Rating: 
Summary: The Best Single Overview Of The Nazi Regime!
Review: I grew up near Lenox, Massachusetts, where author William Shirer spent his last twenty years, and we often drove by the old Victorian where he lived, set back from the road as it was, with a large, lovely lawn hiding the rather reclusive author from public view. I picked up this book again to reread it once more, for I find that it is a wonderful treasure trove of personal observations and actual eye-witness history, written on the run by a man married to a German woman and living in the shadow of the nazis as they climbed into power. William Shirer's comprehensive treatment of the curious rise and horrific fall of the Nazis in post-Weimar Germany is the benchmark volume to measure all other treatments of the era by. There are so many monographs on Nazi Germany that one reels before the list looming in a relevant bibliography. Save yourself the trouble; this book gives one exactly the kind of complete immersion in and coverage of the realities of the era that too many of the other books lack. Shirer, an American journalist stationed in Berlin as a newspaper (and later radio) correspondant during the rise of the National Socialists, was there, on the ground and at the scene witnessing many of the events he describes in such detail. He has, of course, written extensively on these experiences, both herein and elsewhere in books like 'The Nightmare Years' and 'Berlin Diary'. But this book has to be considered his masterpiece, and is worth the time, trouble and price for this hefty best-selling volume. After all, it has never been out of print in the forty years since its original publication in the early 1960s. I promise that if you read this, you'll never think of World War Two in the same way. It is indeed a long and difficult read, but one that is well worth the effort. Enjoy!
Rating:
Summary: A Great Work That Should Never Be Forgotten
Review: 'The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich' may be one of the most important non-fiction books ever written. Read on to find out why. William Shirer has done the world a great service in creating this monumental work. Anyone who may continue to wonder at the presence of evil in the world would do well to read Shirer's book. The author expertly describes how evil manifested itself to produce one of history's greatest villians, Adolph Hitler. Shirer traces how Hitler became the Hitler we know today and how his twisted ideas led converts, demanded allegiance, and terrorized millions. Nearly the entire work is taken from journals, diaries, and eye-witness accounts of those who experienced the years leading to Nazi Germany and beyond. (Shirer himself was an eye-witness to many of the events recorded in the work.) This is a completely readable, comprehensive look at one of history's darkest hours. The first thing readers will encounter is the immense size of the book, nearly 1200 pages of text. Please do not be intimidated by the number of pages. They are well worth your time. Not a word is wasted. Take it in small bites. As I read the book, I kept thinking over and over of the parallels with our current situation against terrorism, and I wondered, "Have we really learned anything?" In the late 1930's, anyone who had read Hitler's "Mein Kampf" would have known exactly what the dictator planned to do to the world. He spelled it out. Either no one read it (which is doubtful), or no one took him seriously. Bin Laden also told this country what his plans were before Sept. 11. Clearly. We didn't listen then either. Of course, that's not the only parallel. There are more, and as each presents itself, the more relevant this book becomes to us today. Reading the book, you will learn that Hitler did a multitude of things expertly, but was not thorough in many of his plans. The terrorists are extremely thorough. Hitler many times did not look far enough ahead (especially with respect to Russia). The terrorists obviously plan months and years in advance. Many of Hitler's henchmen were incompetent in many areas, military and economic. It doesn't appear that incompetence is a major terrorist problem. They know what they're doing. When the time came, the United States was prepared for the Nazis of the Third Reich. May we be even more prepared for the evils that we face today. Don't fall into the trap of thinking 'The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich' is a crusty old history book that belongs on a shelf in a library. Read it now and look around you. I think you'll see that Shirer's work is frighteningly relevant.
Rating:
Summary: A grand overview of troubled times.
Review: William Shirer, a journalist/broadcaster stationed in Berlin in the 1930s and 40s, had a unique opportunity to witness Adolph Hitler's rise to power. Few can say they attended Nazi rallies or stood behind Hitler as he delivered some of his famous speeches. Shirer, the consummate narrator, delivers his experiences to the rest of the world in this book, first published in 1960. It covers Hitler's young life and many experiences that probably helped form his anti-semitism. It is fascinating to see how many of these major characters of the last century came together at first in small restaurants and bars, and later in stadiums before hundreds of thousands of Germans. This book remains one of the great docu-historical writings of the twentieth century. Part history and part opinion, it is quite stunning in scope and character. True, Shirer does occasionally transcend his role as journalist, delivering intense personal opinions on characters from Ribbontrop to Goering to Goebbels. Some have faulted him for this, but I liked it. Who else would be in a better position to deliver such information? If Shirer has spent the time with these people-if he knows enough of them, then by all means, he should expound in this manner. This is a very long book. At 1200-some pages, It was daunting and enjoyable at the same time. While some details blurred over time, the amount of information erred on the safe side-better too much than too little. While this is a valid criticism, it has no bearing on my feelings regarding the book when all is said and done. This is masterful history mixed with first hand drama and (despite what some have said) intense documentation. Essential and highly recommended.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent Throughout
Review: By reading this book I came to the conclusion that Hitler almost made it to rule all of Europe. I have not read a better overall account of the Nazis then this book offers. It does not have in-depth coverage of battles, as that is not the focus of the book. What it does cover is the overall details of the leadership of the Nazis through the period. The title could make you think this is going to be one of those very dry reviews favored only by history professors, but that is not the case. The book is a well-written and orderly book that is easy to read. The detail of the personalities involved made the list of characters easer to remember. There is just so much good information that this book should be the first book read by anyone wanting to gain an understanding of WW 2 in Europe.
