The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William L. Shirer
First published in 1959, William L. Shirer’s The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich seems like a work that does not need a review in 2018. After all, it was an immediate, worldwide success. It has become a standard history primer for professional and amateur historians of World War II. Why does such a classic need a review?
Timely is my only justification. With the rise of ultra-right-wing and violent politics in Europe and the US today, Shirer’s work is a warning to democracies and citizens everywhere.
This massive work is a stark review of fascism written by an eyewitness. Shirer was a foreign correspondent in Europe in the 1930s. He was allowed into Nazi Germany as an American in 1940 and 1941, before events brought the USA into the war. He witnessed Nazi rallies and heard Hitler himself deliver impassioned speeches on several occasions. His accounts of these events, written in the mid-1950s, ring with chilling clarity.
After the war, he was also a witness to the Nuremberg trials of the surviving Nazi leaders. The gloating, strutting rulers from the 1930s and 40s sat passively in the defendants’ docket—broken, humbled, shriveled, utterly defeated. None escaped their crimes against humanity. Most were hanged. A few were imprisoned. History honors none of them.
To the easily-led, the gullible, the power-hungry, fascism may have a certain appeal. But for the serious reader, this work shows inescapable similarities between the 1930s and today, similarities that are frightening and foreboding.
Fascists appeal to violence. This work amply shows the violence against political enemies that Hitler employed. And then the violence he used against his own party and followers to insure his sole and complete dictatorship. And finally, the violence he used to control an entire country and his conquered territories. Our current times seem to embrace this type of violence again, without thinking of the consequences.
Fascists use scapegoats to distract citizens and win supporters. Nothing whips up a crowd more than hearing who their “real enemies” are. For Hitler, the undercurrent of anti-Semitism in Germany and Europe generally was a fertile field. Our current political times, no less so— immigrants, Mexicans, the LGBT community, and Muslims are singled out time and again as our “real enemies.”
Fascists in Germany in the 1930s attacked the free press, shut it down, accused it of being disloyal and dishonest. Shirer’s work traces the rise of modern propaganda via Joseph Goebbels, a master of lying on a massive scale, of distorting and haranguing perceived enemies of the state. A true follower of Hitler, he committed suicide shortly after Hitler did in the Chancellery bunker in Berlin as the Russian steamroller closed in on the remnants of Nazi Germany. Our current political climate attacks the free press and fills the airwaves with distortions and lies with much the same ferociousness.
Fascists appoint sycophant followers who are incompetent and criminal. Their crimes are not just against civil laws—Hitler and Goering plundering art treasures from conquered countries museum after museum—but also crimes against humanity—summary executions of political enemies, barbarous mistreatment of captured soldiers, genocide on a mammoth scale.
Nearly two decades into the 21st century, reading this work is a timely reminder of how unwitting citizens can open the door to a charlatan demigod, and suddenly find themselves enslaved in their own country. Hitler, “a lying vagabond” as Shirer describes him, rose to become the most powerful person in the world. He plunged the whole world into the worst, most costly, and deadliest war humankind has ever known.
And Shirer reminds us, Hitler did so, in large part, by appealing to the ignorant, using the biases and hatreds of his day, manipulating the spineless and complacent citizenry willing to go along rather than protest or stand up to the rising Nazi tide. His hateful prejudices soon became “the law of the land.” He surrounded himself with thieves, criminals, sexual deviants, drug addicts, incompetent but loyal bunglers, and liars. Sounds all too familiar; we are not that far behind.
Shirer’s massive work should be read by taking breaks. (I read other, lighter works along the way, and I took six months to finish it.) But his seminal work is a reminder of our own political vulnerability. It is a reminder that vigilance as citizens and voters is critical to democracy.
His work proves Santayana’s point: “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to relive it.”
First published in 1959, William L. Shirer’s The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich seems like a work that does not need a review in 2018. After all, it was an immediate, worldwide success. It has become a standard history primer for professional and amateur historians of World War II. Why does such a classic need a review?
Timely is my only justification. With the rise of ultra-right-wing and violent politics in Europe and the US today, Shirer’s work is a warning to democracies and citizens everywhere.
This massive work is a stark review of fascism written by an eyewitness. Shirer was a foreign correspondent in Europe in the 1930s. He was allowed into Nazi Germany as an American in 1940 and 1941, before events brought the USA into the war. He witnessed Nazi rallies and heard Hitler himself deliver impassioned speeches on several occasions. His accounts of these events, written in the mid-1950s, ring with chilling clarity.
After the war, he was also a witness to the Nuremberg trials of the surviving Nazi leaders. The gloating, strutting rulers from the 1930s and 40s sat passively in the defendants’ docket—broken, humbled, shriveled, utterly defeated. None escaped their crimes against humanity. Most were hanged. A few were imprisoned. History honors none of them.
To the easily-led, the gullible, the power-hungry, fascism may have a certain appeal. But for the serious reader, this work shows inescapable similarities between the 1930s and today, similarities that are frightening and foreboding.
Fascists appeal to violence. This work amply shows the violence against political enemies that Hitler employed. And then the violence he used against his own party and followers to insure his sole and complete dictatorship. And finally, the violence he used to control an entire country and his conquered territories. Our current times seem to embrace this type of violence again, without thinking of the consequences.
Fascists use scapegoats to distract citizens and win supporters. Nothing whips up a crowd more than hearing who their “real enemies” are. For Hitler, the undercurrent of anti-Semitism in Germany and Europe generally was a fertile field. Our current political times, no less so— immigrants, Mexicans, the LGBT community, and Muslims are singled out time and again as our “real enemies.”
Fascists in Germany in the 1930s attacked the free press, shut it down, accused it of being disloyal and dishonest. Shirer’s work traces the rise of modern propaganda via Joseph Goebbels, a master of lying on a massive scale, of distorting and haranguing perceived enemies of the state. A true follower of Hitler, he committed suicide shortly after Hitler did in the Chancellery bunker in Berlin as the Russian steamroller closed in on the remnants of Nazi Germany. Our current political climate attacks the free press and fills the airwaves with distortions and lies with much the same ferociousness.
Fascists appoint sycophant followers who are incompetent and criminal. Their crimes are not just against civil laws—Hitler and Goering plundering art treasures from conquered countries museum after museum—but also crimes against humanity—summary executions of political enemies, barbarous mistreatment of captured soldiers, genocide on a mammoth scale.
Nearly two decades into the 21st century, reading this work is a timely reminder of how unwitting citizens can open the door to a charlatan demigod, and suddenly find themselves enslaved in their own country. Hitler, “a lying vagabond” as Shirer describes him, rose to become the most powerful person in the world. He plunged the whole world into the worst, most costly, and deadliest war humankind has ever known.
And Shirer reminds us, Hitler did so, in large part, by appealing to the ignorant, using the biases and hatreds of his day, manipulating the spineless and complacent citizenry willing to go along rather than protest or stand up to the rising Nazi tide. His hateful prejudices soon became “the law of the land.” He surrounded himself with thieves, criminals, sexual deviants, drug addicts, incompetent but loyal bunglers, and liars. Sounds all too familiar; we are not that far behind.
Shirer’s massive work should be read by taking breaks. (I read other, lighter works along the way, and I took six months to finish it.) But his seminal work is a reminder of our own political vulnerability. It is a reminder that vigilance as citizens and voters is critical to democracy.
His work proves Santayana’s point: “Those who do not remember the past are condemned to relive it.”
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