Christian Goeschel— On July 20, 1944, a bomb exploded in the Wolf’s Lair, Adolf Hitler’s East Prussian Headquarters. The Nazi leader survived. Hours later, he received Benito Mussolini. This would be the final encounter between Mussolini and Hitler, leaders of Europe’s most significant fascist dictatorships. It took place almost exactly
Ray Moseley— Lynn Heinzerling of the AP and George Kidd of UP shared the distinction of being the first correspondents to hear the opening shots of World War II. A few hours before the shelling of Danzig began, Heinzerling overheard a German officer in his hotel place an urgent 3:15
Ben H. Shepard— The answer to the question of why the German army fought on as long as it did was an answer that evolved and changed during the war’s final two years. By February 1943, and by the summer of 1943 at the very latest, the great majority of officers and
Adolf Hitler’s makeover from rabble‑rouser to statesman coincided with a series of dramatic home renovations he undertook during the mid‑1930s. In the brand-new book Hitler at Home, author Despina Stratigakos exposes the dictator’s preoccupation with his private persona, which was shaped by the aesthetic and ideological management of his domestic architecture.
David Cooper— Béla Bartók, the great Hungarian composer, pianist, ethnomusicologist, and pedagogue, died in Manhattan’s West Side Hospital on 27 September 1945 at the age of sixty four. The final five years of his life had been spent in the United States of America, a stranger in a strange land.
Follow @yaleRELIbooks On the night of November 9, 1938, now known as Kristallnacht, the Nazis burned the Hebrew Bible everywhere in Germany. In the video below, Alon Confino explains why this act, among the other horrors committed that night, was particularly unusual. There is not a direct connection between the Nazi’s racist ideology
As the world became embroiled in the fight against the Nazis, America gathered to decide on the president who would lead them through it. Susan Dunn’s book, 1940: FDR, Wilkie, Lindbergh, Hitler—the Election amid the Storm, documents this incredible moment in history when the US broke with tradition and elected
With so much political activity and talk of revolution in Egypt, Tunisia, and the greater Middle East, perhaps it is time for us to revisit the darker side of resolutions and how regimes can affect the greater course of human history with decisive action. Indeed, when the object of “solving”
Faced with the impending blitz during the Second World War, Winston Churchill and his cabinet sought protection in an underground headquarters beneath the Treasury building in London. Though the prime minister much preferred to observe the war from the keener vantage point of the top floor of 10 Downing Street
In remembrance of the attack on Pearl Harbor 66 years ago today, here are some books related to the “day of infamy” and World War II. Crises in U.S. Foreign Policy: An International History Reader by Michael H. Hunt Repeatedly in the twentieth century, the United States has been involved