Robert ForczykCritiques

There's a lot to like about this book, but how you really feel about it will depend on how you feel about Forczyk's outlook as a writer, as it's best described as acerbic. He starts out early, by making no apologies for bringing more contemporary military theory than the typical "academic" or "general" reader might be comfortable with to his writing, which comes off as patronizing for me, but then ruthlessly applies those same standards to the period flag-rank commanders, and really takes no prisoners. At various points Forczyk refers to Erwin Rommel as being "egomaniacal" and a "con man," and certainly promoted beyond his abilities. On the other hand, less controversially, most of the British commanders get criticized for lack of energy and a failure to understand combined-arms warfare; even the men who beat the Italians in 1940. In fact, the Italians come off rather better in this book than one generally sees; at least Forczyk detects a determined effort to learn from mistakes and improve.

Apart from that, Forczyk keeps coming back to issues of logistics, training, and communication, emphasizing that unless you have these aspects of military art in order, you're unlikely going to be successful in regards to mechanized warfare.

As for what I'd criticize, I do wonder if Forczyk is always in control of his material, as he is trying to cover a lot. I've seen reviews that have "dinged" Forczyk on some factual issues that are mostly small scale. At some points, Forczyk also might have wanted to step back from issues with doctrine, operations, and tactics and consider the general strategic picture. Yes, too many resources were being thrown at North Africa by the powers in question, but for the British this was the best war they had to convince the Americans that they were serious (and Churchill was never going to write off holding the British Empire together), and the German military high command still felt stung by the escape of the BEF from France in 1940, and North Africa in 1941 was the best way to collect prestige points. Still, this an advance over what the general reader has probably read about this campaign, Forczyk actually makes the most use yet I've seen of Italian sources, and I'm looking forward to seeing that the second half of this study is like.

Though, in part, this booklet reads with all the grace of a staff report, it appears to be the best account of this siege from a tactical perspective that you're likely read in English. Apart from that, Forczyk does a good job of demonstrating that neither side really had the manpower, or the logistical resources, to be fighting this battle; not that this prevented Hitler or Stalin from throwing away resources that could have been better spent elsewhere. As Forczyk also notes, if this particular fight is remembered for anything, it is for being the first German effort to conduct the resupply of an isolated garrison by air; the lesson that should have been learned that it was a barely adequate solution and the real answer was to quit on a failing operation before it was too late.

5 pt carte, 2 pt ediția românească de la Litera, trasă în jos de o traducere catastrofală și pe deasupra incompletă: în original sunt 2 părți, Nord și Sud, Litera a scos doar Nord, adică frontul mai puțin relevant.

surprinzător de detaliată și documentată pt o cărticică de doar 140 pagini, dar și curajoasă în a contrazice teze istorice binecunsocute.

In a conflict characterized by blitzkrieg-style movement, the siege of Sevastopol in 1942 is a rare outlier. For eight months the forces of the German Eleventh Army sought to take the fortified city, which served as the main port for Soviet naval forces in the Black Sea. This the Germans did only after months of air and ground bombardment, followed by a bloody attritional battle more akin to the struggles of the First World War rather than the second one. In this book, Robert Forczyk provides a summary of the campaign that describes the commanders on both sides, the order of battle of the forces, and the developments that earned the Germans a debilitating victory.

As Forczyk notes, attacking Sevastopol was not even part of the original German plan to invade the Soviet Union. Focused on capturing Moscow, it was assumed that the Crimean Peninsula would be dealt with in one of the mop-up operations after Soviet forces west of the Dnepr River had been defeated. Occupying the peninsula became a priority soon after the start of the invasion, however, when Soviet bombers based out of the peninsula struck the Romanian oil refineries in Ploesti. Newly cognizant of the threat posed to the key source of oil for the German war machine, both Adolf Hitler and the Wehrmacht high command made capturing the Crimea before the onset of winter a priority.

To that end Erich von Manstein’s Eleventh Army was tasked with attacking the peninsula. While acknowledging his operational abilities, Forczyk is highly critical of the commander who is regarded today as the outstanding German general of the war, noting his aloofness from the men under his command and his postwar efforts to sanitize his wartime record. Forczyk notes in particular Manstein’s attempts to distance himself from his role in the “Final Solution,” spotlighting every example of his support for the Nazis’s genocidal policies towards the Jews. By contrast, his Soviet counterpart, Ivan Petrov, is not as well defined in the text by Forczyk, and is usually represented in the text only by the author’s negative judgments of his conduct of Sevastopol’s defense.

