Adolf Hitler's 'messiah complex' studied in secret British intelligence report

Newly discovered wartime analysis of a Hitler speech in 1942 detects growing fear of defeat and consequent intensification of hatred for the Jewish people
Adolf Hitler giving a speech
Adolf Hitler on the podium. The radio speech studied in the report reveals far less flamboyance and a "dull flatness of delivery". Photograph: Corbis

A secret report, previously unknown to historians, has given an insight into how British intelligence officers were tracking Adolf Hitler's "messiah complex" and his belief that he was leading a crusade against Jewish people.

The analysis of Hitler's mental state, drawn up by British intelligence in 1942, has been uncovered by a Cambridge University researcher, Scott Anthony, while working on the history of public relations. Anthony found a report commissioned by the social scientist Mark Abrams, a pioneer of market research and opinion polling, who worked in the psychological warfare division of the allied expeditionary force during the second world war.

Written as the war was starting to move in the allies' favour, it shows that British analysts had noticed signs of developing paranoia in Hitler's speechmaking and a growing preoccupation with what he called "the Jewish poison".


"[The report's author] recognised that, faced with external failure, the Nazi leader was focusing on a perceived 'enemy within' instead – namely the Jews. Given that we now know that the final solution was commencing, this makes for poignant reading."

Marked "Secret", the analysis was written by an academic called Joseph McCurdy and studied a radio speech Hitler gave on 26 April 1942. According to the report's opening lines, the aim was "to reconstruct, if possible, what was in Hitler's mind when he composed and delivered the speech".

It suggested that what it called Hitler's "shamanism" – his tendency to feed off the energy of a Nuremberg-style rally – was in decline. The report suggests there was now a "dull flatness of the delivery".

But McCurdy concluded that two other characteristics were also developing. He reported that Hitler had a tendency to lose heart when things were not going his way. This speech betrayed "a man who is seriously contemplating the possibility of utter defeat".

Most alarming, however, was Hitler's growing paranoia. McCurdy said he had a "messiah complex", believing he was leading a chosen people on a crusade against an evil incarnate in the Jews. The paper notes an extension of the "Jew phobia" and says that Hitler now saw them not just as a threat to Germany, but as a "universal diabolical agency".

"Hitler is caught up in a web of religious delusions," McCurdy concluded. "The Jews are the incarnation of evil, while he is the incarnation of the spirit of good. He is a god by whose sacrifice victory over evil may be achieved. He does not say this in so many words, but such a system of ideas would rationalise what he does say that is otherwise obscure."

The report was found in papers held by a member of Abrams's family. It is being added to an archive of documents relating to Abrams's life and work at the Churchill Archives, University of Cambridge.