At Hitler's Side: The Memoirs of Hitler's Luftwaffe Adjutant 1937-1945 (Greenhill Book)

Found this book to be a great read. It's written more from the German frame of mind of the time, not from an outsider perspective. The author describes Hitler from a personal perspective,his comments and description of Hitler may not jive with the majority view of the man. There are great insights into the infighting and "normal" conversations of German Wehrmacht officers and Nazi's alike.

George Orwell once wrote that "the hatred the Spanish Republic aroused in dukes, playboys, millionaires and what-not" was sufficient cause for believing it had right on its side. The reaction of the two men quoted by Amazon (see above) towards this book is sufficient cause for reading it. Such people view all firsthand accounts from Hitler's regime in terms of "does he say what we want him to say, or doesn't he? Does he admit to knowing about the concentration camps, or not?" One could scarcely have a narrower view or miss the point more completely.AT HITLER'S SIDE is the most emotionally honest, and least politically correct, of all the memiors written by survivor's of Adolf Hitler's inner circle. The author, Colonel Nicholaus von Below, served as Hitler's air force adjutant from 1937 until 1945, and as a result was one of the priveleged few who enjoyed a "view from the top." That is not to say that he always felt priveleged or enjoyed the view: Below was clearly a man who wished on occasion he were an ordinary Luftwaffe pilot. Certainly his job involved a lot more than just briefing "Der Fuehrer" on technical air force matters, but therein lies the story.Like most of the people around Hitler, Below's "real" job was not listed in his job description. He seems to have been an unofficial representative of the rank-and-file officers in the Luftwaffe - that is to say, a spokesman for the Luftwaffe itself rather than for Goering, who was despised and hated by most of his men for his vainglory, bullying, and incompetence. Below felt it incumbent to push an agenda with Hitler that ran contrary to the "Fatboy's" wishes, but though he gained Hitler's trust and respect he was never able to effect the changes in the system he desired, with the result that he, Below, had to watch as yar in and year out, his beloved air force declined further and further into technical obsolescence and impotence. In addition, he was also witness to palace intrigues right out of Byzantium - all those cliques and cabals in government, business, the armed forces, and the Party, each trying to advance its own interests at the expense of the other, and often, at the expense of Germany. This often caused great psychological strain, as did Below's controversial suspicions that some in the high command were deliberately sabotaging the military effort - suspicions that have always been hotly denied by surviving members of the "military resistance against Nazism", and by those who want to believe that Hitler alone was the cause of all Germany's defeats. More controversially yet, Below flatly denies that he had any inkling of the "special measures" being taken in Russia and Poland by the SS, which the reviewers above find ludicrous, but which anyone who has actually researched the highly compartmentalized nature of Hitler's dictatorship may find less so.But probably the biggest controversy is Below's depiction of Hitler himself. Americans tend to think of Hitler as something between a comic-opera nut case, screaming abuse and chewing the carpet like Charlie Chaplain, and a glowering Antichrist figure out of Revelations. Certainly Hitler was a complex man, "a demon struggling with a genius" as Speer related, and according to Manstein, well capable of tailoring his personality to his audience. Below's experience with Hitler seems to have been largely positive: he recounts a more or less benign tyrant, man of unfailing personal courtesy and broad vision, whose psychological state was slowly undermined by the immeasurable pressures he took upon himself, as well as by ceaseless palace intrigues and the unscrupulousness of some of his confederates. Whether one believes Below or not in this regard is to me irrelevant, since what matters here is the man's perceptions of what happened and not the reality as such. ALL memiors are filled with lies, evasions, distortions, and self-serving facts. Winston Churchill managed to write a six-volume history of the Second World War that hardly mentions the all-important Eastern Front, where 32 million people died, and which downplays the innumerable military blunders he committed during the war; Dwight Einsenhower, on the other hand, devoted exactly one sentence in CRUSADE IN EUROPE to the Battle of the Huertgen Forest, in which 30,000 U.S. troops were killed or wounded because he couldn't be bothered to stop a pointless attack. Obviously Below's memior doesn't jibe with certain views of Hitler expressed by others; but that neither invalidates what Below has to say nor "proves" the others wrong. It's up to the reader to determine the accuracy of what he/she is reading, and not to fall victim to the "if he doesn't admit X or Y or say Z, he must be lying" type of not- thinking.

