Albert Speer

by David Edgar

  HITLER. You know I can’t do that.

  SPEER. Nor can I remain the Minister in name if I desert my post.

  Pause. HITLER doesn’t know what to do. He sits and looks away. SPEER sits.

  HITLER. All right.

  Pause.

  You know, in some ways the enemy’s advance is a great help to us. People fight fanatically when they have the war at their front door.

  SPEER. My Führer, as I pointed out in my memorandum the enemy’s military superority means that –

  HITLER. I sometimes think, the luck. I was always lucky. And then that dreadful early winter in 1941. And the allies get blue skies for Normandy. But, yet, despite all of that, we struggle on, with unshakable determination. You – what – you doubled tank production in two years. You trebled airplanes and munitions. Artillery, quadrupled. When naturally the moaners and whiners said it was impossible.

  Pause.

  Which is why I will give you one more chance.

  SPEER. I’m sorry?

  HITLER. If you can assure me that the war can still be won, then you can keep your post.

  Pause.

  SPEER. My Führer, the war is lost.

  HITLER. Or indeed, if you still had faith the war might still be won.

  Pause.

  Or even . . . that you hoped that we aren’t lost. At least you could say that. And then I would be satisfied.

  SPEER. My Führer, how could I lie to you? It would be like lying to myself.

  HITLER stands.

  HITLER. You think about it. And then let me know.

  SPEER. Um . . . ‘think about it’?

  HITLER. Whether you’re prepared to hope the war might still be won.

  SPEER. But I . . .

  HITLER. You know, when the whiners and the fainthearts say that it’s impossible, then I say – look at Speer.

  HITLER hits SPEER with the glare. It holds a long time.

  You can say it in your own words. Any way you like.

  SPEER turns away. HITLER pleased to have won, but furious that SPEER has not done what he asked.

  Well, there it is.

  He turns to go. Suddenly.

  SPEER. My Führer, how could you doubt me. I stand unconditionally behind you.

  HITLER turns back to SPEER. We don’t know how he will react. After a long moment, it is HITLER who turns away, nodding, his eyes brimming with tears. He comes to SPEER putting out his hand. SPEER puts out his hand, HITLER takes it and converts it into the elbow cupping gesture.

  HITLER. Well. Heil Speer.

  SPEER (pressing his advantage). My Führer. Will you do one thing for me?

  HITLER looks quizzically at SPEER.

  Will you give me and my ministry sole responsibility for implementing your decree of March 19?

  HITLER. For implementing? Not for changing it?

  SPEER. For implementing it, my Führer. Absolutely and entirely.

  SPEER takes a paper from his pocket.

  SPEER. It will require a sentence.

  HITLER. Yes of course.

  SPEER gives the piece of paper to HITLER.

  Very well.

  HITLER takes the document to a table to sign it.

  A glass of wine?

  SPEER. That would be very welcome.

  HITLER calls.

  HITLER. Schaub!

  To SPEER, as he signs.

  My hands are shaking. Lately it’s been hard for me to write even a few words.

  Enter SCHAUB.

  SCHAUB. ’Führer.

  HITLER. Schaub, can you have them get a glass of wine for the Reichsminister.

  SCHAUB goes out. HITLER stands, turns back to SPEER.

  You know, if the war is lost then the people will be lost, and it is not necessary to worry about their needs. For the garbage left over after this will be only the inferior, as the best are dead. And the future belongs entirely to the hard men of the east.

  SPEER. What?

  HITLER hands him the document.

  HITLER. We will leave this world in flame. I am confident in assigning this last duty to my Minister of Armaments.

  HITLER disappears.

  1.12.3  Berlin, 29–30 March 1945

  WOLTERS and ANNEMARIE enter to SPEER. CASALIS is there.

  ANNEMARIE. Thank God.

  SPEER (handing WOLTERS the document HITLER signed). Five thousand copies.

  WOLTERS. New orders?

  SPEER. Yes. And are the vehicles I ordered –

  WOLTERS (reading the document). Yes, as you ordered.

  ANNEMARIE. Cars, trucks, lorries, motorbikes, and bicycles . . .

  WOLTERS. . . . standing by.

  SPEER. Excellent.

