Michael Coffey - Days Of Infamy: Military Blunders Of The Twentieth Century

I don't remember buying this book, but I think that I could have spent my money better elsewhere. Coffey's Days of Infamy was similar in intent to Macksey's Military Errors of World War Two, except that Coffey claimed to look at more than just that war.


Similar to Macksey, Coffey focuses all of his time looking at the big blunders that have been examined countless times before, such as Dunkirk and Market Garden. When he does look at smaller blunders, he does not connect them to the war effort by showing their significance the way he does with the big ones. He also falls short by simply listing out the mistakes that were made and then moving on. Where Macksey attempted to both explain how and why the mistakes were made and then look at what might have happened had things gone differently, Coffey simply lists the facts. In general, that made for fairly boring reading.

I had hoped that Coffey's focus on military actions other than World War Two would help his book become more interesting, but I was wrong. His examination of World War One mistakes could have been interesting, but like with the WWII events he simply breezed through them without examination. I was most excited for the events after World War Two, but Coffey barely looked at them, listing only a few of the very well known events (the Bay of Pigs and Tet Offensive, for example). In addition, there are a whole host of factual errors throughout the book which make its reliability suspect.

Overall, Days of Infamy was a fairly boring read. Coffey fails in his attempt to look at military blunders of the twentieth century, instead looking at military blunders of World War Two with a few extras tacked on. He also fails to inject interest into the already well-known stories by digging deeper. In general, Days of Infamy reads like it was written by who it was: a journalist with very little extensive knowledge of the wars of the twentieth century.

Matthew Seligmann - Daily Life In Hitler's Germany

I bought Daily Life in Hitler's Germany a few years ago because it was in the discount section of one of the local bookstores. I wasn't overly excited to read it, but it wasn't bad.


In general it was a fairly good outline of Germany under Nazi rule, but it wasn't overly exciting. I had a few problems with it as well. For one, there were problems with the chapter on German resistance to the Nazis. Resistance seemed to be a fairly poorly defined concept, with the author somehow including Himmler's secret negotiations with Britain as a resistance effort rather than an act of self-preservation. Including actions like that could quite easily give the reader the wrong impression that German resistance was of more significance than it really was. Another issue I had with the book was its use of pictures. One of the things that drew me to Daily Life in the first place was how many pictures were included, but unfortunately in many cases the pictures were irrelevant to the text of the page (as an example, a picture of German tanks in Paris was included next to the section on German resistance).

Other than these problems, the book does a decent job of outlining the issues faced by ordinary Germans during the Nazi period. I would recommend this as a good book for people with little knowledge of the Nazi system to become acquainted with it.

C.S. Lewis - God in the Dock

I was given God in the Dock by my uncle and aunt a few years ago when they were giving away a lot of their old books. I had very little desire to read it, but as it was so short I decided to just get it over with. God in the Dock is made up of a series of short articles written by Lewis mostly in the 1940s. The back of the book advertizes it as being great to "put in the hands of an intellectual doubter," but I would disagree. Every one of the essays gave off a very strong vibe of "preaching to the choir," by skipping over major contradictory points and structuring hypothetical arguments to heavily favour the Christian side.


He devotes a number of essays to the idea of miracles, but his arguments are all based on the idea that the bible gave a verified account of events. That is, that what the bible says actually did happen, so how can it be explained other than through miracles. He generally claims that there can be no scientific explanation for the miracles of the bible. This is true. However, this argument is only actually valid if there is a consensus that the events spoken of in the bible actually did happen, rather than having been the exaggerations or fabrications of people writing decades later in order to gain followers and bolster the reputation of their leader. This can be seen particularly where Lewis discusses the birth of Jesus. He constructs a hypothetical discussion in which he and an atheist debate the idea of whether or not the birth of Jesus was a divine event or not. Interestingly, his hypothetical atheist does not seem to think of the rather obvious argument that perhaps the story cannot be explained by science because the entire supernatural element was fabricated decades later in order to give an added sense of legitimacy to Jesus' teachings, and that the historical Jesus was born in the regular way to regular parents. Lewis does address this point in a general way, when he argues that it is unlikely that the followers of Jesus would have attributed divinity to his actions after his death because they were Jewish, and to do so without it actually having happened would have gone against their traditions. This ignores the rather obvious fact that throughout history people have been both misled by leaders to go against their own traditions, and that people have told lies that go against their traditions in order to gain influence or power.

Lewis also makes the interesting argument that the laws of nature only explain the constraints of an action (if A, then B), but not the origin of the action itself. He argues that if you follow each action back to its origins, you find another action. Each of these is constrained by the laws of nature, but is not caused by them. He then goes on to say that if you follow these actions back far enough, you arrive at God. Therefore, he argues, it is God who causes actions, and he who has put constraints on them in the form of the laws of nature. He does not seem to want to take his own line of reasoning back one step further and look at God as another action. In other words, God may have caused the tides (as an example), but what caused God?

In what was my least favourite of all his articles, Lewis also argued against allowing women to serve as priests. He makes it clear that this is not because he thinks that they are less intelligent or less able to be pious, but then almost immediately says that the idea of female priests makes him uncomfortable. He can dress it up all he wants, but using the fact that he is simply "uncomfortable" with the idea is still sexist. His main argument is that while he believes that women can represent humanity to God, they cannot represent (or speak for) God to humanity. He argues that this is because God is masculine and requires a masculine representative. Indeed, he goes on to say that those men who inadequately represent God are in fact not masculine enough, and so women should certainly not be allowed. This argument has no real merit, just a number of rather sexist talking points not based in facts. It also reminded me of the discomfort I felt years ago (as a child years before I became an atheist) when reading The Lion, The Witch, and the Wardrobe when Peter is given a sword, but Lucy is given a healing cordial and dagger and Susan a horn to call for help and a bow and arrows. Both girls are told that they are to use their weapons only as a last resort, and not in battle. When Lucy protests, saying that she could be brave enough, Father Christmas replies that bravery is not the problem, but that "battles are ugly when women fight." No explanation, no reasoning given, just a casual sexist comment thrown out in order to tell girls that their bravery (and other qualities) do not matter, they are arbitrarily still not allowed to do what the boys can. Instead, they are constrained to act either as healers or to run and call for help rather than acting in their own power and standing up for themselves.

Overall, I found Lewis' arguments to be largely lacking in logic and not properly addressing the opposing side's main points. If you are a Christian who would like to read a pleasantly self-affirming book, then I would recommend God in the Dock. If you are a doubter or atheist looking for a solidly constructed Christian argument on the existence of God and miracles in order to challenge yourself or make you think, look elsewhere.

Taylor Downing - Churchill's War Lab

I bought Churchill's War Lab at a used book sale last week and I thoroughly enjoyed it. From the title and the book description, I expected it to be almost entirely focused on Churchill's involvement with the science and technology of war, but it looked at far more. Rather than being restricted to science and technology, Downing examined Churchill's personal role in the war as a whole.


One thing that I appreciated about Churchill's War Lab was that although Downing is clearly a supporter of Churchill, he does not fall into the trap of trying to portray him purely as a military genius and savior. Instead, Downing presents Churchill's many bad qualities (his stubbornness, his petulance, his sometimes rash actions, and occasional poor judgements) alongside his virtues (his ability to rally the morale of the people and his farsightedness in terms of how history would unfold, for example), and generally does not try to excuse them.

One of Downing's biggest focuses is on the level of micromanagement that Churchill employed. Throughout the war, he tried to be involved in as many decisions as possible. In some cases, this caused enormous friction with his Chiefs of Staff and his generals, but at other times his personal interest pushed through developments that would change the course of the war (like the development of the tank in World War One, or recalling General Hobart and allowing him to develop his specialized armour). As a side note, it was very interesting to see how while Churchill involved himself as much as possible in military matters and was accustomed to getting his own way, he also insisted on being surrounded by generals and advisers who were willing to stand up to him and argue their points.

