Speer: The Final Verdict

I am trying to write a review of this book but inevitably every attempt ends up being mostly about Speer and my conviction that such an intelligent, shrewd and powerful individual simply could not have been in the dark about the "Final Solution". This book is a very powerful indictment and a must read for any serious world history reader. Besides solidifying my beliefs about Speer, it is a powerful glimpse into the dark side of human nature, an eerie reminder of how easily humans are corrupted by ambition and thirst for power. Judging by the recent events in former Yugoslavia, Rwanda and Sudan one can only hope that no powerful nation will ever turn the way of Nazi Germany, since there is no shortage of power-thirsty, ambitious people that refuse to learn from history.

I found this book to be one of the more perceptive books I have read on members of Hitler's inner circle. Albert Speer as many of the previous reviewers have already wrote, proves to be a great mystery. However, the author provides some very interesting insights to Speer's rather naive but contradictory asute behavior during the time he serves for Hitler.The book proves to be very readable and easy to get into. Its provides a very informative picture of Albert Speer without overwhelming you with mindless details and gives a clear idea what kind of man Speer was, before, during and after the Third Reich.Its interesting that of all the individuals of Hitler's inner circle, Speer was intellectually, culturally and morally above the rest but Fest make it understood that Speer had some sort of psychological blinder on and spent much of his post-World War life with that blinder still partially on. From what Fest wrote, it seem that Speer suffered from some sort of a self-imposed martyrdom at Nuremberg.Interesting book and well worth the effort to read, I thought I knew Speer a bit better now then before.

I thout this is relevant: Wartime reports debunk Speer as the Good Nazi By Kate Connolly in Berlin Albert Speer, Hitler's architect and munitions minister, was fully aware of and involved in the mass murder of Jews despite his lifelong claims to the contrary, new documents have shown. Speer's reputation in Germany as the "Good Nazi" who stood by Hitler only because it enabled him to fulfil his dreams to become an architect of international acclaim, has been blackened by the disclosures that he was fully informed of the human destruction in Auschwitz, the largest of the Nazi's murder factories. His insistence that he knew nothing about Auschwitz or the crimes against Jews, meant that he was the only leading Nazi to escape execution following the Nuremberg trials. Instead he was sentenced to 20 years in prison and after his release in 1966, went on to become the best-selling author of books such as Inside the Third Reich and Spandau: Secret Diaries. He died in 1981, spending his last years in London. His insistence that, despite being the closest Nazi to Hitler, he knew nothing of the Holocaust, led to many Germans adopting a similar stance of denial, The new disclosures have formed the backbone of a documentary drama called Speer and Him, the first part of which was broadcast this week, the 60th anniversary of the end of the Second World War in Europe. It debunks the myth of the benign family father who happened to fall in with the wrong crowd. The film's director, Heinrich Breloer, said: "[He created] a market for people who said 'believe me, I didn't know anything about it. Just look at the Führer's friend, he didn't know about it either'." The documents uncovered by the Berlin historian Susanne Willems include a Third Reich report from May 1943 that refers to a "Prof Speer special programme" to expand the Auschwitz camp so that it could serve as a death camp. The report, on which Speer made copious handwritten notes in the margins and over the text, refers to the fact that Auschwitz's role as a work camp had "recently been expanded to include the solution to the Jewish question". The gassing of Jews began at the latest in the spring of 1942. The report was compiled after Speer, who as the head of armaments for the Third Reich was responsible for overseeing the distribution of building materials, dispatched two of his advisers, Desch and Sander, to investigate a number of concentration camps around Germany and Poland, including Auschwitz. They reported being shown "everything" at the camp by its leader, Rudölf Hoss, who gave them a "short report on the erection and purpose of the whole concentration camp site". Further research by Miss Willems has shown that on the day of Desch and Sander's visit, 900 Polish Jews were murdered in the gas chambers. Following the visit and resulting report, Speer approved the shipment of a thousand tons of steel to the camp to enable its expansion. The head of the SS, Heinrich Himmler, wrote to Speer

