More on this book
Community
Kindle Notes & Highlights
by
Erik Larson
Read between
August 23 - August 23, 2023
The public loved him, forgiving his legendary excesses and coarse personality. The American correspondent William Shirer, in his diary, sought to explain this seeming paradox: “Where Hitler is distant, legendary, nebulous, an enigma as a human being, Göring is a salty, earthy, lusty man of flesh and blood. The Germans like him because they understand him. He has the faults and virtues of the average man, and the people admire him for both. He has a child’s love for uniforms and medals. So have they.” Shirer detected no resentment among the public directed toward the “fantastic, medieval—and
...more
Göring was easily influenced by a “small clique of sycophants,” Galland said. “His court favorites changed frequently since his favor could only be won and held by means of constant flattery, intrigue and expensive gifts.”
“Beppo Schmid,” Galland said, “was a complete wash-out as intelligence officer, the most important job of all.” Nonetheless, Göring paid attention only to him. He trusted Schmid as a friend but, more importantly, reveled in the happy news that he seemed always ready to provide.
“If we can stand up to him, all Europe may be free, and
the life of the world may move forward into broad, sunlit uplands; but if we fail then the whole world, including the United States, and all that we have known and cared for, will sink into the abyss of a new dark age made more sinister, and perhaps more prolonged, by the lights of a perverted science.” He issued an appeal to the greater spirit of Britons everywhere. “Let us therefore brace ourselves to our duty and so bear ourselves that if the British Commonwealth and Empire lasts for a thousand years, men will still say, ‘This was their finest hour.’ ”
“Never in the field of human conflict has so much been owed by so many to so few.”
But
times. Men, women, and children walked beside Churchill’s car,
