Nazi Germany. Hitler. The SS. The names bring up connotations ranging from the cinema of Steven Spielberg and Mel Brooks to tasteless political posters at town hall meetings and anti-war protests. In the eternal words of stand-up comic Bill Hicks: “We're going in for God and country and democracy and here's a fetus and he's a Hitler.” In our modern age, we have called whatever enemy of convenience a Hitler. The same phenomenon throughout history with different groups of people thinking the Antichrist was Nero, the Pope, Napoleon, Hitler, Stalin, FDR, Ronald Wilson Reagan, Ayatollah Khomeini, Mikhail Gorbachev, Bill Clinton, Barney the Dinosaur, and, most recently, Barack Obama. What was once a dire metaphysical threat has now become a punch line … and a funny one at that. Since Hitler’s demise, nearly every US President and nearly every dictator working against US interests (or for them) has been labeled “a Hitler.” Reducing those dark years that engulfed the world to a punch line is a dangerous thing. Reading The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich by William Shirer has been a useful corrective to the omnipresent cheapening and poisonous cultural illiteracy that permeates our present political discourse.
Published in 1960 during the height of the Cold War, Rise and Fall represents one of the first and most comprehensive analyses of Hitler’s Germany. When reading the book, it is important to remember the subtitle. It is “a history” of Nazi Germany, not “the history.” Even in 1100 pages, Shirer gives the reader a summary of Hitler’s rise, the European theater of war, and the Shoah. Even with the oceans of ink spilled in trying to comprehend the madness and seduction of the Third Reich, Rise and Fall of the Third Reich is still a very useful book for those interested in Nazism, World War II, and the Holocaust.
The book remains important as a document of witness. William Shirer was a newspaper correspondent in Germany during Hitler’s ascent to absolute power. On occasion, he editorializes and lets his rage show through. In this case, just because he is angry does not mean he is inaccurate. One also has to remember it was written in 1960 with the wounds of the Second World War still fresh. The Thirtieth Edition, published in 1990, comes with an Afterword by Shirer. He writes about his worry that a united Germany would become a militarist threat. Hindsight has proven Shirer wrong, although the hatred, anti-Semitism, and anti-democratic intimidation have now become the modus operandi of different actors.
Article comments
1 - NancyGail
It hasn't gone away completely. Neonazis still exist.