[39], Plans to build a new Reich chancellery had been underway since 1934. Labor to build the A4 rockets came from the Mittelbau-Dora concentration camp. This led to a significant German Army failure at the Battle of Prokhorovka, a major turning point on the Eastern Front against the Soviet Red Army. Fun facts: before fame, family life, popularity rankings, and more. Speer made no mention of it in the first draft of Inside the Third Reich. [15], In January 1931, Speer applied for Nazi Party membership, and on 1 March 1931, he became member number 474,481. [55] On 8 February 1942, Reich Minister of Armaments and Munitions Fritz Todt died in a plane crash shortly after taking off from Hitler's eastern headquarters at Rastenburg. These factories were death-traps; discipline was brutal, with regular executions. [1] In 1944, Speer established a task force to increase production of fighter aircraft. The Soviet Union, having demanded a death sentence at trial, was unwilling to entertain a reduced sentence. [111] Speer provided information to the Allies, regarding the effects of the air war, and on a broad range of subjects, beginning on 10 May. [113] Speer was indicted on four counts: participating in a common plan or conspiracy for the accomplishment of crime against peace; planning, initiating and waging wars of aggression and other crimes against peace; war crimes; and crimes against humanity. For the television film based on the book, see, :55,71,7879,83,105,115116,138,188,651,674,696, Sarah Word from the British film magazine ", Reich Ministry of Armaments and War Production, https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Inside_the_Third_Reich&oldid=1132240858, Short description is different from Wikidata, Articles with unsourced statements from August 2022, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 7 January 2023, at 23:15. Figlio e nipote di architetti, Spee. August 1, 2017. Sept. 21, 2017. For a treatise on this aspect of the war including Speer's involvement see: Randall, Hansen, Last edited on 17 February 2023, at 08:56, Reich Minister of Armaments and War Production, Reich Minister of Armaments and Munitions, "Trials of the War Criminals Before the Nuernberg Military Tribunals, Volume II: The Milch Case", "Wartime reports debunk Speer as the good Nazi", "Letter proves Speer knew of Holocaust plan", "Historiker ber Albert Speer: "Er tat alles fr den Endsieg", "Rechtfertigung und Entlastung. Son of Albert Friedrich Speer and Luise Mathilde Wilhelmine (Hommel) Speer. Among those who pledged support for his sentence to be commuted were Charles de Gaulle and US diplomat George Wildman Ball. [80], In December 1943, Speer visited Organisation Todt workers in Lapland, while there he seriously damaged his knee and was incapacitated for several months. Hitler appointed Speer, whose work for Goebbels had impressed him, to manage the building site for Troost. Before that, Speer worked as the chief architect in Hitler's Nazi . I recommend this book without reservations. Victoria married. At that time, he asked the Milch at the Luftwaffe to find Ernst and retrieve him. By Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie. It was only on the urgent advice of his publisher that he added a mention of seeing the ruins of the Central Synagogue in Berlin from his car. Speer's full length portrait of Hitler has unnerving reality. [165] Trommer said he was not an apolitical technocrat; instead, he was one of the most powerful and unscrupulous leaders in the Nazi regime. [155] In addition to the myth that he was an apolitical technocrat, he claimed he did not have full knowledge of the Holocaust or the persecution of the Jews. Study now. The large capital investment was not repaid in military effectiveness. It is considered to be one of the most detailed descriptions of the inner workings and leadership of Nazi Germany but is controversial because of Speer's lack of discussion of Nazi . Beginning in 1948, Speer had the services of Toni Proost, a sympathetic Dutch orderly to smuggle mail and his writings. [76], Following his appointment as Minister of Armaments, Speer was in control of armaments production solely for the Army. Sereny decided to complete the book alone . While dozens of submarines were built, few ever entered service. [34] Hitler ordered Speer to develop plans to rebuild Berlin. Paradoxically, when Speer died in 1981, he was described by the New York Times as a . Berthold Konrad Hermann Albert Speer ( Mannheim, 19. oujka 1905. This article is about the book. Speer's books were a success; the public was fascinated by an inside view of the Third Reich. Sereny gained respect for his sincerity in his personal "battle with truth.". [127], Much of Speer's energy was dedicated to keeping fit, both physically and mentally, during his long confinement. [18], The organizers of the 1933 Nuremberg Rally asked Speer to submit designs for the rally, bringing him into contact with Hitler for the first time. She married Prince Albert who was her cousin. [90] By this time, 140,000 people were working in Speer's underground factories. I am sure that an oppressive feeling struck me as I drove past. [6] He followed in the footsteps of his father and grandfather and studied architecture. [70], Speer realized that with six million workers drafted into the armed forces, there was a labor