Double Standards: The Rudolf Hess Cover-Up [Paperback]

Lynn Picknett (Author), Clive Prince (Author), Stephen Prior (Author), Robert Brydon (Contributor)

Book Description

Publication Date: September 1, 2002

For over 60 years, there has been an unprecedented cover-up by both the British Establishment and successive generations of historians about the flight of Hitler's Deputy Rudolf Hess to Scotland in May 1941. It has long been dismissed as the misguided attempt of a madman to make contact with a non-existent British peace party. Based on entirely new material from eyewitnesses, hitherto inaccessible archives, and intelligence sources, Double Standards reveals that despite official denials, Hess flew to Britain with Hitler’s full knowledge; that there is is substantial evidence that the prisoner who died in Spandau prison was not the real Rudolf Hess; and that Winston Churchill guilefully used Hess to influence Hitler and change Britain’s fortunes in the war.

Editorial Reviews

Review

There is much which is new in this well-written and absorbing study of one of the most fascinating missions in modern history. IRISH INDEPENDENT

From the Publisher

For over 60 years, there has been an unprecedented cover–up by both the British Establishment and successive generations of historians about the flight of Hitler's Deputy Rudolf Hess to Scotland in May 1941. It has long been dismissed as the misguided attempt of a madman to make contact with a non–existent British peace party. Based on entirely new material from eyewitnesses, hitherto inaccessible archives, and intelligence sources, Double Standards reveals that:

• Despite official denials, Hess flew to Britain with Hitler’s full knowledge.

• There was a substantial British peace party in 1941, which included most of the aristocracy—and the Royal Family.

• There is substantial evidence that the prisoner who died in Spandau prison was not the real Rudolf Hess.

• The fate of the real Deputy Fuhrer was inextricably linked with that of the Duke of Kent.

• Winston Churchill guilefully used Hess to influence Hitler and change Britain’s fortunes in the war.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 584 pages
• Publisher: Time Warner (September 1, 2002)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0751532207
• ISBN-13: 978-0751532203
• Product Dimensions: 1.8 x 5.2 x 8 inches
• Shipping Weight: 15.5 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.2 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,222,486 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

22 of 29 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars But if the cause be not good ...., October 19, 2003

By 

Thomas Dunskus (Faleyras Frankreich) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Double Standards: The Rudolf Hess Cover-Up (Paperback)

There are not many German books about Rudolf Hess. By contrast, the book list presented in „Double Standards" gives us a dozen British or US titles dealing specifically with the man and many more in which Hess plays a part. Is this due only to the well-known British love of mystery stories, or are there other reasons for the seemingly constant preoccupation with this particular subject?

In 1939, Britain and France were major imperial powers, the USA were still digging their way out of a home-made depression, Germany was trying to reconsolidate herself at the expense of some of her neighbours, and the Soviet Union loomed in the background. A mere six years later, the erstwhile empires were gone or nearly so, Germany was devastated materially, politically, and spiritually, but the Soviet Union had advanced its sway some 500 miles to the west, and for all intents and purposes the USA occupied the rest of Europe.

This was not at all the situation Britain had envisioned when she declared war on Germany after the German invasion of Poland, but, if we are to believe the authors of this book, it corresponded very closely to a picture which Rudolf Hess, after his daring and tragically unsuccessful flight to Scotland, repeatedly outlined to his captors as a possibility to be avoided at all costs. Even if the details of the proposals Hess had taken along on his flight are still locked away or lost forever, this outline matches perfectly the German assessment of the political situation of the day. Churchill, by himself, without even consulting his cabinet, refused to accept such arguments and brushed aside whatever Hess had proposed.

The question which is looming large behind the 500 pages of this well-researched book (and also behind the many others written on this subject) is why Churchill was so adamant in his negative attitude, whether he was aware of the possibly horrible consequences of his position, and to what extent he condoned the scenario that he was conjuring up. These are questions of political morality and in a way it would seem that the incessant preoccupation of British authors with our subject reflects the unease they are feeling with respect to major and in the end catastrophic decisions taken in their name and over their heads by less than a handful of people in Whitehall.

The authors of „Double Standards" devote several pages to a discussion of the tragedies on all sides that could have been avoided if Hess' mission had been a success. With a marvellously tongue-in-cheek attitude they also consider, side by side, the kind of Europe that, in 1941, would have resulted from a reasonable peace, and the political structure we see emerging today in the same geographical area, finding little to choose between the two.

Such, then, is the backdrop against which the scenes of this tragedy are played out. Fate has it that once the two mighty monarchies confront each other across the perilous narrow ocean, there ensues an inexorable march to doom despite the courageous efforts of many noble souls on either side; there is a climax at which point the scales could have been tipped either way, there is the terrible act where the battle's lost and won, and there is the pitiful finale, with murders most foul and ghosts that will not go away.

In their description of Rudolf Hess, the four authors, like so many captains, bear him to centre stage and seem to say that, had he been put on, he would have proved most royal. With this regard it matters but little whether his final resting place is at Wunsiedel, next to his parents, or in Scottish soil, next to the poor fellows who may have crashed with him on Eagles Rock.