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Summary: Light on humanity's darkest night
Review: This book is a spectacular achievement by an author who knows whereof he speaks. Shirer was an American journalist in Germany during the 1930's; he watched Hitler's rise from obscurity in Austria to become the most powerful and evil force in Europe. Shirer was witness to what Hitler built and nourished and he doesn't pretend to be impartial. He states in the book's introduction that he hates all totalitarian governments and he especially came to loathe this one as he watched its relentless assault and violation of everything that makes people human. Shirer pays Hitler grudging respect as a man of undoubted, if evil, genius. He knew how to manipulate time and circumstances to his advantage. But he couldn't have done it alone or in a vacuum, and Shirer builds a solid background on the historical events that made Hitler and Nazism possible. Antisemitism was an old story in Germany; there is an almost unbroken string from Hitler back to Martin Luther whose advice to kill and destroy all Jews as enemies of mankind was "literally followed 500 years later by Hitler, Goering and Himmler". He writes of how the great majority of Germans enthusiastically and blindly followed Hitler through conquest, war, and the destruction and devastation of their country. And he shows in convincing and sickening detail the German mindset that made them "ubermensch" in their own minds, and everyone else, especially Jews and Slavic peoples, subhumans to be killed or allowed to live as slaves to German "kultur". Shirer's book is abundantly documented, largely thanks to the bonanza of Nazi documents that fell almost untouched into Allied hands at the end of the war. Perhaps it was that mania for organization and precision that contributed to the "Final Solution": first, the determination that the Jews were to be eliminated and then the search for a method to most efficiently bring this about. So from mass shootings in the trenches, they progressed to Auschwitz and the gas chambers, and kept searching for ways to improve the rate and efficiency of the carnage right up to the end. What kind of people would participate in something as monstrous as this? Some of the most chilling passages in the book are the descriptions of the defendants' testimony at the Nuremberg trials, as when one officer says without batting an eye that he personally oversaw the deaths of 90,000 people. Even this pales before the descriptions of the medical experiments in the concentration camps, when respected doctors prostituted their science and their souls in some of the most despicable tortures ever perpetrated on human beings, and lost their own humanity in the process. One of the main strengths of the book, besides the wealth of documentation, is that it was written only 14 years after the end of the war, when many of the main characters were still alive. Shirer gives grudging respect to those Germans such as Halder and Speer who were able to face up to and acknowledge their own guilt and complicity that allowed the unspeakable to become real. One wonders what Heydrich or Von Ribbentrop would have told him had they not been executed, one by Czech partisans and the other by a hangman's noose after the Nuremberg trials. Shirer narrates in detail the failed plot to kill Hitler by his own officers in 1944, the revenge exacted by Hitler and his kangaroo courts, the Allied invasion of Western Europe and the final assault by Russia and the Allied forces that destroyed Nazi Germany, and not a minute too soon. He feels some sympathy for the German people who followed Hitler blindly to their own destruction, like lemmings over a cliff. It is difficult to share his feelings. One reads this awesome book and feels that they brought it on themselves, they enthusiastically backed Hitler's rise to power, and in doing so, unleashed a monster.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent
Review: Despite its heft, as of the time of this writing I am reading Rise and Fall for the 4th time. It is a compelling avalanche of information. A must read for anyone who lives in, and wishes to try to understand, the post-Nazi Germany world.
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Summary: Brimming With Facts
Review: This book is over 1000 pages and it is brimming with facts about Nazi Germany in particular and World War II in general. The author, William Shirer, does an excellent job of maintaining the reader's interest throughout this voluminous book. Chronicling Adolf Hitler and the National Socialist Party from the very early days to the end, he provides profound insight into a phenomenon which has left a deep and indelible mark upon modern history. Shirer resided in Germany during the years preceding World War II and he personally witnessed many of the events that he writes about in the book. Although more information has become available from East German archives and other sources since this book was published , The Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich remains the most comprehensive and informative book on the history of Germany under Hitler.
Rating:
Summary: A must read.
