Hitler And His Admirals

A fascinating and penetrating portrait of the Kriegsmarine and their relationship with Nazi Germany and Hitler.

“In this present book I have combined the evidence given at Nuremberg with the material contained in the Führer Conferences on Naval Affairs. It is impossible to cover every aspect of the war in one volume, and I have confined myself to the history, naval and political, which is, I think, a most revealing side of Nazi Germany.

“I must warn the reader that, as this history deals mainly with strategy and diplomacy, there are only a few examples of individual Nazi crimes. It should be borne in mind that the Nazis imprisoned, murdered and tortured—at a conservative estimate—twelve million people.

“It is also inevitable that Hitler should emerge from these pages as a talented and very able man. He was the sole ruler of a powerful, modern nation for twelve years, and obviously he could not have been a fool; but lest there are some who think that cleverness is the sole criterion of greatness, I should like to quote from Hitler’s sixteenth-century tutor, Nicolo Machiavelli: “Yet it cannot be called talent to slay fellow-citizens, to deceive friends, to be without faith, without mercy, without religion....His barbarous cruelty and inhumanity with infinite wickednesses do not permit him to be celebrated among the most excellent men. What he achieved cannot be attributed either to fortune or to genius.””