goose_2 wrote: ↑Mon Aug 02, 2021 4:56 pm
Has anyone read Blood Red Snow? That looks like a good memoir I would enjoy once done.
I listened to the audio book version, which has a very good narrator, and it's an interesting book. Tells the story of a machine gunner from the 24 Panzer Division at Stalingrad. Quite a gripping and picturesque storytelling. Writing about his comrades in his platoon, describing their personalities, and their actions, it feels like you know those guys personally by the end... one can almost get a glimpse at that close-knit comradeship at the front. I'd highly recommend it. The book also helps to dispell the myths about the German army and the reality of war which is far from any glory or adventure. War is truly hell.
David Stahel's Retreat from Moscow is also quite good. It has that descriptive narrative that is almost like storytelling. I can appreciate it much more than the dry and factual Glantz's style, which is invaluable as a source, but rather tedious to read (and I can appreciate the operational details very much). I've read Glantz's Zhukov's Greatest Defeat, which describes the actions of the operation Mars.
As for the personal "memoirs" of the German generals: I've read Manstein's, Mellenthin's, Guderian's, Balck's, and Raus's memoirs. Once you dig deep enough with the help of other sources, you can see more clearly through their bullshit. There's a lot of self-aggrandizing, cherry picking the topics and exploits, or even, as in the case of the Mellenthin's memoir, I was very disappointed in his book. For an operational expert that was present in all major and famous battles, and being so highly regarded by his contemporaries, I expected more interesting professional insight, but got a very dry book instead. Balck's memoir is probably the best of the lot, but still quite self-aggrandizing. Those were some ambitious personalities, and it shows. Still, Balck's memoir offers some interesting details and insight nonetheless. But those are just my personal opinions.
There is also Rommel's papers, a book compiled by Liddel-Hart, who is known for not being critical and neutral enough. Rommel's papers is based on Rommel's notes from France and Africa, and then from Italy, and Normandy. Obviously, Rommel never finished or published the book because of his fate. What I found interesting are his descriptions of his leadership, and it sheds some light on his audacious style that many times crosses the border of recklessness. Rommel gives plenty of reasons for his approach, but he also glances over his shortcomings. His description of leading the 7th Panzer Division is France is quite interesting in this regard. In my opinion, he and his division was spared of destruction only by the indecisiveness and slow reaction of the French.
I might have preferred his Infantry Attacks book from WW1, which reads more like a text book for infantry schools, and if you read this and Rommel's papers, you can see how he used basically the same approach throughout his career. Not bad for a tactical commander, but not great for an operational commander leading a corps or army.