What I found most interesting about Churchill's War Lab was how involved Churchill was in the development of new war technologies and techniques. Starting with the innovation of the tank in World War One, Churchill was generally very open to new thinking, making himself available to scientists (including Professor Lindemann, his personal scientific adviser). He instigated the development of mulberry harbours, and also pushed for the development of the SOE in order to harass the Germans with commando raids. Even when he was not directly involved with specific innovations, he created an atmosphere in which new ideas were fostered and military chiefs were encouraged to try new things and adopt new technologies.

I would highly recommend Churchill's War Lab. It provides a relatively fair (but obviously pro-Churchill) look at Churchill's development as a military and political leader and his direct role in the course of World War Two. It was well-written and very interesting.

Nathan Greenfield - The Damned: The Canadians at the Battle of Hong Kong and the POW Experience, 1941-45

I picked this book up a few months back because I realized that I knew virtually nothing about the Canadian role in the Pacific Theatre during World War Two. The book is divided into two major sections: the Battle of Hong Kong, and the Canadian POW experience. I definitely enjoyed the second section more than the first.


Greenfield states from the outset that his desire is to poke holes in a number of the pervasive myths that surround the battle, such as the idea that the Canadian troops were under-trained, but then provides evidence that they were, in fact, not trained as fully as they could have been because in many cases they had only been recently recruited. One of the reasons why I did not enjoy the battle section is because Greenfield does not do a very good job of setting things up. For one thing, he does a poor job of introducing the various men, which made it difficult to keep track of who was who. For another, he jumps from event to event in the battle so rapidly that it becomes somewhat confusing. The most interesting part of the first half of the book was Greenfield's general contempt for the British General Wallis, who he showed to have been largely out of touch with the situation and content to blame the Canadian troops for the problems that occurred. This seems to follow a general pattern in which British war histories tend to either disparage or diminish the contributions of the Dominion troops in both World Wars (or simply refer to them as "British," which while technically true does not do those soldiers justice).

The book improves considerably when Greenfield begins to describe the captivity of the soldiers. Perhaps because in this section he was confined to using smuggled diaries and interviews with the surviving troops the account he gives is focused on a manageable number of people and follows a relatively clear storyline. He does an excellent job of describing the horrors that the Canadian prisoners went through, and I was struck by the bizarre contradiction between the Japanese allowing some prison camps to have large libraries and sports events while simultaneously denying them sufficient food or medicine.

There were a number of factual errors that bothered me while reading The Damned. One was that Greenfield misidentified the dates of the liberation of Belgium and the Netherlands. While this is not a significant error (at least not for this book, since those events were mentioned only in passing), it made me wonder if other dates which I was not familiar with might have been misidentified as well. In addition, Greenfield makes that claim that by January 1943 the Japanese knew that the war was over because of Midway and Guadalcanal. This is not strictly true. Midway had hampered the Japanese fleet, but had certainly not "neutered" it as Greenfield claims, and while Guadalcanal was significant, it was only the first step of a very long process that the Americans did not yet have a clear guarantee of winning (at least not as easily as Greenfield makes it appear).

Overall, The Damned was a relatively good book. I wish that the account of the battle had been better written, but there was a definite improvement as the book progressed into the POW section.

Martin Gilbert - The Righteous: The Unsung Heroes of the Holocaust

I bought this a few days ago at a used book sale, mostly based on Gilbert's reputation as a historian. It was generally a good book, but I didn't enjoy it as much as Andre Stein's Quiet Heroes or Hidden Children or Eva Fogelman's Conscience and Courage.


It was a good survey of the many stories of rescuers during the Holocaust, but I think that Gilbert tried to cram too many stories into too short a space. As a result, the stories were not given the detail that they deserve, and the reader moves along at an almost frantic pace. This is a shame, since I think that had he focused on just a few of the stories the impact of the book would have been much greater. In addition, Gilbert chose to categorize his stories by region, and as a result lacked a more comprehensive narrative like the one found in Fogelman's Conscience and Courage, where she looked not only at the stories of rescue but also the motivations of the rescuers.

One thing that I did appreciate was Gilbert's emphasis of how rare rescuers really were (especially in Eastern Europe). At the start of each section he lists the number of people from that country or region are recognized by Yad Vashem as Righteous Among the Nations, which helps to drive home how few people were willing to rescue Jews (and conversely how many were willing to aid the Nazis either out of hatred or a desire to obtain reward money).

The Righteous was a good read, but if you are looking for a book on rescuers during the Holocaust I would recommend either of Stein's books or Fogelman's book before this one.

Tim Cook - The Madman and the Butcher: The Sensational Wars of Sam Hughes and General Arthur Currie

I bought this book shortly after it came out because I had read Cook's previous books (At the Sharp End and Shock Troops) for a First World War history class I took in university a few years ago and thoroughly enjoyed them. While I have to say that enjoyed the other two books more, The Madman and the Butcher was certainly an interesting read.


In general, Cook comes across as a strong defender of Sir Arthur Currie (commander of the Canadian Corps) and a fairly harsh critic of Sir Sam Hughes (the Minister of the Militia). Cook does an excellent job of examining the decisions that Currie made and putting them into the context of both the war itself (casualties were obviously to be expected) and Canada's position within it (as a subordinate nation to Great Britain, Canada had limited control over its troops). My one criticism of Cook's focus on Currie is that he generally brushes off both Currie's pre-war embezzlement of militia funds to cover his own debts and his falsification of military records reflecting one of the orders he gave. Both of these were fairly serious errors of judgement, but Cook spends little time on them.

His examination of Hughes was far more nuanced. Rather than simply attack Hughes as many other historians have done, Cook looked at both sides. Certainly he criticizes Hughes' style of personal attacks, patronage appointments, willful ignorance about the realities of war, and his often outright lies, but he also examined Hughes' accomplishments. These include the remarkable feat of recruiting and mobilizing over 400,000 volunteers for military service as well as his relentless efforts to ensure that Canada's war effort would not be subsumed by Britain. Overall, I thought that Cook offered a sympathetic look at Hughes, to the point that I felt some amount of sympathy for him when I read about his deteriorating mental state after being dismissed from Prime Minister Borden's Cabinet.

Overall, The Madman and the Butcher was a very interesting examination of the two biggest names involved with Canada's effort in World War One. I would recommend it highly.

Dick Winters - Beyond Band of Brothers: The War Memoirs of Major Dick Winters

I picked this up after reading Band of Brothers, and I don't have much to say about it other than that it was one of the best first-hand accounts of World War Two that I have ever read. Part of that undoubtedly comes from having watched and read Band of Brothers and therefore identifying with the people that Winters mentions in his book, but a large part also comes from the fact that he tells a riveting story. He does not bog down the account with the minute details of military operations, but instead tells the stories of the men that he served with.


Probably because Winters wrote Beyond Band of Brothers after and in response to Band of Brothers, he often focuses on different people and events than the other book and tv series did. Some of the events that were of significant importance in the mini-series, like the last German artillery barrage at Bastogne or Easy Company's discovery of the Buchloe concentration camp received only brief mention in Beyond Band of Brothers. Instead, he focuses on his own personal reactions to and reflections on events that were not central to the series. He also tends to discuss the actions of the more senior officers he was involved with, which the series rarely focused on.

Beyond Band of Brothers is an excellent book and I highly recommend it, especially if you have seen Band of Brothers and want to know more about the men of Easy Company.

Kenneth Macksey - Military Errors of World War Two

I bought this book yesterday at a used book sale on the recommendation of one of the workers, who gave it high praise. It was interesting, but not overly so. The basic premise of the book was to examine the various errors made by both sides in World War Two (mistakes made by the upper-level commanders) and then examine how they played out and what might have happened had other decisions been made.