Here the limitations of Forczyk’s book are particularly apparent, as he never considers the degree to which Petrov’s decisions were shaped by the constraints of the siege. By contrast, the Germans operations are far better analyzed, and are the great strength of the book. As he demonstrates, the Germans faced almost as many constraints as did the Soviets. With the bulk of German forces committed to the attack on Moscow Manstein attempted to take Sevastopol in November 1941 by a coup de main, only to fall short. Both sides settled into a siege, with the Soviet high command confident that the Germans lacked the resources to reinforce their position and that any attack could be countered by Soviet forces nearby in the Kerch Peninsula. To address this Manstein launched an offensive on the peninsula in May 1942, achieving what Forczyk labels “one of the more astonishing victories of World War II” and leaving him free to assault Sevastopol unimpeded.

Nevertheless, Manstein was effectively on the clock, with many of the Luftwaffe units assigned to him due to be reassigned to support the upcoming summer offensive in the north. Redeploying his forces, he began his attack on June 2 with a five-day bombardment of Sevastopol’s defenses. Much of the attention given to the siege is because of the artillery employed, which included two massive 60-cm mortars and “Dora,” the largest rifled cannon ever used in combat. Forczyk is dismissive of such spectacular weaponry, however, pointing out their meager results especially considering the considerable resources required to deploy them. By contrast, the naval support for the siege was far more limited, which enabled the Soviets to sustain their forces in the city right up to the end, when a surprise German crossing at Severnaya Bay on June 29 triggered the final collapse of the Soviet defenses and the capture of the port by Axis forces.

In the end, the siege of Sevastopol proved a sideshow to the overall war, with Manstein’s costly triumph having little effect on its outcome. Nevertheless, the unusual nature of it and the noteworthy weapons used by the Germans have guaranteed it considerable attention both then and since. Forczyk’s book provides a good history of the siege, one that gives due acknowledgement to all of the factors involved (including the often-overshadowed role of the Romanian and Italian forces that participated) in describing its course and explaining the outcome. It is a fine account that should be the starting point for anyone interested in learning something about this dramatic battle of the Eastern Front.

Forczyk is a committed Anglophobe - the Germans can do no wrong in the period 1940-42 while Churchill and the British thrash about wildly with no strategy and no plan. The British Army had suffered defeat after defeat and its leadership was deficient - certainly worse than that of the French in May 1940! The 'so-called Battle of Britain' still left the Germans much stronger than the British - despite the 'defeat' of the Luftwaffe. Forczyk highlights the increasing sortie rate of the Luftwaffe bomber force - the Luftwaffe killed 15,000 civilians during the period August -October 1940 , compared to just 50 German civilian deaths inflicted by RAF Bomber Command in the same three month period. They simply switched to the night Blitz - against which the British had no strategies.(not that the Luftwaffe had a night fighter force at this stage either!) Forcyzk fails to explain how this would have helped the Germans mount a daylight invasion. He does highlight German inability to 'jam' British radar and the 'sporadic and inconsistent' efforts to disrupt British operational and strategic 'centres of gravity' through inconsistent target selection! Forczyk's resolutely pro-German stance does mean however that he has to invest 'Sealion' with the sort of credibility that meant it was a serious proposition, despite the lack of a plan accepted by all the leaders of the Wehrmacht and the lack of advocates for an invasion among the members of Hitler's inner circle. Forczyk even claims that the 'lack' of a plan would have been to the German's advantage. Forczyk also claims - against all the evidence -that the Germans would have been able to deploy more naval assets in the Channel than the Royal Navy had they attempted an invasion - more destroyers, faster more numerous vessels. Of course Forczyk's arguments fall absolutely flat because 'Sealion' never did take place. There was no 'decisive' moment since nothing was decided. For Forcyzk Churchill made 'critical mistakes' in strategic judgement and Britain was still in a position of 'great peril'. According to Forczyk Britain had no allies and Churchill was hanging on for American or Soviet intervention;"..Churchill had over-extended Britain in the name of uncompromising bravado", when Forczyk insists he could have opened negociations to win a breathing space. Or worse, "Churchill shared some of the same inflexible tendencies as Hitler.." when it came to waging war - an absolutely outrageous conclusion in the opinion of this reviewer.. A resolutely pro-German view of 'Sealion' that almost completely avoids any detailed consideration of why the Germans were unable to attempt an invasion of Britain. German 'technologies' developed for 'Sealion' were however put to good use in other theatres..

