The Battle Of Halbe 1945

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Slaughter at Halbe

Author : Tony Le Tissier
Publisher : The History Press
ISBN 13 : 0752495348
Total Pages : 173 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (524 download)

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Book Synopsis Slaughter at Halbe by : Tony Le Tissier

Download or read book Slaughter at Halbe written by Tony Le Tissier and published by The History Press. This book was released on 2007-03-22 with total page 173 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Operation 'Berlin', the Soviet offensive launched on 16 April, 1945, by Marshals Zhukov and Koniev, isolated the German Ninth Army and tens of thousands of refugees in the Spreewald 'pocket', south-east of Berlin. Stalin ordered its encirclement and destruction and his subordinates, eager to win the race to the Reichstag, pushed General Busse's 9th Army into a tiny area east of the village of Halbe. To escape the Spreewald pocket, the remnants of 9th Army had to pass through Halbe, where barricades constructed by both sides formed formidable obstacles and the converging Soviet forces subjected the area to heavy artillery fire. By the time 9th Army eventually escaped the Soviet pincers, it had suffered 40,000 killed and 60,000 taken prisoner. Teenaged refugees recount their experiences alongside Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS veterans attempting to maintain military discipline amid the chaos and carnage of headlong retreat. While army commanders strive to extricate their decimated units, demoralised soldiers change into civilian clothing and take to the woods. Relating the story day by day, Tony Le Tissier shows the impact of total war upon soldier and civilian alike, illuminating the unfolding of great and terrible events with the recollections of participants.

The Battle of Halbe, 1945

Author : Eberhard Baumgart
Publisher : Greenhill Books
ISBN 13 : 1784387142
Total Pages : 208 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (843 download)

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Book Synopsis The Battle of Halbe, 1945 by : Eberhard Baumgart

Download or read book The Battle of Halbe, 1945 written by Eberhard Baumgart and published by Greenhill Books. This book was released on 2022-01-12 with total page 208 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In April 1945, German troops withdrawing from the Seelow Heights were encircled by the Soviet Army near the small town of Halbe, south-east of Berlin. Rather than surrender, their orders were to attempt to break out, westward, and join up with the German 12th Army. A brutal battle ensued, with an estimated 30,000 German and 20,000 Russian soldiers killed, along with thousands of civilians. This collection of first-hand accounts tells the story of the battle and its aftermath from the German perspective. It is an eclectic mix, containing the recollections of ordinary soldiers, SS-men and men of the Panzer Divisions, as well as civilians caught up in the battle as they attempted to flee ahead of the advancing armies. It brings to life the grim realities of this one-sided engagement, revealing the brutal vengeance of the Soviets and the desperation to escape the slaughter. Translated into English for the first time, this is an important insight into this devastating and little-known aspect of World War II history.

Slaughter at Halbe

Author : Tony Le Tissier
Publisher : History Press
ISBN 13 : 9780750998055
Total Pages : 320 pages
Book Rating : 4.9/5 (98 download)

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Book Synopsis Slaughter at Halbe by : Tony Le Tissier

Download or read book Slaughter at Halbe written by Tony Le Tissier and published by History Press. This book was released on 2022-06 with total page 320 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Operation "Berlin," the Soviet offensive launched on 16 April, 1945, by Marshals Zhukov and Koniev, isolated the German Ninth Army and tens of thousands of refugees in the Spreewald "pocket," south-east of Berlin. Stalin ordered its encirclement and destruction and his subordinates, eager to win the race to the Reichstag, pushed General Busse's 9th Army into a tiny area east of the village of Halbe. To escape the Spreewald pocket, the remnants of 9th Army had to pass through Halbe, where barricades constructed by both sides formed formidable obstacles and the converging Soviet forces subjected the area to heavy artillery fire. By the time 9th Army eventually escaped the Soviet pincers, it had suffered 40,000 killed and 60,000 taken prisoner. Teenaged refugees recount their experiences alongside Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS veterans attempting to maintain military discipline amid the chaos and carnage of headlong retreat. While army commanders strive to extricate their decimated units, demoralized soldiers change into civilian clothing and take to the woods. Relating the story day by day, Tony Le Tissier shows the impact of total war upon soldier and civilian alike, illuminating the unfolding of great and terrible events with the recollections of participants.

