Albert Speers Role as German Armaments Minister during the War

by divinechess (student)

Rise to Prominence

Albert Speer was an intelligent, affluent and well-educated man, in many ways he was an atypical Nazi. Albert Speer claimed to be apolitical as a young man; however he himself like many others, were converted to the Nazi Party after attending a rally and hearing Adolf Hitler speak. The following essay will outline Albert Speer’s rise to prominence within the Nazi Party.

The second of three sons to Albert Friedrich Speer and Lusie Mathilde Wilhelmine Hommel, Berthold Konrad Hermann Albert Speer was born the 19th March 1905. The Speer family lived in Mannheim, Germany and were quite wealthy.

At school Speer excelled, particularly in mathematics. In 1923, aged 18, Speer left school with the ambition of becoming a mathematician. However, his Father disapproved and persuaded him to follow in the foot steps of himself and Albert’s Grandfather in becoming an architect.

Due to the inflation period of 1923, Speer decided to start his architectural studies locally at Karlsruhe Institute of Technology. In 1924 the stabilizing inflation rate meant Speer could transfer to the more esteemed Munich Institute of Technology and a year following that he transferred to Berlin Institute of Technology. It was there that he was under the tutelage of Heinrich Tessenow, whom he held in great regard, as he respected and agreed with Tessenow’s philosophies about architectural simplicity – modest forms of architecture and natural building materials. After passing his exams in 1927, Speer became Tessenow’s assistant, and was involved in teaching seminar classes three days a week.

Although Speer claims “I was allergic to any political commitments”[1] the students of Tessenow (who never agreed with Nazism himself) apparently coaxed him into attending a Nazi Party rally in a Berlin beer-hall on 5th December 1930.

When Hitler entered the hall he was greeted by the applauding students. Hitler wore a neat blue suit, rather than the brown uniform of the Nazi Party posters, and like a skilled politician cunningly crafted his speech to appeal to a well-educated upper class as well as a lower class audience. He didn’t shout excitedly, but spoke with persuasion and sombrely about his visions for Germany.

Speer, of course, was enormously affected by Hitler, not just by his appearance but by his proposed solutions and offer of hope and defence against the growth of communism, answer to the ineffectual Weimar Government and the renunciation of the Treaty of Versailles.

Several weeks later, Speer attended another Nazi rally, this time, presided over by Joseph Goebbels, Head of Propaganda. However, Speer was troubled by the way Goebbels had whipped the crowed into a frenzy by playing on their hopes. Although distressed by Goebbels, Speer couldn’t shake the impression Hitler had left on him, and the following day, 1st March 1931, Speer joined the Nazi Party as member 474 481, however, it could be assumed that due to his gullible nature, it was by accident that he became a Nazi. This same year he married Margarete Weber.

In the early years, as a member of the Nazi Party, it seems that Speer’s main interest was his career. The only contribution Speer made to the Party was driving Party members in his car on official business.

Speer received his first major commission, as a Party member; in 1932 when Karl Hanke, a close friend, recommended him to Goebbels to renovate and redecorate the new district Headquarters in Berlin. Although the building was inspected by Hitler himself who approved of the finished result, Goebbels however didn’t, and in March 1933, when Speer arrived back in Berlin he discovered Goebbels had had the building redecorated.

Speer’s next challenge was set to him by Hanke (now Goebbels’ secretary). After seeing the plans for the first May night rally, Speer remarked that “those look like decorations for a rifle club meet” to which Hanke replied “if you can do better, go to it”[2]. Speer designed bleachers capable of holding over 100 000 people with a platform in the middle for the dignitaries. Large black, red, white and swastika banners were behind the platform with powerful searchlights illuminating the sky. This lighting and design became common characteristics of all future Party rallies, as they represented Nazi ideology - power, strength and dominance. Speer remarked, “I had moved a step ahead”.

A few weeks later Speer was given the chance to redecorate Goebbels’ home. Later in July, he was placed in charge of designing the first Party rally of 500 000 supporters at Nuremberg when the local architect couldn’t generate a design that captured the conquering attitude of the party. Speer’s proposed, and Hitler approved, design was of an enormous eagle with a 30 metre wing span soaring over the field. When Hitler commissioned Paul Troost, in 1933 to refurnish the Chancellery in Berlin, on the recommendation of Goebbels, Hitler appointed Speer as the building supervisor as Troost lived in Munich. During this time Hitler and Speer became close friends and when Troost died in 1934 Speer was chosen to replace him as the Party’s Chief architect.

