(Part 2) Reddit mentions: The best german history books

I just read through those FAQ points. I dont mean to sound weird but there isn't but the smallest reference to the fact that the Jews had become "over-proportionately represented" (I think "powerful" might even be an appropriate, if loaded, word) in Germany.

It just seems that if you are creating a one-stop solution for these "So what was the deal with Jews and the Nazis?" questions that should receive a bit of a treatment.

It seems that almost all of that information just points back to "historic antisemitism".

But ..

>By 1908, 12 of the 20 richest Berliners were of Jewish ancestry, as were 11 of the 25 richest people in Prussia. In 1923, 150 of the 161 privately-owned banks in Berlin were Jewish;

source

>"In Berlin alone, about 75% of the attorneys, and nearly as many doctors, were Jewish."

source

>By 1823, the Bavarian government owed 23% of its public debt to Jews; as early as 1818, there was growing complaint about excessive Jewish influence in Germany.

source

>Jews were responsible for a great part of German culture. The owners of three of Germany's greatest newspaper houses; the editors of the Vossiche Zeitung and Berliner Tagleblatt; most book publishers; the owners and editors of the Neue Rundschau and other distinguished literary magazines; the owners of Germany's greatest art galleries were all Jews. Jews played a major part in theatre and in the film industry as producers, directors, and actors. Many of Germany's best composers, musicians, artists, sculptors, and architects were Jews. Their participation in literary criticism and in literature were enormous: practically all the great critics and many novelists, poets, dramatists, and essayists of the Weimar Republic were Jews ... If cultural contributions by Jews were far out of proportion to their numerical strength, their participation in left-wing intellectual activities were even more disproportionate.

source


This is a HUGE part of the formula of "So what was all that about the Nazis and the Jews". This not-entirely-unwarranted feeling of "Jewish saturation in German culture". But I dont really see it gone into anywhere there.

Yes. That's the burden of moving into another culture. Ideally you should get some help from your advisor with it, but you are still the one who needs to do the bulk of the adjustment.

FWIW, it'll come in very handy later in your career, when you can put 'culturally aware' on your resume as a skill. But you are the one in their environment, and you can't expect them all to conform to your expectations. They are probably already making allowances that you aren't aware of.

Your advisor may have been giving you subtle behavioral clues that you've missed. Try talking with him about cultural differences; he may be able to give you more guidance to how things are done there, and can certainly give you a better handle on his expectations. But you need to be more aware that cultural differences are getting in your way. You seem to feel entitled to being accommodated; that's another very American trait, and not a good one. The stereotype of the Ugly American came from reality, just like many other stereotypes. We are not that special that the rest of the world should be accommodating us.

I've run into this many times in different countries. You'd be surprised at how many people think Americans are overly friendly, effusive, and loud. We call everyone by their first name and we generally aren't shy about our opinions, whether it's about politics, religion, money and finances, people's working styles, or lifestyles. And we're very casual in our dress and mannerisms. It can really rub people in other cultures the wrong way. Try observing more closely how they treat each other, and find ways to live with it.

And you will always be a guest in their country, at least until you become a citizen. Act like it, be more respectful, and play by their rules. When in Rome...

Edit: Here are some books(and this one)that may help with the transition. And please realize--this situation is by and large not a function of you personally, it's a cultural clash. Right now it may seem like they're rejecting you as a person, but they really aren't--they are put off by your americanisms. Try not to be hurt by that. It can feel very personal, but it's really not. Once you understand the culture better and how to function within it, you'll be fine. Meanwhile, finding friends in the international student groups and other interest groups would probably be a good idea.

I would never want to discourage reading the books on the sidebar, but as someone who has taken the AP U.S. History test I can tell you that the textbooks are a much better place if your goal is to score high on the AP exams. Your understanding of history via the booklist is going to be pretty specific to the topics covered by your book, whereas the AP tests are extremely general, survey-style looks at their respective fields.

For the end of the year, at review time, I've always found REA's Crash Course books helpful (I used the ones for U.S. History and Microeconomics).

Here's the one for World History, and here's the one for European History.

Some have told me the Princeton Review also makes great review books, but I can't personally vouch for those.


Here's what I did on the AP U.S. exam, and I think it helped. Read the textbook first, and make a mental note of at least one thing from each period. Then research those things heavily after you're done with the textbook. That way, when you get to the essays, you have in depth knowledge about a few things from all sorts of topic areas, so you'll always have something you can sound very informed about. I did this and ended up talking at end about Operation Ajax and PBSUCCESS in one of my essays, which probably didn't turn up in a lot of the other kid's essays.

That's another thing that can help--the AP graders have to grade hundreds of essays that all answer the same question, and all the students read the same or similar textbooks. If you can throw something relevant but different into your essay, you immediately stand out.

