MissPandaGoth
New Member
Hey Guys,
For my personality study I've been focusing of Hitler's Architech Albert Speer.
We've recently been given an assignment (an oral -groan-) Which asks the
following:
PART A : Assess Albert Speer's contributions to Nazi Germany
and
PART B: 'Histories set the record straight' - how does this statement reflect your study of Speer?
Now, I learnt so much doing this, but at the same time it was a major strain and pain in the butt. So I've decided to post my speech here to help anyone else who is finding this topic hard. Please note: I havent gotten my results yet
but I feel I did an Alright job. I'm merely posting this to help other students.
Miss PandaGoth xxx
PS: Feel free to message me if you require any help concerning Albie Speer <3
______________________________________
PART A)
What were Albert Speer’s contributions to Nazi Germany?
Albert Speer was the first architect of The Third Reich, author and high-ranking Nazi German government official. Even today, he essentially could serve as a warning to those architects willing to sell out their ethical beliefs for wealth and/or fame. Speer had to assume responsibility for a vast enterprise and to solve three key issues that would decide the war effort – how to eliminate the gross inefficiencies of war production, how to increase armaments and munitions production and the problems of labor shortages and how to maintain production. It was Speer who designed several propaganda based structures that promised the Nazi party’s success. It was Speer, who … ‘made an enormous contribution to the survival of the Nazi Regime’.1 As Minister for Armaments and Munitions, it was Speer who prevented Hitler’s scorched earth policy from going ahead. Whether he was the good Nazi or the Liar, Albert Speer’s contributions to Nazi Germany still remains with his country to this day.
In 1931, Speer joined the NSDAP and soon was offered a succession of commissions for the party. He felt fortunate to have been given this opportunity to build and create in a world full of unemployment. His talent and ability were quickly recognized by Hitler and in 1934 he became Hitler’s chief architect. Speer was assigned to assist Hitler in his Dream of creating the ultimate Germany. Hitler and Speer began a project to rebuild the German Capital of Berlin as part of Hitler’s vision for the future of Germany. Hitler named this project ‘Germania’. Firstly, Speer and Hitler planned to construct the Olympic Stadium for the upcoming 1936 Olympics. This grand stadium would promote the rise of the Nazi government, whose ultimate aim was to gain more seats in the Reichstag.
Speer’s most famous designs included the zeppelintribune and the Nuremberg Parade grounds. Between 1923 and 1938 the Nuremberg rallies took place – they were large propaganda events designed by Speer and organized by the state. The primary focus of these rallies was the almost religious focus on Hitler, portraying Hitler as Germany’s saviour, chosen by divine providence.
The marches had a huge presence and were very impressive. Speer made the comment "my mother saw a Storm Trooper parade ... the sight of discipline in a time of chaos, the impression of energy in an atmosphere of universal hopelessness, seems to have won her over also” 2 . These parades stirred strong nationalist feelings in many Germans, and those who respected the militaristic values that Germany had previously stood for were very supportive of Hitler. The ideal of discipline appealed to many, and although the Nazi Party was quite small, it was a tightly controlled, highly disciplined organisation3. This is one reason why the Nazis gained growing support during the 1920's.
Hitler selected Speer to be the Minister for Armaments and Munitions in 1942. From 1942 to the end of the war in 1945, Speer was one of the central planners of the German war economy and was responsible for the production of armament and the construction of strategic defenses. In April 1942 Speer set up the Central Planning Board to control the allocation of raw materials to industry.
In 1942 Speer argued that women should take their place in the work-force which Hitler objected to. In contrast he saw the role of women as home makers and child bearers. ‘Speer’s great contribution to the war effort was that he was able to radically increase the level of war production’4. From March to July 1942, armaments production increased by 55%. In addition, Speer’s department also managed to keep the German transport system operating. In 1943 Speer took over the production of the U-boats and with a competent system of mobile repair units he achieved extraordinary feats in getting bombed factories back into production.