Anyone unfortunate enough to have experienced a bitter divorce can testify as to the degree to which two otherwise intelligent and perceptive human beings can violently disagree as to what the truth is regarding matters both witnessed and had been parties to. So it is with our continuing fascination and absolute incredulity regarding Albert Speer, an otherwise intelligent and perceptive soul, who just so happens to have been a willing participant in one of the most horrific administrations in the history of the 20th century, the Nazi Third Reich.In two quite absorbing but incredibly self-serving books, Speer argued that he never understood the full extent of the Nazi war crimes nor the degree to which his own actions were complicit with those horrific aims. He first argued this at the war trials in Nuremberg, but did so in such a way as to admit his own culpability based on his rank and his actions as Chief Of Armaments Production, during which he employed slave labor in service to the German war effort. By being the only defendant at Nuremberg to show any semblance of remorse, he saved himself by admitting his own guilt, though largely guilt by association. Careful readings of the trials transcripts show that he was, in fact, fairly forthcoming in his admissions, although he always contended that he lacked specifics regarding the so-called ?Final Solution? or even of the fact that the concentration camps in Poland and elsewhere were being used to systematically annihilate millions of Jews and Gypsies. In fact, he was an incredibly sophisticated human being who was expert in ?toadying up? to whomever he needed to. The fact that he was convincing enough to the Allies to escape the death sentence speaks volumes about his persuasiveness and ability to read into the possibilities any situation offered. It is the author?s contention that Speer must be held accountable for having allowed a tyrant like Hitler to rise. Yet Hitler was well in place before Speer ever met him. Speer is a man of stunning contradictions, someone of education, culture, and breeding who succumbed to the siren call of power, fame, and riches. While he eventually became expert at fashioning a defense both for himself and his actions both during and after the war, the truth of the matter is that most of what he argued in his own defense was (and is) preposterous. No one could have walked in the circles he did, have acted in concert with the aims and goals of the Nazi regime with such success and energy, and yet have been as totally naïve and ignorant as he always claimed he was. What he recalls more than anything is the old adage Hitler was said to have coined.; ?Tell a man an outrageous lie often enough for long enough and even he will come to believe it? I think Speer proved the accuracy of that adage, believing in his own lie. This is an absorbing and provocative book, and one I can heartily recommend to the student of modern history. Enjoy!

Albert Speer has proved to be a lasting enigma for historians, and of continued interest to the public. This is not the first book written about Speer, and contrary to the title it will not be the last. I found the book to be well done, and while it does bring some new detail to the life of Speer it is not a book that provides any fundamental shifts in generally accepted facts.There are at least two troubling issues that I found worthy of note. The first is a certain arrogance of the author during his introduction when he expresses the opinion that there has not been a proper biography written of Speer. The author is certainly an authority on Speer and had an unusual opportunity to work with and get to know the man as much or more than any other writer. I have read several biographies of Speer, and two of Speer's own works, and there is a great deal of biographic writing available, and it is not as lacking as the author suggests. Issue number 2 is that the author uses David Irving as a reference and also refers to him as a historian. David Irving has been the subject of books, and a man who was handed a miserable defeat in a courtroom in England that condemned him as a dubious historian but perhaps a good researcher, and confirmed that his views of Nazi Germany were largely revisionist and without documentary facts. David Irving may be a researcher, he may even gather accurate information, no where have I read of any legitimate historian grant the same honor and respect to Irving, in fact his is considered little more than a demagogue. His associations with groups that wish to minimize the Holocaust to the point of triviality, if they admit to it at all is well documented, and why Mr. Fest would quote him from all the available sources is a mystery.The author describes Speer as a man with many abilities, but no qualities. This is one of the better summations of Speer that I have read. Others have also correctly characterized him, as John Kenneth Galbraith did, as a very intelligent escapist from the truth. And the words that head these comments are those of Speer himself.The book is based on the premise that it is men like Speer that allow the rise of tyrants like Hitler, Stalin, and the balance of history's representatives of evil. That the tyrants are routinely produced by history, but only those who have a massive supporting cast that are willing to follow, that are willing to selectively see only what they choose to view, and who place ambition above all else, are necessary for the rise of such dictators.The issue that continues to fascinate me is Speer's escape from execution at Nuremberg, He clearly cooperated with the allies to a degree that no other defendant did, and he at least gave the impression of remorse, and played a brilliant game of saying he was responsible for crimes that were committed, but not guilty as he lacked specific knowledge. This is the same charade that allows a defendant in this country to be found not guilty in a c