Anyway, that's just my advice, and I'm no AP teacher. Be sure to listen to them, if you get the chance to talk to one (which I would recommend, even though you're self studying), you should listen to them over me.

One more thing. The review books I mentioned above also give you a good idea of what is actually going to be on the test. "World History" is one gigantonormous topic--they can't possibly ask about everything. The authors of those reviews study previous tests to get a pretty damn solid idea of what is actually going to show up.


Again, all of this advice is aimed at getting you a good grade on the exam. Please pursue your interest in history however you feel like, such as through our book list. Your interest in history should not be tarnished by these AP exams.

These are a few you want if you're focused on the European Theater:

Endgame, 1945 by David Stafford
http://www.amazon.com/Endgame-1945-Missing-Final-Chapter/dp/0316035998


After the Reich by Giles MacDonogh
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0465003389/ref=pd_aw_sims_1?pi=SL500_SY115&simLd=1


Germany 1945: From War to Peace by Richard Bessel
http://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0060540370/ref=pd_aw_sims_3?pi=SL500_SY115&simLd=1


There are of course a few more but this should get you started. One thing I like to do is if you find a good, comprehensive book on a topic you like, be sure to check out the reference/source pages in the back. Most good history books that's aren't direct novelizations will have references to direct sources that are usually pretty good themselves. Good luck and happy reading!

A Little History of Science, by William Bynum. (Link) It's a little newer than Bryson's A Short History of Nearly Everything, but on par with it in most respects. Covers the histories of medicine, astronomy, chemistry, the discovery of plate tectonics... pretty much all areas of science. Highly entertaining (particularly the section on anatomy and how early artists were painters by day and grave-robbers by night).

I also liked The Blogger Abides, by Chris Higgins (Link), which is an extremely practical guide to managing a freelance career. It's written for writers but is applicable to most freelance professions (photographers, consultants, etc.), and includes sections that most "be a writer" books wouldn't, like how to manage self-employment taxes and give pesky publicity people the brush without looking like an asshole.

For more traditional nonfic, I liked Deep State (link) about the government's secrecy industry; Agent Garbo (link), about a farmer who just decides to be a spy and ends up helping the Allies bring down the Nazis (it's insane); and literally anything written by Mary Roach -- even her tweets are great.

I see your point. I was just clarifying your question "Can you describe what it was like when the Nazi laws pertaining to Jews started to occur in Europe? When did it start feeling like the situation could be life-threatening?". It doesn't seem to logically apply to him, since he was born and lived his entire 11 years, up until the invasion, in Poland. Being 11, what technology and media were like in 1939, and the fact Poland was not Germany, your question certainly doesn't apply to his personal experience. So he actually cannot speak first hand about the Nazi laws pertaining to Jews (since they started to occur, and only occurred before 1939 in Germany, and not all of Europe). Not to be a jerk, but history, especially around WWII and the Holocaust should be nuanced and very clear. Otherwise you get people who believe ridiculous things or don't actually understand what occurred. There is an implicit aspect to your question. Asking solely about the Jewish population decontextualizes what details matter when talking about experiences. As I attempted to clarify before, being he was in Poland and a Polish citizen, "the situation" really didn't start to occur until September 1, 1939 when Nazi Germany attacked Poland. Jews in Poland thought about what was occurring in Poland, first and foremost (as any person does - think of yourself, your greatest concern is likely with what is occurring within a general proximity of yourself - it's only human to do so). If you have ever watched or read about testimonies about the beginning of the war - let's take for example something like 'The Pianist' - many people, both Jews and Poles, thought that this was mostly about war and imperialism. People thought they could escape, flee, pay people off, or simply wait things out. You see that in the conversations of Wladyslaw Szpilman's family in the beginning of 'The Pianist' (which is based on a true story). When I speak even to my own family, both Poles and Jews, their stories often intimate a sense of ignorance until there was no longer a Poland. As I said, I think you are framing this too much in terms of him being Jewish, whereas it's important to remember where he was in order to truly understand context. Jews in Germany had the laws against Jews apply to them. Jews in Poland didn't have the same experience. They experienced the same events and type of situation that Poles did, since they were in Poland.

Here is a historical timeline (if you scroll down in the website) providing some chronology to Ben Lesser's personal experience.

http://zachorfoundation.org/zachor-foundation/founder/

If you look at the fact that they were able to hide and evade being captured by the Nazis up till around May 1944 (over 4 years after the occupation began, and likely with help from their Polish gentile friends and neighbors), it's quite a different experience than Jews from Germany had - who reacted in a variety of ways over the years and months that the anti-Semitic laws were being decreed in Germany.

