Category Archives: History

Arts, Books, History

Book Review – ‘Speer: Hitler’s Architect’

Speer

Crony: Speer with Hitler in 1938.

Intro: Albert Speer saved himself at the Nuremburg War Trials from hanging by claiming ignorance of the Holocaust – then made a fortune from his memoirs in prison.

ALBERT SPEER cut a lonely figure, pacing the grounds of West Berlin’s Spandau Prison. Obsessed by numbers, the former Nazi minister calculated that during his 20 years incarcerated there, he clocked up a staggering 31,816 km.

He also said he read 5,000 books in that time; a questionable claim given he spent six hours a day gardening and two hours walking. But then, Speer was always liberal with the truth.

He lied to save his life at the Nuremberg Trials of Nazi war criminals, he lied to the German people, he even lied to Hitler. And, as Martin Kitchen’s superb and surely definitive biography of the man who ran Germany’s war economy shows, most of all he lied and deceived himself.

Born in 1905, Speer followed his wealthy architect father into the business. His big break came in 1933 while site manager on the renovation of the Chancellery in Berlin.

Adolf Hitler visited the works daily and was immediately impressed by the young man’s polite manner and precise, direct answers to his questions.

Speer was soon a regular at the daily lunches Hitler gave for his closest cronies, and established the nearest thing to a friendship Hitler ever had.

Significantly perhaps, the self-conscious, aloof, narcissistic, ruthlessly ambitious Speer had no intimate friends himself. He even remained distant from his wife and six children.

In January 1938 Hitler appointed Speer as Berlin’s Inspector General of Building, tasked with rebuilding the city (which was to be renamed Germania) as a ‘world capital’.

Speer lacked creativity and originality as an architect, but he had one great asset: he twigged what Hitler liked in his architecture – a kitsch combination of ornate late 19th-century Viennese and the modern ‘cruise liner’ style seen in the Hollywood movies of the time. Above all, everything had to be big.

Take the new Chancellery that Speer built for Hitler. It was ridiculously grandiose. Visitors had to undergo a long walk through several rooms to reach the Fuhrer, the last a 146m-long hall.

Hitler insisted it had a highly polished stone floor, whose slipperiness would unsettle visitors as they approached the huge double doors of his office, a room 27m long, 14.5m wide and 9.75m high.

Hitler was never photographed in it because its inhuman scale would have dwarfed him into insignificance.

Stone for Speer’s projects was quarried by 10,000 concentration camp slaves in unimaginable conditions. When this was mentioned to Speer, he replied: ‘The Yids got used to making bricks while in captivity in Egypt.’

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WHEN dwellings had to be demolished for his projects, Speer seized 23,000 Jewish apartments to rehouse the displaced inhabitants, which meant 75,000 evicted Jews were ‘resettled’, a euphemism for being sent to death camps.

In 1942, three years into World War II, Hitler appointed Speer as Minister for Armaments, recognising both his talents as a brilliant organiser and his utter loyalty to the Fuhrer.

At first Speer produced what he called ‘a miracle’. Production rose as he reshaped the system, but the task became increasingly difficult.

Hitler constantly meddled in details of tank or aircraft design and frequently changed his mind. He had to be fed encouraging production statistics.

Eventually the only way to do this was to churn out vast numbers of obsolete models on existing production lines – like the Messerschmitt Me109 fighter – at the expense of building new factories to make jet aircraft that might have made a difference to the war.

As the Russians advanced and Allied bombing intensified, Speer lost vital factories, raw materials, and oil supplies.

By 1944, the war obviously lost, he was battling vainly to maintain output.

Now Hitler put his faith in ‘miracle weapons’, chiefly the V1 flying bombs and V2 rockets. Their factories were moved underground to protect them from bombs.

Slave labourers worked under appalling conditions, living in tunnels with no latrines, surrounded by their own filth, their clothes infested with lice.

Working 72 hours a week on a daily diet of 1,100 calories, 160 slaves dropped dead every day. But after visiting the factory, Speer wrote to congratulate the manager, seemingly unaffected by the workers’ plight.

Not so some members of his staff, who were so traumatised after witnessing this living hell that they had to take sick leave.

Speer could genuinely claim one thing to his credit. When Hitler issued his infamous Nero Decree, ordering the destruction of Germany’s industry and infrastructure, Speer countermanded it, travelling the country to successfully preserve things for the country’s post-war reconstruction, in which he naively believed he would play a part.

He was shocked to find himself put on trial at Nuremburg, but he mounted a brilliant defence – he accepted full responsibility for his actions but claimed ignorance of the mass murder of Jews. His calm, educated demeanour contrasted with the ranting and fanaticism of other leading Nazis and impressed the judges.

He escaped the hangman’s noose and got 20 years in Spandau.

Ever a loner, he wasn’t too unhappy in jail. His wealthy acquaintances smuggled in luxuries. Always sure of his entitlement, Speer complained if the champagne wasn’t up to scratch or the caviar not the best.

