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Richard Overy

Goering Paperback – September 1, 2000

by Richard Overy (Author)

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His success as Commander-in-Chief of the Luftwaffe, President of the Reichstag, and Prime Minister of Prussia, secured Goering's future as Hitler's designated successor. This major biography takes you to Hitler's inner circle, and inside one its most powerful, fascinating and complex members.

Print length

320 pages
Language

English
Publisher

Phoenix
Publication date

September 1, 2000
Dimensions

6.25 x 1 x 9.25 inches
ISBN-10

1842120484
ISBN-13

978-1842120484
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Product details

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Phoenix; 1st edition (September 1, 2000)
Language ‏ : ‎ English
Paperback ‏ : ‎ 320 pages
ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1842120484
ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1842120484
Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 1.17 pounds
Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 6.25 x 1 x 9.25 inches

Best Sellers Rank: #3,138,657 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #2,564 in Historical Germany Biographies
- #9,040 in Presidents & Heads of State Biographies
- #16,170 in Political Leader Biographies

Customer Reviews:
9 ratings

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Five Stars

Reviewed in the United States on September 19, 2016

Verified Purchase

as with the other books I have read by Richard Overy very detailed survey of the Nazi era

3 people found this helpful

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Bayard B.

Excellent biography on Goering's roles as leader of the Four - Year Plan and the Luftwaffe.

Reviewed in the United States on February 18, 2021

This is probably the best political biography on Hermann Goring. It focuses mainly on is role in in managing (or mismanaging) the German pre-war and wartime economy through the Four - Year Plan and secondly his role as leader of the Luftwaffe.

I thought the best chapters were Chapter 6 "The Era of Egotism and Incompetence" and Chapter 7 "The Failure of the Luftwaffe." One of the fascinating aspects of the Third Reich is that almost all the key leaders in any area were ignorant of the subject and incompetent. It was also almost impossible to remove them and replace them with people who knew what they were doing. The Luftwaffe RLM a was a perfect example.

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R. Setliff

Profiling Goering, the Nazi Air Force and Economics Czar

Reviewed in the United States on September 6, 2004

~Goering~ is an overall objective biography of the so called Iron Man, Hermann Goering. Goering is famous for his ominous statement: "I have no conscience, Adolf Hitler is my conscience." Pragmatic, arrogant, callous, and eager to manifest his unflinching loyalty to Hitler, Goering secured a considerable power base in Hitler's Third Reich.

Goering was a powerful figurehead who controlled a portfolio of coveted positions in the Nazi state, and was an instrumental player in the organization of Germany's Wehrwirtschaft (i.e. war economy.) He served as the head of the Reichswerke A.G.-a state holding company-which consisted largely of nationalized industries, properties expropriated from Jews, as well as assets captured in Lorraine, Luxembourg, Czechoslovakia, Austria, Romania, and all the way to the Donetz basin of the Ukraine. This enterprise was tasked with supplanting the primacy of the I.G. Farben conglomerate and became the fulcrum of the Nazi war machine providing steel, iron, coal, munitions and oil. Reichswerke A.G. was to facilitate the phased shifting of the Reich industrial base into Eurasia following Operation Barbarossa as the Germans ratcheted production up for the war effort. These plans never fully materialized for various reasons. First, the Nazis alienated the conquered Slavs. Second, the Nazis recklessly pillaged and effectively destroyed many productive assets in the east. Third, Goering ineffectually diverted resources and manipulated the economy incessantly.

Richard Overy highlights some of the more naïve economic views of Goering rooted in his affinity for socialist ideas. Goering avowed, in a Nazi economic system, "Profits cannot be considered... Calculations cannot be made as to cost. " Such naïve economic thinking characterized a man obsessed with bringing the German economy under his total control. Goering made sporadic interventions in the economy as if the law of supply and demand could somehow be negated or supplanted with the force of the Nazi will to power. Not surprisingly, the results Goering desired were seldom found. Shortages of supplies were commonplace and production seldom met expectations.

The ambitious Goering zealously guarded his perceived prerogatives and was apt to look for more private industry to gobble up into his inefficient socialist conglomerate. In his role as head of the German Luftwaffe (i.e., Air Force), Goering zealously pushed for an inefficient reallocation of material resources to his pet projects while diverting them from private industry and other military branches.