shortage in the war economy, and not enough workers for his factories. "[16] The historian Magnus Brechtken, discussing Speer, said he did not give anti-Jewish public speeches and that his anti-Semitism can best be understood through his actionswhich were anti-Semitic. "[115] Speer's attorney, Hans Flchsner, successfully contrasted Speer from other defendants[116] and portrayed him as an artist thrust into political life who had always remained a non-ideologue. [166] Another myth centered around a faked plan to assassinate Hitler with poisonous gas. Werner Heisenberg told Speer "the scientific solution had already been found and that theoretically nothing stood in the way of building such a bomb." [121] There he was known as Prisoner Number Five. FC Bayern Munich opens a new sports complex with a youth academy planned by AS+P. After serving. Discussions on the personalities of the Wehrmacht and of the organizations not covered in the other sections. After one of these briefings, Hitler invited Speer to lunch, to the architect's great excitement. According to Speer's daughter Hilde Schramm, "One by one my sister and brothers gave up. [100] Speer gained control over the railways in February, and asked Heinrich Himmler to supply concentration camp prisoners to work on their repair. [69], As head of Organisation Todt, Speer was directly involved in the construction and alteration of concentration camps. By the autumn of 1942 however, the estimated period for developing a weapon had increased to three to four years, much too long to affect the war. body was never found or returned to the family and there are some Speer with his children Albert and Hilde, front, and Margret, Arnold and Fritz, back. Speer liked the scenario so much that he wrote it into his memoirs. It is primarily based on the memoirs of Gertraud "Traudl" Junge ( Alexandra Maria Lara ), one of Hitler's secretaries, and is one of the most accurate portrayals of the last, desperate days of the Third Reich and its effects on the Fhrer, his closest aides, and ordinary Germans. In the summer of 1942 Paulus advanced toward Stalingrad with 250,000 men, 500 tanks, 7,000 guns and mortars, and 25,000 horses. [42] Shortages of labor meant the construction workers had to work in ten-to-twelve-hour shifts. Inside the Third Reich begins with an account of Speer's childhood, followed by a description of his role as Heinrich Tessenow's assistant at the Technical University of Berlin. Albert Speer, the Nazi architect who built a Cathedral of Light for Hitler and commanded millions of prisoners in the forced production of weaponry, had a comfortable second life. Speer cancelled some hours before take-off because the previous night he had been up late in a meeting with Hitler. Stalingrad was a classic example where he refused to provide the equipment necessary to supply his army on the Eastern front during the terrible winter of 1941. Yet development and production would take at least two years. He was 76 years old. She was a kind and simple lady, living for her children. He goes on to say that at the Nuremberg Trial he stated he "had to share the total responsibility for all that had happened", and that he "was inescapably contaminated morally". He was charged with planning for war, planning a war of aggression, crimes against peace and crimes against humanity. Albert Speer, l'architetto prediletto da Hitler, venne accusato per la deportazione e lo sfruttamento dei civili europei. His sister's name was Carrie. Hello. "[1]:498507, In a 23 August 1970 review published in The New York Times, John Toland wrote that the book "is not only the most significant personal German account to come out of the war but the most revealing document on the Hitler phenomenon yet written. This led to the development of Germany's first cyclotron. For Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, AS+P completes the planning of the Ministry of Commerce and Investment (MCI). Germany's armaments production had already begun to result in increases under his predecessor, Todt. This formed a key element of the myths Speer encouraged. [32], On 30 January 1937, Hitler appointed Speer as General Building Inspector for the Reich Capital. It is considered to be one of the most detailed descriptions of the inner workings and leadership of Nazi Germany but is controversial because of Speer's lack of discussion of Nazi atrocities and questions regarding his degree of awareness or involvement with them. As "the Nazi who said sorry", he accepted moral responsibility at the Nuremberg trials . Speer's joint undertaking with the SS leadership resulted in the creation of Mittelwerk (Central Works) for underground production of the V-2. Four years into their relationship, in September 1981, Speer died. A brick factory was built near the Oranienburg concentration camp at Speer's behest; when someone commented on the poor conditions there, Speer stated, "The Yids got used to making bricks while in Egyptian captivity". Albert Speer, Hitler's architect, who became Minister of Armaments and War Production in World War II, died today at St. Mary's Hospital. Berthold Konrad Hermann Albert Speer (/ p r /; German: [pe] (); 19 March 1905 - 1 September 1981) was a German architect who served as the Minister of Armaments and War Production in Nazi Germany during most of World War II.A close ally of