I'd really recommend reading this book to brush up on more information. It's truly enlightening, and I read it myself for an upper level university history course on the History of the Holocaust. You'll be surprised on how much you learn from it.

http://www.amazon.com/War-Genocide-Holocaust-Critical-International/dp/0742557154/ref=pd_sim_b_1?ie=UTF8&refRID=13MA2KXCSNXQCFARW0GS

There are plenty of things you could do:

• Read German literature classics (in English) and then discuss them. I suggest "The Sorrows of young Werther" by Goethe as a short and nice starter.
  
• Try to locate people of German heritage in your area (maybe white pages vs 50 most common German surnames?).Then see if they are in contact with their ancestors in Europe, if so organise talks (for the whole school), if not try to help locating them if they have some clues (old letters / pictures / a village name - we see this in r/germany all the time) plus Google.
  
• Study Germany/Austria/Switzerland geography. Maybe it's a bit lame, but it's a German club, isn't it?
  
• Organise your own German language course. You can buy some cheap used books in Amazon, plus you can take advantage of your fluent member.
  
• Contact the German embassy or your nearest consulate and see if they are willing to give you some materials.
  
• One thing that it's easy and free it's to write letters/e-mails to the tourism bureau of any German city or village you can think of, and they will send you brochures for free. Germans love planning and this was their way of organising their (weekend) trips before the internet was here.
  
• Buy this book and discuss it.

Meyer is good, although since you are a beginner, I would recommend something with lots of visual aides and pictures. It's a bit outdated nowadays, but I would recommend starting with "Sigmund Ringeck's Knightly Art of the Longsword," by Lindholm and Svard (link below). Also, for longsword reference material, Keith Farrell's book is excellent and affordable.

It has pictures of the plays on every page, has the original text and translation, and also has interpretation, which eliminates much of the guess-work. It starts with the absolute basics and proceeds from there, which should be good for you and your buddies.

https://www.amazon.com/Sigmund-Ringecks-Knightly-Art-Longsword/dp/1581604106

(Also, holy crap! This book was like $35.00 when I bought it about 8 years ago. Try to find a digital copy if possible.)

https://www.amazon.com/German-Longsword-Study-Guide-Farrell/dp/099267350X

Thanks for the detailed reply. You have clearly given this a lot of thought and so I'm fully prepared to say you may be right in your assessment of some of these historians. I probably haven't read any of the texts you are referring to so I can’t judge them.

I do still think that this is not an issue of peer-review not working. I am clearly giving these hypothetical authors the benefit of the doubt, but if evidence is not discussed in a particular work, then I'd tend to think that both the author and the peer-reviewers were well aware of what was included/excluded and found it sufficient. That doesn’t mean that all the peer-reviewers agreed with the conclusions though. If that was necessary nothing would get published. There is a fine line between making sure an article is fully documented and letting it succeed or fail on its merits. I’ve read many articles that I thought had a gaping hole of evidence, but that doesn’t mean the article shouldn’t be published or that it was biased or misleading. It is still advancing a new way of looking at a particular problem and a new way of marshalling the evidence. And then I can write an article bringing up what was left out and the conversation continues.

However, if you are reading books for a general audience, they often don’t have the same sort of goals that professional works have. They are more like a digest of opinions presented for people who want to “know the facts” more than understand the problem of history and how it’s done. If you’ve been reading books like that and are not satisfied with them, I’d say it’s time for you to jump further in and read the real stuff.

Btw, if you want to read a great book on barbarians that really addresses the problems of historiography (and has none of the frothing at the mouth stuff), try this one. It’s very influential and important.

Thanks for the link to the video! I liked it overall, but I think it lost track of itself when it said that the Europeans relied upon brute strength. If you ever try to brute strength your way through a tatami mat, you get nowhere fast, even with a longsword or greatsword.

There's a huge tradition of scholarly medieval swordsmanship extending from the late Middle Ages with the I.33 manuscript through the Renaissance with Ringeck's The Knightly Art of Swordsmanship and Talhoffer's Medieval Combat to name just a couple out of a huge corpus of fechtbucher.

I'm coming across pretty crotchety here, but in addition to Star Wars, I'm big on the Middle Ages. I see these myths perpetuated all the time, and I'm just trying to bring to light a topic that is frequently taken for granted.

Cunningham's Encyclopedia of Magical Herbs is kind of close to a no-brainer for herbs.

The best advice for runes from the runemaster that taught me was to ignore the meanings and definitions floating around out there and look at historical material, for example the rune poems, and decide for yourself what each rune means. It's more work but gives you a more intimate understanding of the runes. If you would prefer a reference work that provides meanings for each rune, there are dozens of books out there. Or just buy a set of runes; most come with such a reference. If you want to put in the extra effort, Stephen Pollington's Rudiments of Runelore is an excellent and academically-oriented resource.

Good luck!

Pretty sure the slaves didn't get a vote in that democracy and if you think the NSDAP rise to power in the Weimar republic had anything to do with democratic process I have to assume you have not take the time to look at how that shit went down.