During the last years of WWII, Hitler still continued to consider Speer trustworthy, though this trust waned near the war's end as Speer, at considerable risk, campaigned clandestinely to prevent the implementation of Hitler's Nero Decree.5
“We shall not capitulate, no, never,” Hitler told Rauschning in 1943. “We may be destroyed, but if we are, we shall drag a world with us- a world in flames” 6
His final orders to Speer were to carry out a huge operation of annihilation( his scorched earth policy) and it was only Speer’s bold action in ignoring this order that was responsible for saving a great deal of Germany’s industrial potential.7 Albert Speer braved this policy on March 18, 1945, to write to Hitler that the war was lost and that some measures should be taken to preserve the subsistence level of the population. This differed from every other Nazi as none of them were prepared to disagree, let-alone disobey Hitler's orders. 8 It was this action, as well as the claim that he had no idea about Hitler's 'final solution', that Speer thought would save him from being imprisoned by the allies after the Germans had lost the war. This was the point were Speer went against the German war machine and worked to save himself.
PART B
Histories set the record straight.
Speer's well structured and thought out defense in the Nuremburg trials shaped historical interpretation for years to come. Different historians result in different questions being asked, different sources being used and different perspectives on the subject being analyzed. Histories written concerning Albert Speer have changed during time and they will continue to change as the years go on. The further the distance in time to the actual event, the less likely we will have a personal link with the subject. Future audiences will look at Speer differently and since WWII, historians have had more and more time to assess the bigger picture.
Several historians have tried to discover how a man of Speer’s talent and immense intelligence could have been convinced by the arguments of National Socialism and became – as far as was possible – Hitler’s friend. Gitta Sereny maintains that Speer probably “through his efforts prolonged the war by a considerable period”9. Speer was a complex and brilliant individual who confronted issues of good and evil on a scale that most of us would be hard pressed to m but do histories set the record straight? Do historians see Speer for who he really was? There is no doubt that what we are considering is a likeable man, a man of thoughtfulness and conscience who played a considerable role in an evil empire. Was he misled? A victim of the persuasive charm of Hitler? Or was he a coward who lied to the world and escaped death by the skin of his teeth? Historians all over the globe have tried to answer these questions and are still attempting to discover the real Albert Speer.
In the period from 1945 to 1971 historians were overwhelmed by his performance at the Nuremberg trials and were mostly persuaded by his story10. For example, in his renowned biography of Hitler, first published in 1952, the British historian Alan Bullock praised Speer’s performance in the field of armaments production, calling it ‘remarkable’11. In discussing Speer’s position, he accepts at face value a range of his arguments; that Hitler’s charisma was such that he had a powerful hold over his followers, thereby preventing them from practising free will; that Speer had indeed planned to murder Hitler; and that Speer had been a technocrat who was ‘… interested far more in the job that he had to do than in the power it brought him’. 12 Speer, speaking of his actions and decisions of the period said: “... I had to admit that I confused right and wrong, but I felt I had never acted disloyally.” 13
After living in the Speer Household for many years journalist Gitta Sereny wrote her book ‘Albert Speer: his battle with the truth’ in 1985. Speer and Sereny shared a unique bond and Speer often confided in her. He told her about how his lonely unhappy childhood had affected him to the point that he had.. ‘The inability to feel anything’14. Sereny truly respected Speer and saw in him, much sorrow and regret ‘There was a missing dimension in Speer, the capacity to feel or to express pitty, compassion or sympathy.’15
Sereny believes that her novel is the most accurate historical analysis of Speer, since he opened up to her like no one else before.
Sereny believed that he had undoubtedly known about the murder of the Jews and that his constant refusal to face the issue was the great lie of his life. However, Gitta Sereny was also willing to believe that after the Nuremberg trial Speer had made a … genuine commitment to repent16. Unforgiven by so many for having served Hitler, he elected to spend the rest of his life in confrontation with his past, unforgiving of himself for having so nearly loved a monster. ‘I came to understand and value Speer’s battle with himself and saw in it the re-emergence of the intrinsic morality he manifested as a boy and youth.’ 17
While Sereny's book reflects the face of Albert Speer, it is also a mirror that projects the image of Adolf Hitler and the faces of all those who saw nothing and suspected nothing.
The Dutch historian Dan van der Vat was also a fierce critic of Speer. Alternatively, he sets out to expose Speer as liar in his book, mockingly entitled The good Nazi. He argued that ‘…the eviction of the Jews does not put Speer on the bride of the SS Holocaust or even in the engine room but he was in the first-class saloon, driving steerage passengers out into the gathering storm.18 Van der vat clearly believes that Speer saw enough to know what was happening and was in fact just ‘a liar, a fraud and a hypocrite19.