Vel skrifuð frásögn um mikilvægi Krímskaga í augum valdamanna á fyrri hluta síðustu aldar. Forczyk lýsir vel átökum og þjóðernishreinsunum allt frá fyrri heimsstyrjöldinni, fram yfir þá síðari með tilvísun í innrás Rússa núna 2014. Margt fróðlegt sem kom mér á óvart enda bauð þetta svæði á Austurvígstöðvunum upp á fjölbreyttustu átökin, landgöngur, umsátur, skæruhernað, leifturstríð o.s.frv.

Mjög áhugaverð yfirferð yfir innrás Þjóðverja og Sovétmanna inn í Pólland haustið 1939. Forczyk byggir mikið á pólskum heimildum og áhugavert er að sjá hvernig pólski herinn stóð oft vel í hárinu á þýska hernum og víða gerðu stjórnendur beggja herja afdrífarík mistök sem reyndust Pólverjum þó öllu verr því þeir máttu ekki við slíku. Pólverjar voru í óða önn að endurbæta tæknibúnað herafla síns og voru framarlega á ýmsum sviðum en langt á eftir Þjóðverjum á vissum sviðum s.s. samskiptabúnaði herdeilda. Þjóðverjar voru rétt að byrja að þróa leiftursóknina, hernaðaraðferð sem gjörbylti hernaði á fyrri hluta seinni heimsstyrjaldar. Oft lentu þeir í miklum vandræðum vegna þess að herbúnaðurinn hentaði ekki og hernaðartæknin var oft á tíðum vanþróuð.
Þeir lærðu hins vegar af mistökum sínum, nýttu sér reynsluna frá Póllandi til hins ítrasta í innrásinni í Frakkland og unnu sína glæstustu sigra 1941 þegar þeir réðust inn í Sovétríkin áður en andstæðingar þeirra þróuðu tækni og varnir sem stóðust hervél Þjóðverja fyllilega snúning.

LTC Forczyk gives his readers yet another work that challenges decades of conventional interpretations of what happened in Northwest Europe during the spring of 1940. Although this book is titled "Case Red: The Collapse of France', which was the German code for the second phase of operations against France following Case Yellow, the author is almost compelled to give detailed coverage to that first phase, so the title is a bit of a misnomer. However, I think readers won't hold this against an author such as Forczyk.

Following the obligatory introduction, the author lays out his case for a revised history of this last round of Franco-German conflict in 10 chapters. These chapters are followed by a brief glossary organized by nation--the French glossary is especially needed as Forczyk uses acronyms to designate French Army units for the sake of brevity. Two appendices follow the glossary: A, which outlines the orders of battle for the French and British armies; and B, which outlines the same for the Germans. The appendices are followed by endnotes, a detailed bibliography, and a section of photographs, many of which I have not seen published before.

The book is organized chronologically as is to be expected, with Chapter 1 setting the stage for all three combatant armies from the end of the First World War to May 1940. From Chapter 2 up through the first half of Chapter 6, the author moves rapidly, but thoroughly, through Case Yellow. The German execution of Case Red did not begin until 5 June 1940, nearly a month after the initiation of Case Yellow. Most World War II histories cover the roughly three-week Case Red operation in little more than a paragraph, but Forczyk's research reveals extensive fighting and significant casualites on both sides during this period. Conventional histories mark the beginning of the end for the Franco-British armies coincident with the French defeat at Sedan on 13-14 May, followed by what is popularly known as the German "race to the sea" culminating with the evacuation of French and British troops at Dunkirk. What this author highlights in the second half of his book is that there was plenty of fighting after the Dunkirk evacuation. Moreover, the author skewers one of the commonly postulated reasons for the swift French defeat--poor French troop morale. Forczyk's research highlights that the poor morale did exist, but mostly at the highest levels of French Army command and national government. While there is no question that Germany would defeat France by the end of Case Yellow, had the French senior leadership been made of sterner stuff, the track of the war could have been altered more favorably to the Allied cause.

