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Rating: 
Summary: A well-done, first-hand account of Berlin during war
Review: Howard K. Smith does a great job of describing his experiences in detail about his time spent in Berlin during the first few years of World War II. During the final two-thirds of the book, the reader is a companion to Smith as he describes his increasingly darkening experiences in Berlin, culminating with his departure to Switzerland on the day the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor. Following the bombing, the Germans wouldn't allow anyone to leave the country, so Smith just made it. My two chief complaints about the book: 1. It ends too early. There are pictures of the author visiting Berlin in 1950 touring the burned out Reichstag, but no details about that. It would have been delightful to read about that, and his impressions of defeated Germany, since Smith spent so much time in Berlin. 2. He doesn't add quite enough personal thoughts to his book. For instance, he met the woman that would eventually become his wife in Germany? and there is no mention of it (there's a picture of both of them in the Berlin Tiergarten). A little more of a personal touch would have rounded out the book nicely. However, these are minor complaints about a solid and throught-provoking book.
Rating:
Summary: We didn't see THIS in the movies!
Review: Howard K. Smith's 60 year old writing has an urgent, compelling feel which seems very relevant to our times. With personal anecdotes, facts and figures he illuminates the seduction of the German middle class into Nazism and their eventual betrayal and ruination by Hitler's policies. The internal fracture between eager industrialists who got on board with Hitler and the older, more conservative, landed gentry & industrialists who didn't like Hitler, but feared Bolsheviks even more, parallels the conflict between the established Prussian officer corp and the up and coming Wehrmacht and SS organizations. All this while the country began to bleed dry because of Hitler's crazed decision to attack Russia. Civilians endured huge hardships and shortages while at the same time Germany's military machine almost won the war. Smith's book is outstanding in that it gives the texture of daily life for Germans and how they resisted in small ways but ultimately rationalized the war under the renentless pounding of Nazi propaganda . Vivid descriptions of harrassment by the Gestapo of Smith and others in the foreigh correspondent sector. He emerges as an outspoken advocate for social change in the USA as well. easy, engaging read.
Rating:
Summary: We didn't see THIS in the movies!
Review: Howard K. Smith's 60 year old writing has an urgent, compelling feel which seems very relevant to our times. With personal anecdotes, facts and figures he illuminates the seduction of the German middle class into Nazism and their eventual betrayal and ruination by Hitler's policies. The internal fracture between eager industrialists who got on board with Hitler and the older, more conservative, landed gentry & industrialists who didn't like Hitler, but feared Bolsheviks even more, parallels the conflict between the established Prussian officer corp and the up and coming Wehrmacht and SS organizations. All this while the country began to bleed dry because of Hitler's crazed decision to attack Russia. Civilians endured huge hardships and shortages while at the same time Germany's military machine almost won the war. Smith's book is outstanding in that it gives the texture of daily life for Germans and how they resisted in small ways but ultimately rationalized the war under the renentless pounding of Nazi propaganda . Vivid descriptions of harrassment by the Gestapo of Smith and others in the foreigh correspondent sector. He emerges as an outspoken advocate for social change in the USA as well. easy, engaging read.
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