Hermann Röchling: The Factory of the Third Reich

Who now remembers Hermann Röchling (1872-1955), an emblematic figure of German industry during the two world wars. A Nazi from the very beginning, he was one of the main protagonists of this sinister movement, alongside Albert Speer and Adolf Hitler. He did not shy away from any measure to support the National Socialist effort, and his power was such that the Americans referred to him as the “czar” of a regime that functioned on the backs of millions of enslaved workers. A steel magnate and notorious anti-Semite, Hermann Röchling fell through the cracks of history. Margaret Manale is the first researcher to devote an exhaustive biography to him. She explains the reasons why such a character has remained almost unnoticed. She sheds light on the difficulty of judging him in the aftermath of the collapse of the Third Reich. To put his personality into perspective, Manale goes back to the origins of the family in 1870 and the French defeat by Germany. For 170 years, the Röchlings played a major role in these successive conflicts and in particular in the struggle for control of the mines in Alsace-Lorraine. Herman Röchling was prosecuted and sentenced at Nuremberg for war crimes in 1946 but, under American pressure, he was pardoned in 1951 in order to revive Germany quickly and build a strong Europe in the face of the Soviet threat. This shocking book is the implacable account of one man’s deception and the weight of realpolitik.