num_pages: 356
description: General Erich Luddendorf was one of the most important military individuals of the last century, yet today, one of the least known. One of the top two German generals of WWI, Luddendorf dominated not only his superior. Gen. Paul von Hindenburg, but also Germany’s head of state, Kaiser Wilhelm II. For years, Luddendorf was the military dictator of Germany. Ludendorff not only dictated all aspects of WWI, he refused all opportunities to make peace; he antagonized the Americans until they declared war; he sent Lenin into Russia to forge a revolution in order to shut down the Russian front; then he pushed for total military victory in 1918, in a rabid slaughter known as “The Ludendorff Offensive.” Luddendorf lost the War in 1918. Shortly thereafter, he created the murderous legend that Germany had lost this war only because Jews had conspired on the home front, in what he called a “stab in the back.” He soon forged an alliance with Hitler, endorsed the Nazis, and wrote maniacally about how Germans needed a new world war, to redeem the Fatherland. This savage man had staggering designs to build a gigantic state that would dwarf the British Empire, sweep across all of Africa, then the Middle East, Central Europe, Persia, even India. Simply stated, he wanted the world. His plans, person &amp; ambitions were the prototype for his good younger friend, Adolf Hitler. All in all, Luddendorf was the key German, instrumental in both world wars &amp; the Russian Revolution. He changed the 20th century beyond recognition.
language: English
title: The First Nazi, the Life and Times of General Erich Ludendorff of Germany
publisher: Counterpoint (Berkeley, CA)