Nigel Cawthorne > Quotes

“Hitler had contempt for people or nations that were weak.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Joseph Stalin at Yalta in 1945: Stalin was a typical Russian despot, ruling a backward country with a rod of iron.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Hitler nurtured his personal image with great care to ensure that his adoring public perceived him to be the father figure of the nation.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Though in Mein Kampf Hitler claimed to have had a serious lung ailment, his family doctor Eduard Bloch said this was not true.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Ernst Röhm and Hitler at the cenotaph during the 1933 Nuremberg Rally; Hitler’s fantasies of taking over power were coming true.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“When depressed, he needed to talk to prove his own strength by dominating others.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Hitler bows to Hindenburg in Berlin, 1934. The pose was designed to give the impression he was no threat to the established order.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Writer and politician Otto Strasser was one of the people who understood Hitler’s deep joylessness and lack of humour.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“the”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Shipwrecks: Disasters of the Deep Seas

“He had an excessive fear of poisoning, taking extreme precautions with his food, and his bed had to be made up in a specific way.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“In their diaries, Japanese soldiers often wrote that they were amazed at how good Allied intelligence was, when in fact they themselves were providing it.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Voices of the Vanquished: The German and Japanese Experience of World War II

“According to Vernon, the key to Hitler’s personality lay in his troubled childhood relations with his parents.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Siegfried awakens Brunhilde in this scene from Wagner’s The Ring; Hitler was besotted with Wagner’s work.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“In March 1935, Germany admitted the existence of the Luftwaffe,”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Steel Fist: Tank Warfare 1939 - 1945

“The Hitler Myth created by Goebbels was so successful that many Germans who encountered the Führer immediately began to swoon.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“When Hitler took over as leader of Germany, there was only one outcome: war. He was determined to bend the country to his will.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Fifty-two German tanks were completely destroyed, while the British lost none at all and only one squadron was engaged in the fighting.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Steel Fist: Tank Warfare 1939 - 1945

“Fresh from the barber’s chair, Hitler addresses a mass rally of the SA in Dortmund, 1933. You can easily imagine the feeling of power.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Vernon thought that Hitler probably fell into the athletic, verging on the pyknic.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Hitler’s mother Klara was a devout Catholic and regularly went to church with her children. She doted on her son Adolf.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“powers.’ In 1951,”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Alan Turing: The Enigma Man

“The Great Dictator: Chaplin said he would not have made this film if he had understood the full extent of Hitler’s monstrousness.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“next”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Mafia: The History of the Mob

“Alois Hitler was a cobbler turned civil servant; he was described as ‘stern, correct, industrious, punctual and clear-headed’.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“The image of Che Guevara adorn the walls of students’ bedrooms and T-shirts the world over. Looking out over the head of the viewer he cuts a Christ-like figure. In fact, he was a murdering racist psychopath. A direct descendent of the last viceroy of Peru, he hated Black people and American Indians almost as much as gringos. Only pure-blooded Spaniards were good enough for him – despite his Irish blood He happily shot his own men in the back of the head for minor infractions. In Havana he summarily executed so many allies as well as enemies in the football stadium, Taliban-style, Fidel Castro had to beg him to stop. He helped establish labour camps in Cuba. A Stalinist, he backed the bloody suppression of the Hungarian Uprising An Argentinian, he played host to dictator Juan Perón. A hardline Communist, he back-channelled with President Kennedy. During the Cuban missile crisis he urged a pre-emptive strike against the US, though America’s retaliation would have wiped Cuba from the map. “The Cuban people are willing to sacrifice themselves,” he said. Did anyone ask them? He alienated the Cubans, the Russians and the Chinese in turn. The people of the Congo are suffering from his bungled intervention to this day. The Communist Party in Bolivia did not want him there. Nor did any of the other Communist parties in the surrounding countries. When he was captured, the only people that tried to rescue him were the CIA. Still, he takes a great photograph.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Che Guevara: The Last Conquistador

“Hitler at school in Lambach at the age of ten; he was far from an outstanding pupil. Teachers considered him quite able but lazy.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“In a strongly patriarchal society, his father was particularly aggressive and brutal towards his son.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“He had an excessive fear of poisoning, taking extreme precautions with his food, and his bed had to be made up in a specific way. He could not work steadily, but only in explosive outbursts of energy or not at all. Even the smallest decision demanded the greatest effort and he had to work himself up to it. When thwarted, he would have a hysterical tantrum, scolding others in a high-pitched voice, foaming at the mouth and stamping uncontrollably in fury. On several occasions, when he was to make an important speech, he stood in silence before his audience, then walked out, and one international broadcast was inexplicably taken off air. And he threatened to commit suicide if the Nazi Party was destroyed or his plans for the German Reich failed.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Hitler’s early association with Ernst Röhm, leader of his storm troopers, and other homosexuals sparked gossip, but reliable sources denied that Hitler had any proclivities in that direction.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer

“Murray claimed that Hitler was ‘ideocentric’, since he was clearly devoted to the Prussian militarism ideal for Germany. He could also be seen as ‘sociocentric’, as he had a plan in which the majority of Germans would supposedly benefit. But these characteristics were clearly secondary to his egocentric craving for fame and immortality.”
― Nigel Cawthorne, Hitler: The Psychiatric Files: The Madness of the Führer