Adolf Hitler, he was convicted at the Nuremberg trials and sentenced to 20 years in prison.. An architect by training, Speer joined the . alberts side and was generally desribed as a wastrel. His brothers names were Charles, Albert, Louis (Ludwig), and Albert Einstein lived in the USA, so was not where the holocaust Stars Laurence Olivier Averell Harriman Albert Speer See production, box office & company info Search on Amazon search for Blu-ray and DVD Add to Watchlist 120 User reviews 5 Critic reviews Top rated TV #14 never got along so good before or after. [59] Speer proved to be ambitious, unrelenting and ruthless. His sentence of twenty years amounted to 7,305 days, which only allotted one and a half days per book. Though stockpiling of materials and other work continued, this slowed to a halt as more resources were needed for the armament industry. Neither the organizers nor Rudolf Hess were willing to decide whether to approve the plans, and Hess sent Speer to Hitler's Munich apartment to seek his approval. William. [64] Another factor that produced the boom in ammunition was the policy of allocating more coal to the steel industry. [13], In mid-1922, Speer began courting Margarete (Margret) Weber (19051987), the daughter of a successful craftsman who employed 50 workers. Albert Speer Jr., one of the most important German architects and urban planners, died unexpectedly on September 15, 2017 in Frankfurt. Speer was aided in shaping the works by Joachim Fest and Wolf Jobst Siedler from the publishing house Ullstein. Born 1906 [location unknown] Ancestors. Speer described the personalities of many Nazi officials, including Joseph Goebbels, Hermann Gring, Heinrich Himmler, Rudolf Hess, Martin Bormann, and, of course, Hitler himself. If Speer, who had been so close to Hitler, had not known the full extent of the crimes of the Nazi regime and had just been "following orders", then they could tell themselves and others they too had done the same. He was acquitted on the other two counts. [163] By 1999, historians had amply demonstrated that Speer had lied extensively. [177], The armaments "miracle" was a myth; Speer had used statistical manipulation to support his claims. [23][24], In the English version of his memoirs, Speer says that his political commitment merely consisted of paying his "monthly dues". A dramatization of the life of Albert Speer (Rutger Hauer), Adolf Hitler's (Sir Derek Jacobi's) young architect and one-time confidant, and his meteoric rise into the Nazi hierarchy. [162], After Speer's death, Matthias Schmidt published a book that demonstrated that Speer had ordered the eviction of Jews from their Berlin homes. [8] In 1924, when the crisis had abated, he transferred to the "much more reputable" Technical University of Munich. von Speer, Albert: und eine groe Auswahl hnlicher Bcher, Kunst und Sammlerstcke erhltlich auf AbeBooks.de. Supposing politics to be irrelevant, he turned aside and built roads and bridges and factories, while the logical consequences of government by madmen emerged. The V-2's first target was Paris on 8 September 1944. He met Hitler and toured the damaged Chancellery before leaving Berlin to return to Hamburg. The battle is infamous as one of the largest . Albert Speer, Germany Architect. Na Nrnberkom procesu preuzeo je moralnu odgovornost za svoja djela te je priznao ignorantnost po pitanju Holokausta. First published in 1969, it appeared in English translation in 1970. He fabricated the additional details. [10] After passing his exams in 1927, Speer became Tessenow's assistant, a high honor for a man of 22. [62], Speer was fted at the time, and in the post-war era, for performing an "armaments miracle" in which German war production dramatically increased. It was used for Nazi propaganda rallies and can be seen in Leni Riefenstahl's propaganda film Triumph of the Will. Feigned repentance at Nuremberg, saving his own neck. [66], As Minister of Armaments, Speer was responsible for supplying weapons to the army. Speer enthusiastically supported the program and in March 1942 made an order for A4 rockets, the predecessor of the world's first ballistic missile, the V-2 rocket. [135] Speer's efforts for an early release came to naught. Inventing for Speer the post of General Inspector of Buildings, Hitler steadily promoted him to the point where other Nazi leaders and rivals believed that he might well become Hitler's successor. Albert Speer was a young architect initially seduced by the speeches and rhetoric of Hitler. Speer states he became hopeful when Hitler explained how communism could be checked and Germany could recover economically. The relationship was frowned upon by Speer's class-conscious mother, who felt the Webers were socially inferior. [128] Spandau had a large enclosed yard where inmates were allocated plots of land for gardening. "[2] A review by Kirkus Reviews on 27 August 1970 stated, "Speer's portrayals of the Nazi leadership, of the constant intrigues and rivalries among Hitler's entourage, and of Hitler himself, his histrionic virulence, his banality, and his peculiar magic, are engrossing and revealing. Speer (Albert Speer's brother) and his life. But the children-my two brothers and I-had to use the back stairs. I knew that these must be Berlin Jews who were being evacuated. 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