  WOLTERS (reading). So you got the old man to sign over everything to us.

  SPEER. The Führer assigned me this last duty, yes.

  WOLTERS. To countermand his general order as and when we think it fit.

  SPEER. No.

  WOLTERS. But that is what you plan to do.

  SPEER. I plan to stop the destruction of the factories and farms and mines on which our people’s future life depends.

  SPEER turns to go.

  Where are you going first?

  SPEER. East.

  WOLTERS. A question.

  SPEER. Yes?

  WOLTERS. What happens if you turn the corner and run into an enemy patrol?

  Slight pause.

  SPEER. Oh, I’ve got that all worked out. It’s simple. I’d surround them.

  The tension between them is broken. WOLTERS laughs, turns and goes out.

  CASALIS. And did it work?

  SPEER. Yes. It saved German industry.

  CASALIS. By betraying Hitler.

  SPEER. As he and those who followed his last orders had given up the German people.

  CASALIS. So despite your efforts there was destruction?

  SPEER. Yes, sadly. For instance, I discovered that despite his pledge Karl Hanke had in fact blown up the Schinkel building. And everything besides. And then escaped from an inferno of his own creation.

  CASALIS. Your old friend.

  SPEER. Yes.

  CASALIS. And so did you see Hitler, once again?

  SPEER. Yes, on the 25th of April . . . I flew in and landed on the East-West axis and I was taken down into the bunker, where at approaching midnight I was told I was invited for refreshments.

  SCHAUB enters.

  SCHAUB. Please follow me.

  SPEER. And so I did.

  1.13.1  Eva Braun’s room, bunker, 25 April 1945

  SPEER enters EVA BRAUN’s room. She looks rather guilty.

  SPEER. Eva.

  EVA BRAUN. Oh good it’s you.

  She retrieves a lit cigarette she’s just hidden.

  SPEER. I didn’t know you smoked.

  EVA BRAUN. Extreme circumstances call for extreme measures. Do you want one?

  SPEER. No.

  EVA BRAUN. If ‘someone’ comes in and detects the smell, it’s yours. But I bet you’d like some cake and some champagne.

  SPEER. You’re the first person to think I might be hungry.

  EVA BRAUN. Everybody’s got things on their minds.

  SPEER. As have you.

  Pause. She busies herself with cake and wine.

  EVA BRAUN. Do you recognise your furniture?

  SPEER. Of course.

  EVA BRAUN. It too is a comfort to me in these times.

  SPEER. I’m pleased.

  EVA BRAUN. It’s so sad, what’s happened to all those lovely rooms upstairs.

  SPEER. Yes, it is. But is not the saddest.

  EVA BRAUN. Pop!

  She pours champagne.

  So how’s Frau Speer, and all the children?

  SPEER. She’s very well. I’ve moved them to a place of safety, in the . . . in the area the British are attacking now.

  EVA BRAUN. Good man. D’you want some cake?

  SPEER. I saw Goebbels earlier. He appears to think that we can make a separa
te peace with the British and Americans.

  EVA BRAUN (cutting cake). Oh, is that right?

  SPEER. Well, I’m not sure it’s entirely realistic . . .

  EVA BRAUN (handing SPEER a piece of cake). Hey, have you heard the latest?

  SPEER. No?

  EVA BRAUN (stubs out her cigarette). His ministry is putting out fake horoscopes. Do you want a peppermint?

  SPEER. Fake what?

  EVA BRAUN finds a newspaper.

  EVA BRAUN. Look here, it’s true.

  She opens the newspaper, pops a peppermint into her mouth.

  Now, what are you?

  SPEER. Professionally?

  EVA BRAUN. Your birth sign, Herr Reichsminister.

  SPEER. Well, I was born on March 19.

  EVA BRAUN. Ah. Pisces. ‘You are going through a term of trial but if you are steadfast and your will remains unshakable you will prevail against all odds’. So what’s Frau Speer?

  SPEER. Well . . . she’s September . . .

  EVA BRAUN. Oh, Albert.

  SPEER (guessing). The 28th.

  EVA BRAUN. Libra. And yes. Sometimes she must fear she’s on the wrong path but nevertheless she will reach her final destination. So – you’ve done the right thing there.

