iMolestCats Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Well, now that we are getting back to the good ole Eastern Front, i'm in need of some literature. Being a non-Eastern Front grog i probably need to get a few east front books. Anything that you guys would recommend? Anything will be greatly appreciated. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lurrp Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Steven Zaloga's Companion to the Red Army is the best there is, if you're in to groggy stuff. Pretty much an overview of Soviet TO&Es from the mid '30s to the end of the war. Covers primarily infantry, but some other stuff too, as well as weapons. VERY dry, don't expect to be drawn in and enthralled. With that said, it's the best reference book I've found yet. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
AttorneyAtWar Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 "Panzer Warfare on the Eastern Front"- A collection of stories written by German soldiers on the eastern front, some I find questionable but you never know, great read. "Armor and Blood: The Battle of Kursk" "Tigers in the Mud" "The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War"- This book covers the whole war but it has some great chapters on the eastern front. "Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege" "The Last Battle"- Cornelius Ryan, its about the battle of Berlin Thats just a few, hell I need a few recommendations to! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
iMolestCats Posted February 6, 2014 Author Share Posted February 6, 2014 Steven Zaloga's Companion to the Red Army is the best there is, if you're in to groggy stuff. Pretty much an overview of Soviet TO&Es from the mid '30s to the end of the war. Covers primarily infantry, but some other stuff too, as well as weapons. VERY dry, don't expect to be drawn in and enthralled. With that said, it's the best reference book I've found yet. I actually just ordered Steven Zaloga's Red Thurst, i'll have to check out this one too. "Panzer Warfare on the Eastern Front"- A collection of stories written by German soldiers on the eastern front, some I find questionable but you never know, great read. "Armor and Blood: The Battle of Kursk" "Tigers in the Mud" "The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War"- This book covers the whole war but it has some great chapters on the eastern front. "Stalingrad: The Fateful Siege" "The Last Battle"- Cornelius Ryan, its about the battle of Berlin Thats just a few, hell I need a few recommendations to! I have "The Last Battle" and have been dying to start reading it but i first need to finish "The Guns at Last Light" by Rick Atkinson. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vanir Ausf B Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 http://www.amazon.com/Hells-Gate-Battle-Cherkassy-January-February/dp/0965758435/ref=pd_sim_b_2 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cuirassier Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Glantz, glantz and more Glantz. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Davek555 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 "When Titans Clashed" by Glantz. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BLSTK Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Joel Hayward, "Stopped at Stalingrad: the Luftwaffe and Hitler's Defeat in the East (1942-43)" 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinrich505 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 A huge +1 to Vanir Ausf B for "Hells Gate." Truly amazing book. Anything by Jason Mark - all his works are extremely well done, many that will whet your appetite for Stalingrad. "Bloody Streets" by A. Stephen Hamilton to get you ready for the Berlin module (I hope). Heinrich505 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
John Kettler Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 iMolestCats, Penalty Strike, Pyl'cyn Commanded a platoon and later a company in a penal battalion composed of disgraced officers. This guy can write and had enough excitement for ten combat veterans. Gold standard of war memoirs as far as I'm concerned. Arrived in the war just after Kursk, was in Op Bagration and fought into Poland. Hitler Moves East and Scorched Earth, Paul Carell AKA Paul Karl Schmidt He was chief press spokesman for Von Ribbentrop, rose to Lt. Col. equivalent in Allgemeine SS, created Signal and had blanket access to combat participants. War in the East from a very human level. As in the German divisional HQ which discovers the dead Russian tank in the courtyard isn't! Or joining a Russian tank column at night to get to the objective and the excitement when discovered. Very readable accounts. Haven't read the critiques on either book, as read them in high school. Which wasn't recent! The Battle of the Tanks: Kursk 1943, Clark. Contains what may well be the best overview of the action on the Eastern Front, starting from before the war and running up to Kursk, the real subject of his book which, unlike the turgid slog that is the Glantz and House Kursk book, is a terrific read. From Stalingrad to Pillau, Kobylyanskiy Rare memoir by an artilleryman. this is less about combat per se than the men who fought, who they were and how