The Nazi mind: A fascinating look into the psychology of oppression

A little bit of background📃

I waited over six months for a copy of The Nazi mind after putting it on hold at my local library. The 2025 publication is clearly in demand! I was looking forward to reading the book, not only because of the long wait but because of its claimed psychological perspective on the heinous crimes the Nazis committed. Did the book live up to my expectations? Read my review to find out...

The Nazi mind: Twelve warnings from history | Published May 2025 | Read April 2026

The author✏️

Laurence Rees (born 1957) is an English historian and historical documentary filmmaker. He is the author of several books about the Hitler and the Nazi regime. His work on Auschwitz is the highest selling history of the camp globally. Rees read History at Oxford then joined BBC TV as a research trainee in the late 1970s, eventually becoming a researcher, assistant producer of documentaries and then Head of BBC TV History Programmes. During his time with the BBC, Rees commissioned, wrote and oversaw over 100 history productions and several more through his own production company, LR History after leaving the BBC. Rees has won numerous awards for his work, including the British Book Award for his Auschwitz history, a BAFTA, and two Emmys. Rees was awarded an honorary doctorate at the University of Sheffield in 2005 for his services to History and another from the Open University, in 2011, for services to Arts and Sciences.

The subject matterℹ️

Rees asks several pertinent questions of the Nazi regime in The Nazi mind: how the Nazis could have committed such horrific crimes, how commandants of concentration and death camps willingly oversaw mass murder, and how ordinary Germans tolerated the removal of Jews from existence. Rees combines history and psychology to enter the dark world of the Nazi regime to chart how and why followers were capable of committing such monstrous crimes. He traces the rise and eventual fall of the Nazis through what he calls "twelve warnings", rooted in psychological insights into obedience, authority, scapegoating and systemic beliefs, shedding light on the Holocaust but also providing parallels to the leaders (and their followers) of today as a warning for the future.

My thoughts on the book💭

Rees structures the book around his twelve warnings in parallel with his retelling of German history from 1920 to 1945. While much of this history I already knew, I found the linking of the atrocities the Nazis committed with cognitive concepts - confirmation bias, sunk cost fallacy and so on - and neurobiology provided fascinating insight into the Nazi regime and the blind allegiance of the majority of the German population.

I've seen criticisms of the book that it is dry and academic, but I didn't find it so at all. I think The Nazi mind is written in accessible language, without oversimplifying the complex political, economic, and psychological framework that underpinned the rise of Nazism. The twelve lessons Rees puts forward are indeed worthy of consideration, however there is nothing particularly new about his thesis. I was expecting less history and more psychology, but I still found myself nodding at the claims Rees made. Nodding is good, but I was after more insight to advance my thinking.

Clearly, Rees's wheelhouse is history so that part of the book provides the reader with a thorough appreciation of the rise and fall of Nazi Germany. I just wish he had delved more into the psychology of fascism and taken the too-brief insights he provided into the Nazi mind and explored and explained them much more deeply. The lens Rees uses to understand Nazi Germany is helpful, but I would have liked more of it to give me a deeper sense of the psychology behind the Nazi regime. As I saw one Goodreads reviewer comment, the book is more about the environmental conditions that led to the rise of the regime, and less an exploration of the mind.

My key learnings🪴

I found the explanation of the phenomenon of "killing at a distance" particularly interesting and horrifying, showing how relatively easy it seemed to be for many perpetrators to do the unthinkable once they were distanced from their victims. It's so chilling to read about the almost mechanical way the architects of the Holocaust went about their plans, failing to see their victims as humans, or even worse still, justifying their actions in the pursuit of a "pure" society. The Nazi mind is a good starting point in my understanding, but I'd now like to read more about the psychology of fascism and of blind allegiance to ideologies that seek to oppress and dehumanise.

In sum📝

The Nazi mind is a tough read as it's terrifying to think about the monstrous actions of the Nazis stemming from beliefs that many people still hold today. As Rees says, the Holocaust didn't happen because the perpetrators were German, it happened because they were human. They weren't monsters, just monstrous humans. The book, too, is timely and relevant to the dumpster fire of a world we currently inhabit. It shows, sadly, that what we learn from history is that we do not learn from history. Megalomaniacal tyrants live among us to this day, and the world would do well to heed the warnings Rees sets out in his book.

Rating: ⭐⭐⭐⭐