Because this woman spent day in and day out with Hitler for most of the end period of his rule and because she seems to have been able to be very frank with him (e.g. telling him that Eva Braun wasn't good enough for him) you get a picture of Hitler that is more the view of a valet than the view of a fellow-politician or military man. The result is to make clear that he was far more monstrous personally than is often apparent in other accounts. In essence we learn that he essentially imprisoned his staff, having them - if he wanted - at his side 24/7 whether they were needed or not (he needed them for emotional comfort apparently) so that he was an emotional vampire, depriving them of a personal life. The reader is left with the impression that the author would have gone to have her own life with a partner and children (or whatever she wanted for herself) but that Hitler sucked 15 years out of her life being his slave. Disturbing about the book Is the author's unstated but obvious continued awe and respect for this Monster, but this makes her indictment of his more convincing.

This little book often reads like a decently informative encyclopedia article. Most of what you are going to get can be found elsewhere. However, there is some nuance: it is interesting, if shudder-inducing, to occasionally glimpse what seems to be unrepentant, even if mildly stated, admiration for his subject (which thankfully declines as the war goes on). There is also some detail, like why Hitler's enthusiasm for some new aircraft designs did not translate into production (Goering thought he had a couple of years of production time: he did not expect Hitler to start WWII so soon).There are occasional insider glimpses. For one thing, he has a different take on Hitler's expectations and reaction vis-a-vis England's support of Poland. The standard story (the source is Hitler's interpreter) is that Hitler had been convinced by Ribbentrop that England would not follow through on the recently-ratified treat with Poland. The author states that, on the contrary, he saw (or at least implies he was there) Hitler say to Goering, "My dear Goering, if the British ratify a treaty one day, they don't break it the next."Speaking of Goering, the author did seem to serve as an audience for Hitler's complaints about Goering's handling of the air war - but nothing in this book that touches on this subject is terribly revealing if you've read any descriptions about the decline of Goering.There is some detail about German reactions in Stalingrad - what the officers present were actually writing about how bad the situation was. But this is brief. In fact, no situation is dwelt on at length in this short book.Except for being able to speak frankly with Hitler about a few military questions, he doesn't really seem to have his own story to tell. And even that content is disappointingly meager, given the title of the book.The book itself is written almost from the omniscient third-person narrator point of view, like a history textbook, with just occasional eyewitness detail. So, not much of a memoir, really. And, yes, the information is mostly available elsewhere. That doesn't make the book worthless (especially to someone who is just getting started reading up on the details of WWII), but it does make it a bit redundant.

Excelente ,mesmo em sendo em inglês. É fácil traduzir,pois o livro é excelente!!Afinal é uma super biografia do Below, ajudante de Hitler. (Força aérea).

Good read another hi ranking nazi who didn't know any thing about atrocities must have operated with ears and eyes shut hear no evil see no evil say no evil🙉🙉🙊

Excellent témoignage! Very interesting! Well written.

Libro che tratta molto approfonditamente l'argomento.Sono molto soddisfatto dell'acquisto!Come sempre l'articolo miè giunto in modo rapido e veloce.

An excellent book, from the standpoint of one who was at Hitler's side, but almost as a spectator, for the last 8 years of the 3rd Reich. The reader is assumed to know WW2 history inside out.• GOOD: minimal details on the life of the author; the book starts quickly. A unique insight.• BAD: Hitler just comes off as too "reasonable". I am quite surprised that this book is referred to with praise, on many occasions, in Gitta Sereny's book on Albert Speer. The image of Hitler that comes out is more in line with David Irving's than with Gitta Sereny's.