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The Hitler Book: The Secret Dossier Prepared for Stalin from the Interrogations of Otto Guensche and Heinze Linge, Hitler's Closest Personal Aides

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and the beasts shall reign over the earth."

Of Soviet leader Joseph Stalin's many obsessions with enemies real and imagined his staggering obsession with Adolf Hitler seems to be one that was entirely justified by history. Between the commencement of the Nazi invasion of June, 1941 and the fall of Berlin in May, 1945 destruction and darkness reigned over the eastern front in an unimaginably bloody war.

Stalin's obsession survived the `apparent' suicide of Hitler on April 30, 1945. I emphasize apparent because Stalin did not believe the initial reports of Hitler's death. "The Hitler Book: The Secret Dossier Prepared for Stalin From the Interrogations of Hitler's Personal Aides" was one result of that obsession. Two of Hitler's top aides, SS officers Otto Guensche and Heinz Linge, were captured by the Red Army. Once their role as top, loyal aides to Hitler became clear they were transferred to Moscow. They were kept prisoner there for ten years. During their captivity they were interrogated repeatedly by the NKVD (later known as the KGB) on Hitler's life and times. The resulting dossier was presented for Stalin's eyes only (although it was, apparently, read by other top members of the Politburo) and then locked in the NKVD's archives. The Dossier was `discovered by German historian and researcher Matthias Uhl after the collapse of the Soviet Union. Uhl, along with co-editor Henrik Eberle, annotated the Dossier and it has now been translated into English. It is an extraordinarily riveting inside look at `the heart of darkness'.

The Hitler Book is set out in chronological order. It is a straightforward narrative of Hitler's life from the time he assumed power in 1933 until his death. Both Guensche and Linge were trusted aides to Hitler and even though they were not confidants they had daily access to Hitler for almost twelve years. I wouldn't say there is anything particularly new revealed here. Hitler's reign of terror is well documented. However, the Hitler Book does provide an insider's look at life in the eye of the storm that adds substantially to our body of knowledge of the Third Reich. We read about Hitler's vaunted rages but also see the petty and often vicious jostling for power amongst the members of the Court of the Nazi Tsar. The mixture of sycophancy and deviousness has a powerful effect on readers who may have, like me, often wondered about the nature of people capable of performing the most heinous acts. Hannah Arendt wrote, in covering the Eichmann trial, about the banality of evil, and that banality is also apparent here. Hitler's musical tastes and the often vacuous conversations with Eva Braun and her coterie come to mind in this context.

The book grows more detailed as the tide of war begins to turn at Stalingrad. By the time we get to Hitler's last months in his Berlin bunker the atmosphere becomes increasingly claustrophobic and chaotic as Hitler's life and the life of those in the bunker becomes dominated more and more by paranoia and general insanity. The last third of the book is an intense recreation of the last days of the Third Reich and the last days of Hitler.

There are some glaring gaps in the book. As noted the book was prepared by the NKVD for Stalin so the omission have to be understood in that context. There is much discussion of the Munich Agreement and the appeasement policies of the French and British but there is no discussion about the Hitler/Stalin pact and the negotiations leading up to the pact that was followed in short order by the German invasion of western Poland and the Soviet occupation of eastern Poland. The most glaring omission is any significant discussion of the Final Solution. There are allusions to labor and concentration camps but that is all. This omission is not inconsistent with Soviet domestic and foreign policy in the post war years. Stalin's anti-cosmopolitan campaign and his Doctors' Plot bespeak a mindset that the NKVD editors were most certainly aware of.

However, as the historian Richard Overy notes in his foreword, even with these omissions, the Hitler Book provides a unique perspective on Hitler's life and times. The editors have also spent a lot of time creating annotations that clarify and explain many references that might otherwise be lost on the general reader. The Hitler Book should be of interest to serious historians and to readers with (like me) simply a general interest in history. Highly recommended. L. Fleisig

Hitler: a dictator whose principles affected everyone, a man who played a role in and influenced over 20 years of history - who could know more details about him than his personal aide and his man servant?
They were captured by the Russians and taken to Moscow where they were made to pass on their extensive and detailed knowledge in order to satisfy Stalin's interest in Hitler. They were interrogated until 1949, giving their statements a high measure of authenticity, every detail having been extracted.
Henrik Eberle's historical insights and Matthias Uhl's translatory technique bring this document alive. The full and detailed epilogue helps to eliminate any possible misunderstandings. This book's many layers are the key to what makes it such a fascinating read. On the one hand, one reads the history the captured Nazis imparted to the Russians, whilst reading the footnotes containing today's historical perspective. On the other hand, one can also read the documents which were laid before Stalin following the interrogations, another dictator hoping to gain insight into his arch-enemy. Psychological and historic fact stand side by side. A thorough work, spiced with numerous illustrations and notes. A book of great intellectual value - I recommend it highly.

