Leonard Mosley (1913–1992)

I thought I knew this period backwards and forwards. But reading the actual diplomatic dispatches provides a level of knowledge unavailable in any other format. The British leadership, i.e., Prime Minister Chamberlain and his aides, come across as venal, anti-Semitic, anti-French, and completely incompetent. The French don't come off any better. Character, in either country's leadership was totally lacking. There are details about middle European events, and most interestingly, close-ups of show more top Nazis, including Adolf (who had bad breath). What a reader comes away with is the sense the the war could have been prevented numerous times excepting the sheer idiocy of the men involved. Chamberlain, it turns out, had a major crush on Hitler, as did England's Berlin ambassador. Only quibble is that the book could use editing; it could be one-third shorter. show less

We all like our villains to be mean, sniveling and despicable, tinged with evil, cowards and hand-rubbing, sneering hypocrites. Like the Nazi Goebbels or Mengele for example.

Field Marshal, Luftwaffe flying ace, Hermann Goering is more difficult to hate, and even harder to despise. Despite his luke-warm resistance to the extremism of Hitler, his greedy theft of art and his gross appetites – he had immense courage, great love for his wife, Baroness Carin von Kantzow of Sweden, and was, by show more all accounts, extremely likeable. Wounded three times in his career, the slow to heal wounds gave him both pain, and the treatment, as was nearly usual in those times, a morphine addiction. These are not excuses for the horror of the holocaust, and Mosley – a British journalist, historian, biographer and novelist - does not offer them up as such, but the author knew his subject personally and reveals all sides to Goering, including those to which he gives far from grudging admiration.

An intriguing but rather tragic figure, unable to resist – like so many others – the domination of Hitler, one feels from Mosley’s work that there was a wasted value and potential in Goering – that he could, in fact, been a positive influence if he had tried. He did use that skill during his trial in Nuremberg, as the highest ranking Nazi Goering tried to lead the other defendants towards a more honorable, if defiant, defense, and – having been denied the soldiers death of a firing squad – he persuaded his young American guard to bring him his confiscated brief-case and swallowed the hidden cyanide, cheating the hangman and dying, but strangely with a certain courage.

An excellent history and interestingly constructed biography. show less

Interesting account of the run-up of events to the start of World War Two. The book is very entertaining, for being historically accurate. This is probably due to the fact that the author is a journalist and not a historian. It tells the events in an engaging and gripping style, but I would go to other secondary source books for more detail.

Hard to believe how single-mindedly Republican (in the red-state, let's-not-give-a-commie-a-break, if-we-kill-a-jillion-that's-the-way-it-has-to-be kind of way) John Foster Dulles became when he dealt with Stalin and then Mao. He stayed locked in this mindset when Stalin died and Eisenhower tried very briefly for a working relationship with USSR. Brother Allan Dulles loved his spy-toys and his fun-time covert actions. Reminds me of Pinky and the Brain: John Foster Dulles, Secty of State, was show more the Brain, mind fixed on firm objectives for running the world, and Pinky (Allan) headed the CIA , chasing people and ladies and acting impulsively. OK, Allan was smart in a cunning sort of way that poor Pinky lacked and he did inflict real damage and assinate a bunch of folks.

The real difference is the two Dulles brothers *did* run the world. (Eisenhower let them.)

Mosley tells the story in a folksy, family anecdote sort of way--probably related to his interviewing Eleanor and hearing her point of view. (Sorry I couldnt link Eleanor Dulles to a couple of maniacal mice but she seemed almost human at times.) show less