Customer Reviews

At Hitler's Side: The Memoirs of Hitler's Luftwaffe Adjutant

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1 star:		(0)

 

 

Von Below was Adolf Hitler's Luftwaffe adjutant for eight years, from 1937 to the very end of the war. As such he held many intimate conversations with Hitler and in this well-written (and very well translated) memoir, he claims to have had Der Fuhrer's confidence. That he remained in this job for 8 years is proof enough of that fact. Von Below's portrait of Hitler on the job is very different from the raving single-minded maniac usually portrayed in movies and popular biographies. Von Below claims that if one knew how to approach Hitler one could reason with him and even get him to change his mind. By this account Hitler was a hard-working, dedicated, charismatic and intelligent leader who was often misled by his subordinates. Von Below claims to have known nothing about the mass murders committed by the Nazis. He also claims to have had serious misgivings about Hitler's war strategy; and he writes that he was well aware of the shortcomings of the Luftwaffe. As a pilot himself, I tend to believe him outright on this point, but otherwise I don't know how much of the insight he claims to have had into strategic matters might have been colored by hindsight. In any event, he was never able to convince Hitler although he writes that many times he did express his doubts to Der Fuhrer, who always heard him out. Compare this book with the memoir written by Hitler's pilot, Hans Bauer. Both men, knowing the end was inevitable, stuck it out and for that we must admire their courage and dedication. I don't think they remained with Hitler in Germany's doomed capital because of some lemming-like compulsion to destruction ingrained in the German psyche, but because of their personal devotion to Hitler. And since neither man was an idiot nor a war criminal with nothing to lose, commanding such loyalty from men like these says a lot about Adolf Hitler's personality. Bauer spent 10 years in a Russian POW camp while von Below managed to escape the Russians after Hitler gave him permission to escape from Berlin. For my money this book ends too abruptly. I would like to know what happened to von Below after the war and that is why I gave it only 4 stars. But in summary, this book is a valuable addition to the study of Adolf Hitler and a testament to its author, who I think was a man of honor.

This book doesn't present anything groundbreaking about Hitler, but it s particularly valuable for its picture of what it was like to live around Hitler for many years. As part of Hitler's personal staff, especially for such a long time, Below's experiences were obviously unique and would be interesting to anyone interested in WWII or Hitler. It present an insider's view of what was going on at Hitler's headquarters. In many cases (he claimed) he was not in the know. Below wrote that it was only later, after the war, that he found out the full extent of the atrocities. This was probably true, as it was with many members of his personal staff, who lived isolated lives with Hitler, who never spoke directly about it. Below does say, however, that he finds it inconceivable that Himmler would have exterminated Jews without Hitler's knowledge. Himmmler would not have informed Hitler about the details, writes Below, but Hitler certainly gave his go-ahead. It's little passages like this one that make this book interesting to read, if one is interested in the subject.

George Orwell once wrote that "the hatred the Spanish Republic aroused in dukes, playboys, millionaires and what-not" was sufficient cause for believing it had right on its side. The reaction of the two men quoted by Amazon (see above) towards this book is sufficient cause for reading it. Such people view all firsthand accounts from Hitler's regime in terms of "does he say what we want him to say, or doesn't he? Does he admit to knowing about the concentration camps, or not?" One could scarcely have a narrower view or miss the point more completely.

AT HITLER'S SIDE is the most emotionally honest, and least politically correct, of all the memiors written by survivor's of Adolf Hitler's inner circle. The author, Colonel Nicholaus von Below, served as Hitler's air force adjutant from 1937 until 1945, and as a result was one of the priveleged few who enjoyed a "view from the top." That is not to say that he always felt priveleged or enjoyed the view: Below was clearly a man who wished on occasion he were an ordinary Luftwaffe pilot. Certainly his job involved a lot more than just briefing "Der Fuehrer" on technical air force matters, but therein lies the story.

Like most of the people around Hitler, Below's "real" job was not listed in his job description. He seems to have been an unofficial representative of the rank-and-file officers in the Luftwaffe - that is to say, a spokesman for the Luftwaffe itself rather than for Goering, who was despised and hated by most of his men for his vainglory, bullying, and incompetence. Below felt it incumbent to push an agenda with Hitler that ran contrary to the "Fatboy's" wishes, but though he gained Hitler's trust and respect he was never able to effect the changes in the system he desired, with the result that he, Below, had to watch as yar in and year out, his beloved air force declined further and further into technical obsolescence and impotence. In addition, he was also witness to palace intrigues right out of Byzantium - all those cliques and cabals in government, business, the armed forces, and the Party, each trying to advance its own interests at the expense of the other, and often, at the expense of Germany. This often caused great psychological strain, as did Below's controversial suspicions that some in the high command were deliberately sabotaging the military effort - suspicions that have always been hotly denied by surviving members of the "military resistance against Nazism", and by those who want to believe that Hitler alone was the cause of all Germany's defeats. More controversially yet, Below flatly denies that he had any inkling of the "special measures" being taken in Russia and Poland by the SS, which the reviewers above find ludicrous, but which anyone who has actually researched the highly compartmentalized nature of Hitler's dictatorship may find less so.