In 32 they received 10% fewer votes than just six months earlier, that's when the conservative parties there made a literal deal with the fucking devil and threw all their weight behind him and had him declared chancellor in order to maintain some semblance of power. While it was "legal" Hitler was not elected president by the German people. Even then Hitler only had 2 cabinet appointees from his own party.

Course, then they lit the Reichstag in a false flag and seized power under the guise of a communist revolt, and the rest is nothing but a stain on human history.

But Nazi's being democratically elected? Rofl, good one Fritz.

If you have an interest in the truth of this check out "The Death of Democracy" and/or "The Anatomy of Fascism". While more general, the Anatomy of Fascism is the better read IMO.

Norman Stone - The Eastern Front is the classic standard, best single volume general history.

Prit Buttar's four volume series is the best overall general history, very comprehensive with a much bigger focus on military action, compared to Stone's which has more time devoted to things like the politics of the factories and how it affected production.

APES - Barrons is a must, my teacher for apes was out for most of the year for maternity leave and we had a rotating list of subs, so we didn't really learn anything in class. I purchased the Barrons 1 month before the AP exam out of desperation and scored a 5, would definitely recommend.

Euro - Would definitely recommend a combination of Euro crash course and barrons, while the crash course is really useful for getting to know the bare essentials, the barrons goes more in depth. A combination of the two is what got me the 5.
https://www.amazon.com/European-History-Course-Advanced-Placement/dp/0738606618

Human Geo - Once again would definitely recommend the barrons, it goes in depth of the fundemental concepts you need to know and the biggest reason for Barrons being great is the practice questions they give you.

> > You say you've read several books on theme, can you provide a few?

[Theme: "collusion between Zionist parties and Facist regimes in Europe prior to WWII"]

> Books specifically on this subject, no I'm afraid not. To be frank it's such an 'out there' position that it doesn't garner an enormous amount of attention unless you want to look at Protocols of the Elders of Zion level antisemitic propaganda.

Here's one for your reading list:

The Transfer Agreement--25th Anniversary Edition: The Dramatic Story of the Pact Between the Third Reich and Jewish Palestine

From Amazon:

> The Transfer Agreement is Edwin Black's compelling, award-winning story of a negotiated arrangement in 1933 between Zionist organizations and the Nazis to transfer some 50,000 Jews, and $100 million of their assets, to Jewish Palestine in exchange for stopping the worldwide Jewish-led boycott threatening to topple the Hitler regime in its first year. 25th Anniversary Edition.

About the author (Wiki):

> Edwin Black is an American syndicated columnist and investigative journalist. He specializes in human rights, the historical interplay between economics and politics in the Middle East [...] Black is the son of Polish Jews who were survivors of the Holocaust. His mother, Ethel "Edjya" Katz, from Białystok, told of narrowly escaping death the Holocaust by escaping a boxcar en route to the Treblinka extermination camp as a 13-year old in August 1943.

More on the topic @ Wikipedia:

Haavara Agreement

> The Haavara (Transfer) Agreement was agreed to by the German government in 1933 to allow the Zionist movement, in the form of the Haavara company to transfer property from Germany to Palestine, for the sole purpose of encouraging Jewish emigration from Germany. The Haavara company operated under a similar plan as the earlier Hanotea company. The Haavara Company required immigrants to pay at least 1000 pounds sterling into the banking company. This money would then be used to buy German exports for import to Palestine.

Zionists and Nazis - "strange bedfellows"?

Perhaps, but Germany had something that the Zionist leaders DESPERATELY NEEDED: Jews - wealthy, educated, cultured and politically savvy Jews to populate the little Zionist Homeland that they had been contriving in Palestine for some 40 years.

Meanwhile, the Nazis were suffering substantially thanks to an international boycott against German made goods - AND had come to view their Jewish population as "personae non gratae".

The Nazis benefited by a achieving measure of relief from the boycott (and, from their perspective, ridding themselves of unwanted Jews), whereas the Zionists benefited because they were blessed with wealthy, talented Jews who, were it not for Nazi persecutions, would likely never have considered moving to Palestine.

I love them, got some myself as well.

I own most of those books as well, can i also recommend you 3 others i didnt see on your shelf?

https://www.amazon.com/Devils-Adjutant-Jochen-Peiper-Panzer/dp/1848840101

https://www.amazon.com/Never-Snows-September-German-Market/dp/1885119313

https://www.boekenbestellen.nl/boek/gustav-knittel/9789492475541

Those are very good and detailed books.

There is a great book that spends a lot of time on this subject, Hitler's social revolution. It is more about politics than policy, but talks a great deal about why certain policies were chosen and who they appealed to.

>Both are based on social darwinism where the "the strong (the rich the privilged from rich background..etc) thrives(become richer gets more influence...etc) while the poor perish".