  SPEER. And you?

  EVA BRAUN. Well, I’m Aquarius. And although things may look black I must be assured that they who love and care for me are acting always for the best. Isn’t it priceless?

  Pause. Delicately, she puts her hand on SPEER’s arm.

  You know he had decided to stay here, and I am staying with him. Like everyone, he wanted me to go to Munich. But I’m happy to be here. And you know the rest, of course.

  Slight pause.

  So my dear Albert, please, no pestering! I have reached my destination.

  SPEER smiles. EVA BRAUN eats another peppermint.

  EVA BRAUN. He was so pleased you came.

  SPEER. Yes. Though I fear he would be less pleased if he knew what I've been –

  EVA BRAUN (interrupting). He thought that you had gone against him, like the others.

  SPEER. You see, I have been countermanding orders to destroy –

  EVA BRAUN (interrupting). But I know that you will always stand behind him, unconditionally.

  Pause.

  SPEER. But surely. We must surely, all of us, feel there were things that shouldn’t have occurred. Things said or done, or left undone.

  EVA BRAUN. You mean, not having children?

  Pause.

  Well, perhaps. But after all, I am the Mother of the Nation.

  SPEER smiles, a little wanly, giving up. EVA BRAUN yawns.

  Well, I must go to bed. And you must go to . . . to your family.

  They look at each other.

  I told him – Speer will not betray you. Well, my case is proved, I think. Don’t you?

  SPEER says nothing. EVA BRAUN puts her hand out to SPEER.

  EVA BRAUN. Well. So long.

  SPEER. So long.

  She shakes his hand. SPEER turns and goes out of the room.

  1.13.2  Corridor, bunker, 25 April 1945

  SPEER meets HITLER, looking at a map, and VON BELOW.

  SPEER. Heil, my Führer.

  HITLER. Ah, Speer, you’re leaving?

  SPEER. Yes, my Führer.

  HITLER. Ah.

  HITLER looks at SPEER. For a moment, the same, blinding look.

  HITLER. Well, then. Well, there it is. Goodbye.

  To VON BELOW.

  Will you get Keitel? If we’re going to split the two commands, then we must do it now, while there’s still a corridor . . .

  HITLER goes out with VON BELOW following.

  1.14.1  Hamburg, 1 May 1945

  SPEER turns to CASALIS, as ANNEMARIE enters with a small bag. She opens the bag, takes out a red leather case, opens it, sets up a picture of Hitler in a silver frame. As SPEER takes off his coat:

  SPEER. So that was it. No wishes to my family, no . . . statement, affirmation. No good luck. Nothing beyond . . . goodbye. And he was gone.

  And so I went north, to join Dönitz, who was trying to negotiate surrender with the British. I was assigned a small room in a navy barracks. Frau Kempf had packed a small overnight bag for me, in which she’d put a portrait photograph of the Führer, in a silver frame, which he had given me six weeks before.

  ANNEMARIE goes out with the jacket. SPEER goes and looks at the picture.

  CASALIS. And presumably that’s where you heard about his death?

  SPEER can’t answer. He nods.

  And may I ask – what did you feel?

  SPEER says nothing. Instead he starts to sob. He can’t stop it, it goes on and on, until he is literally too exhausted to sob any more. He looks to CASALIS.

  SPEER. I felt that I was free of him at last.

  1.14.2  Spandau, 1950

  CASALIS. You felt that you were free of him? At last?

  SPEER a little wearily, taking his prison jacket from the case and putting it on:

  SPEER. I’ve said. I realised too late.

  CASALIS. Of course. You were an expert, not a politician.

  SPEER. Yes.

  CASALIS. You had sought where possible to improve the conditions of your workers.

  SPEER. Yes.

  CASALIS. You had visited one concentration camp.

  SPEER. Yes.

  CASALIS. You were ignorant of a systematic plan to murder –

  SPEER. Yes.

  CASALIS. But what do you think you would have done, if you had known?

  Pause.

  SPEER. This is of course the question. And the answer doesn’t help me sleep at night. I fear I would have said: ‘You’re killing them? But that’s insane. I need them for my factories’.