Other research revealed by Forczyk in this book uncovers the realities of atrocities committed by German troops in the course of Cases Yellow and Red. Although previous histories mainly attribute these acts solely to Waffen SS units, the author points out evidence of atrocities committed by ordinary Heer troops, especially against French colonial soldiers and their officers. The author also highlights the air war during this period, noting the shortcomings of both the Armee de l'Air and the Royal Air Force as well as the frightening efficiency of the Luftwaffe's fighter arm. What stands out in this discussion is the horrific loss ratios suffered by the Allied air forces and the speed with which the Luftwaffe established air supremacy over France early in the 1940 campaign. Finally, Forczyk shares a view of the political machinations in all three combatant armies--with totally different outcomes. Within the Wehrmacht, some commanders, most notably Guderian and Rommel, deliberately disobeyed orders when doing so was to the Germans' tactical advantage. Admittedly, there were risks in doing so (the abortive Franco-British counterattack at Arras is one example), but the benefits in this situation grossly outweighed the risks. Both Guderian and Rommel had the measure of their opponents. On the Allied side, both French and British senior leaders repeatedly undermined the authority and the intent of their respective governments, also by direct disobedience of orders. Case Red worked extremely well for the Germans thanks to this insubordination.

Overall I have really enjoyed yet another great read from this author. His research, organization, and writing skills all contribute to this book's success in sharing information.

This is a superb book by LTC Forczyk that covers historical ground overlooked by most previous historians of the Second World War and the Polish Capaign of 1939 in particular. While some readers may call this volume revisionist as it differs significantly from those previous histories, I do not. A history that uses all pertinent sources, old and new, as a basis for a correct history is never a revisionist one. Most previous histories did not access the sources that Forczyk utilized, thus telling only part of the story that was there to tell.

The author includes in his 350 pages (according to my Kindle edition) an introduction, eight numbered chapters, an epilogue, a key to map symbols, a table of officer ranks in the three national armies detailed in this book along with their British and American equivalents (Forczyk gives all ranks in the native language of its national army), a list of abbreviations, an Appendix A with the campaign orders of battle for both Poland and Germany, an Appendix B with the campaign order of battle for the Red Army, an Appendix C with a chronology, an Appendix D with a list of the organizations and strengths of the Wehrmacht and Waffen SS mechanized units, a section of notes, a bibliography, a short author's biography, and a selection of photographs.

The book is divided roughly in half, with Chapters One through Four setting the stage for the Polish/German/Soviet conflict, Chapters Five, Six, and Seven detailing the month-long campaign, and Chapter Eight speaking to both Poland's wartime German and postwar Soviet occcupation. New to me details that I found in my reading was the extent of covert German operations in both Czechoslovakia in 1938 and Poland in 1939. The so-called "fifth columnists" of legend really were German special operators. The author's evaluation of the armies of this campaign were equally enlightening. The Poles performed creditably but would have lost anyway, given the gross inequities between the armies. However, the Poles could have performed even better had it not been for incredibly poor decisions by senior Polish Army leadership. The Germans, for their part, were nowhere near as invincible as Nazi propagandists and many postwar historians would have readers believe. There were significant staff shortcomings during the campaign that the Polish Army could not take advantage of, but that later German opponents could and did. There were also major equipment failures in that the vast majority of German armor was too poorly protected even against under-equipped forces such as the Poles. German logistics fared badly as well, and this is the one warfare area that the Germans would continue to neglect throughout the war. The Red Army did what it needed to do Stalin's bidding; its weaknesses would become apparent in a few months during the Winter War in Finland. Most postwar histories gloss over both the accomplishments of the Polish Army and the German problems, but Forczyk lays bare all of these points.