This isn't even close to a tenet of nazi ideology or modern society. You need to read more. Nazi ideology was vehemently anti-capitalist (international capitalism was associated with jews) and extremely critical about aristocratic privilege in germany.

It could be a cunning ploy to get Sargon's attention, that devious fox.

Although in seriousness, Sargs often will use an article as a counterpoint to something he has indentified in TWIS, so perhaps it makes more sense when looking through such a lens

>That's how Hitler started, he pulled in the youth to miseducate them, to brainwash them, it's happening today.

That's a very good point that is often overlooked. The narrative today appears to be that Hitler duped that great unwashed masses into following his cause, when there were plenty of 'intellectuals' running alongside Hitler ensuring that all levels of society followed suit. There were many 'revolutionary' ideas running rampant in Universities in the 20s, with their advocates expressing the same fanatical zeal for them as anyone in the USSR.

I'd recommend anyone, including Sargs, to sink their teeth into Michael Burleigh's The Third Reich: A New History which touches upon many aspects of Nazi Germany that have often been overlooked, including attempts to Nazify religion (that's right folks, Jesus isn't a Jew anymore, but instead a glorious Aryan)

Hitler wasn't a Christian; he was a pagan who worshipped Wagner and the "old gods" and wanted to restore what he saw as a heroic (i.e. militaristic) conception of Man. The torchlight processionals, the secret rituals, were all profoundly anti-Christian. Hitler actively prosecuted Christian churches until "Hitler's Pope," Pius XII, cut a deal with him - both equally cynical in what they hoped to attain from it. Christian youth groups were banned and disbanded and their members forced into the Hitler Youth instead.

See Unholy Alliance for Hitler's fascination with the occult, and The Third Reich in Power for this:

>Rosenberg declared in 1938, since young people were now almost completely under the control of the Hitler Youth and the Nazified education system, the hold of the Church over its congregation would be broken and the Catholic and Confessing churches would disappear from the life of the people in their present form. It was a sentiment from which Hitler himself did not dissent.

Or this from the same book:

>In July 1935...a speaker told a meeting of the Nazi Students' League in Bernau: 'One is either a Nazi or a committed Christian.' Christianity, he said, 'promotes the dissolution of racial ties and of the national racial community...We must repudiate the Old and the New Testaments, since for us the Nazi idea alone is decisive. For us there is only one example, Adolf Hitler and no one else."

The "cult of personality" makes no room for any other person, living or dead, at the top of the adoration pyramid. Hitler used religion as he saw fit to gain power and respectability, but had as much religion in him as our modern right wingers with their "do as I say not as I do, I've had my fun and I've had yours too" approach to morality.

Looks like he's wearing a British 1st Airborne insignia on his right shoulder. This makes sense, as the 1st Airborne was responsible for attempting the botched securing of the Arnhem bridgehead during Operation Market Garden in September of 1944. The aircraft in the background and the straps on him seem to allude to this being an Airborne outfit as well.

I'd really love it if, because this Elite skin may drop in September, the marketing material says "It will snow in September", in reference to Leutnant Joseph Enthammer's famous remark "It never snows in September!" when he saw all of the British parachutes opening up. It Never Snows in September is also a good book on the German perspective of the Battle of Arnhem, by Robert Kershaw.

For movies, about the Battle of Arnhem, A Bridge too Far is also a great pick, and is an adaptation of Cornelius Ryan's book that bears that same name.

EDIT: It could also just be the 6th Airborne, who wasn't available during Market Garden but who was still heavily involved in operations aimed at securing the Rhine.

Since no one has commented, I would recommend The Pursuit of Italy. It covers more than the last 100 years, but each section is broken down roughly by period so you could just read the part that interests you. But the last 100 years doesn't cover the Risorgimento which is pretty crucial to understanding modern Italy, so I'd read about that as well :)

>Germanic people all originated in Scandinavia whether it's the Angles, Vandals, Goths, Lombards, Geats, Saxons, practically everyone.

Early medieval historians popularized this narrative (as did Tacitus several crnturies before), but there's good reason to treat these accounts with a lot of skepticism. Each was much more concerned with making myths designed to influence contemporary disputes than they were with reconstructing ancient (and almost entirely unverifiable) migration routes.

You can still find a lot of texts treating Germanic migrations out of Scandinavia as established events, but the evidence to support this is extremely patchy and, at best, problematic.

The current consensus has long (since Wenskus' Stammesbildung in the 60s) moved toward recognizing that barbarian tribes are very malleable, and that new groups were formed from new leaders assembling the dispersed inhabitants whose farmsteads losely filled the forests of Germania into new coalitions, rather than these people migrating out of Scanza (etc) as ready-made people groups. For example, Kulikowski's Romes Gothic Wars (which summarizes these questions in a user-friendly manner for the origin of the Goths on the fringes if the Roman empire, rather than out of a long migration out of Scandinavia).

