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Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe by [Mark Mazower]

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Mark Mazower

Hitler's Empire: How the Nazis Ruled Europe Kindle Edition

by Mark Mazower (Author) Format: Kindle Edition

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Draw ing on an unprecedented range and variety of original research, Hitler?s Empire sheds new light on how the Nazis designed, maintained, and lost their European dominion?and offers a chilling vision of what the world would have become had they won the war. Mark Mazower forces us to set aside timeworn opinions of the Third Reich, and instead shows how the party drew inspiration for its imperial expansion from America and Great Britain. Yet the Nazis? lack of political sophistication left them unequal to the task of ruling what their armies had conquered, despite a shocking level of cooperation from the overwhelmed countries. A work as authoritative as it is unique, Hitler?s Empire is a surprising?and controversial? new appraisal of the Third Reich?s rise and ultimate fall.

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August 25, 2009
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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Columbia University historian Mazower (Inside Hitler's Greece) is a knowledgeable guide to the dynamics of Nazi domination of Europe. His focus is on the ambitions and foibles of the Nazi leaders, who believed that all of Europe could be made to serve German interests. As Mazower shows so well, almost nothing about the occupation had been planned beforehand. The Nazis improvised as their armies raced through Poland, the Soviet Union and the Low Countries, and Nazi generals and old-line bureaucrats fought among themselves for power and spoils. Mazower's most interesting commentary comes at the beginning, when he compares the Nazi imperium to other European empires, and at the end, when he demonstrates its long-lasting consequences. The breadth of Mazower's study is remarkable, but while not diminishing the toll of the Nazi anti-Semitism, he claims, contrary to many scholars, that core of the Nazi worldview was not anti-Semitism, but rather… the quest to unify Germans within a single German state. Pulitzer Prize–winner Saul Friedländer's coinage of redemptive anti-Semitism is far more effective at evoking the realities of Nazi rule than any of Mazower's formulations. Maps. (Sept.)
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From Booklist

Analyses of Nazi policies and administration have, of course, been written before. Most of them tend to concentrate on the criminal outrages perpetrated, including the efforts to implement the Final Solution. Mazower has written extensively on modern European history, and he currently serves as program director for the Center for International History at Columbia University. Although he doesn’t ignore the brutalities, Mazower’s focus is upon the day-to-day administrations of the conquered “empire,” particularly in Eastern Europe. For a supposedly totalitarian regime, Nazi administration there was surprisingly slipshod and inconsistent. Due to the rapidity of the military conquest, the occupiers never developed a broad and cogent plan of control, so much of the policy formulation was left to local military and party officials. They were expected to “work their way towards the Fuhrer,” which usually meant extreme political and racial suppression and severe exploitation of resources with little concern for the welfare of civilians. The inevitable result was resistance that slowly increased in effectiveness. This is a well-argued reexamination and will be a fine addition to European history collections. --Jay Freeman --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From The Washington Post

