“One seldom recognises the devil when he is putting his hand on your shoulder” (Albert Speer, October 1966)
In the very centre of Nazi Germany, amid some of the cruellest men of the 20th century, Albert Speer, Hitler’s personal architect, seems an anomaly. Appointed to Hitler’s inner circle in 1933, Speer rose to prominence during the Second World War, quadrupling German arms production from 1942-43 through his pragmatism and organisational prowess. Yet, having been sentenced to 20 years imprisonment following the Nuremberg Trials, Speer was able to transform his public perception into that of a ‘good Nazi’. While perhaps a paradox in itself, the ‘good Nazi’ myth brought Speer worldwide acclaim, contrary to the fact that he had single-handedly reinvigorated the German war effort – prolonging the conflict for a further two years of horror and bloodshed.
From a young age, Albert Speer had all the prerequisites for a successful career. Born into a wealthy family on 19 March 1905 in Mannheim, Speer proved to be exceptionally intelligent. Following in the footsteps of his father and paternal grandfather, Speer became an architect, effortlessly passing through his training; at the age of 23, he was appointed assistant to Heinrich Tessenow, one of the Weimar Republic’s most distinguished architects and town planners. But the opportunities for a young architect, even one with such impressive credentials, were slim in 1928. With the onset of the Great Depression, they disappeared altogether.
Speer was typical of his class and generation. Too young to have fought in the First World War, he felt compelled to revolt against the bourgeois certainties of his liberal father. On the other hand, his mother, Máthilde, lavishly indulged in all kinds of French fashion and left very little time for her second son. Reticent by nature and bullied by his brothers growing up, Speer was something of a loner, adopting a mildly unconventional attitude, and deliberately antagonised his parents by marrying Margarete Weber, the daughter of a craftsman far below Speer’s station. Despite professing only to find fulfilment in a simple outdoor life – camping, canoeing and contemplating the wonders of nature were then much in vogue among the German youth – he remained smitten by material pleasures. Fast cars, fine fare and a patrician lifestyle soon replaced canoes, campfires and tents.
Although he was seen as an exemplary young gentleman among the Nazi elite, Speer did not quite fit the ideal. He lacked the cultural capital that was an essential component of the German concept of the sophisticated bourgeoisie. However, none of this mattered in Hitler’s inner circle. In spite of the efforts of his Munich hostesses and close friend Winifred Wagner, Hitler too remained somewhat socially inept. He never mastered the delicate art of kissing hands, his bows were both too stiff and too low, and the bouquets he presented were invariably grotesquely large. In the words of Speer’s mother – he was not quite a gentleman.
On 26 June 1933, Speer was given his first real test as an architect. Hugenberg had been ousted from the Ministry of Nutrition by the Nazis, with Goebbels taking his place; Speer was then commissioned to remodel and extend the ministerial residence that went with the job. In spite of impressing the Nazi hierarchy with his speed, Speer’s finished project was apt, but not enough to earn a promotion from Hitler. It was instead his devout following of the Führer, as well as his role as an unscrupulous, value-free power broker, that brought about his success. Just as Hermann Göring would have been merely an oddjobbing air force veteran, Joseph Goebbels the author of second-rate novels, pitiable plays and occasional newspaper articles, and Heinrich Himmler a chicken farmer or village schoolmaster, Speer would have merely had a modest career as a small-town architect without Hitler’s support – something he found “exceedingly hard to accept” (Martin Kitchen).
When Hitler’s favourite architect, Paul Troost, died suddenly on 21 January 1934, Speer was appointed his successor. Having been Tessenow’s devoted disciple, Speer had already wholeheartedly embraced Troost’s architectural style that seemed likely to become the Third Reich’s vernacular. Once in this exalted position, he quickly showed those qualities that were to ensure him such a staggeringly successful career. His exceptional organisational talents were already apparent. He was now in a position to delegate authority and did so to people of real ability. As Kitchen writes, “he did what he was told by Hitler and had a handpicked team to make sure that the job was well done.”
Although at heart a traditional nationalist, Speer was soon to become the architect of atavistic cult monuments. From the outset, he had no qualms about employing vast amounts of slave labour from Himmler’s concentration camps. He also enthusiastically endorsed Hitler’s decision to risk war in 1939, even though it might involve putting some of his mammoth building projects on hold until the ‘Final Victory’.
