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Charles Higham
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American Swastika: The Shocking Story of Nazi Collaborators in Our Midst from 1933 to the Present Day Hardcover – January 1, 1985

by Charles Higham (Author)
4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 17 ratings
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Chronicles the relationship between Americans and the Nazis from the 1930s to the present, examining the activities of Nazi sympathizers in the U.S. government, the Catholic Church, and other facets of American life
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  1. Print length
    332 pages
  2. Language
    English
  3. Publisher
    Doubleday
  4. Publication date
    January 1, 1985
  5. ISBN-10
    0385178743
  6. ISBN-13
    978-0385178747
  7. See all details
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Product details

  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Doubleday; First Edition (January 1, 1985)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 332 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0385178743
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-0385178747
  • Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1 pounds
  • Customer Reviews:
    4.4 4.4 out of 5 stars 17 ratings

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Charles Higham

Charles Higham

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Customer reviews

4.4 out of 5 stars
4.4 out of 5
17 global ratings

Top reviews from the United States

RepublicConstitution
5.0 out of 5 stars Proven To Be True By Declassified Documents
Reviewed in the United States on December 24, 2010
Verified Purchase
Hitler was a known evil for the world as early as 1922. Western powers and western corporations loved Hitler and were not at all disturbed by his vile racist hatreds. Every year that passes, there is more and more evidence of specific U.S. collaboration with Hitler and his Nazi underlings. Recently released documents demonstrate beyond any doubt that U.S. complicity post-WWII was far greater than anyone at first was willing to admit and now there can be no denial. Not only did the U.S. collaborate with Nazi racists and war criminals but also some of the most prominent and destructive medical experimenters ever known to humankind. The U.S. helped them escape Europe and hide in various places in the United States and South America. Higham's work is only limited by the documents then available, no doubt his works could be expanded a hundred fold today.
13 people found this helpful
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The Quain
4.0 out of 5 stars Frontiers of Free Enterprise Gone Wrong
Reviewed in the United States on April 26, 2017
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This book is now rightly considered a classic. It falls into its place with the more notable works on well-hidden American history. It reveals the widespread support among the US corporate community of the 1930s and 1940s as they embraced Nazism and the rebuilt German economy. Of course, that economy was built to a large degree on slave labor. Henry Ford, whose own derisive thoughts on laborers are well known, clearly sees the attraction of an approach where labor costs are steeply reduced. Others fall into Hitler's lap without enthusiasm. Some of those profiled here are well known sympathizers, such as Charles Lindbergh, while others might be a surprise to the uninitiated.
4 people found this helpful
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Archimedes
5.0 out of 5 stars Would buy from this seller again.
Reviewed in the United States on May 28, 2019
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Book was as described. I am satisfied with this purchase. I would buy from this seller again.
One person found this helpful
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glennsherwood
5.0 out of 5 stars Now I know
Reviewed in the United States on November 29, 2012
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Now I know what they ment about the chickens comming home to roost...I think Gerald Ford was adopted from Adolf Hitler...
4 people found this helpful
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Iamru
2.0 out of 5 stars Unreliable and dull
Reviewed in the United States on November 6, 2023
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Most of what I wrote about Trading With the Enemy applies to this book as well. This is an unreliable book by an eccentric Hollywood gossip writer but despite that is still quite dull reading for the most part. In some respects the book is more engaging than Trading since we have more characters doing a wider variety of things whereas a great portion of Trading is about labyrinthine business structures and who put how much money in what account. On the other hand, the overall thesis of Trading is a lot more interesting and, if true, significant, than this book, most of which is taken up by ultimately irrelevant espionage drama from the late interwar period and WW2.

For those interested primarily in Nazi networks during the Cold War I would look elsewhere to start with and for those interested primarily in support for the Axis on the part of sectors of the allied business elite I would also look elsewhere to start with (and also elsewhere than Trading With the Enemy to start with in the latter case). That said, this book does have a chapter on White Russian, Ukrainian and Armenian pro-Axis networks, the material on Coughlin is interesting and paints him as a much more serious threat than the standard account of his career does, and there's some information on Joseph P. Kennedy and Axel Wenner-Gren. That third of the book which deals with events from the Cold War is mostly notable for a trio of chapters discussing the Romanians, unfortunately amounting to only about 20 pages and focused more on the WW2-era intrigues of Malaxa, Viorel Trifa and Otto von Bolschwing than actual covert operations involving Romanian emigre networks during the Cold War; most of the material in those chapters which takes place during the Cold War is concerned with much less relevant and more boring naturalization issues than what role these people actually played in the spy games of the early Cold War. Besides that you get some of the usual stuff - Operation Sunrise, Paperclip, Gehlen, Skorzeny, Barbie, a bit on Rockwell. There are better places to start reading about all of that.

The ADL was relied upon in the writing of the book, is called a good source in the bibliography and is thanked in the acknowledgements and Higham is basically a New Deal liberal in his political outlook. Nothing about the latter that's particularly egregious or makes him inherently unreliable but if you want to know his point of view there it is. James Forrestal is called a "paranoid anti-communist" and the treatment of McCarthy (who doesn't get his own chapter) is very simplistic. Frank Wisner is also painted as a clear cut villain. I recommend The Devil's Chessboard if you want to see someone writing from essentially the same political POV as Higham get into some of the complexity surrounding McCarthyism and the way it eventually became a liability for the US imperial apparatus (although even TDC minimizes the fact that there was actually significant Soviet penetration and is unreliable in its own right). A pretty useful clue you can use with this genre of writing to gauge certain biases is to pay close attention to how (and whether) they treat Skorzeny's defection to the Mossad. Higham not only doesn't mention the defection, even to discredit it, but states that towards the end of Skorzeny's life he no longer had US intelligence protection and was being hunted by Israeli intelligence. I suppose that's why there were Mossad agents at his funeral, they were there to arrest his corpse. Later, Meir Kahane and the Jewish Defense League are mentioned positively with no indication that their anti-gentilism was so virulent that even the ADL considered them a hate group.
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WAZMAN
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United States on April 28, 2017
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Good book at a good price.
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Cathleen M. Walker
4.0 out of 5 stars Important history not learned in school
Reviewed in the United States on July 8, 2005
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An excellent book, well researched ... but not very well written. Perhaps the reader needs more of a background in WWII and the various and sundry characters in order to follow them around (there are so many!); while I am more interested in the facts. And someone needs to tell this author that there is no such word as "ironical". How that got past editors and publishers I will never know!

Still, this book is important history for understanding the roots of why our government is so out of control today -- it started then. It continues and will remain until we, as citizens, begin to take some responsibility and hold them accountable for the "Democracy" they claim to be while exporting more of the same.
18 people found this helpful
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Ms.Beyonce
4.0 out of 5 stars 4 1/2 Stars !
Reviewed in the United States on May 15, 2014
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Find look at the Nazi/Fascist forces at work before, during, and after WW2. Fascism is alive and well in the United States today and elsewhere in the world, including the U/S/ backed Ukrainian regime. The far right is expected to make large gains in the upcoming EU elections, Very chilly. 4 1/2 Stars !
4 people found this helpful
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Top reviews from other countries

DJB
5.0 out of 5 stars Five Stars
Reviewed in the United Kingdom on July 4, 2016
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Fascinating insight into Nazi groups in North America.
2 people found this helpful
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