After his release in 1966 he published his memoirs. The book was a phenomenal success. Readers lapped up fascinating details of Hitler’s private life. It earned Speer a fortune.

Its portrait of him as the ‘Good Nazi’ absolved a whole generation of Germans of Nazi war guilt. For if, it was argued, this mover and shaker, a member of Hitler’s innermost circle, didn’t know about the Holocaust, how could an ordinary person be expected to?

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SPEER was deceiving the German people and, in his failure to admit his guilt himself.

Since his death in 1981, the evidence against Speer has mounted. His eviction of Jews from Berlin. His brutal use of slave workers. His presence at a speech given by Heinrich Himmler in which the SS leader said it was not only necessary to exterminate the Jews but their children, too, to prevent future revenge.

Kitchen’s exhaustively researched, detailed book nails, one by one, the lies of the man who ‘provided a thick coat of whitewash to millions of old Nazis’. It’s a fascinating account of how the moral degradation of the chaotic Nazi regime corrupted an entire nation as well as being a timely warning for today.

–     Speer: Hitler’s Architect by Martin Kitchen is published by Yale for £14.99

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Arts, History, Science, Society

Quantum Leaps: ‘Leonardo Da Vinci’

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1452 – 1519

It is something of an indulgence to include Leonardo Da Vinci in any study of scientists who changed the world, not least because most of his work remained unpublished and largely forgotten centuries after his death. His, however, was undoubtedly one of the most brilliant scientific minds of all time; arguably the biggest handicap preventing him from profoundly changing the world was the era in which he lived.

The genius of Leonardo’s designs for his inventions so far outstripped both his contemporaries’ intellectual grasp and contemporary technology that they were rendered literally inconceivable to anyone but him. If Leonardo could have teleported to Edison’s time, with his access to nineteenth century technology, one can only speculate how much more he may or may not have achieved than even Edison himself. But even in his own time, Leonardo’s achievements were notable:

. RENAISSANCE MAN

Leonardo is celebrated as the Renaissance artist who created such masterpieces as the Last Supper (1495 – 97) and the Mona Lisa (1503 – 06), yet much of his time was spent in scientific enquiry, often to the detriment of his art. The range of areas Leonardo examined was breathtaking. It included astronomy, geography, palaeontology, geology, botany, zoology, hydrodynamics, optics, aerodynamics and anatomy. In the later field, in particular, he undertook a number of human dissections, largely on stolen corpses, to make detailed sketches of the body. Irrespective of the breadth of his studies, however, perhaps the most important contribution Leonardo made to science was the method of his enquiry, introducing a rational, systematic approach to the study of nature after a thousand years of superstition. He would begin by setting himself straightforward scientific queries such as ‘How does a bird fly?’ Next, he would observe his subject in its natural environment, make notes on its behaviour, then repeat the observation over and over to ensure accuracy, before making sketches and ultimately drawing conclusions.

. AERODYNAMICS

Moreover, in many instances he could then directly apply the results of his enquiries into nature to designs for inventions for human use. For example, his work in aerodynamics led him to make sketches for several flying machines – which, potentially, could have flown – including a primitive helicopter, some five hundred years before the invention became a reality. He even envisaged the need for his flying machines to have a retractable landing gear to improve their aerodynamics once airborne. In 1485 he designed a parachute, three hundred years before becoming an actuality, and included calculations for the necessary size of material to safely bring to ground an object with the same weight as a human. He also had an excellent understanding of the workings of levers and gears, enabling him to design bicycles and cranes.

. HYDRODYNAMICS

Leonardo’s studies in hydrodynamics led to numerous sketches on designs for waterwheels and water-powered machines centuries before the industrial revolution. In addition, he sketched humidity-measuring equipment as well as a number of primitive diving suits, mostly with long snorkel devices to provide a supply of air.

. MILITARY INVENTIONS

During his work for the Duke of Milan between 1482 and 1499, Leonardo prepared an array of designs for weaponry such as catapults and missiles. Even in this arena, however, he could not help but create sketches of weapons that lay way ahead of their time such as hand-grenades, mortars, machine-type guns, a primitive tank and, most audaciously, a submarine.

Leonardo’s Influence

Any list of scientists ‘who could’ have changed the world, then Leonardo Da Vinci would surely be at the top of the list. But although many of the designs for his potentially world-changing creations were never published, his methodical approach to science marks a significant and symbolic stepping-stone from the Dark Ages into the modern era.

Hoping to secure employment with the Duke of Milan, he wrote to him that his areas of expertise included: the construction of bridges and irrigation canals, the designing of military weapons and architecture, as well as painting and sculpture. To add to the list, Leonardo is also credited with being the first ever person to conceive of a bicycle.

Supplementary appendage:

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Leonardo Da Vinci painting: The Mona Lisa. An oil painting by the Italian Renaissance artist which was created in 1503.

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Government, History, Politics, Society, United States

Barack Obama and foreign policy

UNITED STATES

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President Obama gave his valedictory speech on Tuesday 10 January, 2017. Despite critics, he has achieved much on foreign policy.

