

"...and tends to be not only repetitive, but also I often felt like it was non-sensical...." Read more

"Somewhat self-serving...." Read more

Top reviews from the United States

  • PFLA
    5.0 out of 5 stars An informative book for those who want to understand the leader of the Third Reich
    Reviewed in the United States on April 17, 2023
    Verified Purchase
    The author states in the first few pages of the book that Hitler had a dual personality. He reiterates that time and time again throughout the course of the book. The one side of Hitler, according to the author, loved nature, animals, children, his people and his homeland. That was the man who oversaw the first few years of the reich and all the social programs that made Germany the most modern nation in the world with great public works, promotion of pride in nation and self, and a serious attempt to eradicate poverty and social class that later served as a role model for the socialized democracies of Western Europe and the European Union. That is where he gained the devotion of so many of the German people. This doesn’t make up more than a few pages of the book, though.

    What the book does, more than anything, is illustrate Hitler’s gradual descent into his other personality, the one dominated by his rage and hatred and the loss of anything even remotely compassionate.

    There are several good little nuggets of information in here that should ring a bell or stand out if you’re familiar with events that coincide with the gradual deterioration of Hitler’s mental state, the greatest of which came when he realized the Soviets were poised to destroy the oil fields of Romania in violation of the German-Soviet non-aggression pact, the point where he knew he had been set up to fight an impossible war on two fronts.

    The book is well written, published after the author’s death in the early 1950’s.
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  • C. G. Telcontar
    4.0 out of 5 stars Nice detail on the private side of Hitler's personality
    Reviewed in the United States on May 23, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    Divided into two parts, part 1 is Dietrich's assessment of Hitler's leadership style and impact on Germany. It is clear and lucid, but hardly fascinating. Part 2 is for Hitler's devotees, and by that I mean people fascinated by all his quirks and little incidents of his life. Dietrich was present to witness countless little Hitler moments and he dishes them out for us one after another. I appreciate little known events as it gives more depth to Hitler than the standard scenes one becomes overly familiar with if you are enamored of this period in history. The flight where Hitler nearly ends up in the North Sea, I've never read of that incident anywhere else, nor him staying at one of Napoleon's palaces or the sudden rages over tiny things that would lead to Fuhrer decrees. Dietrich holds back from any backbiting of his erstwhile compatriots and competitors, which is nice, but we get no feeling for who the author was or how his life in the Reich proceeded. So more or less, this is a field level view of Hitler, a short bio, if you will, of his public and private adult life, but it lack depth and perception, not surprising for the time period he wrote it. He skirts the issue of genocide and euthanasia entirely, referencing it only obliquely. You can sense he hasn't thrown off the hypnosis of Hitler, though he points out his flaws and genuinely considers him a great man who simply went off the rails at some point. None of the invasions of foreign countries seem to bother him, only occupation policies. If you like to get a view of Hitler from the viewpoint of his entourage, this is a valuable addition to your library.
    5 people found this helpful
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  • PLM
    3.0 out of 5 stars an ok read.
    Reviewed in the United States on April 13, 2014
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    This book is about Hitler's mistress mostly and her actions and history. It gives a few insights on Hitler himself, but is a not a significant commentary or history of the man- er - monster. If you want a book about the relationship of Hitler and his mistress this will just tease your curiosity. Pla
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  • Devil's Advocate
    5.0 out of 5 stars Hitler Deconstructed.
    Reviewed in the United States on February 2, 2012
    Verified Purchase
    Having read Ian Kershaw's vacuous, endless and pedantic tome and having been thoroughly disappointed by its shrill, patronising truisms I decided to, in future, ignore so-called Third Reich "academics".

    This cosy crew are too frightened/remunerated to deviate from caricatures. None of them speaks German (can you imagine a corresponding biography of Churchill by a non-English speaking German!!!) and all seem to view Hitler solely in terms of the blah-blah Holocaust. They know who butters their bread so you can expect no surprises there.
    The majority of the public being sheep-like, wish for nothing better than to have their prejudices and programming confirmed. That is why the distinctly under-whelming works of Kershaw, Trevor-Roper, Ovary and Evans sell by the truckload. There is nothing there to excite or inform. Hitler was mad. He set out to kill all the Jews in the world and to achieve global domination. Every single thing he did was evil....blah, blah, blah, baaa, baaa...baaa...

