Hey all... haven't been on the boards since around Christmas I've been so busy with school. But, I couldn't stay away forever, plus I have some questions for you all. I'm officially hooked in reading/investigating this seemingly neverending topic of WWII, and it probably has a lot to do with the class I'm currently taking on the USSR in WWII... a great thing to do at college. It's awesome to go to class everyday and listen to a lecture from someone with a docterate on the topic. Anyway, here are the books that I'll have completed once the course is over: "When Titans Clashed" by David Glantz "Man is Wolf to Man" by Janusz Bardach "Stalingrad" by Antony Beevor "Surviving the Holocaust With the Russian Jewish Partisans" by Jack Kagan and Dov Cohen This, combined with the lectures/classes have been great intros into the topic, so my main interest right now is obviously on the Eastern Front. What I wanted to come to you guys here for is to see if you had any suggestions of where to go from here. The amount of books/publications out there seem to be endless, so any suggestions or points toward certain directions would be greatly appreciated.
If you have any chance to get it (libary): Jurgen Forster, Joachim Hoffman, Ernst Klink, Rolf-Dieter Muller, Gerd R. Ueberschar, Ewald Osers, Horst Boog, Dean S. McMurry, Dean S. McMurray, Louise Wilmott: "Germany and the Second World War: The Attack on the Soviet Union (Germany and the Second World War)" best bibliography out there right now: Rolf-Dieter Muller, Gerd R. Ueberschar, Rolf-Dietrich Muller, Gerd R. Ueberschaer, Bruce Little (Translator): "Hitler's War in the East, 1941-1945: A Critical Assessment (War and Genocide, 5)" Cheers,
Some suggestions: Bidermann, Gottlob Herbert. In Deadly Combat: A German Soldier's Memoir of the Eastern Front. Kursk 1943 by Niklas Zetterling and Anders Frankson SS Steel Storm : Waffen-SS Panzer Battles on the Eastern Front 1943-1945 by Tim Ripley Guderian´s and von Manstein´s and von Bock´s memoirs
A couple more: Chuikov´s memoirs ( not so propaganda full as others by Red Army commanders ) parts I and II Scorched Earth : The Russian-German War 1943-1944 by Paul Carell Alan Clark: Operatino barbarossa Charles Winchester: Ostfront ( the stats!)
"Stalingrad, the infernal cauldron" by Stephen Walsh. And as Kai said: "Lost victories" by Erich von Manstein. "Panzer Leader" by Heinz Guderian. "War Diaries" by Franz Halder. "The War Diaries" by Fedor von Bock. "Hitler and Stalin" by Ian Kershaw. "The siege of leningrad: 900 days of terror" and "The battle for Leningrad, 1941-1944" by David Glantz. "Operation Bagration" by Stephen Zaloga. And don't forget to read about Kursk and Berlin too.
I'm not so sure if memoir literature (Manstein, Guderian, Zhukov) is a good suggestion. I think it's better to have a good idea of the facts and current state of scholarship before you get into the heavily biased (memoirs) or controversal (Suvorov etc.) accounts. Avoid "Carell", btw. Cheers,
To get a deep and precise view on events you cannot rely much on testimonial sources, but certainly they help to give you a deep insight into headquarters —which academic sources don't. Besides, they give you a personal and more humain sight of the war —if you like that...
My opinion is sorta the opposite. Even if the views may be distorted by time or propaganda, they were the people who were there and decided how the battle or war was fought. So I think it´s a big gap if one has not read those memoirs due to thinking they´re totally false. One must not trust them 100% but I recommend that they should be read if one is to have "close to complete" picture of the war.
John Erickson's "the Road to Stalingrad" and "The road to Berlin" are two excellent recommendations. Both are written from the Soviet Perspective Alan Clarks "Barbarossa" is good from a general perspective Christopher Duffy's "Red Storm on the Reich" is a must covering the fall of Germany as is "Armageddon" by Max Hastings