But probably the biggest controversy is Below's depiction of Hitler himself. Americans tend to think of Hitler as something between a comic-opera nut case, screaming abuse and chewing the carpet like Charlie Chaplain, and a glowering Antichrist figure out of Revelations. Certainly Hitler was a complex man, "a demon struggling with a genius" as Speer related, and according to Manstein, well capable of tailoring his personality to his audience. Below's experience with Hitler seems to have been largely positive: he recounts a more or less benign tyrant, man of unfailing personal courtesy and broad vision, whose psychological state was slowly undermined by the immeasurable pressures he took upon himself, as well as by ceaseless palace intrigues and the unscrupulousness of some of his confederates. Whether one believes Below or not in this regard is to me irrelevant, since what matters here is the man's perceptions of what happened and not the reality as such. ALL memiors are filled with lies, evasions, distortions, and self-serving facts. Winston Churchill managed to write a six-volume history of the Second World War that hardly mentions the all-important Eastern Front, where 32 million people died, and which downplays the innumerable military blunders he committed during the war; Dwight Einsenhower, on the other hand, devoted exactly one sentence in CRUSADE IN EUROPE to the Battle of the Huertgen Forest, in which 30,000 U.S. troops were killed or wounded because he couldn't be bothered to stop a pointless attack. Obviously Below's memior doesn't jibe with certain views of Hitler expressed by others; but that neither invalidates what Below has to say nor "proves" the others wrong. It's up to the reader to determine the accuracy of what he/she is reading, and not to fall victim to the "if he doesn't admit X or Y or say Z, he must be lying" type of not- thinking.

Readers expecting a plethora of new information on Hitler will be sorely disappointed. Von Below is a pedantic, careful and very dry reteller of history and his memoirs seem contrived in points and highly self-serving. Many reviews point out that von Below never heard Hitler mention the Jews or the death camps, but this is quite believable. Hitler compartmentalized all personal relationships and why would he mention these any atrocities to his Luftwaffe adjutant?

Von Below doesn't really tell us anything new about Hitler, and his personal anecdotes are tragically few. He comes up with some pithy observations on Goering and Goebbels, but it's frustrating that he doesn't elaborate more on Hitler, his entourage, or the inner workings at the Berghof, the Chancellory or in various wartime HQ's.

The book's main flaw is that it ends almost mid-word and mid-sentence. There is no explanation of what happened to von Below after the war, he simply stops the narrative and packs up shop. Very curious indeed. One improvement over the German-language version is the addition of notes, an expanded index and some editorial inclusions. Another weakness is that von Below was never close to Hitler, nor part of his intimate personal entourage. His transactions with Hitler were generally of a military, not personal, nature, but don't expect many fireworks in this dry tome.

A somewhat disappointing book. As Hitler's Luftwaffe Adjutant, Von Below hade an insider view of the Fuhrer's wartime entourage. The book is very light on details, a superficial overlook of Von Below's experiences. This is a fatal flaw for a book of this type. I wanted to know what someone who was there saw and heard. The casual information provided is available from a zillion other sources. It is perhaps understandable. Von Below's notes taken at the time were destroyed. He reconstructed details from memory for the book. Unfortunately, it does not make for an informative, interesting read.

Although the book ends quite abruptly, it was a book that I could not put down. One can almost see in first-person Hitlers moods and thought processes. It's as if you were in the room with him. Very, very interesting.

Von Below was Hitler's Luftwaffe aide. He details his story through the war years at Hitler's side. Von Below is somewhat self serving here as he tries to portray he had Hitler's ear on many important matters such as equipment and personnel. Perhaps he did, or maybe Hitler used him as a sounding board. It is interesting to read the revelations on Hitler's inner circle. Nothing new in facts are proved by his story. However, we get a better idea on how Hitler functioned during the war years.

Historians will find nothing new in this story. Hitler is portrayed as a hypocrite when he hears about the Katyn Forest Massacre of Polish officers and says that one should expect that from the Soviets. This was during the time when his soldiers and SS were massacring millions. As stated, the author inflates his contribution to Hitler's decisions. Otherwise, this is a nice read.