Overall this is a great title to have in your library. Forczyk mentions only one other book that examines the Polish Campaign in an unbiased fashion--Steve Zaloga and Victor Madej's "The Polish Campaign 1939", published in 1985. Zaloga, now known widely as a defense analyst and armor historian, and Madej focus unblinking eyes on the organization, doctrine, and equipment, while give a fairly brief account of the campaign. Mention of Soviet operations during the campaign is limited as the Polish sources available to Zaloga and Madej minimized their criticism of Moscow during the Soviet era. Forczyk's account, with broader access to now more complete Polish sources, is more balanced in covering all three armies involved with the 1939 campaign. I'd still keep that Zaloga/Madej volume, though, for its superior coverage of the Polish Army of 1939.

If I were to simply regard this book from the perspective of straight military history I would rank it somewhat higher, as this is the best operational account of Germany's invasion of 1939 I've ever seen. Forczyk's perspective regarding most of the participants is unsparing, and he is often as critical of Polish actors as he is of the Germans or Soviets. However, particular disdain is reserved for Chamberlain's government in Britain; let's just say that when Forczyk uses the word "appeasement" you can hear the sibilant hiss of contempt. As for what would have really made a difference Forczyk tends to focus on Anglo-American willingness to provide resources to the Soviet state in the name of business and the Anglo-French unwillingness to truly punish the Nazi Regime for it's flagrant disregard of Versailles, which allowed Berlin and Moscow to accelerate their military preparations; though this seems to be a rather unrealistic perspective considering the political chaos of the post-1929 era. Still, Forczyk essentially does admit that the Polish Second Republic was often its own worst enemy, what with grandiose dreams of territorial expansion and a military high command warped by internal political conflict. Poland deserved better, but that's usually besides the point in international conflict.½

Forczyk is establishing himself as one of the best military analysts accessible to the lay reader today. I loved Case Red: The Fall of France, and this is possibly even better. He writes with passion as he demolishes the myths surround Germany's blitzkrieg of the hapless Poles. First and foremost, that it was a walkover for the Nazis, it was not, the Poles fought ferociously, quite possibly harder that France did. They also fought honorably despite the circumstances, scrupulously honouring the Geneva Convention with regard to POWs, while the Germans freely and contempuously executed Polish prisoners and civilians at whim. Secondly, that Poland's air force was destroyed on the ground on the first day, in fact they remained a constant threat to the Germans until the last days of the campaign, despite flying obsolete aircraft, the Polish pilots were skillful and brave and downed more than 100 Nazi aircraft. Not all the Poles equipment was outdated, their 7TP tanks were superior to the Panzer I & II but there were too few and they were wasted fighting in small packets. In short, although Poland had the 4th largest army in Europe, they were brought down by poor planning, political shenanigans, Poland's straitened financial circumstances that prevented buying modern equipment, and an inability to decide where to put their armies to best defend the nation. Despite the bravery of the Polish military, they were caught short on September 1 and were never given the chance to reorganize their forces in a way that could stop the Germans. The Germans themselves had problems, Hitler's much vaunted war machine was still in its teething stages, despite the myth of mechanization, much of their force was horse-drawn, and supply was a constant issue. However Forcyzk makes the point that the Germans were quick to learn and that their experience in Poland was instrumental in developing the improved Blitzkrieg that tore through France and the Low Countries in May 1940. He reserves his most scornful criticism for Poland's supposed Allies, Britain and France, who cynically promised to support Poland and in the end calculatedly did nothing, the machinations of the Chamberlain government in particular certainly does not make pretty reading. Also lashed with contempt is Stalin's Soviet Union, which made a deal with the devil then sat back until Poland was prostrate before slicing their own section of the corpse away. A grim note is provided by Forcyzk's footnote on every page when he mentions a senior Polish officer who was subsequently executed by the Soviets in Katyn Wood, a foul crime for which no-one was ever brought to justice that the Soviet regime denied until glasnost but that Putin government has done back to denying. This is both a tragic and inspiring and book, for as horrific the suffering of the Poles was, they remained resistant and defiant (Forcyzk notes that unlike France and other occupied countries, there was virtually no collaboration by the Poles). Poles fought bravely in the RAF and as soldiers on the ground in North Africa, Italy and many other campaigns. Tragically, the machinations of the West left them after the war still enslaved by the Soviet Union and fighting until finally winning their freedom in the 1990s, possibly the longest resistance campaign in history. A wonderful book, which provides a minute but fascinating story of a heartbreaking episode in European history, while at the same time celebrates a brave people who refused to give up ever. Superb reading.