The Last Panther

Author : Wolfgang Faust
Publisher : Createspace Independent Publishing Platform
ISBN 13 : 9781530359707
Total Pages : 144 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (597 download)

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Book Synopsis The Last Panther by : Wolfgang Faust

Download or read book The Last Panther written by Wolfgang Faust and published by Createspace Independent Publishing Platform. This book was released on 2016-03-17 with total page 144 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: While the Battle of Berlin in 1945 is widely known, the horrific story of the Halbe Kessel remains largely untold. In April 1945, victorious Soviet forces encircled 80,000 men of the German 9th Army in the Halbe area, South of Berlin, together with many thousands of German women and children. The German troops, desperate to avoid Soviet capture, battled furiously to break out towards the West, where they could surrender to the comparative safety of the Americans. For the German civilians trapped in the Kessel, the quest to escape took on frantic dimensions, as the terror of Red Army brutality spread. The small town of Halbe became the eye of the hurricane for the breakout, as King Tigers of the SS Panzer Corps led the spearhead to the West, supported by Panthers of the battle-hardened 21st Panzer Division. Panzer by panzer, unit by unit, the breakout forces were cut down - until only a handful of Panthers, other armour, battered infantry units and columns of shattered refugees made a final escape through the rings of fire to the American lines. This first-hand account by the commander of one of those Panther tanks relates with devastating clarity the conditions inside the Kessel, the ferocity of the breakout attempt through Halbe, and the subsequent running battles between overwhelming Soviet forces and the exhausted Reich troops, who were using their last reserves of fuel, ammunition, strength and hope. Eloquent German-perspective accounts of World War 2 are surprisingly rare, and the recent reissue of Wolfgang Faust's 1948 memoir 'Tiger Tracks' has fascinated readers around the world with its insight into the Eastern Front. In 'The Last Panther, ' Faust used his unique knowledge of tank warfare to describe the final collapse of the Third Reich and the murderous combat between the German and Russian armies. He gives us a shocking testament to the cataclysmic final hours of the Reich, and the horrors of this last eruption of violence among the idyllic forests and meadows of Germany.

The German Defense Of Berlin

Author : Oberst a.D. Wilhem Willemar
Publisher : Pickle Partners Publishing
ISBN 13 : 1786251469
Total Pages : 126 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (862 download)

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Book Synopsis The German Defense Of Berlin by : Oberst a.D. Wilhem Willemar

Download or read book The German Defense Of Berlin written by Oberst a.D. Wilhem Willemar and published by Pickle Partners Publishing. This book was released on 2015-11-06 with total page 126 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Often written during imprisonment in Allied War camps by former German officers, with their memories of the World War fresh in their minds, The Foreign Military Studies series offers rare glimpses into the Third Reich. In this study Oberst a.D. Wilhem Willemar discusses his recollections of the climatic battle for Berlin from within the Wehrmacht. “No cohesive, over-all plan for the defense of Berlin was ever actually prepared. All that existed was the stubborn determination of Hitler to defend the capital of the Reich. Circumstances were such that he gave no thought to defending the city until it was much too late for any kind of advance planning. Thus the city’s defense was characterized only by a mass of improvisations. These reveal a state of total confusion in which the pressure of the enemy, the organizational chaos on the German side, and the catastrophic shortage of human and material resources for the defense combined with disastrous effect. “The author describes these conditions in a clear, accurate report which I rate very highly. He goes beyond the more narrow concept of planning and offers the first German account of the defense of Berlin to be based upon thorough research. I attach great importance to this study from the standpoint of military history and concur with the military opinions expressed by the author.”-Foreword by Generaloberst a.D. Franz Halder.