If you're interested in a U-boat captain's perspective, I highly recommend Iron Coffins. It's a great read. I cannot recommend it enough.

The Winter Fortress is an amazing book covering the secret mission to blow up the plant by Norwegian locals and the intense aftermath of the whole situation.

Excellent read on a story not told enough.

If you want a book, To Conquer Hell is a really good one on the Meuse-Argonne Offensive. For a series of books that cover the Eastern Front (i.e. not just trenches), Prit Buttar's books have been really good so far. I've read the first two, and Russia's Last Gasp is next on my reading list.

BBC's The Great War from the 60s is amazing too.

Stasiland: Stories from Behind the Berlin Wall tells the really interesting stories of people who lived in Communist East Berlin.

Spark: The Revolutionary New Science of Exercise and the Brain is the greatest book about Mental Health ever. It tells how exercise is one of the key factors in effecting mental health.

Both of these are submarine books and are among my favorite reads of WW2

Iron Coffins by Herbert Werner Herbert served on 5 different submarines before the end of the war.

Iron Boats, Steel Hearts by Hans Goebler about U505, which happens to be on display in Chicago.

Both are first hand accounts and will give you a feeling of being on the sub itself.

For a good academic/historical text https://www.amazon.com/Rudiments-Runelore-Stephen-Pollington/dp/1898281491

For divination and the like this is a good starter text https://www.amazon.com/Futhark-Handbook-Magic-Edred-Thorsson/dp/0877285489

It's a very interesting time in German history, that's for sure. I'd recommend Frederick Taylor's The Berlin Wall: A World Divided, 1961-1989 if you want to know more about the history of the GDR.

While my expertise doesn't lie in this exact time frame I have been moved by a number of stories involving the wall. Conrad Schumann was a border guard that jumped over the barbed wire at the wall in 1961 prior to it's heavy construction and was caught in a picture that became infamous with the times here.

The heartbreaking case of Peter Fechter was another interesting story that I have studied in the past that changed how the media viewed the wall and the Soviet engagement of those trying to get across.

I read some of Frederick Taylor's Exorcising Hitler which is a study of the post war Germany and denazification (I enjoyed the writing style) and I know he has a book on the wall so based on that I would recommend The Berlin Wall by Frederick Taylor as I have been told it is a comprehensive and well constructed study of the timeline.

Of course it is insane, everything you have been led to believe is false... including Hitler, i sincerely and wholeheartedly ask you to investigate, and question the reality you live in.

Want me to blow your mind? Investigate who is Fred Leuchter, investigate the Leuchter report, read The Seventh Million, read The biggest lie of the 20th century, read The transfer agreement, read The great holocaust Trial.

Reading The Berlin Wall: A World Divided - essentially the history of Berlin from it's start up until shortly after the wall fell. Super interesting so far. :)

Some of this is true except for the whole shield of victimhood bs you posted about the Jews. One of these days they'll acknowledge their responsibility in being kicked out of many nations. If they'd stop their divide and conquer bs they always do and attempts at utter domination of everyone then that might not happen.

People should also consider that Israel just keeps on taking territory.
http://ifamericansknew.org/history/

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L42TxsKKPi8

Also, for the real history of Israel look to this book:
http://www.amazon.com/The-Transfer-Agreement-25th-Anniversary-Edition/dp/0914153137


Folks there's a good reason our politicians treasonously campaign in Israel and every single one of them MUST make a speech at AIPAC. The fact that this is treason should give everyone pause but no...it's Israel, their shield of victimhood is too strong and stranglehold on media too great.

thezog.info

It is. From what I recall, U-boats suffered the greatest losses in lives percentage-wise. They were called the Iron Coffins, which is also the title of a book.

There are many other good and interesting books on the topic, including the memoirs of Karl Dönitz, admiral who led the U-boat arm.

Anyone who wants to read an account of what it was like living in the DDR read Stasiland. Excellent book.

I absolutely have to recommend The Coming of the Third Reich by Richard Evans for anyone wanting to better understand the process of Hitler's rise. There are many other books I would suggest that deal with causes earlier and external, such as The Twenty Years' Crisis, but I am specifically responding to a comment about WWI.

There is much relevant information on the causes of WWI and it is safe to say that there were a multitude of factors at play. If you were to ask me, however, I'd say one of the primary causes was the weakening of two empires - that of the Ottoman Empire (the "sick man of Europe") and the Austrian-Hungarian empire, the latter thanks to Prussia.

Vienna was long the vanguard of Europe against the Ottomans and the Balkans were always a hotbed of controversy and revolt. The most direct causes of the pre-WWI situation are seen in the wars of the 19th century, which included things like Italian and German (Prussian) unification, the Franco-Prussian War, The Crimean War, etc.