Documenting his case with detail that rarely grows tedious, Professor Matthias Schmidt. exposes major flaws in the monument that Speer, who died in 1981, erected to himself. He argues in his book “Albert Speer: The End of a Myth’ that .despite Speer's claims to having been a disinterested bystander, he was in fact a ‘master manoeuvrer in the endless power struggle that went on around Hitler and continued to win until it suited him to switch to the side of Germany's enemies.’20. He shows how Speer successfully manipulated the judges at the Nuremberg trial and then covered this up in his memoirs by misquoting the court transcript. By demolishing Speer's carefully tailored image of himself, Matthias Schmidt has contributed to setting the record straight, even though he overestimates the extent to which historians have been misled by that image.
In conclusion
Speer serves to remind us that fanatics such as Adolf Hitler and his disciples can cope with the complexities of the modern world only if they can call upon the talents of unscrupulous, self-serving men like Albert Speer.
So do histories set the record straight? They give us a clear understanding of events and personalities, but in the end, it all narrows down to the responder and how they interpret and analyze the enigma of Albert Speer.
__________________________________________________
Books:
Snyder L 1976, Encyclopedia of the Third Reich, McGraw-Hill Book Company
Shuter J 2003, The Holocaust: Life and Death in Hitler’s Europe, Heinemann
Sheehan S 2000, The Death Camps, Hodder Wayland Books
Fischer K 1995, Nazi Germany: A New History, Continuum. New York
Pinson R 1966, Modern Germany, The Macmillan Company New York
Newton D 1990, Germany: 1918-1945, Collins Dove
Sereny G 1996, Albert Speer: His Battle with Truth, Picador Books
Mason K J 1996, Republic to Reich: A history of Germany 1918-1939, McGraw
Willoughby S 2001, The Holocaust, Heinemann Library
Moss, P 1978, Modern World History, BAS Printers, Hampshire
Thomson, D 1963 Europe Since Napoleon, 2nd Edition, Longmans Canada Ltd, Toronto
Holborn, H 1978, A History of Modern Germany 1840 – 1945, Knopf Inc., New York
Websites:
http://www.shoah.dk/Henchmen/jpg_aspeer.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Speer
http://www.auschwitz.dk/Speer.htm
http://albertspeer.tripod.com/
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/speer.html
DVDs:
McTavish G 2000, Propaganda: The War of the Mind, Cromwell Productions
For my personality study I've been focusing of Hitler's Architech Albert Speer.
We've recently been given an assignment (an oral -groan-) Which asks the
following:
PART A : Assess Albert Speer's contributions to Nazi Germany
and
PART B: 'Histories set the record straight' - how does this statement reflect your study of Speer?
Now, I learnt so much doing this, but at the same time it was a major strain and pain in the butt. So I've decided to post my speech here to help anyone else who is finding this topic hard. Please note: I havent gotten my results yet
but I feel I did an Alright job. I'm merely posting this to help other students.
Miss PandaGoth xxx
PS: Feel free to message me if you require any help concerning Albie Speer <3
______________________________________
PART A)
What were Albert Speer’s contributions to Nazi Germany?
Albert Speer was the first architect of The Third Reich, author and high-ranking Nazi German government official. Even today, he essentially could serve as a warning to those architects willing to sell out their ethical beliefs for wealth and/or fame. Speer had to assume responsibility for a vast enterprise and to solve three key issues that would decide the war effort – how to eliminate the gross inefficiencies of war production, how to increase armaments and munitions production and the problems of labor shortages and how to maintain production. It was Speer who designed several propaganda based structures that promised the Nazi party’s success. It was Speer, who … ‘made an enormous contribution to the survival of the Nazi Regime’.1 As Minister for Armaments and Munitions, it was Speer who prevented Hitler’s scorched earth policy from going ahead. Whether he was the good Nazi or the Liar, Albert Speer’s contributions to Nazi Germany still remains with his country to this day.
In 1931, Speer joined the NSDAP and soon was offered a succession of commissions for the party. He felt fortunate to have been given this opportunity to build and create in a world full of unemployment. His talent and ability were quickly recognized by Hitler and in 1934 he became Hitler’s chief architect. Speer was assigned to assist Hitler in his Dream of creating the ultimate Germany. Hitler and Speer began a project to rebuild the German Capital of Berlin as part of Hitler’s vision for the future of Germany. Hitler named this project ‘Germania’. Firstly, Speer and Hitler planned to construct the Olympic Stadium for the upcoming 1936 Olympics. This grand stadium would promote the rise of the Nazi government, whose ultimate aim was to gain more seats in the Reichstag.
