1939 was a glorious year for Hermann Goering. He spent it entertaining dignitaries visiting the Third Reich, attending galas, going on official visits, giving rousing speeches at factories and military parades, hunting on his estates and indulging in his love of fine art, rich cuisine and sumptuous clothes and jewels. Ever vain, pompous and ambitious, in 1939 he attained the summit of his power and popularity when Hitler, speaking to a packed Reich Chancellery in September, named him his successor. Goering's meteoric rise was inseparable from that of his Luftwaffe. As commander-in-chief, he bathed in the glory of the Condor Legion's victory in Spain in April and the Luftwaffe's decisive role in the Blitzkrieg of Poland in September. Out of these encounters in 1939, the Luftwaffe emerged as the world's most feared and respected air force. But beyond the trappings of victory were deep-rooted weaknesses: Goering feared their exposure during a longer conflict against a more powerful enemy, and was therefore desperate to avoid a confrontation with the western powers. At the same time, however, he was apparently powerless to divert from it. Hermann Goering: From Madrid to Warsaw and Beyond, 1939 is a photographic chronicle of a momentous year in the life of the Luftwaffe's commander-in-chief. It was the year in which he achieved unimaginable power, wealth and renown, only for it all to be flung into terrifying jeopardy, along with the fates of his nation and much of the world.
Blaine Taylor was a leading Second World War military and political historian, and an award-winning newspaper, magazine and medical journal writer-editor. A U.S. Army veteran, he served in the elite 199th Light Infantry Brigade as a soldier and military policeman in 1965-67, during the Vietnam War. His twelve decorations include the coveted Combat Infantryman's Badge. Later in life he won four political campaigns as press secretary in county, state, and U.S. presidential elections, and during 1991-92 he was a U.S. Congressional aide on Capitol Hill in Washington, D.C. He is the author of twenty-three books. This fifth volume in his Hermann Goering series, From Madrid to Warsaw and Beyond, 1939, is his last book, completed shortly before his death in 2021.
Dedication; Acknowledgments; Timeline; Introduction: Two Wars that Hermann Goering as Arminius Won; Reich; Balbo; Spain; Steel; Rechlin; Dahlerus; Poland; Berlin; Burgerbrau; Sitzkrieg; Conclusion; Bibliography; About the Author.
