“May this book help me to be clearer in spirit, simpler in thought, greater in love.” Unlikely as it may seem, so begin the voluminous diaries of one of modern history’s most diabolical figures: Joseph Goebbels, Minister of Propaganda for the Third Reich. Despite these noble intentions, the entry soon reveals the ugly disposition of the man who became a fanatical member of Adolf Hitler’s inner circle. Jews, fumed the 26-year-old Goebbels, “suck the blood from our veins. scoundrels, traitors . . . vampires.” Glimpses of Goebbels’ extensive chronicles have dribbled out piecemeal over the past 39 years, but late last month readers had their first comprehensive look at the Nazi’s early writings with the publication of four volumes, running to 2,841 pages, by Munich’s Institute of Contemporary History. Last week a few tantalizing excerpts appeared in the West German weekly Der Spiegel. The journals, dating from 1924 to early July of 1941, record Goebbels’ development from a deeply religious and literary-minded Catholic youth, who saw his diaries as a “substitute for the confessional,” to a zealous political organizer whose sole faith was in Adolf Hitler. Six further volumes, to be published in the next three years, will compile Goebbels’ later writings. They cover the remaining war years right up to May 1, 1945, the day Goebbels and his wife killed their six children and then themselves rather than surrender to the Red Army as it swept through Berlin. Ever since the Hitler diary scandal of 1983, scholars have been leery of late-surfacing relics from the Third Reich. But academicians seem to agree that these diaries are authentic. Goebbels is known to have kept meticulous journals, and the content jibes with existing historical records. Forensic tests have turned up no evidence of fraud. Still, some details are unexpected. In an entry from 1929, Goebbels frets that “Hitler is too soft, he doesn’t work enough,” and is concerned that Germany’s future leader may do “too much womanizing.” Another entry suggests that the burning of the Reichstag in 1933 surprised Hitler’s circle. Though Goebbels’ account may be disingenuous, the passage is likely to fuel the continuing debate as to whether or not the arson > was a Nazi ruse. Elsewhere, Goebbels dismisses Churchill as a “degenerate genius, therefore not too dangerous,” and six days before Germany’s invasion of the Soviet Union, he predicts that Bolshevism will fall “like a house of cards.” No less fascinating than the diaries themselves were Goebbels’ efforts to protect them. As the British bombed German cities, he had 20 clothbound notebooks placed in a bank vault. Later he had the entire inventory put on microfiche. In the final days of the Third Reich he arranged for several volumes to be brought to his underground bunker, determined even then to preserve his version of history. While unlikely to revolutionize modern understanding of the Third Reich, Goebbels’ diaries are certain to prove of great historical interest. “After 1945, people liked to think that Hitler himself was the bearer of guilt for everything,” says History Professor Hans Mommsen of the University of the Ruhr in Bochum. “Books like these let us look at the period more matter-of- factly.” And offer some insights into the frighteningly matter-of-fact ways in which the Fuhrer’s subordinates worked.