    The first stop for me in my journey towards Hitler was David Irving. His compendium of "Hitler's War"/ "Goebbels: Mastermind of the Third Reich" and "Nuremburg: The Last Battle" opened my eyes to an author who could present "real history" without comment or dogma, treating the reader as an adult. I can not recommend his books highly enough. Don't believe the campaign against him. His enemies have an agenda that extends beyond WW2 to today's world and beyond academia to land rape in Palestine.

    I must mention an exception to the Kershawesque Mills'Boon-like history
    namely, "Hitler and the Power of Aesthetics" by Frederic Spotts. Again, informed and provocative. It casually consigns Kershaw & co. to the dustbin of history.

    My next foray was into the books of those close to Hitler. The reminicenses of Traudl Junge (secretary), Christa Schroeder (secretary), Eric Kemka (driver) and Heinz Linge (valet) are fascinating and entertaining reads. In these books you might catch Hitler working out with his chest expander, kissing Eva Braun, driving like a madman in his second-hand Merc, retracing his war years ....etc. They are essential reading for the de-programming of the obstructive notion that Hitler was not quite human. Enjoy!

    Finally (although probably not!!) I have come to Otto Dietrich's short book.
    It is breath-taking. Here was a man who wrote after having done his porridge and sought no self-exculpatory results a la Speer. He was close-ish to Hitler but certainly served him and the regime loyally to the end.
    The book was only to be published on his own death.
    That is why his critique is so compelling.

    The book dissects Hitler giving credit where it is due in many areas e.g. in stalling the retreat from Moscow but is spot-on on Hitler's multiple failings e.g failing to understand the importance of the airforce, abusing power in the occupied countries thus losing potential allies etc.

    The book again and again balances the pros and cons until you feel that the author has rationalised himself to the point where he can clearly say that the evidence against Hitler as a statesman worthy of leading Germany is overwhelming.

    Dietrich came to see Democracy as an undebatable final destination for mankind. Sadly he died only a few years after his release from prison.

    So, save yourself a lot of time and effort. Forget the glossy bestsellers. Hitler the man in all his glory and horror lies around the corner, up on that top shelf.

    The effort will reward you tenfold!!
    7 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

  • Roger Clark
    5.0 out of 5 stars In the shadow of Dr Goebbels - An astonishing book
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on August 4, 2014
    Verified Purchase
    This is an astonishing book - the most clear-eyed psychological analysis of Adolf Hitler produced by a Nazi insider. Written by Hitler's press chief, Dr Otto Dietrich, it explains the workings of Hitler's mind and actions better than nearly any other book. Yet it's quite short - just over 200 pages. Dietrich knew how to write and brought all the skills of journalism - clarity and conciseness - to bear on his subject. His book is full of sharp insights into Hitler and his henchmen and their nefarious activities.

    For almost 14 years Dietrich worked closely with Hitler. He organized the great Nazi propaganda campaigns during the elections of 1932, becoming Hitler's constant companion as he endlessly crisscrossed Germany by car and plane. At one time he controlled the entire German press. He also was in charge of foreign correspondents in Berlin.

    During WW2 Dietrich met Hitler every day. When major events happened Dietrich determined the way they were reported in Germany and abroad. Dietrich demanded editors toed the Nazi party line. He ran courts that punished and purged editors who failed to obey Nazi orders. He knew what he was doing. He knew about politics and he was a true believer. In the beginning he says he really believed Hitler was a man of peace who was promoting the welfare of the German people.

    `Whenever one thinks of the Führer,' he wrote in the 1930s, `a deep love surfaces that is sufficient to justify the sentence: "Hitler is Germany - Germany is Hitler!" ... He was not, is not, and never will be a dictator who forces the people to accept his personal wishes. He is a Führer, and that is the highest thing that can be said of any human being. That is why the people love him, trust him and rejoice in him. This man for the first time in history has allowed them to fully express themselves.'

    By the end of WW2 Dietrich had changed his mind. He was angry - enraged at how Hitler had wrecked Germany. Five months after the end of the war Dietrich started writing this book in a British internment camp. He completed his manuscript in 1948. It was smuggled out of prison with instructions to published after his death. This came earlier than expected. He died in 1955.