From The Washington Post's Book World/washingtonpost.com Reviewed by Andrew Nagorski Surveying Nazi Germany's conquests shortly after it invaded the Soviet Union, Hitler's minister of economics boasted: "Never before in the history of the world has there been such an economy to administer." Germany was indeed the master of most of Europe at that point, and its armies were marching quickly into Russia. But in Hitler's Empire, Columbia University historian Mark Mazower spells out how ill-prepared the Germans were for their string of early victories -- and how completely they botched the administration of their empire. Many histories have focused on Hitler's costly military mistakes, particularly on the Eastern Front. Mazower largely ignores the battlefields and focuses instead on the political, racial and economic policies of the Nazi conquerors. While many parts of this story have been told before, he painstakingly examines a huge body of evidence for insights into Nazi misrule. This hardly makes for light reading, but it allows him to present a compelling case, which was best summarized by a German general at the end of the war. Addressing his fellow POWs, Ferdinand Heim argued that the German war effort would have been doomed "even if no military mistakes had been made." The reason: Nazi articles of faith amounted to grotesque fantasies about how the New Order would function, and they couldn't possibly survive prolonged, or even relatively short, clashes with reality. Leaving morality aside, the Holocaust made no economic sense at a time when Germany was desperately short of workers. When Victor Brack, one of the officials charged with carrying out the Final Solution, suggested that between 2 and 3 million Jews could be sterilized and put to work rather than killed, Hitler wasn't interested. The German leader's plans for the rest of the people in the East were even more absurd in economic terms, since they involved the majority of the local inhabitants, not just minorities. Under Nazi doctrine, Germanization was the overarching goal, which meant eliminating as many non-Germans as possible and finding and elevating local Germans or bringing in new German settlers. But after Germany and the Soviet Union invaded Poland in 1939, 90 percent of the inhabitants of German-occupied territory were Poles and only 6 percent ethnic Germans. And as the empire grew, the proportions of ethnic Germans became even smaller. In the midst of a widening conflict, German officials methodically photographed and examined Polish families, discriminating in favor of those who appeared to have "the soundest German blood." All of which was guaranteed to stir resentment. Even Colonel-General Johannes von Blaskowitz, one of the German commanders in Poland, noted: "The idea that one can intimidate the Polish population by terrorism and rub their noses in the dirt will certainly prove false." Nowhere was that miscalculation more costly than in the Soviet Union. After Stalin's purges and forced collectivization of the 1930s, some Ukrainians, Lithuanians and even Russians were prepared to view any invaders as possible saviors. Hitler's ruthless policies, directed not just against Jews but also against Soviet POWs and the entire civilian population, quickly disabused them of such notions. That part of the story is fairly well-known. But Mazower goes one step further by demonstrating the hypothetical alternative. He points to the relatively enlightened occupation of southern Ukraine and Odessa. In the port city, locals could open businesses if they offered the right bribes, and visiting Germans were astonished by the thriving shops, restaurants and cafes -- all with plenty of food. "It simply showed what could have happened across the former Soviet territories," Mazower writes, "if the Germans had allowed markets to flourish and not planned to destroy the social order." Ironically, the industrialized economies of Western Europe, where German rule was far less draconian than in the East, contributed more to the German war effort than the Eastern territories did. By deliberately starving their Eastern subjects, the Germans only contributed to the poor performance of the agricultural sector. And yet it was the East that mesmerized Hitler, whose whole notion of Lebensraum was built on the premise that Germany would harvest great riches there, using largely mythic German settlers. There simply weren't anywhere near the number of Germans needed to transform those fantasies into reality. At times, Mazower's sweeping survey feels forced, trying to cover everything -- the origins of Nazism, the Holocaust, collaboration and resistance in all parts of occupied Europe. Inevitably, there are some questionable generalizations. In explaining the Nazi New Order, Mazower asserts, "the quest to unify Germans within a single German state" was more important than anti-Semitism or than the lust for conquest -- as if these are contradictory impulses. But all the way through, Mazower offers incisive details and insights that make Hitler's Empire a fascinating read. He points out, for example, that the United States accounted for 67 percent of the world's oil output in 1943 and the Soviet Union only 10 percent. So here, too, Hitler's basic assumptions about what he would gain by conquering the East were flawed: Even if his armies had taken the oil fields in the Caucasus, he wouldn't have solved his energy problem. Luckily for Germany's opponents, the master race was totally impervious to something as mundane as logic.
Copyright 2008, The Washington Post. All Rights Reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From School Library Journal

Starred Review. To the 5000-plus titles in English that examine Hitler and the Nazi era must be added yet another tome, and one that is good. Mazower (program director, Ctr. for International History, Columbia Univ.) has produced an exceptional study of the Nazis and their quest for the control of Europe and its surrounding territory. Expanding on his Dark Continent: Europe's Twentieth Century, Mazower masterfully surveys how the Nazis successfully applied current military technology to accomplish the age-old Prussian goal of dominating the other European nations. The Nazis were effective at conquering (at least at the beginning) but were awful at managing their new subjects: despite their initial spate of victories in 1939–40, the Germans were ruthless masters and quickly lost any support their newly conquered peoples may have felt for them as rulers. Mazower sets his narrative within the context of how European thinkers envisioned empire building in the new 20th century, which puts a slightly different spin on the Nazis and World War II. An essential work; recommended for all collections.—Ed Goedeken, Iowa State Univ. Lib., Ames
Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

About the Author

Mark Mazower is the Ira D. Wallach Professor of History at Columbia University. He is the author of What You Did Not Tell and The Balkans: A Short History, winner of the Wolfson Prize for History, among other books. He lives in New York City.