Bloody Streets

Author : A. Stephan Hamilton
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9781912866137
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.8/5 (661 download)

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Book Synopsis Bloody Streets by : A. Stephan Hamilton

Download or read book Bloody Streets written by A. Stephan Hamilton and published by . This book was released on 2020-01-19 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: On April 16th, 1945 the Red Army launched their fourth largest offensive along the Eastern Front during World War II. The objective was to seize Berlin before the Western Allies.Sixteen days later, the former capital of the Third Reich fell to the conquering armies of Generals Georgi Zhukov and his rival Ivan Koniev. The cost to capture the largest urban complex on mainland Europe from a handful of understrength Heer and Waffen-SS divisions, supported by Volkssturm and Hitlerjugend formations armed mainly with Panzerfaust anti-armour rockets, was exceptionally high. The Red Army suffered more casualties among its soldiers than during the six month siege of Stalingrad, and it lost more armoured vehicles than during the Battle of Kursk.Total losses among the defenders and civilian population remain unknown. Central Berlin was left a wasteland. The scars of the street fighting are still visible today, seventy-five years after the battle.When Bloody Streets was first published in 2008 it detailed the tactical street fighting in Berlin day-by-day for the first time through vivid first person accounts and period aerial imagery of the city. Ten years later this ground breaking study is back in print completely revised. Previously unpublished first person accounts from both the German and Soviet perspectives supplement archival documents that include new data from the operational war diaries of the 1st Belorussian and 1st Ukrainian Fronts. The book is highly illustrated throughout with period images of the city, aerial overviews, and wartime photos.Building on more than 15 years of research, the second edition of Bloody Streets is a capstone to the author's prior works on the final climatic battles along the Eastern Front. It will remain a benchmark study of the Battle of Berlin for years to come.

Berlin

Author : Antony Beevor
Publisher : Penguin UK
ISBN 13 : 0141032391
Total Pages : 429 pages
Book Rating : 4.1/5 (41 download)

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Book Synopsis Berlin by : Antony Beevor

Download or read book Berlin written by Antony Beevor and published by Penguin UK. This book was released on 2007-10-04 with total page 429 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The Red Army had much to avenge when it finally reached the frontiers of the Reich in January 1945. Political instructors rammed home the message of Wehrmacht and SS brutality. The result was the most terrifying example of fire and sword ever known, with tanks crushing refugee columns under their tracks, mass rape, pillage and destruction. Hundreds of thousands of women and children froze to death or were massacred because Nazi Party chiefs, refusing to face defeat, had forbidden the evacuation of civilians. Over seven million fled westwards from the terror of the Red Army. Antony Beevor reconstructs the experiences of those millions caught up in the nightmare of the Third Reich's final collapse, telling a terrible story of pride, stupidity, fanatacism, revenge and savagery, but also one of astonishing endurance, self-sacrifice and survival against all odds.

Hitler's Last Battles

Author : Richard Lakowski
Publisher : Frontline Books
ISBN 13 : 9781848322080
Total Pages : 240 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (22 download)

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Book Synopsis Hitler's Last Battles by : Richard Lakowski

Download or read book Hitler's Last Battles written by Richard Lakowski and published by Frontline Books. This book was released on 2014 with total page 240 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The battle of the Seelow Heights (16-19 April 1945), marked the last stage of the Soviets' offensive against Nazi Germany and saw the most severe fighting of the crossing of the Oder-Neisse line, between German Ninth Army and Marshal Zhukov's 1st Belorussian Front. After three days and massive losses, the Soviets broke through and the Eastern Front collapsed. The Ninth Army was encircled, and in the ensuing battle of Halbe, attempted to break out to link up with other German forces. This study of the last battles of the Third Reich is drawn from original documents, maps and firsthand accounts. It also features photographs of the battlefields as they are today. This is a fascinating and powerful account of the last cataclysmic battles of the Second World War in Europe.

