Tam brought up Second Kharkov on her blog. It made me realize a significant hole in my history knowledge. I know very little about conduct of operation on the Eastern Front. Partly because neither side spoke or wrote in English so their histories aren't as disseminated because of that extra layer of complexity translating all the stuff. And partly because the Wehrmacht was lead by Hitler, a very bad guy, and the Red Army was lead by Stalin a very very bad guy, and we are close enough to the actual events to want one of the adversaries in the epic struggle to be good guys rather than 2 of the most evil, evah.
Anyhoo. Can anyone recommend a very good, engaging, history of that front? 1940-45.
"Armagheddon" is a good book about the final year of the Eastern Front. Horrifying stuff. Beyond Medieval, we're talking Dark Ages here, except fought with howitzers and tanks. Unbelievable cruelty.
ReplyDeleteYou might like Armageddon by Max Hastings. Lots of information about Germany's late war struggles against the Soviets in Northern Europe.
ReplyDeleteAlso check out "Ivan's War" by Catherine Merridale. It pretty much tells the story of the war from the viewpoint of the ordinary Russian soldier.
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