    In this book Dietrich rails against his former master and sets out to examine what went wrong. Why did Hitler, who was so popular and embodied the hopes of millions, crash in ruins? How was he able to fool everybody, including the author? What can we learn from his disastrous rule? This book is one of the earliest examinations of Hitler's reign - proceeding major works by Alan Bullock, John Toland, William Shirer, Joachim Fest, Albert Speer, Ian Kershaw, Richard Evans and countless others. When first written it broke new ground and is still a primary source for historians. Much of Dietrich's information has stood the test of time even if there are gaps in what we would like to know.

    More than half a century after his death at the early age of 55 Hitler's press chief is emerging from the shadows. Less flamboyant than his Nazi rivals he has attracted less public attention. But Dietrich was a key figure - the ultimate spin doctor at the heart of the Third Reich. During his trial in 1949 for crimes against humanity Nuremberg prosecutors described him as 'by far the most important' of the Nazi leaders, including Goebbels, involved in propaganda. Indeed Hitler himself described Dietrich as `an extremely clever man.'

    He was. He had a doctorate in political science. So what drew this intellectual and millions of Germans to the Nazis? The clue lies in the title. Nazi was acronym for the National Socialist German Workers' Party. Hitler, argues Dietrich, offered voters a German version of socialism - Socialism with a German face - a German folk-state containing the racial essence of the German people.

    The communists, on the other hand, engaged in treason. They were in the pay of a foreign country. They received huge funds from Lenin's and Stalin's Soviet Union to provoke revolution and grab power in Germany. They engaged in nationwide terror - murdering and bombing and causing chaos. Hitler created the Nazis to combat them.

    In this book Dietrich explains why Hitler's vision for Germany appealed to voters and why it went wrong. Hitler, he argues, was trying to create a classless state - a racial community of people that would eliminate `the evils of the party system' and solve what some saw as `the Jewish problem.' In the early days, he assures us, `There was no talk at all of extermination of the Jewish race.' The Germans also wanted to scrap the Treaty of Versailles.

    The book is divided into two halves. The first part - Hitler as leader of party, state and armed forces - looks at Hitler's character and talent. `Hitler,' he tells us, `was a demonic personality obsessed with racial delusions ... But he was in no sense mentally ill; rather he was mentally abnormal, a person who stood on the broad threshold between genius and madness.'

    Dietrich was impressed by his leader's abilities:- `Hitler had extraordinary intellectual gifts - in some fields undoubted genius. He had an eye for essentials, an astonishing memory, a remarkable imagination, and a bold decisiveness that made for unusual success in his social undertakings and other peaceful works.'

    But Hitler had no moral sense - `his thinking was both primitive and cranky'. He had a split personality and was at war with himself. He had no restraint and became more extreme and dictatorial as time went on.

    Dietrich provides a subtle and nuanced examination of Hitler's curious character - one of the best I've read - and helps unravel the mystery of this terrible man who destroyed so much. He tells us how Hitler changed from a popular leader to a gambler with destiny and examines his foreign policy during the war.

    On page 38 he says:- `On the day the war began Hitler donned the gray uniform and declared that he would wear it until the end of the war. When he put off his civilian clothes, he also stripped himself of the political skill he had possessed up to then. Throughout the war until the day of his death he displayed not a single impulse toward political activity, no ambition to employ statesmanship in foreign affairs. All his fire, his hardness, his savagery, and his passion which had failed him in foreign politics he now poured into the role of a soldier and Supreme Commander. The fact that he led the war not as statesman, but as a commander obsessed with military ambitions, was the crowning misfortune that his demonic personality brought to the German nation.'

    Two pages later he writes these prophetic words that are relevant today:- `History shows that wars fought on a military plane alone seldom come to a good end. And heads of state who during a war have done nothing but lead campaigns and have failed to consolidate their victories politically - have failed to shape successful battles into a new order - resemble rockets that shoot flaring into the sky and fall, burnt out, as fast as they rose. In this sense Hitler was a shooting star that glowed only briefly and in its fall shattered the German Reich and shook the entire world.'