Obviously WWI was the death-knell of monarchism and the coming of age for nationalism, but I digress. Definitely a complicated subject but certainly the after-effects of it led directly to WW2. Wars have long been generational. It's safe to say that it had deeper roots than the Treaty of Versailles; I'd argue the Treaty was merely a symptom of the European multi-polar way of thinking.

the Pursuit of Italy by David Gilmour is pretty good, not a super tough read, a little boring at points, but good overall.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Pursuit-Italy-History-Regions/dp/0374533601

Two books I enjoyed:
Germany 1945, which is obviously very specific, and Postwar, which is much more wide-ranging and comprehensive.

If you haven't check out-

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0892541709/ref=mp_s_a_1_11?ie=UTF8&qid=1484214739&sr=8-11&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&keywords=peter+levenda

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0826414095/ref=mp_s_a_1_9?ie=UTF8&qid=1484214739&sr=8-9&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&keywords=peter+levenda

https://www.amazon.com/gp/aw/d/0892542101/ref=mp_s_a_1_4?ie=UTF8&qid=1484214739&sr=8-4&pi=AC_SX236_SY340_QL65&keywords=peter+levenda&dpPl=1&dpID=41XBwydxaFL&ref=plSrch

He goes in pretty deep detail about all this kinda stuff and it's well sourced.

I think I was clear, America is a fucked up place. But for you equate living under a Nazi regime as similar is purely the arrogance of youth. Go read Stasiland, for a glimpse of what state oppression is really like.

Yes, most people are happy just getting by. They have a mortgage and/or kids to put through school. You and I have time to wax lyrical on reddit about things that are important to us. I agree with you that the state of things is unjust. But running away won't change anything.

"The Only Thing Necessary for the Triumph of Evil is that Good Men Do Nothing". Social change can be generated by a very small % of the actual population, thanks largely to the aforementioned apathy of the rest. get involved

To be clear, I'm not American, don't live there, and wouldn't choose to myself (well, maybe New York, Boston or Portland). I agree with you that there are major problems. But I disagree with your nihilistic outlook.

The best book that I've read on Nazi occultism is Unholy Alliance by Peter Levenda:

http://www.amazon.com/Unholy-Alliance-History-Involvement-Occult/dp/0826414095




Also, as mentioned by others, there is The Occult Roots of Nazism by Nicholas Goodrick-Clark

Iron Coffins by Herbert Werner is a great book about life on a U-boat.

There's a great book about Juan Pujol Garcia called Agent Garbo that tells his story in further detail, which is where I first heard about him. Guy was a fucking legend.

Sounds like a good idea to me.

The Transfer Agreement is Edwin Black's compelling, award-winning story of a negotiated arrangement in 1933 between Zionist organizations and the Nazis to transfer some 50,000 Jews, and $100 million of their assets, to Jewish Palestine in exchange for stopping the worldwide Jewish-led boycott threatening to topple the Hitler regime in its first year.

http://www.amazon.com/The-Transfer-Agreement-25th-Anniversary-Edition/dp/0914153137

Neal Bascomb wrote a wonderful book about this called The Winter Fortress: The Epic Mission to Sabotage Hitler's Atomic Bomb

https://www.amazon.com/Winter-Fortress-Mission-Sabotage-Hitlers/dp/0544947290

It is an amazing page turner and is amazing for even those that aren't super into history. I took it to the beach with me last year and was done after a few days.

The Winter Fortress an amazing read

I suggest the following:

The first half of Taking Up the Runes by Diana L. Paxson

A Pocket Guide to Runes by Ben Waggoner (full disclosure, Ben is my kindred brother/co-host on Heathen History)

Rudiments of Runelore by Stephen Pollington

Another good book on the subject, in addition to the fine examples already mentioned, is the first in Prit Buttar's series on WW1, Collision of Empires

I'm taking AP Euro - the only class that sophomores can take without a comp. sci. prerequisite (obviously for AP Comp. Sci.). In order to prepare, I got these two books^[1][2] So far, they seem really good.

If you want to learn more about him, I would highly recommend this book:
https://www.amazon.com/Agent-Garbo-Brilliant-Eccentric-Tricked/dp/0544035011

If I remember correctly, War and Genocide by Bergen mentions that there was an active gay and lesbian nightlife in German cities before the rise of Nazism.

Tagging on to this, if you're interested in Stasi material, go read this book: Stasiland.

If I remember correctly, she mentions in the book that there is an organization that has tasked themselves with reconstructing a lot of the shredded files. Literally bags and bags and bags of shredded material that will take them more than their lifetimes to piece back together.

The Narrators of Barbarian History showed up on another thread. Looks promising, although it's from 1991, so perhaps not the most current of readings.