When the war came at last on 1 September 1939, Speer was occupying the role of Generalbauinspektor für die Reichshauptstadt (Inspector General of Buildings in the Reich Capital, or GBI for short), which involved drawing up plans for a new Berlin to be called ‘Germania’. As GBI, Speer disregarded established practice and legal norms. He made vast sums of money by employing his own firm as a consultant for the Germania project, thereby substantially augmenting the generous emolument he received in his official position. He also made handsome profits from real estate speculation. For the first time, his immorality seemed to be coming to light.
However, Speer’s worst offence as GBI was the role he played in the persecution and expulsion of Berlin’s large Jewish community. Being faced with an acute housing shortage in Berlin, Speer turned to nefarious means. With sovereign disregard for landlord and tenant rights, Speer cooperated enthusiastically with Goebbels, the Nazi Party and the SS, first to herd the Jews into over-crowded alternative housing, then into camps until they were transported to the death factories in eastern Europe. After the invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 Speer worked closely with the SS to employ slave labour, much of which was Jewish, to build a motorway through the Ukraine that was designed to link Berlin to the Crimean Riviera. He also lent his expertise to Himmler by helping design his model cities in a future eastern empire to house a new race of German settlers.
Speer visited Hitler’s headquarters at Rastenburg on 7 February 1942, having made an extensive and arduous visit to his operations in the Soviet Union. The Minister of Armaments, Fritz Todt, was also present. Todt had come in the hope of convincing Hitler that the entire system of armament production and allocation had to be drastically altered for a further offensive in the East to have any chance of success. The result was a long and heated debate that went on until midnight. Early the next morning, the plane that was to fly Todt back to Berlin exploded shortly after take-off. All on board were killed. Speer, who was scheduled to fly with Todt, but had been held back by Hitler to discuss plans for Berlin, admittedly found the ordeal “curious.”
Without hesitation, Hitler appointed Speer to replace Todt, both as Minister of Armaments and as head of the colossal government-controlled construction company, Organisation Todt. As Joachim Fest, editor of Speer’s memoirs, writes, “it was astonishing how quickly Speer found his way.” Surrounded by a highly talented team of experts, in both Nuremberg and Berlin, Speer immediately set about extending the powers and influence of the Ministry of Armaments. He did so with such ruthless determination, boundless ambition, and total disregard for established practice as to alarm and dismay many of the key figures in Hitler’s entourage. Within two months, he had managed to take control of 90% of the German armaments industry.
Soon, Speer’s success became evident. In his three years as Minister of Armaments, Speer tripled weapons production, doubled worker output and drafted millions of foreign workers – by 1944, this number was at 9.3 million, making up 30% of the German workforce. However, towards the end of the war, Speer became increasingly isolated. In December 1943, through a combination of exhaustion and depression, Speer fell ill, during which time his political enemies in the Ministry of Armaments set to work undermining his authority. By the summer of 1944, Speer had effectively lost all control of Operation Todt and was in the process of being replaced as Minister of Armaments. In March 1945, he was transferred to be put in charge of aircraft production.
Although he had been effectively stripped of much of his power and influence, Speer still imagined that Hitler might appoint him as his successor. In a letter to his wife, Speer asserted, “much that is unnatural will disappear and things will be so much better…I am sure I shall succeed.” The ensuing news of Hitler’s suicide on 30 April 1945 left him shattered. For the first time in Speer’s life, he was overcome with profound emotion. But this did not last for long. His attention was now focused on securing a position in the post-war world. For this, he needed to ingratiate himself with the Allies and reinvent himself as an apolitical penitent, unaware of the crimes committed by the regime for which he had served in highest office – an innocent victim of a remorseless technocratic age.
From the onset of the Nuremberg Trials on 20 November 1945, Speer proved to be most impressive. He acknowledged the regime’s wrongdoings and admitted to an adroitly ill-defined degree of responsibility for its criminal actions; he deftly distanced himself from men such as Goebbels and Himmler without losing credibility; he answered questions calmly, cogently and convincingly. He avoided the death sentence not only because a great deal of highly incriminating evidence was not available to the court, but also because of the marked contrast between his demeanour and that of most of the other defendants. As German journalist Heinz Höhne wrote, “his self-accusations brought him a reputation as Hitler’s only repentant paladin.” Instead, on 18 July 1947, he was sentenced to a 20-year imprisonment at the Spandau Prison in Berlin.
