ALBERT SPEER

Albert Speer served as the Minister of Armaments and War Production in Nazi Germany during most of World War II (WWII). An architect by training, Speer joined the Nazi Party in 1931, and became a member of Hitler's inner circle. In 1937, Hitler appointed Speer as General Building Inspector for Berlin, and he was responsible for the Central Department for Resettlement that evicted Jewish tenants from their homes in Berlin. In February 1942, Speer was appointed as Reich Minister of Armaments and War Production. Using misleading statistics, he promoted himself as having performed an "armaments miracle" that was widely credited with keeping Germany in the war. After the war, Speer was among the 24 "major war criminals" arrested and charged with the crimes of the Nazi regime at the Nuremberg trials. He was found guilty of war crimes and crimes against humanity (principally for the use of slave labor), narrowly avoided a death sentence and served 20 years in prison. He passed away in 1981 at the age of 76.