Berlin Battlefield Guide

Author : Tony Le Tissier
Publisher :
ISBN 13 :
Total Pages : 330 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 ( download)

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Book Synopsis Berlin Battlefield Guide by : Tony Le Tissier

Download or read book Berlin Battlefield Guide written by Tony Le Tissier and published by . This book was released on 2008 with total page 330 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Contains both walking and driving tours of various exploration, allowing the user to determine one-day tour or longer.

Race for the Reichstag

Author : Tony Le Tissier
Publisher : Pen and Sword
ISBN 13 : 1473817412
Total Pages : 303 pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (738 download)

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Book Synopsis Race for the Reichstag by : Tony Le Tissier

Download or read book Race for the Reichstag written by Tony Le Tissier and published by Pen and Sword. This book was released on 2010-04-30 with total page 303 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The acclaimed historian’s classic account of the Battle for Berlin offers unprecedented detail and insight into the final days of WWII in Europe. This authoritative study dispels the myths created by Soviet propaganda and describes the Red Army’s final offensive against Nazi Germany in graphic detail. For the Soviets, Berlin—and the Reichstag in particular—was seen as the ultimate prize. Stalin had initially promised Berlin to Marshal Zhukov. But after Zhukov blundered a preliminary battle, Stalin allowed Marshal Koniev, Zhukov's rival, to launch one of his powerful tank armies at the city. The advancing Soviet forces were confronted by a desperate, inadequate German defense. General Weidling's panzer corps was dragged into the city in a futile attempt to prolong the existence of the Third Reich, whose leaders squabbled and schemed in their underground shelters. Ten days later, after the suicides of Hitler and Goebbels, the survivors had to choose between breakout and surrender. Drawing on a wide range of Soviet sources and unprecedented access to German archival and memoir materials, Race for the Reichstag brings into startling focus the bitter fight for the last patch of soil under Wehrmacht control.

The Last Battle

Author : Stephen Harding
Publisher : Da Capo Press
ISBN 13 : 0306822091
Total Pages : 258 pages
Book Rating : 4.3/5 (68 download)

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Book Synopsis The Last Battle by : Stephen Harding

Download or read book The Last Battle written by Stephen Harding and published by Da Capo Press. This book was released on 2013-05-07 with total page 258 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: The incredible story of the unlikeliest battle of World War II, when a small group of American soldiers joined forces with German soldiers to fight off fanatical SS troops May, 1945. Hitler is dead, the Third Reich is little more than smoking rubble, and no GI wants to be the last man killed in action against the Nazis. The Last Battle tells the nearly unbelievable story of the unlikeliest battle of the war, when a small group of American tankers, led by Captain Lee, joined forces with German soldiers to fight off fanatical SS troops seeking to capture Castle Itter and execute the stronghold's VIP prisoners. It is a tale of unlikely allies, startling bravery, jittery suspense, and desperate combat between implacable enemies.

StuG III Brigade 191, 1940–1945

Author : Bruno Bork
Publisher : Greenhill Books
ISBN 13 : 1784386960
Total Pages : 556 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (843 download)

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Book Synopsis StuG III Brigade 191, 1940–1945 by : Bruno Bork