they lived and died. Am going to reread it, since when I did the first time, my retention of everything I read was poor. Blood on the Shores, Leonov 2 x HSU Naval Scout Leonov is, arguably, THE ancestor of Russian Navy Spetsnaz and was as tough and audacious as they came. You can read a no-holds-barred short account of him at the bada**oftheweek site. The Defense of Moscow 1941: The Northern Flank, Radey and Sharp A fresh new look of the barely mentioned by historians of either side Battle of Kalinin, using a full array of primary documents, many never seen before, from both combatants. The German explanation of failure to take Moscow because of Generals Mud & Winter is exposed to the cold light of day. Tremendous book with massive documentation. And I do mean massive, probably 40% of the book. Lists many sites, books and doc collections worth their weight in gold to those researching the Russians. Fighting for the Soviet Motherland, Loza HSU Loza, also the author of Commanding the Red Army's Sherman Tanks, takes you into the nitty gritty of war, much of it in Lend Lease AFVs, including a Matilda. He describes being part of a blocking detachment which shot their own men who were fleeing after being overwhelmed by the Panzers , conducting dismounted reconnaissance using his SMG, the dismounted bow MG and the driver to run it, plus grenades kept in the tank. Rather than being a narrative, it's a series of essays on various aspects of the Red Army at war, including female antitank gunners, the medical services (he was wounded), the good and the bad of Lend Lease tanks through Russian eyes, armor spalling and more. For a look at his work, head over to iremember.ru He fought across Russia, into Austria, then switched over to the Far East and fought in the invasion of Manchuria. I haven't read his second book, but I may be suffering some account conflation. What you can count on is that I consider the first book listed to be one of my war memoir treasures. Apparently, he's got a third one on the P-39 Airacobra and the 9th Guards Air Regiment men who flew it, two of whom wound up the top Russian aces of the war. Regards, John Kettler 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
z1812 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Panzergrenadier Aces: Exciting stories of the infantrymen who supported Germany's tanks. How tanks and infantry cooperated at the small-unit level. The majority of the book is Eastern Front. There are a few stories toward the end that deal with France after Normandy. http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/8673994-panzergrenadier-aces 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Combatintman Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Glantz, glantz and more Glantz. What he said and (from my library): Entry level overviews: Hitler's Greatest Defeat by Paul Adair is as reasonable a cheap primer on Bagration as any. Red Storm on the Reich by Christopher Duffy is a reasonable overview of the 1945 battles. For me the best academic overview of this part of the Eastern Front in the English language is The Road to Berlin by John Erickson. Obviously this is rooted at the strategic/operational level. Tactical Stuff: Fighting in Hell (The German Ordeal on the Eastern Front) edited by Peter G. Tsouras has a variety of operational/tactical type discussions/vignettes from the German perspective of which some cover the period to be modelled in the game. Red Armor Combat Orders (Combat Regulations for Tank and Mechanized Forces 1944) edited by Richard H. Armstrong is pretty much what it says on the tin. Specific Operations: The Battle for Lvov July 1944 The Soviet General Staff Study translated and edited by David M. Glantz and Harold S. Orenstein Belorussia 1944 The Soviet General Staff Study translated and edited by David M. Glantz and Harold S. Orenstein. Free stuff: Browse this linky for stuff that interests you: http://usacac.army.mil/cac2/CSI/CSIPubs.asp#ww2 Not bad for a dyed in the wool modern CMSF fan methinks ... 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
LUCASWILLEN05 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 East Freont Drama 1944 Rolf Hinze Covers the German operations in AG Centre fom July to early August 1944 so directly relevent to Red Thunder. Hinze has written a number of late war Russian Front books so well worth looking out for this author. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Lille Fiskerby Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 George M. Nipe, Jr. "Last victory in Russia" The SS-Panzerkorps and Mansteins brilliant Kharkov counteroffensive february-marts 1943. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phantom Captain Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 I've been really engrossed with this one. It's told entirely from a soldier's POV and perspective. Good stuff. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/618453.In_Deadly_Combat 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
