Adolf Hitler is the greatest mystery of the 20th century and the mystery surrounding him consists of two unanswered questions that have baffled biographers and historians. First how did he ever rise to power Second who was he really Hitler had the power to mesmerize crowds as the most dynamic orator of the modern age. Yet his power was not in his ideas which he collected from the gutter sheets of Vienna nor was it in his personality his biographers describe him as an unperson and his character as a void and a black hole. What then was the source of his power Was he a medium or a magician with paranormal powers as many contemporaries thought Or did he have a secret or method that has not yet been revealed Ben Novak spent fourteen years searching for the secret of Hitlers political success and his power as a speaker. Hitlers most astute contemporary observer Konrad Heiden who wrote the first objective books on Hitler warning that this man was the greatest massdisturber in world history suggested that Hitlers secret lay in his use of eine eigentiimliche art von Logikor a peculiar form of logic. Beginning with this clue Novak finds that there is a new form of logic in accordance with Heidens description and examples that can explain Hitlers phenomenal political success. This new form of logic called abduction was discovered by an American philosopher Charles Sanders Peirce 18391914 who is rapidly becoming Americas most wellknown philosopher and logician. Abduction is a third form of logic in addition to deduction and induction. Unlike the other forms of logic abduction is based on instinct and has a power over emotions. Novak argues that Hitler was the first politician to apply the logic of abduction to politics. This book provides the first coherent account of Hitlers youth that ties together all the known facts clearly showing the genesis of the strangest and most terrible man of the twentieth century while identifying the power he discovered that allowed him to break