You're assuming inevitability. You're also not considering that Germany was the strongest postwar economy and you're also forgetting that they also just stopped paying reparations. The Versailles treaty was definitely part of what led to WW2, but not the whole thing. http://www.amazon.com/War-Genocide-Holocaust-Critical-International/dp/0742557154

From Axis perspective:

Guy Sajer - The Forgotten Soldier

Herbert Werner - Iron Coffins

Sven Hassel books (treat it like the fiction)

Saburo Sakai - Samurai

I highly recommend this book to anyone interested:
https://www.amazon.com/Stasiland-Stories-Behind-Berlin-Wall/dp/0062077325

It's absolutely terrifying and more about the regime and its crimes as a whole. And should probably dissuade most people from thinking "it wasn't that bad".

I guess my sword fighting training may actually come in handy if something like that ever happens to me. Not saying it will happen; just daydreaming. After some time fighting, your body gets used to being hit and you're able to resist stuff like that a lot better than someone who's never been exposed to that kind of stuff. Still hurts like a bitch, but you can push past it.

The Transfer Agreement--25th Anniversary Edition: The Dramatic Story of the Pact Between the Third Reich and Jewish Palestine

Italian history book:

The Pursuit of Italy: A History of a Land, Its Regions, and Their Peoples / David Gilmour (Author is not the Pink Floyd one!!)

Heppy Reading!

From an American perspective, Goodbye Darkness by William Manchester

From a German perspective, Iron Coffins by Herbert Werner

https://www.amazon.com/Unholy-Alliance-History-Involvement-Occult/dp/0826414095

Good start

Read more here: https://www.amazon.com/Stasiland-Stories-Behind-Berlin-Wall/dp/0062077325/ref=sr_1_1?ie=UTF8&qid=1501588135&sr=8-1&keywords=stasiland

This is his story.

Juan Pujol Garcia. I can't recommend reading this enough.

Really? Check out the history of Zionism and the Nazis...

http://www.amazon.com/51-Documents-Zionist-Collaboration-Nazis/dp/1569804338

http://www.amazon.com/The-Transfer-Agreement-25th-Anniversary-Edition/dp/0914153137/ref=pd_sim_14_2?ie=UTF8&dpID=51pBrljOWRL&dpSrc=sims&preST=_AC_UL160_SR106%2C160_&refRID=0GN1CVGSZNESC2C73HZZ

Hell, Google the history of the Lehi. Or, check out this link and the sources provided... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Zionist_political_violence

Or downvote facts? Rebel against knowledge. "Ignorance is strength. War is peace. Freedom is slavery."

If you ever get a hold of this book by Herbert Werner, a former U Boat commander do pick it up. Astounding accounts of U-Boat warfare and the dangers of being in an U Boat.

El muro se construyo cuando la gente aun no tenia idea de lo que se venia, y la gente del bloque socialista no tenia real idea de como eran las cosas en occidente.

Te recomiendo leerte este libro. Para que hagas post mas informados.

http://www.amazon.com/Stasiland-Stories-Behind-Berlin-Wall/dp/0062077325

Later in WW2, German U-boats were being decimated because they had limited range on battery power while submerged. They invented a snorkel device for the intake and exhaust to allow submerged running on diesel power.

The crews hated them because they couldn't track waves well enough. When a wave interrupted the airflow, every crew member paid the price with their eardrums.

PS. Iron Coffins is a good personal account of what it was like as a German.

Group 13

Żagiew

Judenrat

Jewish Ghetto Police


Abraham Gancwajch



Stephanie von Hohenlohe

Stella Kübler

Alfred Nossig

Chaim Rumkowski

Henric Streitman


Józef Szeryński

Ignaz Trebitsch-Lincoln


Hitler's Jewish Soldiers


Uncovered: new evidence of Jewish movie moguls’ extensive collaboration with Nazis in the 1930s


The Collaboration: Hollywood's Pact with Hitler

>"To continue doing business in Germany after Hitler's ascent to power, Hollywood studios agreed not to make films that attacked the Nazis or condemned Germany's persecution of Jews."


The Transfer Agreement

>The Transfer Agreement is Edwin Black's compelling, award-winning story of a negotiated arrangement in 1933 between Zionist organizations and the Nazis to transfer some 50,000 Jews, and $100 million of their assets, to Jewish Palestine in exchange for stopping the worldwide Jewish-led boycott threatening to topple the Hitler regime in its first year.

Many Jews want to hide the story, but the Zionists needed a middle class to populate Palestine. The Nazi's needed to end the boycotts that were crippling their country. So the Zionists and Nazi's worked together make this happen. Jewish peasants did not have any value to the new country and were left to die.

Read all about it:
http://www.amazon.com/Transfer-Agreement-25th-Anniversary-Dramatic-Palestine/dp/0914153137