Some of the mistakes that Macksey looked at were ones that have been examined countless times, such as the failure during Market Garden to secure bridges in order to allow for Allied advances, or the mistakes made by Admiral Nagumo during the Battle of Midway. For the most part he does not offer new insights into these mistakes, but merely discusses what countless other historians have looked at already.

Macksey also examined Dunkirk, although he presented a possibility that I had not considered before. He is of the opinion that had the Germans pressed on, not only would they have killed or captured many of the Allied troops (an opinion that is shared by most historians) but would have also been able to launch an immediate invasion of Britain based on the fact that all three branches of the British military were severely weakened at that moment. It was an interesting bit of conjecture that I had not thought of.

Macksey's central thesis for many of the mistakes made revolves around technology. Namely, that the commanders and governments of all of the countries involved were generally unable to keep up with or effectively apply new scientific advances. He points to this as being a deciding factor in the Germans not developing advanced U-Boats to win the Battle of the Atlantic, the failure of the Japanese to aggressively pursue radar, and the failure of either side to invest in tanks that were effective in desert warfare (allowing the North Africa campaigns to drag on longer than necessary).

Overall, Military Errors was an interesting read, but not an overly insightful one. Much of what Macksey discussed has been examined many times before.

Michael Burleigh - Moral Combat: Good and Evil in World War II

Moral Combat sets out to examine the complexities of morality withing the Second World War, but ends up merely parroting the same arguments made by Western historians for years, namely that the Germans, Soviets, and Japanese are all guilty of war crimes (which is true) but that all actions by the British and Americans can be excused by the necessities of war.


Burleigh spends a considerable amount of time examining the myth of the "good German," or the German soldier (and by extension the Wehrmacht) who was not complicit in war crimes but was instead merely fighting for his country and knew nothing of concentration camps or other atrocities. He does a good job of puncturing this myth, and showing that even if they generally did not participate directly, they did know about the crimes and generally did not act to prevent them or mitigate the effects. Burleigh makes an interesting argument that in those cases where the Wehrmacht command did protest the slaughter of Jews on the Eastern Front it was not out of a sense of moral duty but rather because they feared that the influence of the SS actions would spread to the Wehrmacht troops who would join in, thereby dissolving military discipline.

One of Burleigh's biggest failings is that all atrocities committed by the Western Allies are looked at through the lens of German/Soviet/Japanese crime. He generally reaches the conclusion that while the Western Allies did commit atrocities they were either not as bad as those committed by the Axis and Soviet Union (and therefore are irrelevant) or were justified. In justifying attacks such as the firebombings of Dresden and Tokyo, he generally parrots the justifications made by Allied commanders at the time, that they affected Axis war industries (which they didn't) or more significantly that they were calculated to affect the morale of the civilians (which they didn't--at least not the way the Allies intended). In those cases where neither argument can be made, Burleigh's general thesis seems to be that it was war and that alone justifies it. He also makes a seemingly arbitrary distinction between the inaction of the Western Allies to stop the Holocaust (which he excuses as being both strategically irrelevant to winning the war and impossible anyway) and the inaction of the Soviets (which he condemns).

Moral Combat has an interesting premise, but in general does not do what it purports to; namely examining morality in World War Two. Instead, Burleigh spends the book examining Axis and Soviet crimes while excusing and justifying Western Allied crimes. While I certainly agree that the Axis and Soviet crimes are far more horrific than any committed by the Western Allies, Burleigh is not presenting any new information in Moral Combat, he is merely rehashing the same arguments that have been made for the last 70 years that define the war as a strictly black and white affair while ignoring the myriad shades of grey that actually defined it.

Allen Dulles - Great True Spy Stories

I picked up Great True Spy Stories at a used book sale because I recognized Dulles because he had headed the OSS during World War Two. I thought that a book edited by him on the subject of spies would be an interesting read, but I was wrong.


Many of my problems with the book are minor. Some of the stories seem somewhat sensationalized and injected with a false sense of excitement. In others, the dialogue seems somewhat contrived which can be attributed to the authors' misuse of artistic license. Many of the stories also show tinges of both racism and homophobia.

One of the more significant problems with Great True Spy Stories is that it was written in the middle of the Cold War, and it definitely shows. Without fail those who opposed the Soviet Union are hailed as sacrificial heroes, while those who supported it are branded cowards and traitors, often with significant character flaws. These characterizations are carried on to the point of making the stories almost cartoonish in places, and this makes it particularly frustrating to read.

The major problem with the book, however, is that it is just plain boring. Many of the stories were written by people who were there but who do not have much writing experience, and so the stories seem to drag on and blunder around, often with little to hold the interest of the reader.

There isn't a lot to be gained by reading this book, and I would recommend against it.

David Cesarani - Becoming Eichmann: Rethinking the Life, Crimes, and Trial of a "Desk Murderer"

I had tried to read Becoming Eichmann a few years ago, but wasn't able to get past the first chapter, and this time through it took a fair amount of work to get through the first half of the book. In it, Cesarani attempts to both trace Eichmann's life and path to becoming a central figure in the Holocaust and to challenge a number of prevailing myths about him and the Holocaust itself.


The first myth that Cesarani takes issue with is the idea that the Holocaust in its final form was the plan of both the Nazis and Eichmann from the beginning. He argues, backed by the evidence, that systematic killing was only considered as an option after expulsions had failed (which is an argument supported by the book on 20th century genocides that I read a few months back).

Cesarani also challenges the idea that Eichmann was the main organizer of the Holocaust. Instead, he argues that while Eichmann did play a major part in the prosecution of it, especially in the deportations of Jews to the concentration camps, he was not a policy maker. That does not excuse his actions, of course, but it does provide a more realistic picture of the situation.

His main argument, however, is one that emerges only towards the end of the book. Cesarani is extremely critical of Hannah Arendt's portrayal of Eichmann as a dispassionate bureaucrat uninterested in anything other than fulfilling his duty and advancing through the ranks. He argues rather effectively that Arendt's thesis ignores ample evidence of Eichmann's anti-Semitism as well as instances in which he was anything but dispassionate in completing his work. According to him, Arendt's research was flawed because she based it largely on a short period of observation in which Eichmann remained purposely calm and dispassionate while being interrogated, as part of his defence strategy. As part of this argument, he also disputes the work of Stanley Milgram, and states that the results of his studies on human obedience are not relevant to the Eichmann case. While I mostly agree with him about Arendt, I take some issue with him on Milgram. For one, some of his dismissals of Milgram's research seem weak. He states that some of the participants feared that they would not be paid if they did not continue to shock the subject. Not getting paid was perhaps the least of the fears of many of those who worked in concentration camps, where disobedience of orders would likely have gotten them transferred to units on the Eastern Front (this does not excuse their actions, but it is relevant nonetheless). Cesarani also argues that the volunteers in Milgram's experiments were following orders from a "scientist" in a white coat, who would have been seen as a legitimate authority figure. He believes that the volunteers would have been less likely to obey if the person giving orders was dressed in an SS uniform. This is almost certainly true, but that is because the volunteers were Americans in the 1950s and 1960s. Had the volunteers been Germans in the 1930s and 1940s, they would likely have obeyed the orders of a black-uniformed SS officer far more easily than those of a white-coated scientist. That being said, I do agree that the Milgram experiments are not necessarily applicable to Eichmann himself, but I do think that they are relevant to many of the direct participants in the Holocaust, something that Cesarani also dismisses. In the context of the Holocaust, Eichmann was not the "volunteer," he was the "scientist." The "volunteers" were the people who did the actual killing and were ordered to do so by their superiors, including Eichmann.