Speer’s most famous designs included the zeppelintribune and the Nuremberg Parade grounds. Between 1923 and 1938 the Nuremberg rallies took place – they were large propaganda events designed by Speer and organized by the state. The primary focus of these rallies was the almost religious focus on Hitler, portraying Hitler as Germany’s saviour, chosen by divine providence.
The marches had a huge presence and were very impressive. Speer made the comment "my mother saw a Storm Trooper parade ... the sight of discipline in a time of chaos, the impression of energy in an atmosphere of universal hopelessness, seems to have won her over also” 2 . These parades stirred strong nationalist feelings in many Germans, and those who respected the militaristic values that Germany had previously stood for were very supportive of Hitler. The ideal of discipline appealed to many, and although the Nazi Party was quite small, it was a tightly controlled, highly disciplined organisation3. This is one reason why the Nazis gained growing support during the 1920's.
Hitler selected Speer to be the Minister for Armaments and Munitions in 1942. From 1942 to the end of the war in 1945, Speer was one of the central planners of the German war economy and was responsible for the production of armament and the construction of strategic defenses. In April 1942 Speer set up the Central Planning Board to control the allocation of raw materials to industry.
In 1942 Speer argued that women should take their place in the work-force which Hitler objected to. In contrast he saw the role of women as home makers and child bearers. ‘Speer’s great contribution to the war effort was that he was able to radically increase the level of war production’4. From March to July 1942, armaments production increased by 55%. In addition, Speer’s department also managed to keep the German transport system operating. In 1943 Speer took over the production of the U-boats and with a competent system of mobile repair units he achieved extraordinary feats in getting bombed factories back into production.
During the last years of WWII, Hitler still continued to consider Speer trustworthy, though this trust waned near the war's end as Speer, at considerable risk, campaigned clandestinely to prevent the implementation of Hitler's Nero Decree.5
“We shall not capitulate, no, never,” Hitler told Rauschning in 1943. “We may be destroyed, but if we are, we shall drag a world with us- a world in flames” 6
His final orders to Speer were to carry out a huge operation of annihilation( his scorched earth policy) and it was only Speer’s bold action in ignoring this order that was responsible for saving a great deal of Germany’s industrial potential.7 Albert Speer braved this policy on March 18, 1945, to write to Hitler that the war was lost and that some measures should be taken to preserve the subsistence level of the population. This differed from every other Nazi as none of them were prepared to disagree, let-alone disobey Hitler's orders. 8 It was this action, as well as the claim that he had no idea about Hitler's 'final solution', that Speer thought would save him from being imprisoned by the allies after the Germans had lost the war. This was the point were Speer went against the German war machine and worked to save himself.
PART B
Histories set the record straight.
Speer's well structured and thought out defense in the Nuremburg trials shaped historical interpretation for years to come. Different historians result in different questions being asked, different sources being used and different perspectives on the subject being analyzed. Histories written concerning Albert Speer have changed during time and they will continue to change as the years go on. The further the distance in time to the actual event, the less likely we will have a personal link with the subject. Future audiences will look at Speer differently and since WWII, historians have had more and more time to assess the bigger picture.
Several historians have tried to discover how a man of Speer’s talent and immense intelligence could have been convinced by the arguments of National Socialism and became – as far as was possible – Hitler’s friend. Gitta Sereny maintains that Speer probably “through his efforts prolonged the war by a considerable period”9. Speer was a complex and brilliant individual who confronted issues of good and evil on a scale that most of us would be hard pressed to m but do histories set the record straight? Do historians see Speer for who he really was? There is no doubt that what we are considering is a likeable man, a man of thoughtfulness and conscience who played a considerable role in an evil empire. Was he misled? A victim of the persuasive charm of Hitler? Or was he a coward who lied to the world and escaped death by the skin of his teeth? Historians all over the globe have tried to answer these questions and are still attempting to discover the real Albert Speer.