Review: In reading the thoughtful and eloquent reviews contained within this site I can't help but think that my review is unnecessary, except to add one more voice of praise to the chorus. "The Rise and Fall of Nazi Germany" is the standard by which any work on the Third Reich needs to measured to. I use measured instead of compared because I highly doubt any other work on the Third Reich will rival it let alone better it. The history of the Third Reich is clearly told in a transparent easy to read prose. Considering the mass amount people and places that Mr. Shirer has to deal with it is surprisingly easy to keep track of who did what, when and where. The book is a gripping, entertaining read and manages to present and the detailed and intricate history of the Third Reich in a clear straight forward manner. Mr.Shirer relies on thousands of captured official German documents, diaries and correspondence of people involved in the events describe to flesh out a very accurate history of the Third Reich. Let me say that since the book was written that there has been additional information that have seen discovered that would expand or modify some of the conclusions reached by the author and thrown a different light on certain facts and events. For example at the time of the writing of this book it was not widely known that Japan had lost a series of clashes against Russia on the Mongolian frontier in 1939. That event would throw a different light on Japan's refusal to declare war on Russia in 1941. Regardless in the majority of instances this book is still extremely accurate. As to its downside I have the same reservation as mentioned by prior reviewers in that M.Shirer time and time again repeats some of his biases and observations. Again as mention by a prior reviewer, c leong73 the sexual orientation of some of the figures that played a major role in Nazi Germany has no bearing weather they were slimeballs or not. There were plenty of heterosexual psycho's running around Germany at that time. At any rate the good points in this book far out weight the flaws. A must read for anyone who want to comprehend this fascinating era in history.
Rating: 
Summary: Eye-opener, but read with an open mind.
Review: This book is hard to beat when it comes to detailing the causes of WWII, particularly in the European theater. I have read many different books on WWII history and thought that I had a pretty good grasp of what happened, when it happened, how it happened and the eventual results, but upon reading this book, I realized that there were much that I did not read about. Shirer filled in many of the gaps in my knowledge of this crucial period in history. Considering the amount of names, dates and details that Shirer put in the book, he has managed to write a large work that rates very high on readability. At no point in the book did it get dry (at least for me). He has managed to weave together his voluminous research into captured German papers as well as interviews and correspondence with those involved into a very coherent, "story-telling" way. The reason I didn't rate this book the full 5 stars is because Shirer, as a journalist and not a military historian per se, couldn't resist injecting his strong personal biases and prejudices throughout the entire book. I understand that a certain amount of personal bias is sometimes inevitable in a work written by a journalist, but when those same views get repeated over and over again, it just becomes plain annoying. The first glaring bias that gnawed on my nerves was Shirer's repeated attack on some of Hitler's henchmen because they happened to be homosexual. He was trying to make a point that Hitler employed some of the worst scums of the earth during his early rise to power. I would fully agree with the fact that these men were scums because they were also murderers, thieves.... but homosexual? To place someone's sexual orientation (and we're not talking about pedophilia here) on the list of the world's biggest crimes shows Shirer's worst inconsistencies - you simply can condemn Hitler for being the worst bigot in the world and yet demonstrate such glaring bigotry yourself. His personal attacks also get very tiring after a while. True, Goering was one of the most despicable characters to come out of the Nazi era, but when an author of a supposed work of history chooses to refer to him time and time again as "the FAT Field Marshal" or "the CORPULENT Field Marshal", it kind of takes a lot away from the reader's sense of the author's objectivity. Moreover, the fact that Goering wasn't a thin man doesn't have anything to do with the events of that period. For that matter, Churchhill was no model of fitness either, but the author doesn't point that out at all. Sometimes, Shirer lets his personal biases contribute to silly inconsistencies. One moment, he'd be talking about "typical German clumsiness", and a few chapters later, while talking about another event, he would write about "typical German orderliness". Which one is it? Were the Germans slobs or perfectionists? Maybe he just shouldn't have made generalizations so freely like that throughout the entire book. Tell us the events that happened and let us make up our own minds. In similar ways, Shirer also seems to be torn between deciding whether Hitler was a genius, or a bumbling maniac. His views on that differ from chapter to chapter. It may seem like I've written more about the book's weak points than its strong ones. The thing is, the book is invaluable as far as WWII history works are concerned. I'm just trying to emphasize that although you won't be disappointed with the mountain of details offered by it, it is also extremely important to know that this book must be read with an open mind, knowing that the author has liberally injected many of his personal biases into the narrative. At no point should it be considered strictly a work of history (in the vein of Stephen Ambrose's "D-DAY" etc. for example). Shirer gives you history the way HE wants you to see it.
Rating:
Summary: A Nice Place to Start on Nazi Germany.
Review: I read it somewhere as a teenager. It is long but interesting. The writer is a journalist. He has opinions, but I thought the book was a good one. It does what the title says generally. It chronicles the rise and fall of the third reich. I felt like the book sets the flavor or tone that is necessary when learning about such a thing. I also suggest Inside the Third Reich by Albert Speer and Order of the Death's head, which is about the rise of the SD and SS. Between the three of them I feel like I have more knowledge than most about Nazi Germany. I would guess so would anyone that read these three books. This book is long. I read all three books over the course of maybe five years. I was in no hurry. Each of these books leaves a lasting impression to say the least. I would argue that a focus on power is the right way to go. There are plenty of mindless racists around. Hitler and his peers were able to sieze power and nearly take over the world. There are many reasons to be informed about these people and people like them. Thank you for your time and enjoy the book.
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