This is definitely a fascinating work, in addition to being surprisingly readable. You will learn A LOT! However, the nature of the book is such that not everything the authors' wrote was accurate, and this book is better read by people already well-versed in WWII history. If you are knowledgable about WWII, and Hitler in particular, this is a "must read" if you want to remain on top of your game. Make sure to read the Editors' afterword.

Not a story, but more like a long, well-written history paper based on the forced testimony of two of Hitler's closest aids and written from the Russian point of view (corroded somewhat because it was meant for Stalin's eyes). At the end of the war, the Russians grabbed two of Hitlers lower level assistants; one was a butler and one was an adjutant; and forced them to tell them everything they knew about life with Hitler. The book is even better because the writters help ensure historical integrity by describing why and why not they might have been telling the truth to their Russian captors.

The Hitler Book was written for Stalin by two security service officers of the NKVD/MVD, There was, admittedly an agenda. "They wanted to brand Fascist leaders as licentious . . ." and a "tool of German Capitalism," They also worked under heavy pressure to prove that Hitler was either alive and had escaped to South America or was, as Stalin believed, a coward who took poison instead of shooting himself. Most of the details came from Otto Guensche, Hitler's adjutant, and Heinz Linge, his personal valet. Both were captured by the Russian Army in Berlin. The Hitler Book was finally given to Stalin in 1949, it was then hidden away for decades. Not until 1991 was it found by Matthias Uhl and its validity confirmed

In spite of the agenda and USSR politics, this book is probably the most accurate, intimate and authoritative publication about the last days of Hitler. It is a must read for WWII scholars, WWII history buffs and anyone who is interested in Stalin or Hitler because it tells us a lot about both men.

I couldn't put this book down and was disappointed when I finished it!It's mandatory reading for all WW2 buffs as the insight it provides into the personal lives of Hitler and other top Nazis in the Third Reich is invaluable. I found it riveting as it described Hitler's personal foibles,his descent into paranoia and detachment from reality while his lackeys around him continued to pander to his gigantic ego and self-delusion.It depicts a world gone mad and rampant evil. Hitler's callous diregard for the lives of his soldiers and those of German civilians caught up in the horror that was 1945 Berlin stuns the imagination. Equally disturbing is Stalin's prurient fascination with his Fascist counterpart.
This is a superb book and of great value to the keen historian who wants more than just facts and dates.

This dossier is the result of the interrogation, by the Soviet NKVD, of two SS officials who knew Hitler very well--Heinz Linge and Otto Gunsche. It offers a comprehensive history of WWII, with much attention devoted to the closing stages of the European war on the eastern front. There is discussion of the Hitlerjugend sacrificed against the Soviets, the suicides of Goebbels and his family, and the self-destruction of the Fuhrer and burning of his body. (Hitler feared that the Soviets would turn him or his body into a public spectacle). The editors use numerous footnotes that clarify and correct the issues raised by the NKVD. The Editors' Afterword section provides extensive commentary, and the Notes include comprehensive biographical information on many Nazis (including dates of birth and death, and relevant postwar activities).

This dossier begins with a short, prewar history of Nazism: "The official version of the story was that Rohm had been executed for homosexuality, but Hitler concealed from the German people the fact that homosexuality was widely practiced and tolerated in the higher echelons of the National Socialist Party and the Hitler Youth." (p. 6).

Hitler is quoted, on April 17, 1943, of saying that Jews must either be annihilated of thrown into a concentration camp (p. 114). If correct, this itself suggests that, even at this late date, Hitler wasn't irrevocably committed to the extermination of every possible Jew within his reach. Interestingly, Hitler had a purely utilitarian view of Slavs that matched that of his view of Jews, as illustrated by the Nazis' use of both Slavic and Jewish forced laborers. Consider the former: "Filled with loathing Hitler remarked, `It is quite right to make Slavs do this, these robots! Otherwise they would have no right to their share of the sun!'" (p. 102).

The following was Hitler's reaction to Britain's declaration of war against Germany following the Nazi attack on Poland: "It is disgraceful to present Czechs and Poles as sovereign states when this rabble is not a jot better than the Sudanese or the Indians..." (pp. 47-48). At the start of Operation Barbarossa, the Germans fought under the slogan: "Bash the Russians' brains in...We need the Russian expanses without Russians!" (p. 76).