He may have won Hitler's respect initially, because of their shared obsession with wunder-waffens (i.e. wonder weapons.) Despite the engineering ingenuity and pioneering ambition of Germany in aviation and military technologies, the sporadic state interventions in the economy made German technological advantage superfluous. Both Hitler and Goering were obsessed with constant perfection of designs as well as getting new designs online. As a result, assembly lines had to be constantly retooled and components redesigned. For all these reasons, the idea of mass production became rather comical with the incessant changes ordered by Goering. Obsessed with perfecting tank and aircraft designs throughout the war, Germany made only piecemeal gains in productivity while the Western Allies were busy churning out far more armaments and equipment. The potency of Allied arms and munitions was cognizable in the sheer quantity they produced. These were volleyed at the crumbling Reich with full force.

The Ruhr capitalists expressed frustrations at the sporadic interventions of the state. The radicalism of Goering was tempered by others in power since he would have preferred more nationalization and state control over the economy. At the behest of Speer and Hitler, the power base of Goering was finally curtailed after 1943 as concessions were made to industry and 'party moderates' in vain hopes of turning things around for the German war economy. It seems that Goering's bungling, anti-capitalist tendencies, and unintentional economic sabotage coupled with the Allied bombing campaign kept the German war machine from ever reaching its full productive potential. Overy captures this reality quite well.

In the end, the so-called Thousand-year Reich died in its infancy. History and divine providence, which was so often was invoked by Hitler to legitimize his assent to power, proved to be against him in actuality.

2 people found this helpful

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Cody Carlson

Goering- A Biography of the Economics Czar

Reviewed in the United States on June 28, 2009

Richard Overy's biography, "Goering" is less a fully fleshed out biography than an examination into certain aspects of Hitler's number two man between 1936 and 1942. Though the book begins with Goering's childhood and WWI service and continues throughout his life, these years are clearly given preference. Goering's role in the German economy is the principle theme of this work, and offers many keen insights. However, his other roles such as head of the Luftwaffe, Air Minister, President of the Reichstag, and others don't receive the same weight as Goering the Economics Czar. This book is must reading for those interested in the state directed economy of the Third Reich, but for those seeking a larger portrait of Goering the man you might want to check out Anthony Read's wonderful "The Devil's Disciples" which details Goering's life brilliantly beside Hitler's other lieutenants.

4 people found this helpful

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Kevin M Quigg

Good thing Goering was on their side.

Reviewed in the United States on August 9, 2005

This was a difficult book to read since it is not really a biography. In fact you would learn little about Goering's early life from reading this book. What this book reviews are the policies Goering pursued at both the Luftwaffe and his Economics Ministry. Goering was no military genius, and he certainly couldn't organize like George Marshall, so he basically was a flop at both these positions. Yet, he garnered them up and retained them throughout much of the war to the detriment of Nazi Germany. It was a good thing he was on their side.

The other thing that is striking about this book is that Goering made possible much of the war and murderous genocide of the regime. Even though he acted as the humane face of the regime, he in fact was one of the chief devil's disciples. He deserved what he got at Nurnenburg. He was as guilty as Hitler for the genocide, slave labor, and brutal warfare.

This is a difficult read, since it covers primarily the policies of Nazi Germany. For policy wonks, this is a great read, for the lay reader, probably not.

8 people found this helpful

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Harmonious

Informative but somewhat difficult to read

Reviewed in the United States on February 7, 2007

This is a good book even if it does not resemble a conventional biography. The book has scant information on Goering's private life concentrating itself, rather, on Goering's performance at the helm of the German economy during Nazi rule. The author has a superb grasp of the subject at hand and he does portray an encompassing picture of German economic affairs during World War 2. Mr. Overy is an accomplished writer; his sentences are elegant and clear. Nonetheless, the book is difficult to read because the chapters and, even many paragraphs, are overly extensive causing fatigue to the reader. Overall, it is a good book that taught me a lot about Goering, the Nazis, and the German war effort.

13 people found this helpful

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