Germany Army on the Eastern Front – The Advance

Germany Army on the Eastern Front – The Advance is an excellently compiled photographs from Wartime Archives by Ian Baxter with an explanation in the three chapters. What is forgotten about the Eastern Front and during the advance Germany was actually winning it was not until a lot further in to the war that the tide began to turn. They had advanced to the outskirts of Leningrad, heading towards Stalingrad and head long down the highway to Moscow. This book is a pictorial account of that advance in all weathers and the soldiers are the stars of the book.

When Operation Barbarossa was launched in the early hours of 22nd June 1941, through the dividing line in Poland towards Russia herself the Infantry and Panzer Divisions went through the Russians like a hot knife through butter. The Russians were facing a front that spread from Poland down to the Black Sea, 3,332 Panzers, over 7,000 artillery pieces, 60, 000 vehicles, 625,000 horses and 3 million men.

Chapter One covers The Advance and there is a picture of the some soldier who have commandeered a child’s pram in order to transport their kit as the distances some of the soldiers had to cover on foot were immense. There are also plenty of pictures of the soldiers making their way on foot, in panzers or on horseback in all weathers including the dreaded winter snows. But they were still doing well at this point.

Chapter Two covers Army Group South who at this time had not been trapped and surrounded in Stalingrad yet but were heading towards the Great Dictator’s City. This chapter has some excellent information for the reader as well as excellent pictures. There is a picture of where German Soldiers have built an igloo as shelter from the weather. Plenty of pictures of the Germans advancing in the snow and using dogs to pull sledges. There is also a picture of a cameraman filming above the Volga towards the heart of Stalingrad in 1942 for the Reich News films.

Chapter Three covers the Winter and Spring Campaign 1943 before the tide turned against the German invasion and the might of the Soviet War Machine slowly turned the tide and began the push back. There are pictures here where we can start to see the mud that would hold up the Germans and make them easy targets for the Russians. It is hard to explain how bad the mud was due to the lack of decent roads and highways but the pictures show you how easy it was to be stuck in the mud and there is a great picture of a staff car stuck.

The three chapters in this book along with the appendices are well written and the pictures well compiled so that you can see how well the Germans had advanced in to the Soviet Union. The research that has gone in to this book is excellent, and a wonderful addition to the growing history of the Eastern Front that is oft forgotten in the West. It is often overlooked that the Germans did well with the initial advance and this is a great addition to that cannon that will help to give students a broader perspective of the war there. ( )