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Loading... When Titans Clashed: How the Red Army Stopped Hitler (1995)by David M. Glantz, Jonathan M. HouseNone. Really well-researched and detailed account of the Soviet side of the Eastern Front. Could have done with a scorecard, or at least a few more maps. Names and units were flying fast and it was difficult to keep up at times. Overall, a terrific addition to this field. ( )Viewing the English language literature about WWII, the Americans do not leave much room both to the crucial British and Soviet contribution to victory. Great Britain for holding out single-handed in 1940 and the Soviets for absorbing and wearing down the Nazi offensive capability. Victory was mostly paid with Russian blood. Glantz and House, former US army officers, try to redress the balance. They divide the Eastern Front in three periodes (6/41-11/42; 11/42-12/43; 1/44-5/45). During the first, the Germans were dominant and only their logistical limitations prevented a Soviet defeat. The second period resulted in a standstill while the third period saw a Soviet juggernaut rolling over the crippled German army. Glantz and House concentrate on military formations and leadership. Readers looking for more human interest (esp. suffering) should consider Werth's classic Russia at War. One difficulty, they solve not so well, is the Soviet custom of calling corps or even division-sized formations armies which results in one German army or corps fighting half a dozen Soviet armies. Readers should also supplement the printed maps with the excellent online West Point Atlas. Overall, a good contribution to a neglected topic. no reviews | add a review
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1st SS Division Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler |
Told in swift stirring prose, When Titans Clashed provides the first full account of this epic struggle from the Soviet perspective. David Glantz, one of the world's foremost authorities on the Soviet military, and Jonathan House present a fundamentally new interpretation of what the Russians called the "Great Patriotic War." Based on unprecedented access to formerly classified Soviet sources, they counter the German perspective that has dominated previous accounts and radically revise our understanding of the Soviet experience during World War II.
Placing the war within its wider political, economic, and social contexts, the authors recount how the determined Soviets overcame their initial disasters to defeat the most powerful army ever assembled. As they vividly show, this truly was war waged on a titanic scale, sweeping across a half-million square miles from Moscow to Berlin, featuring monumental offensives and counteroffensives, and ultimately costing both sides combined a staggering forty million casualties.
Their work offers new revelations on Soviet strategy and tactics, Stalin's role as supreme commander of the Red Army, the emergence of innovative and courageous commanders in the crucible of combat, numerous previously concealed or neglected military operations, German miscalculations on the road to the Red capital, the effect of D-Day and the "second front" on the Soviet effort, and the war's devastating impact on the Soviet economy and civilian population.
An essential volume for anyone interested in World War II or Soviet history, When Titans Clashed will change forever how we look at one of the greatest military confrontations in world history.
This book is part of the Modern War Studies series.
(retrieved from Amazon Sat, 23 Apr 2011 00:18:42 -0400)
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