Download or read book StuG III Brigade 191, 1940–1945 written by Bruno Bork and published by Greenhill Books. This book was released on 2021-12-08 with total page 556 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: An illustrated history of one brigade of German World War II armored fighting vehicles and the action they saw along the Eastern Front. Based on their experiences during the First World War, the Reichswehr decided that the infantry support gun of the future should be an armored, motorized vehicle with an effective caliber of cannon: the Sturmgeschütz III. The weapon was used in the “fire brigade role” at hotspots along the Front, where it was much feared by enemy forces. This illustrated volume tells the tale of Brigade 191, aka the “Buffalo Brigade,” who used the Sturmgeschütz III as they took part in Operation Barbarossa in the Ukraine, saw action during the fight for Greece in 1941 and were deployed to the areas of heaviest fighting in the campaign against the Soviet Union. This began with the infantry advance from Ukraine to Moscow (1941): then to Voronezh, Kursk, the Caucasus, and Kuban (1942), then the Kertsch Peninsula and the Crimea (1943-1944), before they were finally evacuated from Sevastopol into Romania by naval lighters. On the South-east Front (the retreat through the Balkans), the Brigade fought its way into Austria and was still fighting on the last day of the war to keep a corridor open. Keen to write an account recording the tactical significance of the Sturmgeschütz III, while surviving members of Brigade 191 also wished for a cohesive documentary record of the war, Bork set about gathering military records and literature, as well as interviewing as many ex-Brigade men as possible, in order to bring this detailed account into being. Praise for StuG III Brigade 191, 1940–1945 “Author Bruno Bork not only offers a tactical unit history, but also another German “blood and guts” ground-level views of Hitler’s retreats and defeats on the Eastern Front. This is also a truly riveting read.” —ARGunners.com “Upon finishing this book the reader will doubtlessly better realize what a useful and versatile armored fighting vehicle the Sturmgeschütz III really was to the German armed forces.” —Globe at War “As a unit history, the scenarios come a poppin on page after page.” —Historical Miniatures Gaming Society “Highly recommended for beginner to advanced builders and historians interested in the StuG actions on the Eastern Front.” —AMPS

The Book Thieves

Author : Anders Rydell
Publisher : Penguin
ISBN 13 : 0735221235
Total Pages : 370 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (352 download)

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Book Synopsis The Book Thieves by : Anders Rydell

Download or read book The Book Thieves written by Anders Rydell and published by Penguin. This book was released on 2018-02-06 with total page 370 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: "A chilling reminder of Hitler’s twisted power." —BBC For readers of The Monuments Men and The Hare with Amber Eyes, the story of the Nazis' systematic pillaging of Europe's libraries, and the small team of heroic librarians now working to return the stolen books to their rightful owners. While the Nazi party was being condemned by much of the world for burning books, they were already hard at work perpetrating an even greater literary crime. Through extensive new research that included records saved by the Monuments Men themselves—Anders Rydell tells the untold story of Nazi book theft, as he himself joins the effort to return the stolen books. When the Nazi soldiers ransacked Europe’s libraries and bookshops, large and small, the books they stole were not burned. Instead, the Nazis began to compile a library of their own that they could use to wage an intellectual war on literature and history. In this secret war, the libraries of Jews, Communists, Liberal politicians, LGBT activists, Catholics, Freemasons, and many other opposition groups were appropriated for Nazi research, and used as an intellectual weapon against their owners. But when the war was over, most of the books were never returned. Instead many found their way into the public library system, where they remain to this day. Now, Rydell finds himself entrusted with one of these stolen volumes, setting out to return it to its rightful owner. It was passed to him by the small team of heroic librarians who have begun the monumental task of combing through Berlin’s public libraries to identify the looted books and reunite them with the families of their original owners. For those who lost relatives in the Holocaust, these books are often the only remaining possession of their relatives they have ever held. And as Rydell travels to return the volume he was given, he shows just how much a single book can mean to those who own it.

Panzers in Berlin 1945

Author : Lee Archer
Publisher : In Focus
ISBN 13 : 9781908032164
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.0/5 (321 download)

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Book Synopsis Panzers in Berlin 1945 by : Lee Archer

Download or read book Panzers in Berlin 1945 written by Lee Archer and published by In Focus. This book was released on 2019-09-19 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: This 392-page book is lavishly illustrated with 360 mostly unpublished photographs that take the reader from the retreat at Seelow to collecting wrecks from central Berlin. Years of painstaking research and a network of like-minded researchers from across the globe have enabled the authors to piece together the who, where and why, including lists o

Last Panzer Battles in Hungary

Author : Norbert Számvéber
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9786156602275
Total Pages : 0 pages
Book Rating : 4.6/5 (22 download)

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Book Synopsis Last Panzer Battles in Hungary by : Norbert Számvéber

