This compelling book on Hitler and Stalin - the culmination of thirty years' work - examines the two tyrants during the Second World War, when Germany and the Soviet Union fought the biggest and bloodiest war in history. Yet despite the fact they were bitter opponents, Laurence Rees shows that Hitler and Stalin were, to a large extent, different sides of the same coin.
Hitler's charismatic leadership may contrast with Stalin's regimented rule by fear; and his intransigence later in the war may contrast with Stalin's change in behaviour in response to events. But at a macro level, both were prepared to create undreamt of suffering, destroy individual liberty and twist facts in order to build the Utopia they wanted, and while Hitler's creation of the Holocaust remains a singular crime, Rees shows why we must not forget that Stalin committed a series of atrocities at the same time.
Using previously unpublished, startling eyewitness testimony from soldiers of the Red Army and Wehrmacht, civilians who suffered during the conflict, and those who knew both men personally, bestselling historian Laurence Rees - probably the only person alive who has met Germans who worked for Hitler and Russians who worked for Stalin - challenges long-held popular misconceptions about two of the most important figures in history. This is a masterwork from one of our finest historians.
Published February, 2021
Buy the book
I’ve read this book twice now. I’ve avoided reviewing it because I just don’t know what to say about it. Not that it’s bad, because it’s not. It just gives me so much to chew on, it’s hard to parse it all out for a review.
Through years of research, I’ve decided you can’t really understand World War II without understanding both Hitler and Stalin. The men hated each other and everything they stood for, but there were also some striking similarities between them. Comparisons are not frequently done. There was a book released a while ago (Hitler and Stalin: Parallel Lives) that compared the two throughout their lifetimes, but since then, it’s been pretty quiet on that front.
When I saw Laurence Rees released this book, I jumped on it. Rather than taking a lifelong look at both men, Rees gives some details about their upbringings, but he focuses more on the war years, from 1939 on, though there are some events previous that do hold weight, like Hitler’s time as a soldier in World War I. Through careful study and chronology, Rees shows how the two dictators are similar, but mostly how they differ in so many respects.
It’s hard to study these men, but they have long interested me because they have shown just what extremes humanity is capable of, if given the right circumstances. I watched a Great Courses lecture series last year about the idea of Utopia, and the distances people will go to try to attain their ultimate society. Hitler and Stalin, when seen under a certain lens, were both men who were striving after their ultimate utopia. They operated in different ways, and their ultimate visions were vastly different, but they both marched to the drumbeat of vision.
It’s not a question as to whether these men were evil or not, what Rees does here is show how they operated. How their similarities and differences both impacted their governmental systems in dramatically different ways. Stalin was adept at using people to get his aim, of editing history and glossing over uncomfortable details. Stalin watched, while Hitler was the charismatic, center of the stage man who commanded attention and could bring halls packed with people to their knees. Stalin never forgot anything and carried a grudge, while Hitler only saw what he wanted to see.
The two men played off of each other in some ways. Hitler was terrified of communism, and Stalin was terrified of the nationalist cause. Stalin wanted a stateless society, and Hitler wanted an empire. Both men ruthlessly ruled in order to see the fruition of their goals, and their ruling styles were vastly different and worth a study all on its own. They tolerated each other at first, but when World War II hit, and Hitler blasted right past the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact and invaded Stalin’s lands, everything changed.
Stalin knew how to work with the allied governments to get the support he needed. He knew what to say and how to say it. He knew what to do, and he knew that everything depended on securing help for the Soviet front of the war. Hitler, on the other hand, often delegated tasks to others. Stalin was paranoid, and considering many of his purges, he likely had reason to be. He didn’t dictate to others, rather he held the reigns of the government and took action on his own, in a much more hands-on way than Hitler ever did.
As Rees says in this book, “Ultimately, both Hitler and Stalin made the same mistake. Both fooled themselves into believing that they could think into existence what they wanted to happen.” Both men held unfathomable power in their hands and were surrounded by sycophants and yes-men. Both could easily delude themselves into believing they were succeeding, winning, doing the right thing for the right reason. No one really had the courage to gainsay either man. Those who did not perform up to caliber ended up being (literally) erased from history in Stalin’s regime and as late as 1944, “… Hitler openly fantasized that Jews were responsible for anything and everything that he opposed and feared. Unlike Stalin, who saw different potential enemies wherever he looked, Hitler saw the same enemy the world over.”
In the end, these two tyrants tore the world apart. Millions died under their regimes and their legacies and the suffering they imbued is still felt to this day. Their modes of leadership were vastly different, as were their ultimate end goals. Despite their differences, they both viewed themselves as infallible, and their nations’ most prized asset. This book is important, not just to show what people are capable of, but as a lesson to all of us about the relationship between people and power.
We must learn from the past.
Stunningly researched, fantastically written, this book will be a classic for any World War II history buff.
5/5 stars
Comments
Post a Comment