Michael Page has been recording audiobooks since the mid-1980s and now has nearly 500 titles to his credit. He has won two Audie Awards and several AudioFile Earphones Awards. A PhD and a professional actor, Michael is also a retired professor of theater. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Review

" Compelling . . . Mazower offers incisive details and insights that make Hitler's Empire a fascinating read."
-The Washington Post

"Drawing on an enormous amount of research, yet always writing clearly and well, Mr. Mazower takes the reader on a guided tour through every corner of the Nazis' domains."
-The New York Sun --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

Product details

ASIN ‏ : ‎ B06XQZV2RJ
Publisher ‏ : ‎ Penguin Books; Reprint edition (August 25, 2009)
Publication date ‏ : ‎ August 25, 2009
Language ‏ : ‎ English
File size ‏ : ‎ 19899 KB
Text-to-Speech ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Screen Reader ‏ : ‎ Supported
Enhanced typesetting ‏ : ‎ Enabled
X-Ray ‏ : ‎ Not Enabled
Word Wise ‏ : ‎ Enabled
Sticky notes ‏ : ‎ On Kindle Scribe
Print length ‏ : ‎ 782 pages

Best Sellers Rank: #783,565 in Kindle Store (See Top 100 in Kindle Store)
- #882 in History of Germany
- #1,168 in Jewish History (Kindle Store)
- #2,239 in Jewish Holocaust History

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Difficult, But Important Work With Implications For Today

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on November 26, 2009

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This work is about the short-lived empire that Hitler built, its guiding principles and how it was governed. As such, this is a study of governance, not military operations or even politics at the highest level, but nonetheless, this study is critical to understanding World War II and why Hitler failed in achieving his war aims. His policies decreed that a European Empire not only be constructed under German hegemony, but that four classes of citizens would be present: the German overlords; the "almost-Germans" (Danes, Norwegians, English, Dutch, Swedes, Finns and some Belgians; useful populations (French, Italians, Hungarians, etc.; and temporary slave or serf labor (Slavs and others.)

The author points out that this was not the first time a state attempted to create a Pan-European empire -- normally Napoleon is considered the first creator of a world (European -- unusally considered synomous with "world" by Europeans) order, but actually one can go further back to Louis XIV and the efforts by the Roman Catholic Church during the Middle Ages to create a secular confederation subject to Papal control and direction. Assuming that Hitler's empire was the second, we are now experiencing a third rising of a world order centered again in Europe and staffed and controlled by many of the same individuals and their adherents who were present during Hitler's times. One need only look at the Bilderbergs formed by Nazi sympathizer Prince Bernhard, and the development of the EU by Bilderberg members supplemented by other groups such as the Trilateral Commission and the US Council for Foreign Relations to see this at work. There are differences with respect to what roles the various populations will fulfill, but the desire for world (European) domination controlled by a powerful unelected elite is present in the current movement like it was during Hitler's regime.

In this respect, author Mazower's work is extremely instructive, both for showing what policies failed under Hitler (sometimes disasterously) and what worked. Fast-forwarding to the present day, the slave labor is present in 20 million Muslim workers in Europe (sort of), the governing elite is present in the EU bureaucracy in Brussels, and even "progressive" concepts like gun control and euthansia that Hitler introduced are alive and well in European states through gun control/confiscation laws and socialized health systems that ration health care to productive citizens first. Unfortunately, the US seems to be following Europe's lead into this same world order, suppressing individual liberty in favor of ever-intrusive government. If one changes the party from "National-Socialist" to Supra-National-Socialist" (SNAZI) it would be difficult to tell the difference between then and now other than in the racial policy against the Jews which has now abated in Europe (due in a large measure to the small numbers of remaining Jews), and in the citizenship classes by nationality instead of economic status.

The author points out that had Hitler's policy in the Soviet Union been to promote Ukrainian, Belorussian, and ethnic republics (even possibly a Russian non-communist republic), Operation Barbarossa might have been successful. There would have been time to suppress the Slavic populations later after the Soviet Union had been defeated, but Hitler opted for ideological purity rather than a pragmatic strategy. Gee, rather sounds like Obama today where he is being driven by ideology rather than pragmatism.

I could belabor many of these points, but suffice it to say the author does an excellent job of presenting Hitler's policies and actual implementations at length. In the long run they failed as populations were willing to support anyone fighting against the new and ultimate threat to liberty, even if they didn't see their struggle in those terms. In the very short run, harsh utilization of subject populations materially strengthened the war-making ability of the German Wehrmacht, and since Hitler expected a short war, that was what he wanted for the duration.

Today we understand that a longer time horizon is necessary. Our elite understands that it is only necessary to create crises of sufficient magnitude, economic, financial or the threat of war, to panic a people and cause them to give up their liberties. Europe had been weakened by economic hard times in the thirties, then the threat of war weakens individual resolve still further. By the time Hitler attacked, the West no longer could manifest a will to resist. Only England, secure behind its moat, found the time to gather itself together and resist. But even then, it took the totalitarian regime in the Soviet Union to defeat another totalitarian regime (Hitler's), and it most likely would have happened without the participation of the US. So what totalitarian regime will save us from the threat of war with Islam? Why, the new world order arising out of the EU, of course.

Read and comprehend. This is an important work.