In the period from 1945 to 1971 historians were overwhelmed by his performance at the Nuremberg trials and were mostly persuaded by his story10. For example, in his renowned biography of Hitler, first published in 1952, the British historian Alan Bullock praised Speer’s performance in the field of armaments production, calling it ‘remarkable’11. In discussing Speer’s position, he accepts at face value a range of his arguments; that Hitler’s charisma was such that he had a powerful hold over his followers, thereby preventing them from practising free will; that Speer had indeed planned to murder Hitler; and that Speer had been a technocrat who was ‘… interested far more in the job that he had to do than in the power it brought him’. 12 Speer, speaking of his actions and decisions of the period said: “... I had to admit that I confused right and wrong, but I felt I had never acted disloyally.” 13
After living in the Speer Household for many years journalist Gitta Sereny wrote her book ‘Albert Speer: his battle with the truth’ in 1985. Speer and Sereny shared a unique bond and Speer often confided in her. He told her about how his lonely unhappy childhood had affected him to the point that he had.. ‘The inability to feel anything’14. Sereny truly respected Speer and saw in him, much sorrow and regret ‘There was a missing dimension in Speer, the capacity to feel or to express pitty, compassion or sympathy.’15
Sereny believes that her novel is the most accurate historical analysis of Speer, since he opened up to her like no one else before.
Sereny believed that he had undoubtedly known about the murder of the Jews and that his constant refusal to face the issue was the great lie of his life. However, Gitta Sereny was also willing to believe that after the Nuremberg trial Speer had made a … genuine commitment to repent16. Unforgiven by so many for having served Hitler, he elected to spend the rest of his life in confrontation with his past, unforgiving of himself for having so nearly loved a monster. ‘I came to understand and value Speer’s battle with himself and saw in it the re-emergence of the intrinsic morality he manifested as a boy and youth.’ 17
While Sereny's book reflects the face of Albert Speer, it is also a mirror that projects the image of Adolf Hitler and the faces of all those who saw nothing and suspected nothing.
The Dutch historian Dan van der Vat was also a fierce critic of Speer. Alternatively, he sets out to expose Speer as liar in his book, mockingly entitled The good Nazi. He argued that ‘…the eviction of the Jews does not put Speer on the bride of the SS Holocaust or even in the engine room but he was in the first-class saloon, driving steerage passengers out into the gathering storm.18 Van der vat clearly believes that Speer saw enough to know what was happening and was in fact just ‘a liar, a fraud and a hypocrite19.
Documenting his case with detail that rarely grows tedious, Professor Matthias Schmidt. exposes major flaws in the monument that Speer, who died in 1981, erected to himself. He argues in his book “Albert Speer: The End of a Myth’ that .despite Speer's claims to having been a disinterested bystander, he was in fact a ‘master manoeuvrer in the endless power struggle that went on around Hitler and continued to win until it suited him to switch to the side of Germany's enemies.’20. He shows how Speer successfully manipulated the judges at the Nuremberg trial and then covered this up in his memoirs by misquoting the court transcript. By demolishing Speer's carefully tailored image of himself, Matthias Schmidt has contributed to setting the record straight, even though he overestimates the extent to which historians have been misled by that image.
In conclusion
Speer serves to remind us that fanatics such as Adolf Hitler and his disciples can cope with the complexities of the modern world only if they can call upon the talents of unscrupulous, self-serving men like Albert Speer.
So do histories set the record straight? They give us a clear understanding of events and personalities, but in the end, it all narrows down to the responder and how they interpret and analyze the enigma of Albert Speer.
__________________________________________________
Bibliography
Books:
Snyder L 1976, Encyclopedia of the Third Reich, McGraw-Hill Book Company
Shuter J 2003, The Holocaust: Life and Death in Hitler’s Europe, Heinemann
Sheehan S 2000, The Death Camps, Hodder Wayland Books
Fischer K 1995, Nazi Germany: A New History, Continuum. New York
Pinson R 1966, Modern Germany, The Macmillan Company New York
Newton D 1990, Germany: 1918-1945, Collins Dove
Sereny G 1996, Albert Speer: His Battle with Truth, Picador Books
Mason K J 1996, Republic to Reich: A history of Germany 1918-1939, McGraw
Willoughby S 2001, The Holocaust, Heinemann Library
Moss, P 1978, Modern World History, BAS Printers, Hampshire
Thomson, D 1963 Europe Since Napoleon, 2nd Edition, Longmans Canada Ltd, Toronto
Holborn, H 1978, A History of Modern Germany 1840 – 1945, Knopf Inc., New York
Websites:
http://www.shoah.dk/Henchmen/jpg_aspeer.htm
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Albert_Speer
http://www.auschwitz.dk/Speer.htm
http://albertspeer.tripod.com/
http://www.jewishvirtuallibrary.org/jsource/Holocaust/speer.html
DVDs:
McTavish G 2000, Propaganda: The War of the Mind, Cromwell Productions
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