While in Spandau, Speer occupied himself with writing, reading, gardening and exercising. To make his daily walks around the garden more engaging, Speer embarked on an imaginary trip around the globe. Carefully measuring the distance travelled each day, by the time of his release, Speer had walked over 30,000 kilometres. Although prisoners were forbidden to write memoirs, Speer used the services of Toni Proost, a sympathetic Dutch orderly, to smuggle his writings out of Spandau. Speer amassed over 20,000 pages of writings that were sent to his long-time friend, Rudolph Wolters. Following his release in October 1966, he embarked on a career of writing, publishing three memoirs before his death on 1 September 1981.
For a number of reasons, Speer’s memoirs prove problematic. As Marcus K. Billson argues, there is a “conspicuous ignorance” to the extent of the Jewish persecution, and that Speer is trying to “convince us that what he did not see in person, he did not know.” In reality, Speer was not unaware of the nature of the ‘Final Solution’ – in many ways, he was one of its key perpetrators. Further factual accuracies call Speer’s memoirs into question. Writing to Wolters, Speer claimed that he “should have been one of Hitler’s close friends had he actually had any.” In light of Hitler’s treatment of Speer towards the end of the war, this statement becomes increasingly difficult to justify. Speer even ventured to reimagine his own birth, claiming to have been brought into the world at high noon during a thunderstorm, amidst the peal of church bells. While these may be intrinsically harmless white lies, once discovered, they question whether anything Speer writes has complete veracity.
Through his memoirs and interviews, Albert Speer was able to prevent his war crimes from emerging during his lifetime. He admitted to his personal share of collective responsibility, parading his remorse on every possible occasion. It was only upon the death of Wolters in January 1983 that Speer’s true colours were revealed. To Wolters alone, in defence against his oldest friend’s complaints, Speer confessed that the continual confession of guilt and the monotonous chant of repentance were only a sham: “he himself called them his ‘tricks’ to my face.”
What makes Speer so particularly frightening is that this hollow man, resolutely bourgeois, highly intelligent but utterly immoral, was not ostracised by German society. He was the type that made National Socialism possible. The Third Reich would never have been so brutally effective had it not been for men who were willing to forego all concepts of morality for the ‘greater good’ of the state. That so many found his carefully staged post-war image so thoroughly convincing points to an insidious danger. As Sebastian Haffner so shrewdly remarked, “we can get rid of the Hitlers and the Himmlers, but not the Speers. They are still with us. They are immediately recognisable and every bit as dangerous.”
–
Fest, Joachim C, Alexandra Dring, and Ewald Osers. 2003. Speer : The Final Verdict. Orlando: A Harvest Book ; Harcourt Inc.
Gitta Sereny. 2017. Albert Speer: His Battle with Truth. Pan Macmillan.
Speer, Albert, Richard Winston, Clara Winston, and Eugene Davidson. 1997. Inside the Third Reich. New York: Touchstone.
Kitchen, Martin. 2015. Speer. Yale University Press.
Van, Dan, Albert Speer, and Mazal Holocaust Collection. 1997. The Good Nazi : The Life and Lies of Albert Speer. Boston: Houghton Mifflin.
Marcus K. Billson, III. “Inside Albert Speer: Secrets of Moral Evasion.” The Antioch Review 37, no. 4 (1979): 460–74. https://doi.org/10.2307/4638243.
Mierzejewski, Alfred C. “When Did Albert Speer Give Up?” The Historical Journal 31, no. 2 (1988): 391–97. http://www.jstor.org/stable/2639220.
Lane, Barbara Miller. “Architects in Power: Politics and Ideology in the Work of Ernst May and Albert Speer.” The Journal of Interdisciplinary History 17, no. 1 (1986): 283–310. https://doi.org/10.2307/204134.
Mayo, James M., Dennis E. Domer, and Albert Speer. “JAE/Interview: Albert Speer: Education and Values.” JAE 36, no. 1 (1982): 44–53. https://doi.org/10.2307/1424607.