In terms of enjoyability I would rate Becoming Eichmann in two parts. The first 199 pages, up to the end of the war, are at times almost mind-numbingly boring. Eichmann's life was not overly exciting, and Cesarani's writing does little to spice it up. On top of that, when discussing the implementation of the Holocaust Becoming Eichmann is in many places almost unreadable due to Cesarani's tendency to jump around chronologically. Many parts of the book become confusing as Cesarani shifts suddenly to different parts of Europe and different time periods. The book from page 200 on, however, is excellent. When discussing Eichmann's life as a fugitive and then as a prisoner Cesarani narrates events chronologically, and his account of the trial was particularly interesting, especially his examination of the failures of the prosecution to mount a particularly effective argument and Eichmann's vacillation between effective testimony and bewildering lies.

Overall the book was fairly good, but if you have any working knowledge of the Holocaust I would recommend starting the book from page 200 and skipping the first 199.

James Owen - Nuremberg: Evil on Trial

I decided to read Nuremberg after the trial got only a short mention in All Hell Let Loose, which I read a few days ago. I knew the basics of the trial, of course, but wanted to know a bit more. The book was fairly interesting, as it is mostly a collection of trial transcripts and diaries written by the participants, with a few short descriptions interspersed by Owen. As a result of it being largely court transcripts, there are moments when the books drags a bit, but it was quite interesting nonetheless.


On a number of occasions Owen makes interesting points about how groundbreaking the trials truly were in terms of setting standards for war crimes and international tribunals. It required, as pointed out by Owen, an enormous amount of negotiation in order for the four powers to even agree on a set of charges, let alone who should face them and what the punishment should be (especially as the Soviet judges were determined to vote for the death penalty in all cases). It is also interesting to note that because the Allies rushed to get the trials started a number of important figures in the Nazi war effort were missed entirely (such as Adolf Eichmann) and in some cases were not even known until their involvement was mentioned at Nuremberg.

Perhaps the most riveting part of the book is the excerpts from the cross-examination of Goering by Robert Jackson, the lead American prosecutor. Jackson was woefully inadequate to the task of crossing swords with Goering, whose wits had recently been restored to full function after he was weened off of his dependance on drugs. Goering managed to avoid answering almost all of Jackson's questions, and Jackson couldn't seem to take control as Goering launched into long-winded defences of the Nazi regime and his part in it. It was actually somewhat uncomfortable to read as Goering took complete control (perhaps I'm too used to seeing defendants taken apart on the stand by Jack McCoy on Law and Order).

There were a number of interesting passages in the transcripts involving a considerable amount of hypocrisy. For example, in his memoirs that are quoted in Nuremberg, Albert Speer claims to have been angry at Goering for whitewashing Nazi crimes and lying about his involvement. Given Speer's own willful ignorance about anything within the regime that made him uncomfortable, this statement seems somewhat ridiculous. In a similar vein, it seems the height of hypocrisy for the Soviets to have presumed to judge the Nazis for crimes such as the execution of prisoners of war or the mistreatment of civilians, given the atrocious war crimes that they were guilty of themselves (especially the Katyn Forest massacre, in which they slaughtered over 20,000 Polish officers). The outrage affected by the Soviet prosecutors struck me as particularly ridiculous.

One thing that disappointed me about Nuremberg was that in several cases it skipped the testimony of defendants, notably Seyss-Inquart. Although it is likely that this was done because the testimony contained nothing of particular interest or import, it would have been nice to read their arguments in their own defence. The book also largely skips the transcripts of the cases against the various Nazi organizations that were on trial. I would have particularly liked to read the evidence the prosecutors gave against the Gestapo and the SS.

Despite missing a number of things that I would have liked to read, Nuremberg made particularly interesting reading. It contains enough background information on the crimes and people involved that it is accessible to all audiences, and I would highly recommend it.

Max Hastings - All Hell Let Loose: The World at War 1939-1945

I got this book for Christmas last year, but had been putting off reading it because of its size and scope. It's a fairly comprehensive look at the entire war, from the build-up of Germany in the 1930s to the surrender of Japan in 1945. Perhaps the best feature of it is that it draws largely from the letters and journals of those involved in order to give the reader an idea of what the people involved were going through.


One of the defining elements of All Hell Let Loose is Hastings' extensive use of hindsight to point out the errors of those in command, ranging from the national leaders to the generals conducting the war. He doesn't spare anyone, criticizing the command failures of Churchill and Roosevelt as much as he does Hitler. In that vein, he looks extensively at the records and reputations of the generals and admirals involved in the war and generally judges them on their merits. He makes an interesting point that in many ways MacArthur was not a very good general and was often driven by his ego rather than national objectives (such as his retaking of the Philippines) but that he had such an effective domestic propaganda machine that it was almost impossible to rein him in. He is also not afraid to criticize those generals often thought to have been geniuses and heroes, such as Rommel.

Along the same lines, Hastings often pokes holes in the defining myths and public perceptions that people have about the war. He doesn't paint every encounter in terms of "heroes," he also points out incidents of cowardice and incompetence. He looks critically at things like resistance movements (pointing out that they were in reality far less widespread and supported than the people of occupied countries like to believe after the war) and the idea of unity of purpose between the Allies (including between the Western Allies). Perhaps the only public perception of the war that he doesn't take issue with is that of general Italian incompetence in almost every engagement they were a part of.

Interestingly, because he makes such extensive use of hindsight himself, Hastings points out the follies of applying the benefits of hindsight to the issue of the atomic bomb, and makes two very good points about it. First, the use of the bomb cannot be looked at in isolation. It was developed as a weapon to increase the firepower of the Allied arsenal, and that was the spirit in which it was used. Dropping it and killing a large number of civilians was not a moral concern for the American decision makers, since they had already been killing large number of civilians in the bombing runs of German cities and the firebombing of Japanese cities, and at that point of the war the lives of the enemy were counted cheaply alongside the lives of American soldiers. Second, the very fact that the American government had gone through such expense and effort to create it almost guaranteed that it would be used. Similarly to the use of new bombers in Europe long after the purpose of bombings had been exhausted, the expense provided the impetus to use them.

Hastings also makes an interesting contrast between the fighting styles of the Western Allies and the Soviet Union. The Soviet Union was more invested in the fight because they had been invaded, and were therefore willing to go through greater lengths to win the war. They also had a far larger army, and could therefore afford to lose more soldiers. Finally, the fact that the Soviet Union was a totalitarian nation meant that the government could demand greater sacrifice from the soldiers. Casualty rates that would have caused outrage and protest in the Western democracies were shrugged off because Stalin was not accountable to the people.

Finally, Hastings makes an excellent point that the war cannot be explained in the simplistic terms of a fight between good and evil, since it was far more nuanced than that. Atrocities were committed on both sides, but the difference lies in the scale and intent. Whereas the Nazis began the war and committed countless horrific crimes, in general the crimes of the Western Allies were isolated incidents. Hastings is also quick to point out that in order to win the war the West had to ally itself with the Soviet Union, who committed many war crimes against the enemy, against refugees within its borders, and against its own soldiers. In that light, one must look at the war crimes trials following the war with some criticism, since crimes committed by Axis soldiers that were punished with imprisonment or death (such as the murder of POWs) were generally overlooked when committed by Allied soldiers.

I had only a small number of criticisms of All Hell Let Loose. First, I wish that he had looked more closely at a number of major events (such as Iwo Jima or the death of FDR), but can understand why he didn't find time or space to do so. Secondly, in his coverage of the Atlantic convoy system, I wish that he had examined the Canadian role in more detail, although that is likely my Canadian bias peeking through. Finally, the book contained a number of grammatical problems that at times made it somewhat annoying to read. I felt that in some cases Hastings made more of an effort to construct a pretty looking sentence than one that got the point across effectively.

Those problems are all minor things, and do not in any way detract from what is an excellent book. I would recommend it to both people who know a great deal about the Second World War and those who know very little.