Speer’s most impressive and memorable production/design was that of the 1934 Nuremberg rally. He surrounded the parade grounds, capable of holding 240 000 people, with 130 anti-aircraft searchlights. This simulated the effect of a “cathedral of light” or a “cathedral of ice” as it was called by the British Ambassador. These rallies were key to the dispersion of Nazi propaganda; they almost became a Nazi icon.

Speer continued to create and come up with innovative and imaginative designs for the Nazi Party and Hitler, most of which were never built, such as the German Stadium in Nuremberg and ...

This is a preview of the whole essay

Speer continued to create and come up with innovative and imaginative designs for the Nazi Party and Hitler, most of which were never built, such as the German Stadium in Nuremberg and the rebuilding of Berlin which was to become the capital of a “Greater Germany” and out do cities such as Vienna and Paris. Speer also designed the new Reich’s Chancellery which included an extensive hall designed to be twice as long as the Hall of Mirrors in the Palace of Versailles.

Albert Speer was the First Architect of the Reich and when the war started, Hitler refused to allow him to work for the army and told him to continue his work as an architect, building for him. However, Speer managed to get himself in charge of the rocket construction site at Peenemunde. Speer also formed groups so they could rebuild damaged bridges and widen roads. Gradually Speer assumed a greater role within Hitler’s inner circle and was very influential in the first years of the war. After a plane crash where the Minister of Armaments, Fritz Todt, was killed, Hitler appointed Speer as Todt’s successor and he immediately stepped into the position.

Albert Speer’s Role as Armaments Minister during the War

As the outbreak of World War Two was drawing closer in 1939, obviously the architectural career of Speer was restrained and so he undertook the initiative to use his organisational skills to orchestrate a team of skilled construction supervisors, who under his leadership would rebuild damaged infrastructure. Speer’s intention of playing an active role was shown in obtaining an army identification number and the purchasing of sleeping bags and tents. However, Hitler refused to allow Speer to work for the army and argued that he had to continue his work as an architect.

When the war started Speer gradually assumed a greater role within Hitler’s inner circle and with it more power. Speer was appointed Department Chief of Public Works and was responsible for 26 000 workers as well as directing building construction work for the army and air force, such as three Junker 88 bomber factories and air-raid shelters that were completed under 8 months. It was this campaign that instigated the war crimes and slave labour controversy, (this will be addressed later on).

After the defeat of France in 1940 and with the German invasion of Russia getting closer the Russians adopted a scorched earth policy. When Speer heard of this and the problems that it was causing the Germans, the Russians had damaged most of the railway system, he volunteered to organise and head a group of 30 000 men to repair the railway system. This group, the special ‘Speer Construction Staff’, was under the direction of Dr Fritz Todt.

In 1940, Hitler appointed Todt the Minister for Weapons and Munitions, a system that Todt found chaotic and slow. However, Todt drew a solution that ended up being the basis of Speer’s success, this involved:

1 – Limiting the production numbers of models of each weapon

2 – Making factories autonomous and no interfering with its internal administration unless the required production wasn’t met. – This strategy wasn’t looked favourable upon by Hitler as he wouldn’t have as much power and control over production.

3 – Using small numbers of experts to run the system rather than the traditional large bureaucracy.

However, Todt was convinced that a Nazi loss was inevitable. He believed that the USA was far more superior with its industrial might, that the unlimited resources of Russia and the cut backs in war production that Hitler ordered, as he was so confident of winning, would be their downfall. He approached Hitler with his concerns, but Hitler refused to listen and disregarded Todt’s recommendation to increase equipment for the German’s fighting on the eastern front. The next day, 7th March 1942, Todt was killed in a mysterious plane crash.

At one O’clock that same day, Hitler summoned Speer to his office and appointed him the new Minister of Armaments. Initially, Speer was shocked, but immediately started reorganising the armaments industry.

First, Speer inaugurated a new business structure for the industry. The new structure meant that each individual factory would concentrate on the continual production of one specific weapon or ammunition, which would avoid any shortages. A committee was in place for each of the productions, and Speer made it a policy that technically capable young men were appointed to leadership positions so as to bring about new ideas for the industrial production.

The Zentrale Planung (Central Planning Board) was also established by Speer, to coordinate armament production for the Army, Navy and Airforce. This concept was to help cut down costs, unnecessary loss of time, raw materials and duplication of effort.

