The Greatest Battle: Stalin, Hitler, and the Desperate Struggle for Moscow That Changed the...

The Greatest Battle: Stalin, Hitler, and the Desperate Struggle for Moscow That Changed the Course of World ... | Andrew Nagorski | The Battle for Moscow - the Big Picture view

books:

The Greatest Battl...

	The Greatest Battle: Stalin, Hitler, and the Desperate Struggle for Moscow That Changed the Course of World ... Andrew Nagorski Simon & Schuster, 2007 - 384 pages average customer review:based on 51 reviews view larger image
	for more information click here

highly recommended

A good re-hash

This is an accurate read, and good for the first-time reader of the Grand Alliance, and the Eastern Front. On the other hand, for those of us already familiar with the subject, there is no groundbreaking news here.

The Battle for Moscow - the Big Picture view

I purchased THE GREATEST BATTLE because of a general interest in World War II and particularly its turning points. I didn't read beforehand a synopsis or reviews of the book and thus wasn't disabused of the notion that its vantage point was that of the units fighting on the ground, perhaps at the army, corps and brigade levels. This preconception proved to be a misconception, though not one fatal to my subsequent appreciation of this narrative about Germany's attempt to capture Moscow.

THE GREATEST BATTLE is rather a Big Picture overview of the largest armed clash of WWII beginning well before Hitler's invasion of the U.S.S.R. to April 1942, considered by military consensus to be the end of the battle. It is, as the subtitle suggests, more about Hitler vs. Stalin and their respective leadership styles as the Wehrmacht, seemingly unstoppable, drove on the Soviet capital in the summer and fall of 1941.

Author Andrew Nagorski touches on so many topics: Stalin's purge of the army in 1937-38, the Nazi-Soviet nonaggression pact, the partition of Poland, the Soviet's 1939 Winter War with Finland, Hitler's reasons for invading Russia, Stalin's apparent blindness to the coming assault, the speed of the German advance, the unpreparedness of the Soviet Army, Stalin's view of Russian POWs, the panic that overtook Moscow's citizenry, the evacuation of Lenin's body, Stalin's decision to remain in Moscow and his decision to recall troops from the Far East, winter's effect on the unprepared German forces, American and British diplomatic overtures to the Kremlin, the Lend-Lease program, the rise of General Zhukov, General Guderian's removal from command, General Andrei Vlasov's switch of sides, the difficulties encountered by Western journalists reporting the battle, and Stalin's concept of post-war boundaries. "Touches on" is the operative term for the author's approach as the volume's relatively short length (316 pages of text) doesn't allow for an in-depth treatment of any one of its wide range of topics.

The book includes four single-page maps that show general directions of advance along the Eastern and Moscow fronts at various times, but which don't include unit designations and positions below Army Group. There's also a serviceable sixteen-page section of photographs.

In my inexpert eyes, THE GREATEST BATTLE doesn't have the narrative power of, say, The Fall of Berlin 1945 by Antony Beevor, but, as a solid, comprehensive summary of the battle for Moscow, it should serve the casual student of WWII well enough.

for more information click here

The Greatest Battle recounts the horrific battle of Moscow between Nazism and Communism in the fall of 1941

Imagine your name is Joseph Stalin. You awaken in the Kremilin on June 21, 1941 to learn that over three million German soldiers have attacked your nation! Three Nazi forces attacking Leningrad and the north, Moscow and the central portion of the nation and the southern part of Russia have decided they will end communism and reign over eastern Europe!
The greatest battle began that June dawn in the greatest invasion in modern history. From September 1941 until the spring of 1942 over seven millon soldiers would be involved in the life and death struggle for Moscow. Over 2.5 million Russians would die without the Germans losing about half that number of casualties. Though later battles such as Stalingrad, Leningrad and Kursk would get more publicity the battle of Moscow was the largest contest in the war. During World War II the Soviets lost over 25 million of their soldiers and civilians.
Both regimes were led by cruel amoral dictators. Stalin and Hitler had both been born far from the center of power in their empires. Stalin in Georgia and Hitler in Austria. Both men were ruthless killers of opponents who trusted no person. Stalin wed twice and was a terrible father. Hitler only married in the last hours of his life to his loyal mistress Eva Braun. Together they are responsible for a war in which 55 million lost their lives.
Both dictators made mistakes in the Russian campaign. Hitler invaded Russia too late in the year. His men would die in the thousands during the harsh Russian Winter. They had not been furnished with winter clothing, equipment and supplies of fuel were inadequate. The blitzkrieg warfare did not work in such a huge land as Russia. Hitler failed to learn from Napoleon's disastrous 1812 invasion of Russia! Hitler's forces made a diversion to the south instead of pressing towards Moscow which should have been the main focus of the campaign. Hitler did not win over the populace launching mass terror even worse than the terrorism practiced by Stalin.
Andrew Nagorski is a former Newsweek correspondent in Russia. He interviewed many people who had participated in events during this terrible time. The anecdotes told by and about the old Russians who lived through this era make the book interesting.
The book is well illustrated with maps helping us visualize the battles.
Nagorski has done his research on a battle which is little known in the West. He has done a good job dealing with such a grisly story.

for more information click here

Good Introduction to the Eastern Front

Mr. Nagorski's book is a good introduction to the German/Soviet conflict during WWII. I got this book because,although I have studied the USSR and had a good background on the Great Patriotic War, I didn't know very much about this specific battle. I'm not really Mr. Nagorski's proper audience . This book was written for readers who don't have much background on the conflict or on the Soviet Union during the Stalinist era. Mr. Nagorski spends a good deal of time providing background information that's necessary to understanding the war, but which many readers will already have under their belts. This isn't in any way bad; a normal American or Western European of the late 20th/early 21st Century will find the Stalinist system bewildering. Why did Stalin murder and imprison thousands of loyal and competent officers immediately before the start of a war he knew was imminent? And although its easy to see why Stalin was paralyzed with the fear of "provoking" the Germans, I've always wondered why he didn't do someothing like order his planes to withdraw beyond the operational limits of the Luftwaffe-surely Hitler couldn't have considered that "provocative" and it might have saved his Air Force from its destruction in the first days of the war. Of course Mr. Nagorski can't explain that either-no one really can-but he presents the basic story in a very readable way and gives a good background on the paranoia and unreasoning terror that was part of daily life during the Stalinist era. He also gives a great deal of very useful background from foreigners looking into the Soviet Union at the time, quoting the American diplomatic staff's reports to Roosevelt and their diary entries as they observed one of the most horrific and baffling political systems in history. This is an excellent place for people interested in the Eastern Front to start their studies.

for more information click here