MengJiaoRedux Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Glantz, glantz and more Glantz. You can't beat Glantz. One of the wonders of the first two books of the Stalingrad trilogy (soon to be 4 books apparently) are the phone calls from STAVKA and amazing tales of Soviet foul-ups and (eventually) triumphs. But I really like Absolute War: http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/books/reviews/absolute-war-by-chris-bellamy-462704.html And as ultimate background, The Wages of Destruction is a must: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2006/aug/12/featuresreviews.guardianreview16 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vinnart Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 “The Long Walk” by Slavomir Rawicz. This is not a combat story, but rather one of the best P.O.W escape stories about a Polish soldiers escape from a Russian gulag at the beginning of the war. The trek takes him, and several fellow prisoners 4,000 miles through the deep wilderness of Siberia through the Gobi desert. This Really is an amazing story that is well written, and read (audiobook version). There is also a movie about the story called “The Way Back”. One very small interesting tidbit is that during the journey he claims to have seen a yeti (bigfoot). This was before such things were talked about, or commercialized, so I got no feeling why he would lie about such a thing. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wodin Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 My favourite military history author is Jason D Mark. I can't recommend his books enough. Read Island of Fire and his Cholm book. Reading his Pioneer book at the moment. Also his first book Death of a leaping Horseman is finally being reprinted for a fantastic price. Second hand these where being sold for hundreds of dollars..the reprint is around £24!! Island of Fire, Death of a leaping horseman and Into Oblivion are must reads if you have any interest in Stalingrad. His Cholm book is superb aswell. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Heinrich505 Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 +1 to Wodin. Jason Mark's books are amazing in detail and research. I couldn't find or afford his "Death of a Leaping Horseman" but thank heaven it is being re-released. I'll get it this time around. Just picked up "Into Oblivion" recently and have "Island of Fire" and "Cholm." The quality of his books are top notch. Heinrich505 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Michael Emrys Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Since nobody has mentioned it yet, Enemy at the Gates: The Battle for Stalingrad (the book by William Craig, not the movie that pinched his title). Very colorful and nitty-gritty coverage of the battle on a very personal level as seen through the eyes of several of its participants. Not the last word on the subject, but a very good read and paperback copies are easy to find and inexpensive. Michael 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phantom Captain Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Completely forgot about Jason Mark. I bought "Death of the Leaping Horsemen" ages ago when it was released. It was expensive at the time but really worth it! 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
76mm Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Am reading Jason Mark's Island of Fire now. It is really an incredible piece of work. So far he has given little bios and pictures of all of the *company commanders* in the attack on the barrikady factory, along with blow-by-blow tactical accounts of the action. I can't imagine where he got all of the material. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wodin Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 Jason can't be beaten. He puts you right there with them..better than any work of fiction. His research is second to none aswell. I wouldn't part with his books for any money. 76mm..his CHolm and Oblivion books are just as detailed aswell mate and you really must buy them! The only others that are just as good are Jack Sheldon and Ralph Whitehead..but they are WW1 books. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wodin Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 I've been really engrossed with this one. It's told entirely from a soldier's POV and perspective. Good stuff. https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/618453.In_Deadly_Combat Great book...one of the first German memoirs I read. The Forsaken Army by H Gerlach Stalingrad memoirs and reassessment by J Wieder Few returned by E Corti (Also wrote an amazing novel The red Horse) Sacrifice on the Steppe by Hope Hamilton The Retreat by M Jones Hot motors Cold Feet by H Gunther Panzer Operations by General Raus Bounden Duty by Stahlberg Soldat by S Knappe Stalingrad Cauldron by F Ellis Winter Storm H Wijers Mussolini's Death March by N Revelli Death of the Wehrmacht and Werhmacht Retreats by R Citino AL the above I recommend 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vanir Ausf B Posted February 6, 2014 Share Posted February 6, 2014 I wouldn't part with his books for any money. This seems to be a recurring theme with his books. http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/0646410342/ref=tmm_pap_new_olp_0?ie=UTF8&condition=new&sr=1-2&qid=1391720434 For $1700 they must be among the greatest books ever written. 0 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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