Commandant of Auschwitz : The Autobiography of Rudolf Hoess

Rating:
Summary: Is this the truth or not?
Review: I'm no revisionist, but the crucial question remains: was this confession faked? The Nuremberg trials were conducted under the auspices of the Allies entirely, and the possibility of unbiased judgement on this issue - then as now - would require something with no knowledge and understanding of human nature. We will never find the truth of what actually happened. "THERE ARE NO FACTS, ONLY INTERPRETATIONS." - Friedrich Nietzsche

Rating:
Summary: Why Read This?
Review: The autobiography of Rudolf Hoess is the story of a man who would ultimately be in charge of the huge extermination camp at Auschwitz where millions of Jews were systematically murdered.

In its pages you will find an accurate account of the means that were used to isolate those victims, of the political principle that was used to justify the victims' elimination from public life, and of the mental state needed to carry out the order for their deaths. Consequently "this book," as Primo Levi states in his introduction, "is filled with evil."

Even so, the book ought to be read--and read carefully--because an understanding of the ideas that drove Rudolf Hoess to do what he did are a major step towards ensuring that the horrors of Nazi Germany will never happen again.

Rating:
Summary: It's hard to feel sorry for Rudolf
Review: This was the second book that I had read on Rudolf Hoess, commandant of Auschwitz-Birkenau, and like the first book "Death Dealer"; it had my attention up to a point. The chronicle of his childhood and youth were interesting only from the viewpoint of the European mindset of Father and son relationships. His military career and rise in the ss organisation appears to be fueled by his own inner self, in other words; no one forced him to wear the black uniform. That he wanted to be a farmer and enjoy the workings of nature is one thing, becoming a soldier was something else. The experiences in Auschwitz at its inception and afterwards leave little room for sympathy or understanding. Can the dilemma of poor Rudolf having to scrounge his own barbed wire equate to you or I trying to buy something for our own homes? His pathetic laments over the types of "bottom of the barrel" people that he had to work with doesn't wash here. He neglected to mention the dozens of efficient, ruthless barbarians like Joseph Mengele, Otto Moll and Stefan Baretzki of whom Birkenau survivors have a different remembrance. Lastly, the worst omission that the book carries is that Rudolf makes no repentant statement concerning the murder of the Jewish people. His only regret is that the wholesale slaughter besmirched the concept of National Socialism as he saw it! Die-hard follower of Hitler to the end, it would have cost him little to apologize to the Jewish people, and at least show some humanity. I feel that the nazi machine had made Rudolf Hoess into the perfect unfeeling automaton, capable of love only to his own, yet looking on the "untermenschen" as vermin. I recommend this book for any serious student of the Holocaust who desires an insight into the psyche of one of mankind's most horrific murderer's and bureaucrats.