4 people found this helpful

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Theodore A. Rushton

The ultimate cost of fear and terror

Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on October 3, 2008

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Aztecs.

Aztecs ruled a vast empire in the heart of Mexico by the fear imposed by cutting the living hearts from their victims, then rolling the bodies down the long blood-spattered steps of their pyramids. The Nazi terror didn't use pyramids; but, they made death a public and frequent spectacle. Both used pure terror without morals, mercy or meaning; both were crushed when their victims rebelled.

Aztecs used terror to worship their gods; Nazis used terror to offset their well-deserved inferiority complex produced by dfefeat in World War I. Endless terror is the cruelty used to crush slave revolts.

In defeating the Aztecs, Native Americans became victims of the Spanish who reduced the population by 90 percent within a century. The Spanish balanced the cost of feeding slaves against the price of new slaves; Nazis used similar accounting in their "labour" camps, and might have inflicted a similar fate on Eastern Europe had they been given a century to rule.

In both cases, terror was imposed by brutal armies who had utter contempt for the defeated. For the Nazis, killing was proof of the triumph of the will; for Aztecs, it was a pious religious rite. In early Newfoundland, extermination of the Beothuk people was "better sport" than killing deer. In every case, elimination of "trash" people was considered a virtue.

As John Lukacs writes in his superb 'Five Days in London: May 1940', "Churchill understood something that not many people understand even now. The greatest threat to Western civilization was not Communism. It was National Socialism. The greatest and most dynamic power in the world was not Soviet Russia. It was the Third Reich of Germany. The greatest revolutionary of the twentieth century was not Lenin or Stalin. It was Hitler."

Mazower explains the fate of mankind had Churchill failed. Sadly, the "right to kill" is often used by the Hitler's of the world who assume they have moral superiority over the lives and ethics of others. Thus, a "just" society executes murderers and other evildoers. "Exceptional" societies claim a right to impose their ideologies and morals at the point of a gun. Al Qaeda claims holy piety and thus a moral right to kill "unbelievers".

This book describes the impact of soldiers who wore 'Gott mit uns' on their belt buckles but felt no remose at wholesale slaughters of those their leaders deemed "trash". They were supported by millions of civilians, at least until they began to lose the war; and even now, by Americans such as Patrick Buchanan in his latest book.

Is it not a Christian ethic -- and a fundamental moral value of all religions -- to show mercy to the weak, the poor, the halt and the lame? Sadly, some want to kick the Underdogs out to make room for the "exceptional" superiors.

Who are the Underdogs? Take a look at 'The Underdogs' by Mariano Azuela, a reprinted classic from 1915 which vividly describes the wrath of those who finally rebel against brutal overlords.

Mazower describes a society based on fear and terror, a policy used for thousands of years though it has never achieved peace, progress, prosperity or innovation. In contrast to the ideology of terror, perhaps the only surprise is the relative mercy shown to the defeated Nazis.

Somehow, leaders must learn that force, repression, fear and terror doesn't work. Somehow, as weapons, authority, religion and globalisation become more pervasive and deadly, people must learn the merits of decency. As Mexican President Benito Juarez once said, "Peace is respect for the rights of others." Yet even he refused clemency to his defeated enemy, the Emperor Maximilian.

Will we ever learn?

8 people found this helpful

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Top reviews from other countries

Ivan Petrovic

WWII was different experience under Nazi rule for every nation.

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on August 12, 2018

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It is very well written account of what happened once Germany was in power. What is striking is that there was two wars: one in west and another in east and in south of Europe. The one in west was walk in park compared to things that happened in east or south.
Author is very objective and you can read this book like thriller. Some knowledge about WWII in general is needed to read this masterpiece.

5 people found this helpful

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Gift

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on May 30, 2020

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Can’t comment was a gift

One person found this helpful

Amazon Customer

Hitler's Empire - Strongly recommended for readability,detail and content!

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on February 17, 2016

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A concise, detailed overview includig most of the current research results with special regards for new, up to now less prominent points of view. The aspect of an "Empire" has been neglected by many serious Researchers in the past. A book, strongly recommended not only for any serious student of this period, but also relevant for institutional libraries.

3 people found this helpful

Kate Thornbury

good read

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on February 8, 2013

Verified Purchase

very good for an in depth analysis of the happenings of world war two. interesting read and good for uni work

One person found this helpful

Emily Sivell

When you feel that everything about this terrifying period in ...

Reviewed in the United Kingdom 🇬🇧 on January 13, 2015

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When you feel that everything about this terrifying period in our history has been written, along comes another aspect to fill one with amazement at man's inhumanity.

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