The Unknown Eastern Front

Rolf Dieter Mller is Professor of Military History at the Humboldt University, Berlin; Scientific Director of the German Armed Forces Military History Research Institute in Potsdam; and Coordinator of the 'The German Reich and the Second World War project. He is the author of numerous publications on World War II. At the beginni.

Collision of Empires is the first major historical work on the Eastern Front during World War I since the 1970s. One of the primary triggers of the outbreak of World War I was undoubtedly the myriad alliances and suspicions that existed between the Russian, German, and Austro-Hungarian empires in the early 20th century. Yet much of the actual fighting between these nations has been largely forgotten in the West. Driven by first-hand accounts and detailed archival research, Collision of Empires seeks to correct this imbalance. The first in a four-book series on the Eastern Front in World War I, Prit Buttar's dynamic retelling examines the tumultuous events of the first year of the war and reveals the chaos and destruction that reigned when three powerful empires collided. A war that was initially seen by all three powers as a welcome opportunity to address both internal and external issues would ultimately bring about the downfall of them all.

'Without question one of the classics of post-war historical scholarship, Stone's boldly conceived and brilliantly executed book opened the eyes of a generation of young British historians raised on tales of the Western trenches to the crucial importance of the Eastern Front in the First World War' Niall Ferguson 'Scholarly, lucid, entertaining, based on a thorough knowledge of Austrian and Russian sources, it sharply revises traditional assumptions about the First World War.' Michael Howard

Operation Barbarossa, Hitler's invasion of the Soviet Union in 1941, led to one of the most brutal campaigns of World War II: of the estimated 70 million people who died in World War II, over 30 million died on the Eastern Front. Although it has previously been argued that the campaign was a pre-emptive strike, in fact, Hitler had been planning a war of intervention against the USSR ever since he came to power in 1933. Using previously unseen sources, acclaimed military historian Rolf-Dieter Muller shows that Hitler and the Wehrmacht had begun to negotiate with Poland and had even considered an alliance with Japan soon after taking power. Despite the signing of the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact, at the declaration of war in September 1939, military engagement with the Red Army was still a very real and imminent possibility. In this book, Muller takes us behind the scenes of the Wehrmacht High Command, providing a fascinating insight into an unknown story of World War II.

Chilling and authentic historical novel.

A detailed and absorbing narrative of the campaigns fought on the 'forgotten' Eastern Front of the Great War, vividly illustrating that these campaigns were no less costly, tragic and important than the catastrophes of the Somme, Verdun and Passchendaele. The massive offensives on the Eastern Front during 1915 are too often overshadowed by the events in Western Europe, but the scale and ferocity of the clashes between Imperial Germany, Habsburg Austria-Hungary and Tsarist Russia were greater than anything seen on the Western Front and ultimately as important to the final outcome of the war. With the Russians hamstrung by weak supply lines and the Austro-Hungarian leadership committed to a strategy of offensive drives despite diminishing manpower and adverse terrain, the fighting in early 1915 was a costly and futile exercise. By the summer, the Central Powers, increasingly dominated by Germany, had begun to gain the advantage, but even the Gorlice–Tarnów Offensive of 1915 – which ultimately resulted in the retreat of Russian forces from Poland – failed to bring the conflict to a conclusion. Now with the work of internationally renowned Eastern Front expert Prit Buttar, this fascinating story is finally being told. From the bitter fighting in the Carpathian Mountains, to the sweeping advances through Serbia and the almost medieval battle for the fortress of Przemysl, this is a staggeringly ambitious history of some of the most important moments of the First World War.

The full story of the first and only time American and Soviets fought side-by-side in World War IIAt the conference held in Tehran November 1943, American officials proposed to their Soviet allies a new operation in the effort to defeat Nazi Germany. The Normandy Invasion was already in the works; what American officials were suggesting until then was a second air front: the US Air Force wouldestablish bases in Soviet-controlled territory. Though pushing relentlessly for the United States and Great Britain to do more to help the war effort - the Soviet body count was staggering - Stalin, recalling the presence of foreign troops during the Russian Revolution, balked. His concern was thatthe American presence would inflame regional and ideological differences. Eventually in early 1944, Stalin was persuaded to give in, and Operation Baseball and then Frantic were initiated. B-17 Superfortresses were flown from bases in Italy to the Poltova region (in what is today Ukraine).As Plokhy's fascinating and utterly original book shows, what happened on these airbases mirrors the fate of the Grand Alliance itself. While both sides were fighting for Germany's unconditional surrender, differences arose that no common purpose could overcome. Soviet secret policeman watched overthe Americans, shadowing every move, and eventually trying to prevent fraternization between American airmen and local women. A catastrophic air raid by the Germans revealed the limitations of Soviet air defenses. Relations soured and the operations went south. Based on previously inaccessiblearchives, Forgotten Bastards of the Eastern Front offers a bottom-up history of the Grand Alliance itself, showing how it first began to collapse on the airfields of World War II.

A junior officer in the Red Army provides one of the richest and most detailed memoirs of life and warfare on the Eastern Front, from his combat training in early 1942 until the surrender and occupation of Germany.

“Remarkable personal journals . . revealing the combat experience of the German-Russian War as seldom seen before . . . a harrowing yet poignant story” (Military Times). Hans Roth was a member of the anti-tank panzerjager battalion, 299th Infantry Division, attached to the Sixth Army, as the invasion of Russia began. As events transpired, he recorded the tension as the Germans deployed on the Soviet frontier in June 1941. Then, a firestorm broke loose as the Wehrmacht tore across the front, forging into the primitive vastness of the East. During the Kiev encirclement, Roth’s unit was under constant attack as the Soviets desperately tried to break through the German ring. At one point, after the enemy had finally been beaten, a friend serving with the SS led him to a site—possibly Babi Yar—where he witnessed civilians being massacred. After suffering through a brutal winter against apparently endless Russian reserves, his division went on the offensive again when the Germans drove toward Stalingrad. In these journals, attacks and counterattacks are described in you-are-there detail. Roth wrote privately, as if to keep himself sane, knowing his honest accounts of the horrors in the East could never pass Wehrmacht censors. When the Soviet counteroffensive of winter 1942 begins, his unit is stationed alongside the Italian 8th Army, and his observations of its collapse, as opposed to the reaction of the German troops sent to stiffen its front, are of special fascination. Roth’s three journals were discovered many years after his disappearance, tucked away in the home of his brother. After his brother’s death, his family discovered them and sent them to Rosel, Roth’s wife. In time, Rosel handed down the journals to Erika, Roth’s only daughter, who had emigrated to America. Roth was likely working on a fourth journal before he was reported missing in action in July 1944. Although his ultimate fate remains unknown, what he did leave behind, now finally revealed, is an incredible firsthand account of the horrific war the Germans waged in Russia.