A detailed review of the life of Heinrich Himmler and an analysis of the horrors he encouraged and oversaw. This new book looks closely at one of the most notorious individuals of recent history – Very Highly Recommended.
NAME: Heinrich Himmler, The Sinister Life of the Head of the SS and GESTAPO FILE: R2667 AUTHOR: Heinrich Fraenkel, Roger Manwell PUBLISHER: Pen & Sword, frontline books BINDING: soft back PAGES: 285 PRICE: £14.99 GENRE: Non Fiction SUBJECT: WWII, World War Two, Second World War, World War 2, SS, GESTAPO, SS-SDP, NSDP. Nazi, mystic, superstition, genocide, Germany, Hitler, revolution, despot, internal security, Waffen-SS ISBN: 1-52671-339-X IMAGE: B2667.jpg BUYNOW: http://tinyurl.com/y77arah9 LINKS: DESCRIPTION: A detailed review of the life of Heinrich Himmler and an analysis of the horrors he encouraged and oversaw. This new book looks closely at one of the most notorious individuals of recent history – Very Highly Recommended. Since 1945 there has been a continuing flood of books attempting to identify the warnings from history provided by the rise and fall of Nazi Germany and evaluating the main players in the Nazi court. This is one of the best and comes from two authors who have already collaborated successfully on several projects in this area. What most historians chose to ignore is the fact that unified Germany has been the kiss of death for Europe four times. The Franco-Prussian War was the point where German political ambitions brought war to Europe. The First and Second World Wars brought terrible carnage, and the re-unification of Germany after the defeat of the Soviets has again brought carnage and division to Europe as it has taken over the European Union and subverted it for German advantage. In none of these major upheavals has the flavour of German politics made any difference to the thrust of political ambition and a belief in a German master race that is destined to rule the subordinate races of Europe. The real differences during the Third Reich are that it exposed the underlying dark nature of political Germany in the form of the genocide program. Himmler has been described variously as the devil incarnate, a mentally disturbed psychopath, an evil man. That is as much an attempt to explain away the horrors of Nazi Germany. In reality there were many Germans who would have slid into his power slot and behaved in much the same way, given a chance. One of the most intriguing and horrifying aspects of Nazi Germany was that many SS officers held multiple degrees and doctorates and even included professors, many having study law at university. Very similar individuals occupy positions of power in 21st Century Germany. It may be that this terror is a natural component of socialism in making the citizen subordinate to the State and then dehumanizing the citizen to a number, while removing accountability from the people who make up the ruling elite. It that environment in Soviet Russia, Nazi Germany and other socialist States, terrible abuses have resulted and even in some of the most tolerant nations, such as Great Britain, socialism has spread through 'public services' and introduced a spectrum of criminality, demonstrating that, when accountability is relaxed, many people are capable of becoming monsters. It is very natural that we should consider how the Nazis came into being, obtained power in a major industrial nation, which had produced many outstanding examples of cultural leadership and art. There is a fascination of how seemingly ordinary people came to perpetrate vile acts on an industrial scale never before seen in history. What it overlooks is that everyone is potentially capable of great good and terrible bad, given a series of conditions that allow and encourage the bad to overtake the good. Fortunately few have the opportunity to indulge their bad side on anything like the scale perpetrated by Nazi Germany. Himmler came from a very ordinary background. His family all appeared to be typical Germans of their region, social group and education. There is not much in Himmler's childhood to suggest any reason for him to become distinguished in any way later in life. Sickness did bring an unexpected change in life, stopping him from learning how to become a successful chicken farmer. It created a physical weakness that prevented him of joining the military reserves, but he did go on to study agriculture at University. Then he became involved in the NSDP and his strong ambitions came to the fore and propelled him up the ranks of a growing and dark political Party that was virulently anti-Semitic, held a deep hatred for Communists and Social Democrats and where its leader Hitler was happy to foster and atmosphere of conflict within its ranks in the belief that it would bring the strongest to the top. However, anti-Semitism was deeply engrained in German society and also widespread across Europe. Equally deeply engrained was a belief that Germans were some how a master race that would conquer the world. Had Britain fallen in 1940, the Soviet Union would have fallen in 1942 and the US and Canada would have fallen in the late 1940s. The same beliefs are today dominant in the European Union which is an entirely political project that sees itself dominating the world. It is based on much of Nazi Germany. Himmler appears to have had a hunger for approval and belonging that was a very unfortunate combination in the poisonous atmosphere of the NSDP. He quickly formed a deep hatred of Sepp Dietrich, who headed Hitler's close protection squad. As a result he spent much effort in trying to discredit Dietrich in Hitler's estimation with the objective of persuading Hitler to sack Dietrich. It is not entirely clear whether this hatred was of Dietrich personally or because he presented a perceived potential barrier for Himmler's take over of the SS and expansion at the expense of the SA, leading to ambitions to replace the Wehrmacht with the SS. All of these interests and ambitions culminated with the mass genocide of Jews and others who the Nazis hated. Himmler was the key part of this appalling program, instigating the development and selecting subordinates to carry out the work. After all of the terror inflicted by Himmler and his henchmen, he still thought he could negotiate with the Allies and save his skin, failing to understand how he was perceived outside Germany. The authors have provided many fresh insights into the life of Himmler, his interactions with his family and friends and the obsessive and superstitious nature of the man himself. This is an absorbing book. There will be inevitably those who disagree with some parts of the work but that is due to the wide and often strongly held conflicting views of the subject. This is a most compelling biography.