Speer was able to bring a practical understanding of what was needed by the forces, when he visited the German soldiers fighting in the south of Russia and Lapland and being able to assess its adequacy and efficiency.

Within the first six months of Speer being in charge of the armaments production, results were increased markedly. With 27% increase in gun production, 25% increase in tank production and 97% increase in ammunition production, the armament production rate continued to rise over the following year and a half.

During Speer’s reign as Armaments Minister, his success was only hindered by Hitler’s position as Commander-in-Chief of the Army as Hitler constantly overruled Speer on many major aspects of the armaments industry. When meeting with Hitler to discuss new ideas, Speer always took an entourage of technical experts and specialists. However, sometimes Hitler, although not knowing the situation on the fronts, overruled development plans such as the Panther Tank and the ME-262 fighter plane, which could have been successful. Another problem Speer had was, Hitler’s interest in ‘miracle weapons’. Speer claims that throughout the war, the Germans were working on and developing, rocket planes, rocket missiles, sound- seeking torpedoes, the atomic bomb, remote-controlled missiles and ground-to-air defence missiles. However, the lack of concentrating on just one or two projects at a time caused none of them to develop and failure in the production of any ‘miracle weapon’.

As the end of the war was drawing closer and the need for more soldiers came about, Speer needed more people working in the industry and so pushed to mobilise German women into the workforce. But Hitler disagreed with Speer’s plan and opted for an illegal roundup of foreign labourers to work in the armaments factories. The foreign workers were badly treated; they worked in appalling conditions, endured violence, illness and death.

Speer’s role as Armament’s Minister during the war from 1942 to 1945, was in an industry in which he had no real prior knowledge about. However, with his intelligence, organisational skills, friends in high places (Hitler) and power as a leader, he increased armament production in Germany by 300 per cent and by doing so, kept Germany in the war longer than may have been if Todt was alive.

The main features of Speer’s relationship with Hitler

As a young boy, Albert Speer was brought up in an extremely wealthy, protected environment and was given the best education money could buy. However, with two bullying brothers and parents who showed no love or guidance, that he desperately needed, Speer became a naïve young man who lacked morals and ethics and the ability to think critically, as Dan Van der Vat states this also “turned him into an emotional cripple”. He “was an unfinished gem waiting to be shaped and polished to perfection”[3] and Hitler took advantage of this, and moulded him into one of his followers.

The first sign of Speer’s weak and easily persuaded nature was when a group of students insisted on him going to one of Hitler’s rallies at a beer-hall in Berlin. Through Hitler’s charisma Speer “rapidly fell under the spell of his magnetic personality”[4] and was instantly drawn into the Nazi Party. Several months after joining the party in March 1931, Speer realised his ambition of being an architect could be resolved working for the Nazi Party under Hitler. It was the ambition that blinded Speer in not being able to “tell the difference between good and evil” although he wasn’t “intrinsically evil” he “had a narrow intelligence, which meant that he could concentrate solely on his work to the exclusion of other things”[5]. This statement is reaffirmed several times throughout Speer’s role within the Nazi Party and in keeping Hitler’s friendship and ultimately his trust.

After the recommendation of Speer by Goebbels, Hitler appointed Speer to work under the guidance of Troost in refurbishing the Chancellery of Berlin in 1933. It was through this assignment that Hitler and Speer started to communicate, and Hitler soon realised that Speer was responsible for the design of the Nuremberg Rallies.

Hitler and Speer were in constant contact with each other. On most days they would gather with other party leaders to have lunch and dinner and would occasionally watch a movie. Speer was soon one of Hitler’s confidants. At the Nuremberg trial in 1946 Speer claimed “If Hitler had actually had friends, I would certainly have been one of his close friends”.

A possible reason why Hitler took such a liking to Speer was that he himself wanted to be an architect. Through Speer, Hitler realised his own architectural ambition and was able to project his youthful fantasies of being a great architect through him. “You attracted my notice during our rounds. I was looking for an architect to whom I could entrust my building plans. I wanted someone young; for as you know these plans extend far into the future. I need someone who will be able to continue after my death with the authority I have conferred on him. I saw you as that man”.[6]

Another factor in the relationship between Speer and Hitler, which would have drawn and bonded them together, was that they had very similar personalities. “Both… were bedevilled from childhood by… withheld love, a deficiency which rendered both virtually incapable of expressing private emotions”[7]. However, it was “emotion that ruled their decisions”[8]. Another point which Sereny makes is that “they ever consciously thought of each other with affection. Yet it was a kind of unspoken love, needed, demanded and received that bound them to each other”. Nevertheless, neither were homosexual, Speer was married with children and Hitler was married to Eva Braun at the end of the war.