Solid, well-done account of Operation Suvorov, the Summer 1943 offensive in the area of Smolensk carried out by the Red Army against Army Group Centre of the German Army. I thought this account was very well done, both at the lower-level discussions, and the discussions of higher-level strategy. Forczyk makes it clear that it was logistical issues, as well as poor support by the Red Air Force, that more than anything else held up the Red Army from smashing Army Group Centre; it was a very close run thing for the German Army. They wouldn't be so lucky next year...

On 10th May, 1940, Hitler's Wehrmacht launched Case Yellow, smashing into France and the Low Countries, pushing back the Allied armies to the coast at Dunkirk in a matter of weeks. In most war histories, the story jumps almost immediately to the Battle of Britain, but as Robert Forczyk relates, the fighting in France still had another 3 weeks to run. After Dunkirk the Germans launched a new operation, entitled Case Red, to knock France out of the war altogether. This is the story of the desperate struggle by the French army, air force and even navy to stop the German advance, ultimately it was futile, but Forcyzk shows, far from capitulating easily, the French soldiers fought extremely hard. Individual units showed extreme bravery, but were undermined by France's poor pre-war preparation, inept command and the machinations of French politics The author is scathing about these politicians, particularly the ones who tamely advocated capitulation, at one point he regrets that they weren't taken out and shot as traitors. This passion makes what might otherwise have been a dry war history into an entertaining and informative read. . The author is also contemptuous of the British effort, their refusal to allow any Spitfires, the only plane capable of beating the Me-109, to be sent to France, is slammed, and the general ineptness of their commanders which betrayed the courage of the individual British units. The almost forgotten farce of Britain's 2nd BEF venture in particular is related in scathing detail. This is a great piece of war writing, bringing to life a largely neglected campaign, passionately written, which overturns many myths about France's defeat. Highly recommended.

Book received from NetGalley

I had heard about Operation Sea Lion prior to reading this book but I had no clue what it was. World War II history is too "new" for me to really enjoy reading or studying about it. I learned quite a bit from this book and now I want to know more about this early part of World War II.

While with any given Osprey booklet of this length you have to wonder whether you're going to wind up with a lot of nothing, this is a concise overview of why the Condor was such a thorn in the side of the British war effort for the period 1940-41, and why that period was so short. This was due to the limitations of the Condor as a war machine and how the British worked hard at coming up with a comprehensive solution to this threat.

A nice setting straight of accounts of the celebrated Russian mission to disrupt the German airlift into Stalingrad, emphasizing that while the operational objective was achieved there were still failings in terms of command & control and logistics at this stage of the capabilities of the Red Army. One also comes away with respect for the Soviet commander Vasily Badanov, who proved able to handle an independent command in terms of trying to complete the mission when having really reached the culmination point a little short, and then salvaging what could be salvaged when the inevitable German counter-attack arrived.

This is an historical and well documented rendition of the order of Battle in the Crimea with both failed and successful strategies by the Russian and the German armies from 1941 to 1944 resulting in the heavy loss of manpower. Heavy-duty weaponry such as the 62cm “Thor” proved to be impractical. The tenacity and flexibility of the Russians was a surprise to the Germans. Crimea was of strategic importance to both Russia and Germany. Hitler was determined to rid it of the enemies of the Third Reich and to exploit its resources. Crimea as a prize was elusive. Russia eventually gained control over the region after a two year Nazi occupation. Under Stalin’s orders the Tatars were removed and ethnically cleansed being considered as traitors to the motherland and the russification of the area began. Russia lost the Crimea in 1991 to the Ukraine peacefully. Recent efforts to annex it back to Russia by Russia to keep the Crimea out of NATO have been successful but the outcome is tenuous at best. This is a very useful text for the war historian and goes beyond 1944. Attention should be paid to the Postscript 2014, as a forecast of where all this action is heading. History tends to repeat itself and we do not learn its lessons.

Robert Forczyk has produced a detailed but easily read narrative of a much neglected area of the 1941-45 Russo German war.