John F. Sweets - The Politics of Resistance in France, 1940-1944

I bought this book years ago, tried to read it, and gave up. I'm not sure why though, because this time around I thoroughly enjoyed it. Sweets traces the evolution of the French Resistance in the southern (Vichy) zone of France during the Second World War, looking at its formation, struggles, and efforts in the Liberation.


I don't have terribly much to say about The Politics of Resistance except that I quite liked his detailed analysis of events that I didn't know terribly much about. One point he made that I found quite interesting was that when the three major resistance movements in the south merged, they did so with very little friction, since most of the members by that time had joined for the sake of resisting, and had not joined a particular group based on its ideology. The conflicts between the unified southern resistance and the communist and socialist movements was also fascinating, especially regarding Sweets' conclusions that the communists actually cooperated better with the Resistance than the socialists because the communists and Resistance were both focused on the matter of driving out the Germans, while the socialists were seemingly more preoccupied with preparing for politics after the Germans were gone.

The problems between the Resistance and the Allies was something that I had not been fully aware of previously. I found it quite interesting that even though the Resistance was fully committed to de Gaulle as their future president, they were also very frustrated with his seeming lack of comprehension of the situation on the ground, as well as his unwillingness to listen. In addition, I had not realized before reading this that the Resistance was also preparing to rebel against the British and Americans if they attempted to control France the way they had Italy, and in order to forestall that they had installed local authorities everywhere they could to prevent the Allies from doing so when they advanced.

I had a few minor criticisms of The Politics of Resistance. First and foremost was Sweets' tendency to incorporate French phrases into the narrative with little or no translation. While I could generally figure out what was being said, it made the reading somewhat more difficult. Second, while Sweets did a good job of examining the relationship of the Resistance with the pre-war left-wing political parties, he almost never mentions the right-wing parties. I would have liked to know if the members of those parties had joined the Resistance as much as the left-wingers had or if they were more predisposed to either remain neutral or collaborate. While the assumption would be that they would likely collaborate at a higher rate it would have been nice to have that confirmed or disproved.

Despite these flaws, it was an excelled book and I would recommend it to those with an interest in the Second World War.

Richard Lourie - Hunting the Devil: The Pursuit, Capture and Confession of the Most Savage Serial Killer in History

I have no idea where or when I got this book, but it was certainly an interesting read. It chronicles the crimes of Andrei Chikatilo, who murdered over fifty people in the late 1970s to early 1990s, as well as the investigation by Issa Kostoev.


It was an interesting book, and quite well-written, but I don't have a lot to say about it. The narrative style was very dramatic (something that the author admits in the prologue), so it is hard to know exactly what is fact and what is conjecture. In addition, the author is overwhelmingly in favour of the version of events as recounted by Kostoev, dismissing the versions of others involved in the investigation, so the book certainly has a bias.

In general it was a fairly good book and it was an easy read, so it would be worth reading if you are interested in the subject.

André Stein - Hidden Children: Forgotten Survivors of the Holocaust

A few years ago I read the book Quiet Heroes by Stein (about Christian rescuers during the Holocaust) so I was quite interested to read Hidden Children. It tells the stories of ten children who survived the Holocaust by going into hiding.


It is an excellent survey of the different sorts of experiences that these children had, ranging from relatively safe to constant peril. It also does a wonderful job of showing the different types of people who did the rescuing. Some fit the bill of the commonly-described Christian rescuer, saving the Jewish refugees out of the goodness of their hearts. Others, however, did it only so long as they received payments, or so long as they were allowed to forcibly convert the children to Christianity. Still others took in children but were horribly abusive to them.

Throughout the book Stein does a very good job of linking the ten stories with a number of themes. One such theme was a sense of shame for being Jewish. Being children, they only knew that they were being persecuted because they were Jewish, so therefore being Jewish must be a bad thing. Another common theme for many of the children was a sense of resentment or estrangement towards parents who left them in hiding in order to save them. In many cases the children felt that they were being punished. For others who found loving homes they were not eager to return to parents of whom they had little memory. Yet another theme was a sense of guilt for not being able to save family members who had been taken away. Many of the children felt that they should have been able to do something to save them, even though there was nothing that they could have done. Finally, the most prevalent theme was one of silence. The children were taught to remain silent and secretive during the war years, and once the war ended they generally found that they world did not want to hear they experiences, especially the experiences of children that were thought not to be terribly reliable. This sense of silence and internalization in many cases continued into adulthood.

I have nothing critical to say about this book whatsoever. It was an excellent and moving read, and anyone interested in the Holocaust should read it.

Gordon Kerr - Fugitives: Dramatic Accounts of Life on the Run

Fugitives is a collection of several dozen stories of fugitives, ranging from POWs to wild west outlaws to modern criminals. The idea behind the book is excellent, and it had the potential to be incredibly interesting.


Unfortunately, however, it was generally a very poorly written book. The grammar and punctuation were horrendous, making it necessary to reread some sentences multiple times before the meaning became clear. Similarly, on a number of occasions Kerr mixed up the names of the people involved (at one point a man named Gunther was referred to as Gerhard for a page). Kerr also made a number of factual errors, including the dates of the Korean War. If he made mistakes in such basic facts, there is no telling how many more serious errors slipped past the editors. Finally, the narrative structure was generally poor, as Kerr jumped around in his writing leaving me baffled as to what the order of events was on a number of occasions.

I would recommend against Fugitives. The subject matter is interesting, but the book itself is too flawed to make it worth reading.

Simon Wiesenthal - The Murderers Among Us: The Wiesenthal Memoirs

I got this book last year at a used book sale, and I had been meaning to read it for a while. Most of the book is a collection of stories by Simon Wiesenthal about his hunt for various Nazi war criminals, while the rest is a brief biography of Wiesenthal written by editor Joseph Wechsberg.


One of the things that really stuck out for me in the book was Wiesenthal's emphasis on the idea of shades of grey, and how guilt is not always as clear-cut as it might seem. He illustrates this by telling the story of a number of SS men who found themselves in situations that they could not stomach and who did their best to help the Jews that they were supposed to be killing. On the flip side of that, he cites a number of examples of civilians in occupied countries volunteering to help persecute the Jews when they could have stayed out of it without fear of consequences. His perspective is interesting as well in that he condemns Jewish collaborators alongside the perpetrators. Unlike some Holocaust work I have read, Wiesenthal also rejected the idea of collective guilt on the part of the German population. This is because, as he says, the idea of collective guilt has been used for centuries to persecute Jews. To his mind if it is an invalid charge against the Jewish community then it is an equally invalid claim against the German population. Finally, I definitely appreciated the perspective of the book. It was published in 1967, which means that at that time a lot of the major war criminals (Josef Mengele, Klaus Barbie, and more) were still alive and at large and the fate of others (like Martin Bormann) was still unknown. Reading accounts of the ongoing efforts to find and capture these men added a lot to the interest of the book.

I did have a couple of criticisms of the book. One is the acceptance of the ODESSA network as fact. While Wiesenthal was convinced of its existence, and Nazi aid and smuggling networks certainly did exist, it has never been proven that a single all-encompassing network such as ODESSA was active. That being said, reading about it from Wiesenthal's perspective certainly was interesting. Another criticism was in the structure of the memoir. In it, Wiesenthal quoted enormous sections of dialogue between himself and others, sometimes from conversations over twenty years old. While I'm certain that the conversations took place, I couldn't help but wonder whether or not Wiesenthal would have been able to remember those conversations word-for-word. That relates to my final criticism, which is Wiesenthal's penchant for exaggeration. Over the course of his life he made a number of claims that have been proven to be untrue (such as the number of concentration camps he was in), which call into question whether or not some of the more minor details of the memoir are completely true to life.

None of that, however, takes away from what is otherwise an excellent book. It is a fascinating look into the post-war hunt for war criminals, and I would recommend it to anyone interested in the subject.