Intro: Critics of Mr Obama’s foreign policy also often fail to acknowledge some of the significant accomplishments the President has achieved

Barack Obama has given his farewell address as US president from McCormick Place in Chicago, the venue for his election victory speech in 2008. This is the first time in US history that a president has returned to his hometown to deliver a valedictory speech to the nation, and Mr Obama vacates office on a seven-year high approval rating of 56 per cent (according to a poll conducted by Gallup).

Traditionally, farewell addresses have represented a legacy-defining opportunity for presidents to set out their accomplishments and by articulating a vision for the future. In many cases, the outgoing head of state has focused in large part upon foreign affairs, especially in the post-war period of US international leadership. This, too, became a central point of Mr Obama’s speech.

Harry Truman, for example, used his address in 1953 to talk about the emergence of the Cold War on his watch. On his departure from presidential office he said not a day had passed which had not been dominated by the conflict between those who love freedom and those who would have us return to the days of slavery and darkness. President Truman also outlined his rationale for using atomic weapons in Japan.

George W Bush defended his foreign policy and wider national security legacy in 2009. Despite approval ratings of just 34 per cent on leaving the White House, Mr Bush included in his triumphs that Afghanistan was no longer ruled by the Taliban. He also cited changes to the US security apparatus that he said contributed to the homeland avoiding attack in the seven years after 9/11.

Referring to some of his controversial calls, including the highly contentious decision to invade Iraq, Mr Bush said that he hoped people would understand that he was willing to take tough decisions.

Mr Obama’s farewell speech has been given at a time when there is rising criticism of his administration after Russia’s successful intervention in Syria to shore up the Assad regime, and the unravelling of the Trans-Pacific Partnership (TPP) which has caused angst with allies in the Asian Pacific. Critics have asserted that Washington has become significantly diminished on the world stage with weak presidential leadership responsible for the collapse of the TPP.

Others, however, will argue that this is too simplistic. For instance, while Mr Obama has not advanced his Asian “pivot” as fully as he would have hoped, it is actually President-Elect Donald Trump’s opposition to TPP that looks to have consigned the trade deal to history, not the Obama team (which has tried to cultivate it for years).

While Mr Obama has made multiple mistakes in the Middle East, his strategically political decision to downsize the US presence in the region was taken in the context of the mandate he perceived himself to have won after his election victory in 2008 – when a war-weary nation seemed to endorse his call that the Iraq conflict had been a costly mistake, and that the United States was militarily overstretched during the Bush presidency.

Critiques of the Obama doctrine on foreign policy also tend to omit that, whilst the United States is still regarded as the most powerful country in the world – certainly in a military sense – it is not by any means an all-powerful hegemonic power. This core fact has been demonstrated recently in Ukraine and Libya, but was also true of America following Somalia in 1993 and of Iraq and Afghanistan post 9/11.

Current geopolitical fault lines – where there are no easy, quick fix ways for the U.S. to enforce its policy preferences – are wide and varied. They include tensions with China over territorial claims in the South China Sea; the nuclear stand-off in the Korean peninsula that may yet intensify following impeachment proceedings of South Korea’s president; continuing instability in Iraq, Afghanistan and Libya; the bleak prospects facing the Israeli-Palestinian peace process; and terrorism remaining a significant international concern a decade and a half after 9/11.

Critics of Mr Obama’s foreign policy also often fail to acknowledge some of the significant accomplishments the President has achieved, particularly given the backdrop of the high-risk political and economic landscape in which he has operated. One big positive, for instance, was the leadership taken by the United States in tackling global warming. Mr Obama’s efforts led to the climate change deal agreed in Paris in 2015 which was signed by more than 170 countries. Crucially, the deal will form the basis of a new post-Kyoto framework, essential if global warming is to be properly tackled. The Paris agreement was ratified and came into effect last November.

Another example is the 2014 nuclear deal with Iran and six other powers. The agreement, which Mr Trump has criticised, could enhance global nuclear security, as well as constituting an important win for longstanding efforts to combat nuclear non-proliferation.

Despite the incoming president’s rhetoric, there are many senior Republicans on Capitol Hill, including the Chair of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, who openly recognise the benefits the nuclear deal with Iran will bring. They are calling for it to be more strictly enforced, rather than being scrapped.

The resetting of relations with Cuba was also instigated on Mr Obama’s watch. In December 2014, the two countries announced they would restore diplomatic relations, and Mr Obama became the first US president to visit the country in 90 years. He announced a new suite of measures that further eroded the bilateral sanctions regime introduced during the Cold War era. The President-Elect has threatened to reverse all progress that has been made with Cuba.

In his speech on exiting the White House, Mr Obama robustly defended his foreign policy record at a time of growing unease and criticism. The outgoing president has achieved significant accomplishments, but, he knows much of his legacy now risks being rolled back. Mr Trump will have a very different vision and agenda to how he sees America shaping the world order.

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