Download or read book Last Panzer Battles in Hungary written by Norbert Számvéber and published by . This book was released on 2024-04-30 with total page 0 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: In the last phase of the Second World War the Sixth Panzer Army was the last army available to the German military leadership which was more or less intact and was capable of launching a major offensive. After it had been withdrawn from the Western front in the aftermath of the failed Ardennes counter offensive, it was replenished with men and gears as fully as was possible in the given circumstances, and as a result it almost regained its 1944 autumn strength. It would not have been a surprise if it had been deployed on German territory against the Allied troops advancing to Rhine, or in Silesia or in the Baltics or even if it had been sent as a reinforcement to the Army Group Vistula to defend the distant approaches to Berlin against the advancing Soviet army - reinforcement and fresh troops capable of launching counter offensives were desperately needed everywhere. But it happened otherwise: the Sixth Army was deployed in Hungary and participated in the Operation Spring Awakening, launched in the western part of the country on 6th of March, 1945. This was the last German "big offensive" in the course of the Second World War. Several questions come to mind about the operation. What were the goals originally set to be achieved by this seemingly pointless attack? What role was assigned to the once formidable German Panzer Corps? Is it true that the Soviet command used the same defense directives as had been used during the battle of Kursk in 1943 because they had proved to be viable then? What types of tanks and armored vehicles fight in West Hungary and in what numbers? How did the American made M4A2 tanks manned by Soviet crews fare against the much heavier German Panther and Tiger B tanks on the Hungarian soil? What were the losses on both sides in tanks and armored vehicles? To what extent can be the prompt and powerful response of the Soviet side - the offensive towards Vienna - evaluated as being successful? How did the Germans, the Soviets, the Hungarians and the Bulgarians use their tanks and armored vehicles in this operation? Besides giving a detailed chronological description of the events, the book tries to find answers to these questions. The facts extracted from the operational documents of the fighting sides have been supplemented with excerpts from diaries and memoirs, and even the maps have been drawn on the basis of the original ones. The author has explored some new archival sources kept in Russian archives and also incorporated some published Russian materials into his research that was neglected up until now by other researchers, along with some newly published German memoirs - all this has made possible to create a narrative of the events related to us by the author in hitherto unprecedented detail.

Endkampf Um Das Reichsgebiet 1944-45, Ostfront

Author : Axel Urbanke
Publisher :
ISBN 13 : 9783941437326
Total Pages : pages
Book Rating : 4.4/5 (373 download)

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Book Synopsis Endkampf Um Das Reichsgebiet 1944-45, Ostfront by : Axel Urbanke

Download or read book Endkampf Um Das Reichsgebiet 1944-45, Ostfront written by Axel Urbanke and published by . This book was released on 2017 with total page pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt:

Hitler's Fortresses in the East

Author : Alexey Isaev
Publisher : Pen & Sword Military
ISBN 13 : 9781526783950
Total Pages : 272 pages
Book Rating : 4.7/5 (839 download)

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Book Synopsis Hitler's Fortresses in the East by : Alexey Isaev

Download or read book Hitler's Fortresses in the East written by Alexey Isaev and published by Pen & Sword Military. This book was released on 2021-07-30 with total page 272 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: 'Fortresses must carry out the same tasks as the fortresses of old....They must allow themselves to be surrounded and thus tie down as many enemy forces as possible.' So Hitler directed in March 1944 and, in so doing, sealed the fate of Ternopol', Kovel', Poznan and Breslau, cities in the Ukraine and Poland that were in the path of the Red Army's advance towards Nazi Germany. German forces, under orders to resist at all costs, adopted all-round defence and struggled to hold out while waiting for relief - which never came. In this gripping and original book, Alexey Isaev describes, in vivid detail, what happened next -intense and ruthless fighting, horrendous casualties among soldiers and civilians, the fabric of these historic cities torn apart. His account is based on pioneering archival research which offers us an unrivalled insight into the tactics on both sides, the experience of the close-quarter fighting in the streets and houses, and the dreadful aftermath. At the same time he shows why these cities were chosen and how the wider war passed them by as the Wehrmacht retreated and the battlefront moved westward. Each of these cities suffered a similar fate to Stalingrad but their story has never been told before in such graphic and circumstantial detail.