Whilst other authors have written extensive tracts on the initial phases of Barbarossa, Kursk, Moscow, Leningrad, etc. for some reason the battles for the Crimea have largely been ignored.

What is even more surprising is why? From a purely military point of view it has everything. Naval battles, amphibious landings, sieges, air battles and naval evacuations the size of Dunkirk.

Logistics is key in any battle and Forczyk describes well the German quandary of trying to balance limited resources across multiple threats, as well as the friction between the Germans and their Rumanian allies who fought better, than is normally described.

The book also gives insight into Wehrmacht complicity in war crimes and the grim matter of ethnic cleansing on both sides. Whilst rightly so there is focus on German atrocities, Forczyk also describes the little known story of the Crimean Tartars where the Soviets carried out the forced deportation of 180,000 Crimean Tartars to Uzbekistan on the belief that many had collaborated with the Germans, resulting in 109,000 Tartar dead within 3 years.

The last chapter brings the book back to the present day with a contemporary view of Russia's recent invasion and annexation of the Crimea.

Overall a great addition to any Eastern Front library, but would benefit from the addition of maps.

Very good art, and good snapshot text of the Bf-110 VS the Lancaster. An easy read, informative and interesting first hand accounts scattered through out. As usual left me wanting more but thats what a good intro should do.

..this latest 'Duel' title features the usual competent text, the usual Bundesarchiv pictures, unfortunately already seen many times before, a relative dearth of first-person accounts and some neat cockpit and 'action' illustration by Hector and Laurier, two of the best in the business. Unsurprisingly (for an American) author Forczyk concludes that Bomber Command's night offensive was on the whole thwarted by the Luftwaffe night fighter defenses, the Lancaster being especially vulnerable to the upward firing armament of the Bf 110 twin-engine night fighter. The 'duel' was largely fought out against a backdrop of tactical innovations by the radar scientists and while the British had the strategic edge at all times, German nightfighters were able to score some tactical victories, although usually (not that the author points this out..) when weather conditions conspired to leave the raiders exposed to night fighter offensive action. Which happened occasionally with disastrous consequences for the bomber crews. While the text skips neatly through events and actions to which entire books have been devoted elsewhere, ultimately though the Lancaster and its crews get relatively little credit here for the almost wholesale destruction wrought on German industrial centres and related infrastructure. The author recognises that on a purely fighter vs bomber comparison, the fighter is bound to prove the 'superior' aircraft, yet in this instance he simply fails to recognise that the Bf 110 did not stop the RAF's night bombing offensive, far from it! The fact that German armament production increased during 1944 is explained, Mr Forczyk, by the FANTASTIC resources devoted by the Germans to bunker building, civil defence, production dispersal, underground factories, the massive and terrible deployment of foreign and slave labour (more than 650,000 Frenchmen alone between 1942-1944) and many other factors - not least the relative ineffectiveness of the USAAF's daylight bombing offensive - and not to any failure of Bomber Command's night offensive. The author produces statistics on the cost to the UK of producing a strategic bombing force which make interesting reading - his aim though is to show that the British invested almost as much in the Lancaster "program" as the US did in the atomic bomb project and seemingly got far less in return for their investment. He ignores the evidence that roughly 50% of Germany's entire war effort was devoted to DEFENDING against the RAF's strategic bombing campaign while British expenditure on strategic bombing was 12% of the UK's total war outlay - a decent enough return I'd have thought. And US Lend-Lease "meant that the British didn't have to produce landing craft or machine guns.. ". Maybe not, but simply put, Mr Forczyk, RAF Bomber Command were the much vaunted Second Front in Europe; even early on in the war large numbers of Germans - not just women and children - were manning anti-aircraft guns in German cities and constructing huge bunkers for civil defence. A considerable number of these could perhaps have been fighting soldiers at the front against the British in North Africa or against Stalin's Russia in front of Moscow. By the time the RAF launched it's first 1,000 bomber raid (May 1942, not 'late 1942') the city of Cologne had devoted nearly one hundred million RM to civil defence including bunker building. This was just one German city. See Zaloga in 'Defence of the Third Reich' (an Osprey "Fortress" title) for some figures. Hitler of course had ordered the 'Sofortprogram' of huge civil defence projects from the first raids on Berlin that took place in mid-1940. Difficult to describe the bombing of Germany as " ineffectual " in the context of the overall picture of German home defence and the FANTASTIC resources it tied up. Of course the author quotes the RAF's own 1942 Butt report which highlighted the difficulties of hitting individual factory targets from 4 miles up. Hence the campaign against the Ruhr district. For the British, 'Terror bombing' was the only offensive weapon available to Bomber Command in mid-1940 when British backs were to the wall. As usual American writers/historians tend to forget this. Nor do they tend to point out that the USAAF were just as eager to bomb the big German cities and especially Berlin as the RAF were and the USAAF tried any number of times to do just this from March 1944 when they felt sufficiently strong enough. The USAAF hid (hides) behind the pretense that collateral casualties were avoidable but the vaunted Norden sight was just as ineffectual above cloud cover. Having already demonstrated that Kammhuber's Himmelbett and the limited 'box' system for the night defence of Germany could be easily overwhelmed, Bomber Command comprehensively defeated & blinded the Nachtjagd over Hamburg in July 1943 - Forcyzk almost says this; his emphasis though is on the "40,000 civilians " that died. In the context of this defeat of the German night fighter force it is perhaps not surprising that 'Bomber' Harris thought his heavy bomber squadrons could go on and finish the job. Even the Nazi hierarchy (men like Speer) thought they could too - not that Forcyzk says this. Rather bizarrely Forczyck ends his text by declaring that the resources devoted to the Lancaster could have been far better spent on another great British aircraft, the de Haviland Mosquito. Mosquitoes were already largely deployed as Pathfinder's, target makers, intruders and in the 'Berlin express', the highly effective 'Light Night Striking Force' that no German defences could counter so a somewhat anomalous assertion in the context of this title. Recommended albeit with some reservations