The editors cite an eventual figure of 11.27 million Soviet military deaths, but add: "On the other hand, it is mentioned only in a few places that the campaign against the Soviet Union was also a racially motivated war of annihilation, which claimed the lives of 18.4 million civilians. This war of annihilation was carried out above all by the SS, but a politically-indoctrinated Wehrmacht played its part." (p. 300). Combining these figures with others (e. g., the 2-3 million murdered Polish gentiles), it is obvious that the Germans' genocide of Slavs was greater than that of Jews (5-6 million). Considering this metric, the reader realizes that Jews and Slavs were indeed unequal victims--with Slavs the greater victims.

Some proponents of Holocaust uniqueness have claimed that the Nazis' disrespect and exploitation of the dead, as exemplified by the removal of tooth fillings, was done only to Jews. We learn instead that it was also done to Slavs--including living ones. Blaschke, Hitler's personal dentist, obtained crowns, bridges, and gold teeth that had been extracted from Soviet POWs (pp. 164-165).

Certain revisionists (e. g., Alfred Maurice de Zayas) have repeated the canard that the Soviets and Poles killed over 2 million German civilians during the final offensives and early postwar period. However heavy the loss of German civilian life actually was, it was clearly the fault of the Germans, not the Russians or Poles: "When the German troops fled in chaos, the population panicked and ran with their soldiers. A mass migration towards the German heartlands began. The roads and paths of East Prussia were thick with old men, women and children who had turned and run, only to become jammed in the numerous tank traps that offered only a torturously narrow path. Many--the children in particular--froze to death in the intense cold." (p. 180).

The Churchill-Roosevelt betrayal of Poland to the Soviet Union, culminating at Yalta, is often rationalized by the specter of a German-Soviet separate peace. However, Stalin ALSO feared a separate peace--a German-western one. For example, the Battle of the Bulge was framed as an attempt by the Germans to so bloody and dishearten the western Allies that they would unilaterally sue for peace (p. 170).

This is a "must read" book on the subject of Hitler and the last days in Berlin. It is a jewel from the Soviet archives.
Having said that, great caution must be used in accepting what is written in the book as the truth. Only by comparison with other accounts can the facts be sifted out from the propaganda. Read all the front and back material as well to get a better understanding of what is in this report.
The report on which the book is based was written for Stalin's consumption and therefore there are distinct biases and distortions in what information is reported and how it is presented. It is almost comical in places how the Soviet writers attempted to twist things. Almost comical - but not actually, because the intended audience of this book, Stalin was as diabolical and hideous, if not more, than the subject of the report.
The fact that it is a Soviet report is not really a flaw since it gives us insight into the Soviet mind and their use of history to indoctrinate rather than enlighten.
The true flaw in the book is that the English translation has abridged the German editor's notes and inserted additional footnotes that are often just plain wrong. The English translator also lacks any understanding of WW2 German military terminology, for example, translating "Minenwerfer" as "mine thrower" instead of "mortar". Very childish, but fortunately there are not too many of these screwups.

I still give it 5 stars because it is a priceless document. I might suggest getting the German edition for better supporting material.

The book is a worthy read, overall. With that said, the reader must proceed with the caveat that the Soviet viewpoint clouds the contents and events herein. For example, the industrialists are shown to have too big a role and relationship with Hitler. When in fact, they were only a means to help Hitler to an end. While one can certainly understand the focus being on the Eastfront war, the Soviet NKVD officers who edited the book do belittle the Western Front time and again.

On the plus side, the book covers last days in the Berlin Bunker in detail. It is the only one to have the full statement's of each of Hitler's most personal aides, Linge* and Gunsche which other books (even ones based on Soviet materials) do not. For example, "Hitler's Death: Russia's Last Great Secret from the Files of the KGB" is only made up of the incomplete early SMERSH (Military Counter-Espionage Dept.) investigation of Hitler's death. "The Hitler Book" was put together from the full dossier of the subsequent secret investigation (Operation Myth) by the Soviet NKVD (later known as the MVD, the forerunner of the KGB). A dossier received by Stalin on Dec. 30, 1949.

The end part of the book and "Editor's Afterward" go into detail as to the different investigations that took place by the different Soviet offices [mainly, SMERSH and the NKVD], contradictions they found and the fact they would not share information, etc. Further, SMERSH would not allow the NKVD to conduct a second autopsy on the remains to check for signs of cyanide and glass from the capsule. In the end, one does come away with the position that Hitler shot himself in the temple. And as the authors state, the official Soviet status and death of Hitler changed over time to suit the political whims of Moscow.

*Footnote: As of late summer 2009, the memoirs of Heinz Linge have been re-published under the title: "With Hitler to the End: The Memoir of Hitler's Valet". So one can now read that book for Linge's full account, as well.

Clearly one of the most informative books written about the life of Adolf Hitler. The account of the last days in the Fuhrer bunker is not only spellbinding, but probably the most accurate. A "must read" for the WW2 history enthusiast.