  That is why I came to you, and asked you to help me to become a different man. And you said you could and would if I told you the truth.

  CASALIS. And do you think you have?

  SPEER. Why, do you think I’ve been lying to you all this time?

  CASALIS. No, Herr Speer. I don’t think you’ve been lying. But I must tell you the questions that remain. You have told me you were let down by this man who had promised you so much. But was it really that? Was it not rather a playing out of what was there from the beginning? Is it not the case in truth that the hope was always false because the choice was always wrong? That there was a straight line from your building of the new Berlin to the blasting of that tunnel by those miserable slave-workers in the mountain. That the granite for Germania was quarried by the inmates of Mauthausen. That the searchlights which obscured the stomachs of the party bureaucrats at Nuremberg also blinded you to what was being thought and said and planned. Herr Speer, you have presented me the story of a man who was inspired by great ideals and saw those great ideals betrayed. And yet. I see a man with all the intellectual, yes, and all the moral strength to have seen through all of this. Surely, when you look back to the first time when you looked into those eyes, don’t you ask yourself, how in God’s name was I taken in by that?

  SPEER is appalled.

  SPEER. Look, Pastor. You had a simple war. Dangerous of course. Unenviable in many ways. But simple in that in hindsight there’s no doubt at all that you were right. Now put yourself in my shoes. Ask yourself what hindsight asks of me. Had I done what was required of me by posterity in the war I would have been shot by Hitler. Had I admitted what I was asked to admit after the war, I would have hanged at Nuremberg. My crime consisted of not knowing and not asking what I didn’t know, about an evil we will perish if we do not understand. For that – I have been condemned as a war criminal, robbed of my freedom, tortured with the knowledge that I based my life upon a catastrophic error. If you demand of me that I should have done more than I did, then you must be sure that if – God forbid – it came to that for you, you would make and meet the same demands on yourself. Till then . . . I must repeat. I could have known, I should have known. I didn’t know. I was blinded
by what I felt about him at the start to what he reall – . . . To what he had become.

  CASALIS. But still, you see, you cannot say: ‘to what he really always was’.

  CASALIS realises he has gone too far.

  I’m sorry. I should not have . . . It is not my job to judge or to cross-examine you –

  SPEER. So what is your job? If it is not ‘to judge to probe and to interrogate’.

  CASALIS. It is to repeat those two words. To a man who thought he should have died at Nuremberg.

  SPEER. What words?

  CASALIS. ‘Not yet’. To a man who now may have begun to live.

  SPEER. Begun?

  CASALIS. Like his garden here in Spandau, he has cleared the undergrowth. Now the time has come to plant new seeds in fresh soil.

  Enter HESS with a chair.

  HESS. Ah. There you are.

  SPEER. Herr Hess?

  HESS. I’ve something for you.

  SPEFR. Yes?

  HESS. I broke my chair. You lent me yours.

  SPEER. I did.

  HESS. I understand you take your chair to religious service every Sunday. So you will have need of it. I mended mine. The whole thing’s mumbo-jumbo, anyway.

  He goes out, leaving the chair.

  SPEER. In fact it is not my chair. It’s Neurath’s. It was found for him to help his back. But oddly enough, it is my chair in another sense. In that it was my own design.

  Pause.

  CASALIS. Well.

  SPEER. Herr Pastor, God preserve your strength.

  CASALIS. And yours. Please – stay. You have your chair.

  CASALIS goes. SPEER turns out front.

  SPEER. And he was gone. To complete his doctorate at Strasbourg.

  Pause.

  I said that when I heard of Hitler’s death I felt that I was free of him at last. But as you know that isn’t true at all.

  Yes. Yes. That’s when the dreams began.

  Dreams of his knowing what I did, dreams of his knowing what I thought.

  And I realised he wasn’t really dead at all.

  1.15.1  Germany

  SPEER is dreaming. Suddenly, the sky is full of fire. Through it walks VON BELOW.

  VON BELOW. In October 1942, I was approached by a young lieutenant of the communications corps, who’d been working on a cable transfer somewhere in the Ukraine. He’d come upon a troop of SS shooting men and women in a trench.

  I naturally investigated this. I was advised that this was not a matter of concern for me.