Fallen Elites

Fallen Elites

Author: Andrew Bickford

Publisher: Stanford University Press

Published: 2011-03-09

Total Pages: 289

ISBN-13: 0804777160

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Military officers are often the first to be considered politically dangerous when a state loses its authority. Overnight, actions once considered courageous are deemed criminal, and men once praised as heroes are redefined as villains. In Fallen Elites, Andrew Bickford examines how states make soldiers and what happens to fallen military elites when they no longer fit into the political spectrum. Gaining unprecedented entry into the lives of former East German officers in unified Germany, Bickford relates how these men and their families have come to terms with the shock of unification, capitalism, and citizenship since the fall of the Berlin Wall. Often caricatured as unrepentant, hard-line communists, former officers recount how they have struggled with their identities and much-diminished roles. Their disillusionment speaks to global questions about the contentious relationship between the military, citizenship, masculinity, and state formation today. Casting a critical eye on Western triumphalism, they provide a new perspective on our own deep-seated assumptions about "soldier making," both at home and abroad.


GERMANY HAS FALLEN

GERMANY HAS FALLEN

Author: Arikpo Lawrence Omini

Publisher: tredition

Published: 2018-10-10

Total Pages: 228

ISBN-13: 374697965X

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In a world bedevilled by wars, hunger, inequality, social injustice, racial discrimination and intolerance, almost all of the world's rich societies such as America, the European Union, Australia and Asia set up immigration barriers in order to keep migrants and refugees from coming through their borders and seeking a new and better life, different from the one they knew before, but migrants aren't deterred. They still travel to those countries' frontiers, defying warnings, hoping to make it. In recent years, Germany has taken in many foreign migrants who fled violence, persecution, hunger and death amid a growing atmosphere of resentment, xenophobia, racism and bigotry partly ushered in by the coming to power of the United States of America's dystopian demagogue Hurricane Donald Trump, who endorses politics of hate, ethnic prejudice and religion mostly because these minorities don't look like him. Some of these people pass through hardships into the Sahara Desert. Some are raped while others are used as guinea pigs as their lives are uprooted for transactional purposes. Some are sold and forced into labour while others are killed. Those who survive the ordeal into the Mediterranean Sea lose their lives in unseaworthy boats. What's the end game to this whole global crisis? Will the world cooperate to resolve global issues besieging the world and tackle the forces that enthrone them? Should we still believe in the hope offered the world by the Fall of Berlin Wall, or, should we, in these strange times, believe the Wall has gone right back up?


If Britain Had Fallen

If Britain Had Fallen

Author: Norman Longmate

Publisher: Frontline Books

Published: 2012-03-19

Total Pages: 467

ISBN-13: 1783030828

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What if Germany had invaded the British Isles? “A distinguished contribution to the canon of alternate histories” (Military History). If Britain Had Fallen is a fascinating contemplation of what it would have been like for Britain to live day to day under Nazi occupation. It discusses every phase of the scenario, from the German pre-invasion maneuvering and preparations, to the landing of troops, to the German seizure of power. What would have happened to the king and the government? Would America, Canada, or Australia have come to the rescue? Would the British people have grown to accept the occupation? Would the deportation of friends and the flying of the swastika from Buckingham Palace incite passive compliance, or brave resistance? All these questions and more are explored in this thought-provoking and chilling pastiche of the twentieth century’s most enduring and darkest episodes. Based on a classic television film of the same name, this book includes illustrations and an updated foreword by military historian Norman Longmate.


Why the Allies Won

Why the Allies Won

Author: R. J. Overy

Publisher: W. W. Norton & Company

Published: 1997

Total Pages: 454

ISBN-13: 9780393316193

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"Overy has written a masterpiece of analytical history, posing and answering one of the great questions of the century."--Sunday Times (London)


The Gravediggers

The Gravediggers

Author: Hauke Friederichs

Publisher: Profile Books

Published: 2019-11-07

Total Pages:

ISBN-13: 1782834591

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November 1932. With the German economy in ruins and street battles raging between political factions, the Weimar Republic is in its death throes. Its elderly president Paul von Hindenburg floats above the fray, inscrutably haunting the halls of the Reichstag. In the shadows, would-be saviours of the nation vie for control. The great rivals are the chancellors Franz von Papen and Kurt von Schleicher. Both are tarnished by the republic's all-too-evident failures. Each man believes he can steal a march on the other by harnessing the increasingly popular National Socialists - while reining in their most alarming elements, naturally. Adolf Hitler has ideas of his own. But if he can't impose discipline on his own rebellious foot-soldiers, what chance does he have of seizing power?


"Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself"

Author: Florian Huber

Publisher: Little, Brown Spark

Published: 2020-03-10

Total Pages: 304

ISBN-13: 031653434X

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Named a Best History Book of 2019 by The Times (UK) The astounding true story of how thousands of ordinary Germans, overcome by shame, guilt, and fear, killed themselves after the fall of the Third Reich and the end of World War II. By the end of April 1945 in Germany, the Third Reich had fallen and invasion was underway. As the Red Army advanced, horrifying stories spread about the depravity of its soldiers. For many German people, there seemed to be nothing left but disgrace and despair. For tens of thousands of them, the only option was to choose death -- for themselves and for their children. "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" recounts this little-known mass event. Using diaries, letters, and memoirs, historian Florian Huber traces the euphoria of many ordinary Germans as Hitler restored national pride; their indifference as the Führer's political enemies, Jews, and other minorities began to suffer; and the descent into despair as the war took its terrible toll, especially after the invasion of the Soviet Union. Above all, he investigates how suicide became a contagious epidemic as the country collapsed. Drawing on eyewitness accounts and other primary sources, "Promise Me You'll Shoot Yourself" presents a riveting portrait of a nation in crisis, and sheds light on a dramatic yet largely unknown episode of postwar Germany.


Mein Kampf

Mein Kampf

Author: Adolf Hitler

Publisher: ببلومانيا للنشر والتوزيع

Published: 2024-02-26

Total Pages: 522

ISBN-13:

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Madman, tyrant, animal—history has given Adolf Hitler many names. In Mein Kampf (My Struggle), often called the Nazi bible, Hitler describes his life, frustrations, ideals, and dreams. Born to an impoverished couple in a small town in Austria, the young Adolf grew up with the fervent desire to become a painter. The death of his parents and outright rejection from art schools in Vienna forced him into underpaid work as a laborer. During the First World War, Hitler served in the infantry and was decorated for bravery. After the war, he became actively involved with socialist political groups and quickly rose to power, establishing himself as Chairman of the National Socialist German Worker's party. In 1924, Hitler led a coalition of nationalist groups in a bid to overthrow the Bavarian government in Munich. The infamous Munich "Beer-hall putsch" was unsuccessful, and Hitler was arrested. During the nine months he was in prison, an embittered and frustrated Hitler dictated a personal manifesto to his loyal follower Rudolph Hess. He vented his sentiments against communism and the Jewish people in this document, which was to become Mein Kampf, the controversial book that is seen as the blue-print for Hitler's political and military campaign. In Mein Kampf, Hitler describes his strategy for rebuilding Germany and conquering Europe. It is a glimpse into the mind of a man who destabilized world peace and pursued the genocide now known as the Holocaust.


A Demon-Haunted Land

A Demon-Haunted Land

Author: Monica Black

Publisher: Metropolitan Books

Published: 2020-11-17

Total Pages: 203

ISBN-13: 1250225663

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“A Demon-Haunted Land is absorbing, gripping, and utterly fascinating... Beautifully written, without even a hint of jargon or pretension, it casts a significant and unexpected new light on the early phase of the Federal Republic of Germany’s history. Black’s analysis of the copious, largely unknown archival sources on which the book is based is unfailingly subtle and intelligent.” —Richard J. Evans, The New Republic In the aftermath of World War II, a succession of mass supernatural events swept through war-torn Germany. A messianic faith healer rose to extraordinary fame, prayer groups performed exorcisms, and enormous crowds traveled to witness apparitions of the Virgin Mary. Most strikingly, scores of people accused their neighbors of witchcraft, and found themselves in turn hauled into court on charges of defamation, assault, and even murder. What linked these events, in the wake of an annihilationist war and the Holocaust, was a widespread preoccupation with evil. While many histories emphasize Germany’s rapid transition from genocidal dictatorship to liberal democracy, A Demon-Haunted Land places in full view the toxic mistrust, profound bitterness, and spiritual malaise that unfolded alongside the economic miracle. Drawing on previously unpublished archival materials, acclaimed historian Monica Black argues that the surge of supernatural obsessions stemmed from the unspoken guilt and shame of a nation remarkably silent about what was euphemistically called “the most recent past.” This shadow history irrevocably changes our view of postwar Germany, revealing the country’s fraught emotional life, deep moral disquiet, and the cost of trying to bury a horrific legacy.


The Joy of Freedom

The Joy of Freedom

Author: David R. Henderson

Publisher: Financial Times/Prentice Hall

Published: 2002

Total Pages: 398

ISBN-13:

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Henderson, one of the world's most vigorous advocates of free markets, celebrates those in American society, and around the world, who are fighting to get government off their backs.