John Cornwell - Hitler's Pope: The Secret History of Pius XII

I got this book at a used book sale last year. It caught my eye because I have always heard accusations against and defences of the wartime papacy, but I had never really done much reading on it. With a title like Hitler's Pope I was expecting it to be a rather violent diatribe against Pius XII and the Catholic Church in general. I was mostly pleasantly surprised. Cornwell is a practicing Catholic, which meant that there wasn't an automatic bias, and for the most part the book is in support of the Church in general, just not of some specific practices. Cornwell claims that he went into the project intending to defend and vindicate Pius XII but couldn't do so after confronting the evidence. Whether or not that is actually true, the book made for good reading that traces the life of Pius XII from his birth, to his role as nuncio in Germany, to his efforts to shape canon law, and finally to his papacy. Cornwell condemns the wartime papacy on a number of grounds.


First, and most flimsily (in my opinion) is his assertion that Pius XII was at least somewhat anti-Semitic, and that therefore influenced his opinion in order to do nothing in the face of the Holocaust. He cites a number of incidents from the early 1900s, including one in which Pius XII (then Eugenio Pacelli) rejected a request by the Jewish community in Germany to help them obtain palm fronds for a Passover ceremony. According to Cornwell, Pacelli rejected the request himself but let the Jewish leaders believe that he had done his best and that the decision had come from the Vatican. Cornwell also claims that in the post-WWI chaos in Germany Pacelli began to link the Jewish community with communism, which in his opinion was a far worse threat than fascism. For the most part, I think that this argument is somewhat weak. While there might easily have been some amount of anti-Semitism on the part of Pius XII, that was not exactly a rare sentiment during the first half of the twentieth century, especially in Europe. In my opinion, actions such as the palm frond incident illustrate less of a dislike of Jews and more of a disinterest in any religious community that was not Catholic.

As mentioned, Pius XII believed communism to be the primary threat to Europe until his death. In his role as Secretary of State for the Vatican prior to being elevated to the papacy, Pacelli was of the opinion that while the fascists could be reasoned with, the communists were a deadly threat to the Catholic community of Europe. This opinion would change over the course of the war, but by then it was far too late. Even then, however, fear of communism clouded his thinking as he refrained from supporting the resistance in Italy after the Allied invasion for fear that if the resistance overthrew the government before the Allies arrived in Rome then the communists might take over the country. His efforts against communism continued during the Cold War, and interestingly he loudly and publicly called for Catholic resistance in a way that was drastically different than his actions during WWII. Cornwell uses this as more evidence of Pius XII's anti-Semitism, but I would again argue that it indicates more his apathy for the lives of non-Catholics in general.

Part of the problem, according to Cornwell, was that Pius XII believed in a church that was authoritarian in nature. This accomplished three things. First, it severely hampered the efforts by clergy in the war zones from doing anything "official" to help. There were early and public denunciations of Nazism by a large number of German bishops when the Nazis were rising to power, but Pacelli and his predecessor walked those back and silenced the outspoken bishops for speaking out of turn. Second, it contributed to an anti-democratic attitude that put Pacelli more in sympathy with totalitarian fascist governments than with the European democracies. Third, and perhaps most important, it led to Pacelli (as Secretary of State) being able to force Catholics to withdraw from politics in pre-war Europe. Specifically, it meant that as part of the bargaining process with Hitler Pacelli forced the Catholic Center Party to dissolve in exchange for the protection of the religious rights of Catholics within Germany (which Hitler largely ignored, obviously). Since in the early 1930s the Center Party was one of the largest parties in Germany and was in many ways the only stumbling block in the way of Hitler's ascent to power these actions on Pacelli's part in essence smoothed the way for Hitler to take over Germany. This is yet more evidence that Pacelli was only concerned with Catholic well-being to the exclusion of all else. In my mind this is also the most damning of the accusations laid at Pacelli's feet. His supporters might claim that during the war speaking out would only have made things worse (as will be seen below), but there is little that can be said in favour of surrendering the Center Party except Pacelli's own belief that Catholics should stay out of politics.

Prior to the war Pacelli was strongly in favour of appeasement of both Germany and Italy. He did not speak out against either the Anschluss or the takeover of Czechoslovakia, and he pushed for Poland to allow Germany to take a "corridor" to Danzig through their territory. In addition, he did not condemn the invasion of Poland until mid-October 1939. While Cornwell makes this out to be a major failing, and in some ways it is, it is not that different from the appeasement of both Chamberlain and Daladier, and does not make him stick out more than either of those two men.

Once the war began and the facts of the Holocaust became known, the recently elevated Pius XII was almost entirely silent on the matter despite the efforts of the Allied governments to convince him to denounce the atrocities. In fact, over the course of the war he made very few public statements, and when he did he confined himself to general statements condemning all violence against non-combatants, never mentioning either Jews or the Nazis specifically. His detractors (like Cornwell) and his supporters have very different arguments for why this is so. The main argument by Pius XII's supporters is that speaking out against the actions of the Nazis not only would have done nothing to stop the atrocities, but may have led to reprisal attacks against Catholics under German control. They also argue that a denunciation may have led to an increase in the pace of the Holocaust, which I find fairly hard to believe considering the pace at which it was already moving. Cornwell lays out a number of arguments against these theories, based mostly around three incidents. Cornwell and other detractors argue that Jews in western countries (specifically France, Belgium, and the Netherlands) were caught off-guard by the extremes of anti-Semitism that led to the Holocaust when Germany invaded. He believes that the Pope could have made a public denunciation prior to the invasions and thereby given warning to the Jews in those countries. In Croatia, in many cases the local Catholic clergy warmly welcomed the Nazis and in some cases they participated in the massacres. Cornwell states that the Vatican was kept completely up to date on these issues and yet failed even to rein in the priests committing murder. In Cornwell's opinion Pius XII kept silent on this because he saw Croatia as a gateway to converting the Orthodox in the east. If true, this is more evidence in my mind of the unconcern for anything not Catholic by Pius XII. Finally, in the roundup of Jews in Rome before the Allies liberated the city Cornwell argues that Pius XII made virtually no efforts to save them even in the face of pleas to do so by the local German authorities who feared that the roundup by the SS would lead to riots.

While I largely agree with the arguments put forth by Cornwell, there are nonetheless a number of flaws in the book. Many of these have to do with the dismissal by Cornwell of the seemingly sincere (but ultimately ineffective) efforts by Pius to bring about peace, such as his part in writing an encyclical critical of Germany in 1937. He also did what he could to convince Mussolini to stay out of the war, including publicly praising him for wanting to maintain peace. Pius XII was also a somewhat complicit party in a 1939-1940 attempt to overthrow Hitler, acting as a go-between for the plotters and the Allies. While Cornwell does praise this last action, for the most part he is contemptuous of the efforts by the papacy for peace and seems to argue that Pius XII spoke when he should have remained silent and said nothing when he should have spoken out (the latter of which I agree with).

I believe that there were several other flaws in the form of absent information. For one, virtually nothing is mentioned in the book of what Pius XII did in the years between the liberation of Rome and the end of the war. Cornwell says nothing of whether the pope began to speak out or remained silent, and this is a major problem in the scope of the book. Second, Cornwell makes very little effort to address the main argument of Pius XII's supporters; namely that the pope supposedly saved a huge number of Jewish lives (one source puts it at 860,000). Cornwell dismisses this argument but doesn't actually offer any real evidence to refute it. These two omissions call into question whether the book is written fairly and leave major holes in the argument.

Nonetheless, I very much enjoyed the book. Although I wish it would have expanded its argument to cover the omissions I mentioned, the evidence it does present is compelling. I would recommend the book, but perhaps also recommend reading a book that is supportive of Pius XII in order to get a fuller picture of the issues and to look at the evidence presented in favour of Pius XII having worked to save the Jewish community.

