HITLER: 1936-1945 Nemesis

I was tempted to give it 5 stars only because of its sheer length (over 1400 pages when the 2 biographies are combined), its copious footnoting, and its obvious "scholarliness." And it was certainly a good biography, which I would recommend. But despite all that, I had a few problems with it, some trivial and some not:1. I found the book to be both overinclusive and underinclusive. I mean the former in the sense that the lens of the author was so tightly focused on Hitler and Hitler only that it seems as if Hitler's every utterance, every thought, and every movement was included. The problem with this is that so many of Hitler's thoughts and sayings were repetitive that we didn't need to be advised each of the umpteenth times they occured. The author was also repetitive in his own right. For example, how often did we read the following? (10? 20? 100? In any case, TOO MANY.)1. Hitler was determined that there would be no repeat of 1918.2. Hitler insisted on a military success before any talk of settlement.3. Hitler had an "either-or" way of thinking with no middle ground.4. Hitler refused to capitulate.5. Whenever anything went wrong, Hitler looked for scapegoats upon whom to case the blame.6. Hitler felt the Jews and Bolsheviks were the root of all evil.7. Hitler felt that Gemany's fortunes would turn around as soon as new weapons were developed.8. Hitler felt betrayed by his generals.9. Hitler ordered [fill in appropriate geographic area which was being wiped out the Allies] to be held at all costs.10. By doing X [especially if it's something nasty against the Jews], Mr. Y was "working towards the Fuhrer". 11. The little phrases used over and over such as "pushing at an open door".By about the 5th time I read each of these sentiments, I got the point. I didn't need to be advised another 20 times. I think that one of the "dirty little secrets" of Hitler's life is that, once the war started to go sour--say after the failure of Operation Barbarossa--his life was not only unchanging but also not all that interesting. It was just one straight downward path culminating in his ultimate suicide. It seemed as if there were no ups and downs after 1942--it was just straight down. For that reason, I feel that the second half of the book could have been shortened significantly with virtually no loss in understanding Hitler the man. But just as I felt the book was overinclusive in terms of the author's steadfast focus on Hitler, it was also underinclusive in terms of how little attention was paid to various major events during the war. I recognize that the book was not about Nazi Germany per se and it is not called "Hitler and his times", but couldn't the author have devoted more than a few sentences to major events such as: The Warsaw Ghetto uprising? The British decoding efforts? The concentration camps? D-Day? Yalta? These events were almost completely ignored.Finally, one trivial--but for me annoying--trait of the book--was the author's constant translation of words, phrases and sentences into German. What exactly did this add to the book? That the author knows German? That the Nazi leaders spoke in German and not in English? What was the point?? He could have knocked off 20 pages right there. I was particularly annoyed with the translation of "annihilate" to vernichten. It must be no exaggeration to say that we are given that little translation at least 50 times (particularly if you include the offshoots such as "annihilation" which are also helpfully translated for us). Did the author not feel that the first 10 times were sufficient? Also, on some occasions, we are told that "vernichten" means "annihilate", while on several other occasions, we are told it means "destroy." I don't know about German, but for my money, those words may be--but are not necessarily--synonymous.Don't get me wrong--the book is a real achievement and "as I noted" (to use another of Kershaw's pet phrases without the royal 'we'), I would recommend it. I just think it could have been a little better.