La Polonia aveva sonnecchiato sotto il regime nazista per cinque anni. Tuttavia i polacchi avevano dato vita a un esercito sotterraneo, l'Armja Kraiowa, e aspettavano il momento in cui la debolezza tedesca avrebbe offerto loro la possibilità di un'insurrezione vittoriosa. L' AK diede il via alla rivolta il 1° agosto 1944, ma nonostante alcuni successi iniziali i tedeschi riuscirono a reprimere l'insurrezione.

Alla fine di luglio 1942 Hitler ordinò al Gruppo di Armate Sud di conquistare la Crimea al fine di prevenire i raid sovietici sui giacimenti petroliferi di Ploesti, in Romania. Questa missione di vitale importanza fu affidata alla debole 11° Armata, comandata dal generale Von Manstein. Questo volume prende in considerazione l'impatto della logistica, delle condizioni meteorologiche e delle operazioni congiunte per esaminare l'ultimo successo di grandi proporzioni dei tedeschi nel corso della Seconda guerra mondiale.

Entro la fine di settembre del 1941, i sovietici avevano già subito la sconvolgente perdita di più di 2 milioni di soldati quando Hitler deviò le numerose armate tedesche verso il cuore della Russia sovietica: Mosca. Questo libro spiega nel dettaglio l'Operazione Tifone, l'offensiva tedesca contro Mosca, che fu uno dei più grandi attacchi operativi della Germania durante la guerra e la prima sconfitta di Hitler.

Of the three Osprey Command titles I received as a present, this is clearly the best one. It still suffers from the fact that Manstein was not truly a commander, he was but Hitler's willing tool. While he planned campaigns and coordinated battles, he wasn't free in disposing his forces. His unwillingness to stick up for his subordinates, his unwillingness to confront Hitler and his eager acceptance and complicity in the Nazi crimes make him a highly questionable character (whose four years in prison was a rather mild punishment for the Wehrmacht atrocities in the Eastern theater).

While his involvement in the planning of the Sichelschnitt guarantees Manstein a place in the history books, Forczyk's competent account of his campaigns shows a mixed picture regarding his strategies, execution and leadership. His Crimea and Leningrad attack and Stalingrad relief operations as well as Operation Zitadelle show him frittering away Germany's offensive capabilities for little strategic gain. Most of his successes were due to Soviet overreach (or French incompetence). By the way, just one of the three commissioned illustrations actually show Manstein, which underlines the questionable concept of this series.