Greg Campbell - Blood Diamonds: Tracing The Deadly Path Of The World's Most Precious Stones

I got this book at a used book sale a few years ago after seeing Blood Diamond in 2006, but never got around to reading it. It was written in the early 2000s by Greg Campbell, a journalist investigating the conflict diamond trade and the civil wars that were spawned around it.


The book was definitely well written, and gave a lot of excellent background information for those not familiar with the region and with the international diamond trade. Chapters are devoted to the history of Sierra Leone and the slave trade, the illegal arms trade, the mining process, and the history and practices of De Beers, which dominates the diamond industry. I thought that Campbell also did an excellent job of switching between testimonies of the victims of the civil war in Sierra Leone, the perpetrators, and the politics that were at work. Also fascinating was his description of the link between the illegal diamond trade and international terrorism, specifically Al Qaeda and Hezbollah.

He does a good job of adding a sense of realism to the book as well. One part that I particularly appreciated was when he compared the statistics and optimism of the UN leaders with the realities on the ground. Namely, that while some child soldiers had been disarmed and many adult soldiers had given up their weapons, many were feeling tricked and angry and those who were still armed were still illegally mining diamonds.

One problem I did have was with the tone of parts of the book. At times Campbell seems to be looking down on everything and everyone. Descriptions of some of the villages or the refugee camps seem not just to be describing the squalor but are somewhat contemptuous of the inhabitants as well. One example of this that particularly stuck out for me was when Campbell and his photographer were in a small refugee village with the UN. Campbell, tired of the poor conditions he was in and frustrated because his research was taking longer and was more difficult than he had anticipated, demanded a place on one of the planes being used to evacuate the sick and some disarmed child soldiers rather than wait to leave when he had planned. While I understand his eagerness to be out of the situation, I couldn't help but wonder if he and his photographer were taking up space that might otherwise have gone to refugees.

One thing I had to keep in mind was when the book was written. The bulk of his work was done towards the tail end of the civil war in Sierra Leone, with the epilogue addressing things that had happened until about 2003. Since that time, Sierra Leone has been mostly peaceful and far more democratic than it had been, and neighbouring Liberia (which was discussed extensively in the book) has transformed into a mostly functional democracy and has extradited former dictator Charles Taylor to the Hague. I would very much like to read the updated version of the book that has just been released.

In general, I would greatly recommend this book to anyone who wanted to learn more about blood diamonds, but I would suggest purchasing the 2012 version rather than the 2003 version that I have.

Anne Arnott - The Secret Country of C.S. Lewis

I was given this book by my uncle and aunt when they were getting rid of a large number of their old books. As an avid fan of the Narnia books I thought that it might be an interesting look at C.S. Lewis' life, but I was somewhat disappointed.


It is a biography of his life, but rather than focusing on his literary work (which is what I had been hoping for) the focus is almost entirely on his spirituality. It explores his disillusionment with Christianity as a young man, his period of atheism, and culminates with his return to Christianity. It is certainly not an objective view of his life, and his return to Christianity is shown as a great triumph. The books he wrote during this period are given only passing mentions in favour of focusing on his spirituality.

I found the beginning of the book to be the most interesting, as it explores Lewis' childhood and his fascination with reading and mythology. However, I become somewhat skeptical of the details that were included, since they often talked about the thoughts and feelings of Lewis as a very young boy. The book was written after Lewis' death and drew on other works of his and on his correspondence from later life, and so I am somewhat curious as to whether or not many of these memories were not either invented outright or at least greatly embellished by Arnott.

Regardless, it was an interesting read, and at 123 pages it wouldn't be a waste of time to skim through it.

August Kubizek - The Young Hitler I Knew

I bought this book off of Amazon a few years ago after it was recommended to me, but I never got around to reading it. It was written by August Kubizek, who was friends with Adolf Hitler for about four years when they were teenagers. The core of the book was written while the Nazis were in power at their behest (although Kubizek denied this), and was later expanded upon. It was published in the early 1950s, shortly before Kubizek died. It's a fascinating read, but it required me to try to separate the facts from the embellishments and evasions that were fairly obviously present.


Kubizek's perspective for much of the book is one of near-infatuation. His own youthful insecurities shine through as he heaps praises on the young Hitler. Hitler was "wise beyond his years" when he was sixteen, he employed "mature" handwriting, and had no interest in the "follies" of youth. He is portrayed as a dedicated, hard-working young man who did not let setbacks fluster him. Kubizek claims that his grand plans for reshaping society were "noble," and intended to benefit all of society (except those who were considered "undesirable," of course, but Kubizek doesn't mention that). The hero worship is laid on so thick at points that it seems almost like a gospel. In particular, Kubizek relates one instance in which the two men climbed to the top of a mountain, after which Hitler declaimed his vision for society and how he would shape it. The modern introduction to the book casts serious doubts over whether this incident ever happened, and I am inclined to agree that it seems like a fairytale designed to help foster Hitler's mystique. To be honest, reading through this book I kept thinking of parallels between this and the last Harry Potter book. In Kubizek's eyes, Hitler was a young Dumbledore, with him content to be Elphias Doge, faithful sidekick, bootlicker, and defender of character. The political discussions held by the two men also bring to mind Potter references, although Hitler obviously turned out to be much more of a Grindelwald than a Dumbledore.

The book is a fascinating source, however for a number of things that shaped Hitler's worldview. One is his obsession with buildings and architecture that followed him into his later life. His desire to physically reshape society into the image he wanted it to fit into obviously started at this stage of his life. The other is the genesis of his Aryan superman theories, which can be traced back in large part (in my opinion) to his obsession with Germanic mythology, specifically the works of Wagner, and the outright rejection of works from any other culture.

One of the biggest things that struck me about the book was how careful Kubizek was to distance himself from the adult Hitler. While he refers to the Hitler of his youth as Adolf, without fail the adult is referred to either as Hitler or the Reich Chancellor. He definitely tried to separate himself from any hint of support for Hitler's policies of anti-Semitism. He virtually never mentions it, and when he does he is careful to point out that anti-Semitic attitudes belonged to Hitler, and not to him. Kubizek does this to the point of possibly conflating Hitler's own early anti-Semitism, since he claims that in 1908 Hitler joined the Anti-Semitic Union in Vienna, despite the fact that no such organization existed at the time. In general, the book improved in terms of bias as it progressed. I think that this can largely be attributed to the increasing tensions felt between the two young men, which in many ways seemed to lessen Kubizek's hero worship that was so pervasive early in the book.

Perhaps one of the most interesting parts of the book has to do with Hitler's love life (or lack thereof) in this stage of his life. He was, according to Kubizek, obsessed with a young woman named  Stefanie. She belonged to a family that was considerably wealthier than his, and as such was well out of his reach. His solution to this was to stand on a bridge that she walked over each day and stare at her. Daily. For almost four years. He never once introduced himself, and according to Kubizek he barely even nodded to her, but he was convinced that she was as in love with him as he was with her. During those periods when he was away he had Kubizek, the faithful sidekick, stand on the bridge alone and report back to him whether or not Stefanie had inquired as to where Hitler was (she never did, obviously). In fact, Hitler's only communication with her whatsoever was a letter he sent her from Vienna asking her to wait for him, which he did not sign. Despite this, he remained convinced for almost four years that she was in love with him and was prepared to marry him.

I really enjoyed this book. It was obviously written from the perspective of a supporter of Hitler trying to portray him in the best possible light, but it is absolutely fascinating. I would definitely recommend it.

Legion Magazine - True Canadian War Stories

I got this book a few years ago at a used book sale, since while I had a lot of books on the World Wars I had very few on Canada's part in them. The book itself is a collection of short true stories written by veterans about their experiences during the First and Second World Wars as well as the Korean War.