Most simply put, this, the second of two superb books by British historian Ian Kershaw on Hitler's life and times, quite successfully draws the reader closer to an understanding of this historically enigmatic and often bizarre human being who so changed the world of the 20th century. Although there are a myriad of such books that have appeared in the half-century since Hitler's demise in the dust and rubble of Berlin, this particular effort, which draws from hundreds of secondary sources, many of which have never before been cited, paints an authentic and masterful portrait of Hitler as an individual. This is an absolutely singular historical work; and it will almost come to occupy a central place on the shelves of serious World War Two historians. Most fascinating for me is the way in which Kershaw grows an incredibly fertile appreciation for Hitler's personal characteristics into a sophisticated appreciation for what unfolded historically. A good example is his fetish for secrecy, which left both Hitler himself and those around him incredibly poorly informed of many of the details of what their policies were doing to the society around them.Author Ian Kershaw takes a quite different and novel approach, and it is one I enjoyed. Here, by carefully locating and fixing the individual in the context and welter of his times, it yields a much more enlightening approach toward painting a meaningful comprehensive picture of how this criminally twisted psychopath became such a fatefully placed politician and leader of post-World War One Germany. Thus, in Volume One we saw the boy grow and change in whatever fashion into a man, tracing the rise of this troubled malcontent from the anonymity of Viennese shelters to a fiery and meteoric rise into politics, culminating in his ascent to rule Germany. Kershaw memorably recreates the social, economic, and political circumstances that bent and twisted Hitler so fatefully for the history of the world. In this volume, Kershaw concentrates masterfully on how this single human being then fatefully pushes Nazi Germany, Europe, and the rest of the world into the most horrific bloodbath in modern history.Hitler was, in Kershaw's estimation, a man most representative of his times, reflecting a widespread disaffection with democratic politics, steeped in the virulent anti-Semitism of his Viennese environment, twisted and experienced in the cruelties and absurdities of the First World War, thrust by circumstance and disposition into the sectarian, dyspeptic, and rough & tumble politics of the 1920s, and rising by finding himself the most unlikely of politicians with an unusual ability to orate and emote. It is also interesting to discover that Hitler had an unusually acute (though uneven) intellect, is rumored to have possessed a 'photographic memory', and was said to have an amazing ability to discuss and quote facts and figures and then subsequently casually weave them into a conversation that witnesses found spellbinding and convincing. He was also unquestionably quite charismatic and charming. Kershaw argues masterfully that it is impossible to understand 'why' Hitler without understanding this extremely toxic and strange combination of social, economic, and cultural factors that characterized Germany.Thus, as Hitler begins his ineluctable rise to power, we better appreciate how and why such a seemingly unlikely cast of characters as the Nazis succeeded so wildly beyond what one would expect to be possible in a sane and sophisticated modern industrial state. This is fascinating stuff, as is his treatment of the concomitant rise of the slugs, thugs, and under-life accompanying him into the corridors of power and influence. Here is the world's greatest single collection of otherwise underachieving bullies, fanatics, pseudo-intellectuals, and fellow travelers, who clashed into an uneasy coalescence that formed the nucleus of the single greatest force for collective evil seen in the modern world. Finally, one's mind reels at the scene at the book's conclusion, as the fabulous evil empire created by the Nazis had been reduced by Soviet artillery and Allied bombing into dust and rubble, and Hitler becomes an almost comically eccentric figure, reduced by his own devices to settling for a self-inflicted gunshot to the brain rather than the worldwide domination he had struggled toward.

On many occasions some "facts" are pure repetitions of German Nazi war propaganda. To author: please do your homework and please check and then check again.On many occasions repeating arguments laid out after the war by former Werhmacht high ranking officers trying to diminish their role in the Nazi regime and/or whitewash history from their mistakes. "It's not us it's Madman Hitler!".Also in the kindle edition: spelling and typos.

What I found most interesting in this second volume was how as a military leader, Hitler's instincts were nearly always wrong, once the tide began to turn against him as it did at Stalingrad.He was incapable of surrender and fundamentally believed, so he said, that the cause, in success or failure, was more important than saving lives, or any survival of the Reich based on any form of compromise.With the possible exception of Goebbels, nearly all his followers wanted to try and strike a deal before the Reich sank into the marshes, but Hitler would not budge an inch, and didn't totally give up hope of a change of fortune until hours before his bunker suicide, with Russian shells dropping in the garden above.The character of his main lieutenants, notably Goring, Goebbels, Bormann and Speer emerge clearly from this volume.As I said in my review of the first volume, this is not a history of the Third Reich but a biography of Hitler and as such many details of the war are absent.Kershaw's style is a little heavyhanded. He refers to his sources only by numbers of notes at the rear, so in a literary sense everything is presented without much evidence. The evidence is there of course, I am not doubting his scholarship, but it isn't the most engaging read.This is compensated for however by the drama of the story he has to tell. There is plenty to say about the plight of the German people and their gradually changing mood and attitude to Hitler.

Ian Kershaw is one of my favourite WW2 authors, and I have enjoyed all of his books immensely. But this book is in my opinion is his very best piece of work, also it is my favourite WW2 book by any author, and I have read scores of them. The book showed not only the dark side of Hitler and the influence that dark side had upon the world. But it offered an insight into the why's and how's of his thinking. Not only did it focus on Hitler, but also on those around him, the pressures he put them under, the rewards he offered and punishment for failure. It describes his mentality and showed how that mentality effected politics,everyday lives, battles and military thinking.This book I cannot recommend enough, if there was a ten star rating that would perhaps be enough.

The best biography I have ever read he describes in detail the twisted mind of the biggest monster of the 20th century. In Nemesis h e describes how Hitler's evil but magnetic personality slavishly dragged the German people into a war of annihilation with the whole of Europe. He describes how Hitler used the fear the France and Britain of been dragged into another world war and used it to get his hand on the Sudentland. He also describes in great detail on how facing complete defeat Hitler lost attachment with the reality around and kept Germany on the fast track to ruin. I would recommend this book to any body interested in 20th century history.

What an author. Superb book, extremely well researched, as you would expect from Kershaw. This book is more than just another overview of Adolf and his mottley bunch. Kershaw takes the reader across the Nazi term in office at a god pace, yet missing nothing of importance. As always, his accounts of Hitler's thought processes, the cruelty and sheer follies of Nazism are fully exposed for what they are. The Allied response to the expansion of Germany is also well set out. As a student of Soviet Russia, I found this book far more than a "duplication" of Kershaw's other mighty works on Hitler. A very good additional, authoritative read indeed.