Joachim Fest

Joachim Clemens Fest (8 December 1926 – 11 September 2006) was a German historian, journalist, critic and editor who was best known for his writings and public commentary on Nazi Germany, including a biography of Adolf Hitler and books about Albert Speer and German resistance to Nazism. He was a leading figure in the debate among German historians about the Nazi era. In recent years his writings have earned both praise and strong criticism. Fest was born in the Karlshorst locality of Berlin, Germany, the son of Johannes Fest, a conservative Roman Catholic and staunch anti-Nazi schoolteacher who was dismissed from his post when the Nazis came to power in 1933. In 1936, when Fest turned 10, his family refused to make him join the Hitler Youth, a step that could have had serious repercussions for the family although membership became compulsory only in 1939. As it was, Fest was expelled from his school and then went to a Catholic boarding school in Freiburg im Breisgau in Baden, where he was able to avoid Hitler Youth service until he was 18.[citation needed] In December 1944, when he turned 18, Fest decided to enlist in the Wehrmacht, mainly to avoid being conscripted into the Waffen-SS.[citation needed] His father opposed even that concession by saying that "one does not volunteer for Hitler's criminal war". His military service in the Second World War was brief and ended when he surrendered in France. After the war, he studied law, history, sociology, German literature and art history at the University of Freiburg, in Frankfurt am Main and in Berlin.