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WORK TITLE: Hitler’s Enabler
WORK NOTES:
PSEUDONYM(S):
BIRTHDATE: 1933
WEBSITE:
CITY: Loretto
STATE: PA
COUNTRY:
NATIONALITY:
Mentions 50 years of service (1965-2015): http://info.francis.edu/uploadedFiles/Content/Departments/Human_Resources/2015%20Service%20Award%20Program.pdf * http://www.abc-clio.com/ABC-CLIOCorporate/PrintProduct.aspx?pc=A4872C
RESEARCHER NOTES:
Mentions 50 years of service (1965-2015): http://info.francis.edu/uploadedFiles/Content/Departments/Human_Resources/2015%20Service%20Award%20Program.pdf
PERSONAL
Born 1933.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer.
WRITINGS
SIDELIGHTS
John Ruggiero was born in 1933, and he became a published author when he was seventy-eight years old. Ruggiero has since published two additional volumes, all nonfiction. His debut effort, Frontiers in Major League Baseball: Nonparametric Analysis of Performance Using Data Envelopment Analysis, was released by Springer in 2011. The book was followed by Nonparametric Estimation of Educational Production and Costs Using Data Envelopment Analysis three years later. This title was also published by Springer, and it was written with the assistance of Vincent Blackburn and Shae Brennan. Ruggiero next returned to his solo efforts in 2015, authoring Hitler’s Enabler: Neville Chamberlain and the Origins of the Second World War for Praeger.
In Hitler’s Enabler, Ruggiero examines the unfortunate role that Neville Chamberlain played in the lead up to World War II. Chamberlain was cabinet member and then prime minister, directing defense policy in Britain from 1934 to 1939. During this period, Chamberlain’s dealings with Adolf Hitler focused largely on a strategy of appeasement. This strategy, as Ruggiero asserts, proved disastrous. The author reports that Chamberlain was slow to rearm, and that he often deferred to Hitler despite pushback from members of his own government. Furthermore, Chamberlain often communicated with Hitler and his diplomats outside of official channels. According to Ruggiero, Chamberlain went against public opinion and ruined negotiations with Russia, all in service of his appeasement strategy.
From there, Ruggiero notes that Chamberlain’s reasons for choosing appeasement were twofold in that he hoped to quash socialism in Britain while simultaneously avoiding war with Germany. These policies, the author claims, were less about what was best for Britain and more about what was best for Chamberlain’s political career. Chamberlain was so set against socialism and its detriment to his party that he spent more time focusing on the perceived threat of socialism than the very real threat of fascism. Ruggiero reports that Hitler knew of Chamberlain’s position and exploited it to his advantage. Thus, while it could be argued that Chamberlain succeeded somewhat on one count, he not only failed on the other, but failed so drastically that he left Britain at a disadvantage when war became inevitable.
G.M. Stearns praised Ruggiero’s efforts in Choice, noting that the book is well written and well researched. For instance, Stearns announced that “Ruggiero debunks Chamberlain’s justification of appeasement on ‘structural constraints.'” Stearns then went on to declare that the book is “highly recommended.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Choice, April, 2016, G.M. Stearns, review of Hitler’s Enabler: Neville Chamberlain and the Origins of the Second World War, p. 1227.*
Ruggiero, John. Hitler's enabler: Neville Chamberlain and the origins of the Second World War
G.M. Stearns
CHOICE: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries. 53.8 (Apr. 2016): p1227.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 American Library Association CHOICE
http://www.ala.org/acrl/choice/about
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Ruggiero, John. Hitler's enabler: Neville Chamberlain and the origins of the Second World War. Praeger, 2015. 230p bibl index afp ISBN 9781440840081 cloth, $60.00; ISBN 9781440840098 ebook, contact publisher for price
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Ruggiero (Saint Francis Univ., Pennsylvania) asserts that Neville Chamberlain will rightly be stigmatized forever as Hitler's enabler. As cabinet member and prime minister, Chamberlain orchestrated Britain's defense policy from 1934 to 1939. The author claims Chamberlain deliberately delayed rearming, secretly bypassed official channels to communicate with the dictators, intentionally spoiled alliance negotiations with Russia, and capitulated in every instance to Hitler's bullying aggression, often in defiance of the wishes of government officials, Parliament, and public opinion. Ruggiero contends that Chamberlain stubbornly pursued two "dual policies": the twin goals of avoiding war with Germany and stifling socialism at home via two strategies, gradual rearmament and appeasement. Chamberlain's "double policies" were driven by politics rather than national security, in the warped view that socialism was more dangerous than Nazism. Ruggiero debunks Chamberlain's justification of appeasement on "structural constraints," e.g., insufficient manpower, industrial capacity, skilled labor, or finance. Instead, he shows that appeasement was Chamberlain's cleverly disguised ploy to marginalize the Labor Party by reducing the threat of war and the need to rearm. Chamberlain's appeasement policy was doomed to fail not by lack of resources or allies, as revisionists argue, but by his obsession with the Left, a point Hitler understood and exploited. Summing Up: *** Highly recommended. All levels/ libraries.--G. M. Stearns, Elizabethtown Community College