However, their relationship was mutually beneficial, for as much as Hitler needed Speer for his architectural knowledge and organizational skills, Speer needed Hitler. He saw Hitler as a solution to his ambition of becoming a successful architect, “after all, I was entirely dependent on Hitler’s whim for achieving my ambitions”[9].

The Changing Historical Assessments of Albert Speer

Albert Speer has been given several nicknames, such as the ‘good Nazi’ and the ‘penitent Nazi’. However, these nicknames have come under serious disrepute within the last 30 years.

Speer was arrested in 1945 and was put on trial at Nuremberg at which he was charged with:

having plotted to wage aggressive war
of participating in war crimes
of committing war crimes
of crimes against humanity

In an unusual turn of events, Speer accepted all charges “and seemed to come face to face with himself and the nature of the state that he had helped to create”[10]. Speer took full responsibility as a leader in the Third Reich for crimes committed by the Nazis and the death of six million Jews. However he “denied all knowledge of, and personal involvement in, The Final Solution”[11].

Speer was found guilty on the last two counts and was sentenced to 20 years in prison. While in prison Speer endeavoured to write his memoirs in an attempt to explain his actions and motives. When he was finally released from prison, Speer started work on writing an autobiographical book. For several years Speer carried around the image, which he created himself, as an apolitical technocrat who had rejected Nazism although he was Hitler’s architect, Minister of Armaments and friend, and historians accepted his word as an accurate source. However, some historians started to question whether he was telling the truth or lied to save his life.

Particular historians, such as W. Shirer (The Rise and Fall of the Third Reich, 1960) are convinced that Speer was telling the truth at the Nuremberg Trials and admitted he was partly guilty for crimes undertaken by the Nazis.

Author of “Hitler a Study in Tryanny” (1962) A. Bullock sees Speer as the apolitical technocrat that he claimed to be and believes that he didn’t have a say in many of the decisions and actions of the Third Reich.

Joachim Fest, (The Face on the Third Reich, 1970) explores the idea that a modern totalitarian state could not exist without the help of such skilled bureaucrats like teachers, technical experts, police and architects. These people are often so dedicated and absorbed within their specialised field that they “concentrate entirely on their limited professional tasks and are totally involved in their job. They never give a thought to the impact of their actions on the lives of others”[12]. As most historians, Fest believes that Speer was a well-educated intelligent man, however unlike others such as Henry King, Fest believes Speer was true to his beliefs and maintained personal integrity as a Nazi leader.

Henry King, (The Two World’s of Albert Speer) however, believes that Speer wasn’t able to develop a set of personal ethical beliefs early in life which made him susceptible to the lure of groups such as the Nazi Party after hearing someone such as Hitler, a decisive, well spoken and clever politician of the time, talk. Due to Speer’s lack of ethics and morals he wouldn’t have realised when he crossed between good and evil and soon, “Hitler’s world quickly became Speer’s world”[13].

King also recognizes that towards the end of the war, Speer had woken up and realised exactly what Hitler was doing, and although still felt loyalty towards Hitler, it was a much stronger feeling towards the German people. King continues to say that Speer wasn’t blindly obeying authority anymore and turned completely around, willing to risk his life for the survival of his country and people, which was recognised by the judges at the Nuremberg Trial. This statement however, contradicts with Speer’s best friend at the time, Rudolf Wolters, who believed that at the Nuremberg Trials, he was far more interested in protecting his reputation than in telling the truth. Van der Vat also supports the same notion that Speer only escaped the death penalty in the Nuremberg Trials because he was a good liar.

Dutch author Dan van der Vat of “The Good Nazi – the life and lies of Albert Speer (1997) states that Speer “managed to prevent his personal war crimes from emerging during his lifetime and did everything he could to stop their inevitable revelation from ever being made”[14]

Historians such as Matthias Schmidt believe Speer’s only ambition in life was to become an historical figure. But the real truth in whether Speer was an apolitical who had no prior knowledge or interest in politics or the war crimes committed by Hitler and his fellow Nazi leaders will never really be known. Whether it was through ambition or controversy, Albert Speer is most certainly an historical figure of World War Two.