    If only George W. Bush and Tony Blair had read those words before they invaded Iraq and Afghanistan. As for the Vietnam war... I could go on...

    Dietrich's message is clear - there's more to war than `shock and awe'.

    In addition, he examines the administrative chaos caused by competing empires in the Nazi government, Hitler's ruthless will power, his lack of flexibility and much else. In part two he describes scenes from Hitler's life - so different in reality from what the public thought at the time. What he tells us may be familiar now, but was new when he first put pen to paper and has been confirmed by historians since.

    What about the Holocaust? It gets scant attention in this book. That reflects the different way people look at WW2 today compared to the past. Nowadays more emphasis is put upon this appalling tragedy explains the historian Roger Moorhouse in his modern introduction to Dietrich`s book:- `This tendency to view the Third Reich almost exclusively through the prism of its persecution of the Jews is of rather modern provenance and would have been alien to many in the 1940s.'

    Nonetheless, the question refuses to go away. So how anti-Semitic was Dietrich? More than he lets on. As Prof Jeffrey Herf reveals in his book "The Jewish Enemy - Nazi Propaganda during WW2 and the Holocaust" Dietrich played a major role in the campaign against the Jews. As I said, at Nuremberg prosecutors described Dietrich as 'by far the most important' of the Nazi leaders, including Goebbels, involved in propaganda. He was found guilty of Crimes against Humanity for disseminating anti-Semitic propaganda in his daily press directives issued during the Holocaust:-

    `It is thus clear,' stated the Tribunal, `that a well thought-out, oft-repeated, persistent campaign to arouse the hatred of the German people against Jews was fostered and directed by the press department and its press chief, Dietrich. That part or much of this may have been inspired by Goebbels is undoubtedly true, but Dietrich approved and authorized every release . . . The only reason for this campaign was to blunt the sensibilities of the people regarding the campaign of persecution and murder which was being carried out . . . These press and periodical directives were not mere political polemics, they were not aimless expression of anti-Semitism, and they were not designed only to unite the German people in the war effort . . . Their clear and expressed purpose was to enrage the German people against the Jews, to justify the measures taken and to be taken against them, and to subdue any doubts which might arise as to the justice of measures of racial persecution to which Jews were to be subjected . . . By them Dietrich consciously implemented, and by furnishing the excuses and justifications, participated in, the crimes against humanity regarding Jews . . .'

    Holocaust apart, what is extraordinary about this book is the detail - how Dietrich wrote a sophisticated analysis so soon after the war describing what was wrong with Nazism. He got much of it right and his examination stands up to modern scrutiny.

    Nevertheless, one critic has dismissed this book as `a self-serving piece of rubbish.' The book may be self-serving. But it's also a perceptive analysis of Hitler's personality. Decades later many of the facts he presents - and his arguments - have been confirmed by distinguished historians. Whatever one thinks of the man's morality he wrote a valuable book. Dietrich was an intelligent intellectual. Like Albert Speer, who also wrote perceptively about Hitler, he provides problems for modern readers and comes with a health warning. But to dismiss him out hand is wrong. This book is essential reading for anyone who wants to understand the tyrant.

    Psychologically Hitler is one of the most puzzling major leaders. He's more difficult to understand than Churchill, Mrs Thatcher, Eisenhower etc. Dietrich was one of the earliest insiders to write a book that explained the tyrant's dual nature and how it fooled so many people. He makes Hitler understandable. One can see how the trick was done and why socialism, Hitler-style, seemed so appealing to many in the beginning. Dietrich wrote a number of books supporting Hitler, including "With Hitler on the Road to Power" in 1933 where he enthusiastically described what he thought was Hitler's struggle for the soul of the German people. `I presented National Socialism as imbued with the desire for peace,' he admits. `At the time I honestly believed this. Now I owe to the public the tragic sequel to that book, the second part of the drama, which alone explains Hitler's plunge into the abyss and the collapse of the German Reich.'

    In his introduction the historian Roger Moorhouse raises an interesting question. When did Dietrich start to have doubts about Hitler? Dietrich is vague, but gives readers hints in his preface printed as an appendix at the end of this edition. He claims in the course of years he came to hate Hitler's despotic nature.

