Nigel Askey's Operation Barbarossa Series is nothing short of magnificent. Askey's work will span eight volumes when complete (including a full analysis, tables of organizations and equipment, and orders of battle for both the Axis and the Red Army's forces during Barbarossa). Nonetheless, please note that this review concerns itself only with the introductory volume and both volumes concentrating on the German forces deployed during Barbarossa and within the Reich in 1941. As a military...
Book and Film Reviews
The Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis, and Military Simulation Volumes I, IIA, IIB, by Nigel Askey, IngramSpark Publishing 2017-2018, 210 pages, $44 (Volume I), 726 pages, $128 (Volume IIA), 406 pages, $96 (Volume IIB)
Steve Mercatante
on Jul 4 2018 - 1:20pm
Review Type: Book
By Valeriy Zamulin, Helion and Company, 2017, Hardback, $69.95, 416 pages
Steve Mercatante
on Jun 15 2018 - 7:38pm
The Battle of Kursk was quite possibly the turning point in the Second World War. Though that contention is of course debatable, the fact that Kursk can be considered in such terms speaks to its importance. Moreover, for enthusiasts of armored warfare Kursk featured not only one of the greatest concentrations of armored fighting vehicles in history but, in a battle within a battle, few continue to attract as much interest as the clash of armor that occurred in July of 1943 near the small...
Review Type: Book
The German Army and The Russo-German War 1941-1943 by Gregory Liedtke, Helion & Company Ltd., 2016, 389 pages, $37.28
Steve Mercatante
on Dec 22 2017 - 9:30pm
Gregory Liedtke's Enduring The Whirlwind is more than anything else a deep dive into the statistics behind the first two years of the war fought between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Most importantly, Liedtke's work seeks to address the ongoing controversy over whether or not the numbers game played the key role in explaining the Ostheer's defeat at the hands of the Red Army. To do that, the author focuses the book on German personnel and material losses during the war's early years, and...
Review Type: Book
The Combat History of the 2nd Guard's Tank Army from Lublin to Berlin Volume 2: July 1944-May 1945 by Igor Nebolsin, Translated and Edited by Stuart Britton, Helion & Company Ltd., 2016, 552 pages, $89.95
Steve Mercatante
on Dec 22 2016 - 11:19pm
I previously reviewed and endorsed Volume One of Igor Nebolsin's two-volume set entitled Stalin's Favorite. Here, I shall examine what Volume Two has to offer (subtitled "From Lublin to Berlin, July 1944-May 1945). Like Volume One, Volume Two offers Second World War armored enthusiasts a treasure trove of information about one of the Red Army's top combat armies and the mechanics of tank warfare in general.
Continuining where he left off Nebolsin takes the combat history of the 2nd Guards Tank...
Review Type: Book
The Red Army's Forgotten 15-Month Campaign Against Army Group Center 1942-1943 by Svetlana Gerasimova, Translated and Edited by Stuart Britton, Helion & Company Ltd., 2013, 280 pages, $59.95
Steve Mercatante
on Sep 19 2016 - 8:09pm
The Battle of Rzhev was a fifteen-month campaign that took place during World War II. During these battles the Red Army sought to not only evict German forces from a central position not far outside of Moscow, but also eliminate the bulk of Army Group Center. These battles formed a campaign so colossal that in a number of metrics outdid the fighting at Stalingrad. However, there is much controversy surrounding the Rzhev battles.
As such, Svetlana Gerasimova's The Rzhev Slaughterhouse seeks to...
Review Type: Book
The Combat History of the 2nd Guard's Tank Army from Kursk to Berlin Volume 1: January 1943-June 1944 by Igor Nebolsin, Translated and Edited by Stuart Britton, Helion & Company Ltd., 2015, 504 pages, $79.95
Steve Mercatante
on Mar 26 2016 - 7:55pm
Igor Nebolsin's Stalin's Favorite offers Second World War armored enthusiasts a treasure trove of information about one of the Red Army's top combat armies. One would be hard pressed to find an English language translation of a Soviet army's combat history, and in doing so here the team of Nebolsin and Britton have performed an invaluable service.
As the mouthful of a sub-title indicates this is the first of a two part look at the 2nd Guards Tank Army (hereinafter referred to in this review as...
Review Type: Book
The Red Army's Gentleman Commander by Dr. Boris Sokolov, Translated by Stuart Britton, Helion & Company Ltd., 2015, 493 pages, $79.95
Steve Mercatante
on Dec 30 2015 - 6:22pm
Dr. Boris Sokolov's Marshal K.K. Rokossovsky offers a unique look at not only the life of one of the Red Army's top Second World War era senior officers, but also interesting insight into a Red Army at war. Detailed English language treatments of the Red Army's personnel are rare. For this reason alone this book is an important one for any student of the Second World War. And minus a few oversights the author does a credible job of providing a detailed study of Marshal Rokossovsky.
Sokolov's...
Review Type: Book
German Operations West of Kiev 24 December 1943-31 January 1944 Volume's 1 and 2, by Stephen Baratt, Helion & Company Ltd, 2014, Hardcover, $61.69 (per volume with each volume including accompanying map book), each volume approximately 300 pages (with accompanying map books another 400 plus pages in total)
Steve Mercatante
on Jun 28 2015 - 2:07pm
Stephen Barratt's two-volume set Zhitomir-Berdichev (sold separately) should go down as the definitive look from the German side of the hill at the critically important combat operations on Army Group South's left flank during the lead up to the far more famous Battle of the Korsun Pocket. Well-researched, these books are an excellent starting point for understanding how and why the German 4th and 1st Panzerarmy's were unable to stop Soviet General Nikolai Vatutin's 1st Ukrainian Front from...
Review Type: Book
The Struggle for Hungary, Autumn 1944 by Kamen Nevenkin, The History Press, 2013, Softcover, 288 pages
Steve Mercatante
on Dec 20 2014 - 2:34pm
Piggybacking upon my recent review of Tomb of the Panzerwaffe is another well done work covering the tank heavy battles in Hungary that occurred in the final year of the Second World War. In this case Kamen Nevenkin’s Take Budapest ably documents the first Soviet drive on Budapest during the fall of 1944, and in that process provides a firm foundation for those interested in this particular aspect of the Second World War.
The first four of the book’s eleven chapters detail the political,...
Review Type: Book
The Combat History of SS-Panzer Regiment 12 and SS-Panzerjager Abteilung 12 Normandy 1944 Based on Their Original War Diaries, by Norbert Szamveber, Helion Books, 2012, Hardcover, $47.94, 304 pages.
Steve Mercatante
on Oct 14 2014 - 9:56pm
Norbert Szamveber’s Waffen-SS Armour in Normandy covers the combat history of the SS-Panzer Regiment 12 and SS-Panzerjager Abteilung 12 during the Second World War’s Battle for Normandy France; which lasted from June 6 to just about the end of August 1944. These two units served as the armored core of the 12th SS Panzer Division Hitlerjugend; a unit noted for both is ferocious fighting skill and at times criminal disregard for the laws of war.
Waffen-SS Armour in Normandy is organized around...
Review Type: Book
