What Would Heinrich Do?

Heinrich Himmler was the head of the Gestapo during World War II. Most of you know that I'm sure, but I needed to establish the fact just the same.

I peruse many messages boards on subjects of interest to me where questions are asked and experts answer. As a student of history many of the places I frequent address people and events from the past. A favorite is a site about the Second World War.

Most of the questions are rather broad ranged. What were the German aims in the War? Why did they attack Russia? Things like that. Some are speculative. If Hitler hadn't declared war on the United States, how would that have affected the outcome? If the US only fought Japan, how would things have turned out? Some queries are technical: How close were the Nazis to an atomic bomb? What were the fiercest weapons used? Others ask about the specifics in battles. You get the point. There's a wide array of inquiries.

One unusual question the other day stopped me in my mental tracks. It was, What was Heinrich Himmler's management style?

It took me a few minutes to process the query, all of it broken with stilted laughter as I stared at my computer screen. His management style? He was the head of the bloody Gestapo. I suppose it was something along the lines of, you do this or it's the firing squad! 

Was this an honest question or some kind of trolling? I hope it was trolling, high schools seniors being stupid.

There was an attempt at a serious answer by the way. It basically said, Himmler's management style was top down and detail oriented. I label that understatement.