    But once he'd boarded the Hitler train speeding towards its doom it was impossible to get off. `In spite of repeated attempts on my part to break free,' he says, Hitler `did not permit me to leave ... Only at the end, when I watched the inglorious collapse and the obstinacy of his final downfall, was I able suddenly to fit together the bits of the mosaic I had been amassing for twelve years into a complete picture of his opaque and sphinx like personality. Revelation of the bestialities in the concentration camps at home and in Poland opened my eyes, and showed me in firm outline the shifting contours of this man's character. When we study his portrait in retrospect, the lights and shades fall quite differently from the way we used to see them. Up to the end, we were looking at the portrait from an entirely different angle. The uncanny duality of his nature and the monstrousness of his true being suddenly became apparent.'

    Hence Dietrich's complete reversal after the war and repudiation of Hitler and the Nazis. The Nuremberg tribunal sent him to seven years imprisonment, but he was out of jail in 18 months. Like many high Nazi officials, he denied he was aware of the crimes of National Socialism. And he tried to downplay his own role in the co-ordination and control of the press. He claimed he served Hitler only as `a postman'.

    `I always acted in good faith and from patriotic motives,' he claimed. If that was a crime then he was just as guilty as 70 million Germans were guilty.

    In 2010 Stefan Krings published a major biography entitled "Hitler's press chief Otto Dietrich" (1897-1952). He argues at times Dietrich was even more powerful than his rival Dr Goebbels. Krings says that for decades historians have been fixated on the more colourful Goebbels and shifts the balance towards Dietrich.

    It's an argument Jeffrey Herf makes in his book "The Jewish Enemy". He says:- `Joseph Goebbels enormous celebrity, his voluminous published work and his remarkable diary have all influenced scholarship about Nazi propaganda. Whereas the minister of propaganda was obviously a key figure, he did not control daily and periodical journalism in the Third Reich to the extent that is often thought to be the case. Adolf Hitler did, or rather Hitler did so via Otto Dietrich and the Reich Press Office.'

    In short, Dr Dietrich was a much larger cog in the Nazi propaganda machine than many people once thought. Expect to hear more about him as the years roll by.

    Meanwhile, his memoirs present readers with dilemmas judging by the conflicting views they excite. If you're an unrepentant Nazi and refuse to admit you were wrong you cause offence. If you criticise Nazism, repent and say democracy is the way forward you're told you're self-serving and insincere. This has prompted one critic to observe:-

    `So a repentant Nazi. Strange how few repentant Communists or socialists are around nowadays. Communism slaughtered even more people than the Nazis and they still do in China, North Korea and Cuba. But most socialists haven't the common decency to admit they were wrong. It needed a Nazi to show them what they should have done.'

    Make of that what you will.
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  • Paul
    5.0 out of 5 stars Interesting read
    Reviewed in Australia on April 25, 2024
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    Interesting book with great details
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  • Imawens
    3.0 out of 5 stars honest account
    Reviewed in Canada on December 20, 2013
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    Nothing I didn't already know. Good for those not in the know. A seemingly honest straightforward first-hand account. An act of contrition.
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  • David McIntyre
    5.0 out of 5 stars A insight into Hitler by a intelligent observant man not one of the inner circle but ...
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on May 3, 2018
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    A insight into Hitler by a intelligent observant man not one of the inner circle but very close for a very long time,a pressman not a military man this book is not about the military side of things in any big way.He noted many things about his leader and to me does not come across as trying to excuse himself for his part in the Nazi Government nor did he allow the book to be published until after his death the memoir is a important piece in the Hitler jigsaw the modern writer of the forward asks just when he realised Hitler was not a good thing to support.i don't think it matters its the insight that is important,Hitler seems to have realized the war could not be won around mid 1943 those around Hitler although not going to say it must have felt in their private thoughts exactly the same.No one is alive today that knew Hitler so this book and a few others are all we have to help work out just how this horror story came about,many say it could not happen again I would love to say they are right but in truth I doubt it.If you are interested in absolute power and its misuse this book is a must.
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  • Mike K Hallam
    5.0 out of 5 stars Excellent first hand account
    Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 30, 2023
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    Very good account, with good introductory material
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