I don't have much good to say about this book. It was 300 pages of universally dull stories. Some of the stories would have been interesting, but they seemed like they were excerpts from larger accounts, and the reader is dropped into the middle of a story with no context and no way of knowing who is who. Many of the other stories are simply boring; anecdotes about war experiences far from the front that were no doubt amusing to the people involved but which have no real interest or relevance for the reader.

It's an easy read, and a few of the stories are somewhat intriguing, but in general I wouldn't recommend this book. There are far better sources of Canadian war history out there.

Joseph Pistone - The Way of the Wiseguy: Secrets to Success in the Mob, Everyday Life, and Business

I have no idea why I bought this book, but thankfully I got it cheaply at a used book sale because it was a waste of my time and the paper it was written on. The author is Joe Pistone, best known for having been undercover in the mafia for six years as Donnie Brasco. This book, a follow-up to his book on his time undercover, is supposedly an "inside look" on how wiseguys look, act, and feel. In the first chapter, he talks about how real life wiseguys are nothing like the fictional wiseguys seen on TV and in movies, and then proceeds to fill the book with sweeping stereotypes about them that are identical to the portrayals in Goodfellas and The Godfather. These stereotypes might very well be true, but it's not like this book is somehow offering new and exciting insights.


The book is split up into several dozen short chapters, each addressing a specific topic such as "Why Wiseguys Will Kill You" and "Wiseguys Love Their Food." The stereotypes are so pervasive that given the chapter titles I likely could have written the content after having watched a few episodes of The Sopranos. Pistone doesn't seem to care that his blanket statements seem to contradict each other on a regular basis, either. In the chapter entitled "Wiseguys and Money" he says that when wiseguys go out to eat, "you get the check, and you pull out a three-inch-thick roll of Lincolns and Hamiltons." A few chapters later, in "Wiseguys Are Cheap," Pistone asserts that "When wiseguys go out, everything is on the arm--given to them for free."

Obviously these observations are drawn from his real-life experiences, but the book reads like he was an extra on The Sopranos. Don't bother reading this book. If for some reason you haven't already done so, go out and watch The Godfather. It's just as informative and a lot more entertaining.

Benjamin A. Valentino - Final Solutions: Mass Killing and Genocide in the 20th Century

To give myself a break from WWII books, I decided to take a look at this book, which I picked up at a used book sale a few days ago. As it turns out from the excessive amounts of writing in the margins, it was one of the textbooks for a mass killing and genocide history class that I had wanted to take when doing my BA but hadn't had the chance to.


Valentino divides the mass killings of the last hundred-odd years into six categories, and focuses on examples in the three main ones. Communist mass killings (USSR, China, and Cambodia), ethnic mass killings (Armenia, the Holocaust, and Rwanda), and counterinsurgency mass killings (Guatemala and Afghanistan in the 1980s). His basic conclusions are two-fold. First, that in no cases (not even the Holocaust) was the mass killing done for the sake of killing alone, and second, that in all cases the root of the killings can be traced to either a single leader or a small group of leaders.

To address that first point, he argues that the mass killings that resulted in all cases did so only after the regimes responsible had attempted other options and found that it was easier and/or cheaper to kill large numbers of people or that the deaths resulted as a part of social change. In the cases of the communist killings, widespread societal changes forced on the people led to starvation and repression of rebellion. That, combined with the imprisonment and murder of so-called enemies of the state resulted in the massive death tolls. Even in the cases of deliberate murder of a certain group (such as the kulaks in the USSR) they were not being killed for the sake of killing people, but because the regime viewed them as a threat (they weren't, obviously, but the regime believed they were). In the cases of the ethnic mass killings, in all cases the regimes ended up murdering enormous numbers of people after trying a number of other options first. They first tried expulsion, but that failed to reduce the population of the target group sufficiently. In Turkey/Armenia and Nazi-controlled Europe, they next tried segregation. Since that required the regimes to feed and shelter the target group, that was also deemed inefficient. Only then did they turn to directly killing on a wide scale. None of this excuses the actions of the regimes, of course, but it does provide insight as to how they arrived where they did (since even in Nazi Germany up until the end of 1940 top Nazi leadership still wanted to expel the Jewish population to a place like Siberia or Madagascar and had rejected systematic murder). Finally, in the case of counterinsurgency mass killing, regimes ended up killing large numbers of civilians in order to deprive guerrilla fighters of their base of support after trying to directly engage those fighters had failed.

For his second main point, he argues that there must be a combination of both a fanatical leader/group of leaders who genuinely believed in their cause (however perverted it might be) and a general passivity on the part of the general population. In the Holocaust, for example, the drive to kill the Jewish people was done by the leadership, mostly Hitler. The actual killing was done by a relatively small group (when compared to the population as a whole). The Nazi regime did not need the willing participation or even approval of the general population, they simply needed most of them not to care, and they needed those who did care to be too frightened for themselves and their families to do anything about it. Similar situations occurred in virtually all places where mass killings occurred.

Valentino also spends a portion of his book rejecting the most common assertion as to why mass killings occur, namely that there exist deep social cleavages between the group that is killed and the group that is doing the killing. He rejects this for two reasons. First, in many cases (particularly the communist killings) there were no real differences. The kulaks as an actual social group in Russia were mostly a figment of Stalin's imagination. In Cambodia, there were virtually no differences between the killers and the killed other than that most of the killed had once lived in the cities. Second, he rejects the social cleavage theory on the basis that if it were truly the reason for mass killings there would be a lot more than there have been. He points out, for example, that in the early part of the 20th century many European countries were as anti-Semitic if not more so than Germany, but it was only in Germany (and German-occupied regions), where there was a fanatically anti-Semitic leader bent on expanding German territories that the mass killings occurred.

For the most part I agree with Valentino's arguments, although I would argue that there were a number of things that he overlooked. The major one for me was that while his theory can be applied correctly to Germany and German-occupied western, southern, and northern Europe, I do not think it can be in eastern Europe. Many of the people there were not simply passive watchers, but active participants. The Nazis found huge numbers of volunteers in Ukraine, Latvia, Lithuania, and other countries who joined killing squads and willingly went to guard concentration camps. Those who did not enlist were often all too willing to inform on Jews in hiding (there were few examples of people in those countries hiding Jews or smuggling them to safety as there were in western and northern Europe). So in that case, the mass killings were not just attributable to a single fanatical leader but rather to a violently anti-Semitic population who had been given permission to kill Jews. The other small quibble I had was in his examination of the mass killings in Guatemala. While I think that he did a fairly good job of looking at it, he did not examine the role that foreign support (specifically the US) played in the killings. I think that it would have been valuable to look at whether or not the killings would have happened on the scale they did without foreign support. Overall, I very much enjoyed the book and I would recommend it. It's not light reading, but it's worth it.

Stephen Ambrose - Pegasus Bridge

This book tells the story of the British 6th Airborne Division on D-Day, and their mission to take two bridges near Caen in order to hinder German counterattacks and ensure that the Allies would be able to cross the Caen Canal and Orne River. I picked it up a few days ago at a used book sale when I saw the author's name (he has also written Band of Brothers, which I very much enjoyed). I knew virtually nothing about the operation before reading the book, so it was quite informative.


Like Band of Brothers, Pegasus Bridge is a fairly easy read. Ambrose's prose is simple but eloquent, and it does not generally bog the book down with unnecessary figures. I thought that it gave a good summary of events, but it did not go into a lot of detail in places that it could have. One major point in its favour was that it was not just an account from the side of the Allies, since Ambrose was able to interview both one of the German commanders and one of the German soldiers who had been guarding the bridges. I think, however, that Ambrose's scope was somewhat limited--he interviewed only a handful of the British participants, and generally seemed to portray their experience as the whole story. There were moments when he would seemingly skip over parts that did not involve his interviewees that I wish he would have covered in more depth.

Overall, the book was enjoyable but certainly no more than a light read.