Ian Kershaw

Well, let's get into it.

The thing about Hitler in terms of his character that's misrepresented by people like Alan Bullock, by people like Kershaw, really by kind of the seminal like mainstream historians of Hitler, they cast him as this kind of provincial rube who was not at all worldly, you know, and, um, you know, kind of had no understanding of power political affairs outside of, you know, this narrow corner literally of the kind of, of, of, of the Hasser empire where he was raised.

You know, this kind of, this kind of underdeveloped, you know, sort of failing by the time he was born, like monarchist dinosaur, you know, that was, that was wracked by like ethnic conflict and, and things and, and kind of arcane political structures, you know, and, and, um, and intrigues and vendettas therein.

That's not at all the case.

Yeah, why don't...

Okay.

How do you want to finish up this I wanted to do a retrospective on Hitler's character a bit because the main biographies of Hitler that are accepted by court historians are Ian Kershaw, Alan Bullock, Joachim Fest, and John Toland.

Although Toland increasingly, I mean, he's been dead for many years, but increasingly he's no longer considered part of the canon because he, you know, people who want to finesse their ideological prejudice would say like, oh, he humanizes Hitler or he minimizes the severity of, you know, purported, you know, fascist evil and things.

I mean, that's essential, and that was after Ensig that, that was the model for how things were going to be organized.

Okay? So these guys like Ian Ker- Ian Kershaw and some of these other kinda just midwit court historians who are like, "Oh, German chauvinism and German nationalism." It's like, look, nobody...

There, there, there weren't a million like non-Germans who signed on to, to fight in the Waffen-SS 'cause they loved the German nationalism.

Like, that's not how things worked, and that's just not how-- It's asinine.

I don't really, I don't really, but at the same time, it's important not to reduce things just to that.

Like I've heard, I know people like Ian Kershaw, they act like Adolf Hitler was some kind of con man who just capitalized on these kinds of grievances that were kind of middling.

I mean, first of all, Weimar really was tailored to wreck the German economy.

That was its point.

But that's basically Hitler's geopolitical book.

Like Mein Kampf is like, it's basically, it's Hitler like making his case to the German voter as to why you should vote for the National Socialists.

That's the only thing that's goofy when you get these losers, whether it was old Chrissy Hitchens or whether it's Ian Kershaw.

It's like, oh, my cop's a terrible book.

I mean, because intentions and opportunities arise.

The great historical example of this is Ian Kershaw's work on the Holocaust.

The Nazis went from removing Jews from German society, expelling Jews from the Third Reich, to a program of physical extermination.

Well, genocide is policy.

And then there are, you know, the, there's a book called The Devil's Admiral about him, so that gives you an idea of some of the flavor of, uh, of some of the historical writing.

He's been called an arch Nazi by Ian, historian Ian Kershaw, for example, or he's been called, uh, incorrigible even after the war ended by a German, uh, historian, Michael Epkenhans.

So there's a lot of material there to work with for us to explore why are historians writing this about Dönitz, where does all this come from, and why did our supporter ask about this in particular? It's because of this historiographical, so older history or the, the history of history writing, let's say.

So that's kind of a bit of the, the thinky background.

Well, let's get into it.

The thing that I didn't like about Hitler in terms of his character that's misrepresented by people like Alan Bullock, by people like Kershaw, really by kind of the seminal mainstream historians of Hitler.

They cast him...

Thumbtack presents Uncertainty Strikes.

Okay.

How do you want to finish up

this? I wanted to do a retrospective on Hitler's character a bit because the main biographies of Hitler that are accepted by court historians are Ian Kershaw, Alan Bullock, Jakob Fest, And John Toland, although Toland increasingly, I mean, he's been dead for many years, but increasingly he's no longer considered part of the canon because he, you know, people who want to finesse their ideological prejudice would say, like, oh, he humanizes Hitler or he minimizes the severity of, you know, purported, you know, fascist evil and things.

But if you're going to deal with Hitler in any meaningful capacity, you kind of have to rebut those allegations and those kinds of specious claims.