7 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

2.0 out of 5 stars The whole story doesn't hold together, November 17, 2008

By 

Jersey Kid (Katy, Texas, America!) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Double Standards: The Rudolf Hess Cover-Up (Paperback)

Imagine that - sometime in 2002 - Vice President Cheney flew to the border of Afghanistan and Pakistan with the intent to open direct negotiations with Usama bin Laden to end the conflict between the US and al Qaeda. Then imagine that - instead of trumpeting the news around the world - UBL only kept Cheney incommunicado for years.

Seems improbable, doesn't it?

Well, that is exactly what happened in May of 1941. Rudolph Hess - at the time Adolph Hitler's notional right-hand man who carried the title Deputy Fuehrer - flew to the United Kingdom, bailing out over Scotland. After his almost immediate apprehension, he acted and made statements seeming to imply that he was expected by one or more members of Scottish nobility. Within hours of his arrival Hess was locked away from public view and nothing more was known until he appeared as a defendant at the initial war crimes trials in Nuremburg, Germany. There, he appeared to be mentally unstable, at times alternating between near-catatonia, rambling incoherency and acute mental clarity. Sentenced to life imprisonment, Hess was - at the time of his death - the only remaining detainee. After his death - which was ruled a suicide - the prison where he was held was demolished and the land diverted to other uses. A rather shocking action in light of the fact that the Fuehrerbunker - admittedly underground but still capable of access - and Gestapo headquarters - now a memorial and visitation site - remained.

"So", as we Americans say. "What's up?"

The authors contend the following:

1. There was a large and active "peace-party" in the UK before and during World War Two that sought, first, to avoid was with Germany and, having failed at that, sought to end the war. Key to this was commonalities between Germany and the UK in the areas of racial-cultural superiority, anti-Semitism and anti-communism. This peace-party included many of the upper class and nobility, possibly even into the upper reaches of the Royal Family.

2. There was active and ongoing communication between "like-minded" individuals in both countries that included members of the government (though not Winston Churchill).

3. Hess's flight was planned by both sides to open negotiations for a cessation of fighting but was kept at arm's length via intermediaries so that both sides would be able to evoke plausible denial.

4. The plan went awry and Hess fell into the hands of Churchill, who was able to use his captive as a mallet to crush the "peace-party" and any mention of supposed purpose for Hess; mission. Instead, both sides relegated Hess to nut-case status.

5. In order to assure Hess never spoke the truth, he was either kept drugged for the next 50 odd years or a fake Hess was created - the real one having died in a plane crash that killed a member of the Royal family while they wer on the way to Sweden to negotiate a peace treaty - who also was prevented from speaking. In the end, one or the other was killed by the Brits over fears te truth might come out upon his release - rumored to be about to happen - from Spandau prison.

`Double Standards' is a very high quality conspiracy theory story that contains much valid and documented proof. There were elements in the UK that would have preferred no war with Germany that did have power. In fact, there are indications that in the weeks immediately after Dunkirk, efforts were underway to depose Churchill and replace him with a PM more amenable to negotiations. It's pretty clear from this book and others on the topic that Hess knew whom he wanted to meet and certainly believed/assumed they would be open to the subject. And, there are many other more-or-less verifiable facts that - when woven into the storyline - make it all seem plausible, even likely.

Until you get to Prisoner Number Seven - Hess' designation at the Nuremburg Trial and during his incarceration at Spandau Prison - being killed after 50 years to keep the truth hidden. Why would those in power - then and now - risk the story coming out by keeping this man - the real Hess or the doppelganger - alive when his death at an earlier point in time could have been arranged so easily?

It calls the whole story into question and leaves it as little more than a better written and referenced version of stories like Roswell, the Kennedy assassination or FDR knowing about Pearl Harbor in advance. As with those "events," it assertions that errors in documentation are not errors of omission, but rather signs of deliberate falsification that cause this reviewer to question what is being presented. To say that each and every discrepancy in various source materials were deliberate and not the result of haste, distraction or simple mis-statement is absurb. To - near the end of the book - imply that the faux-Hess was one of the first to be a victim of mind-control pharmaceuticals in a string that lead eventually to the MKULTRA program only adds to questions about the purpose of this book being scholarly inquiiry or muckraking for profit.

32 of 48 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars But who is that double???, September 23, 2002

By 

Linda Oskam "dutch-traveller" (Amsterdam Netherlands) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Double Standards: The Rudolf Hess Cover-Up (Paperback)

It remains an intriguing fact: the trip of Rudolf Hess to England. There were no indications that he was mad (at least not madder than the other nazi leaders) and all of a sudden he decides to fly to England to start the peace negotiations...

The authors write a very stout book to investigate what happened or what could have happened. And that is my major problem with the book: on the basis of a number of very flimsy clues they draw far-reaching conclusions which they then present as the only possible truth in the rest of the book. They then use those conclusions as the basis for even more far-fetched conclusions etc.

I also think that there is more to the flight of Hess than the ravings of a lunatic, but this book is a very easy way to come with a fantastic story. And the major conclusion (the person in Spandau prison was a double of the real Rudolf Hess who died in WW 2) is not supported by the evidence presented in this book.