Your "Must Have" List

[Michael Dorosh]

Ah. Sarcasm is lost on me sometimes....

[Soddball]

Originally posted by jacobs_ladder2:

Just out of curiosity I thought I would see how you guys would answer a question posed in another (possibly less informed) forum.

What books, covering any and all aspects of WWII, should be considered "must haves"?

Patrick Bishop's "Fighter Boys" - covering The Battle of Britain.

James Holland's "Fortress Malta".

Antony Beevor's "Stalingrad" and "Berlin 1945".

[Rupert_2]

Martin Middlebrook's Arnhem 1944 The Airborne battle.

Carlo D'Este's Fatal Decison - Anizo & the battle for Rome & Bitter Victory - the battle for Sicily.

Cassino The Hollow Victory by John Ellis

Any books by Michael Reynolds.

[JonS]

Originally posted by Rupert_2:

Any books by Michael Reynolds ...

... should probably be burnt.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Rupert_2:

Any books by Michael Reynolds.

I'll veto the votes for Guy Sajer (surprise, suprise) in an earlier post - there are better books on the German experience in Russia, Siegfried Knappe's SOLDAT being one of them.

Michael Reynolds doesn't seem very authoritative to me; I get the impression he writes from the perspective of a British staff officer (which he was) and didn't have a firm grasp on the nuances of the German military. Perhaps JonS has some firmer objections than I do.

[JonS]

Frankly I think Reynolds want's to sleep with Meyer, and bear Wittmans children. His use of sources is questionable, and his writing style is a cross between Hassel and Kessler.

*shrug* I guess it depends what you're looking for. I got his book on 1SSPzKorps in Normandy based on reccomendations of this forum, and was sorely, sorely dissappointed.

[bradenwalks]

JasonC ... thanks for the info, I hadn't realized that about Raus. Although I had noticed he only talked about his victories

[HeinzBaby]

Max Hastings-Overlord

well, anything by Hastings'..

Charles Whiting ETO books are a good read, not too heavy but interesting, though I don't know how acurate his stuff is, he seems obsessed with the 'Bulge', has a few on the subject..

[Tiredboots]

Michael Dorosh could you expend on your veto on Guy Sajer. As his experience in russia closely parallels an alsacien "uncle"of mine drafted in the wermarcht I wonder how much is truth,how much is covering your ass with retroactive pity.

[michael_wittman44]

The longest winter : the epic story of WWII's most decorated platoon by Alex Kershaw is a good read even if it uses alot of propaganda drivel such as that Liebstandarte was originally concentration camp guards only instead of being formed as a bodyguard for Hitler. The Forgotten soldier by Guy Sajer as mentioned before is a good read.

[Michael Dorosh]

Originally posted by Tiredboots:

Michael Dorosh could you expend on your veto on Guy Sajer. As his experience in russia closely parallels an alsacien "uncle"of mine drafted in the wermarcht I wonder how much is truth,how much is covering your ass with retroactive pity.

I think you sum it up nicely.

Here are some conflicting views on Sajer:

http://members.shaw.ca/grossdeutschland/sajer.htm

[SgtMuhammed]

"Hitler's Last Gamble" Trevor N. Dupuy. Better researched version of "A Time for Trumpets." Trumpets still a very good book though.

"Three Battles: Arnaville, Altuzzo, and Schmidt" from the U.S. Army Green books. Maps, names down to platoon level, everything you could want to build battles.

"Beyond the Beachhead," Joseph Balkoski. Excellent T.O.&E.s for Normandy period.

And if you can get hold of them there are a bunch of little paperbacks from the U.S. Army lessons learned archive about German actions on the east front as well as U.S. actions.

Plus if you really want to play on these forums you might want to grab a good encyclopedia of WWII equipment.

[Mies]

I should also add John Erickson's Road to Stalingrad and Road to Berlin double piece. Both are very elaborate (and I found fairly hard to read for a not native English speaker) on a high tactical and strategic level. So not a lot of small unit combat tactics here. It does give a good impression imho of the initial attacks on the Soviet Union, the turn around in the East and the huge Russian offensives after that.

Mies

[Crinius]

Stephen Ambrose "D-Day" "Pegasus Bridge" and of course "Band of Brothers". Very well written. Lots of Vets information. Donald R. Burgetts 4 books. All are his memoires as Para in the 101st.

The book that made me virtualy vomit was Albrecht Wacker "Im Auge des Jägers. Der Wehrmachts Scharfschütze Josef Allerberger". Dunno if its available in english. These are the memoirs of Allerberger who was the second leading german sniper (by kills). Unbelievable how he described the cruel eastern front. One passage deals with how he watched his friends being tortured by romanians and russians. There are some photos of his victims, some with broken up skuls etc.. This was the first book that realy showed me how cruel war is.

[Bigduke6]

I will second the recommendation of Hastings' Overlord.

Gudarian's and Rokkosovsky's memoirs are available in English and I would say they are must reads if you are interested in the Eastern Front. Zhukov's are available as well, but I don't recommend them.

General Chuikov's (of Stalingrad and capturing the Hitler bunker fame) memoirs also are available in English, but out of print I think. You have to wade through a lot of propaganda, but Chuikov was there personally at just about every important incident in the entire East Front war.

Most of the Soviet Front and many of the Soviet Army commanders wrote memoirs as well, of quality varying from excellent to might as well be a Pravda reprint. All, unfortunately, are in Russian.

Along those same lines, you can find division and even regimental histories of most of the big-name units in the Wehrmacht; 1st Panzer Division etc - in German.

This is a little out of the traditional CM area but probably the best-written, and frequently funniest, general officer memoir of them all is Slim's Defeat Into Victory. Burma, Assam, the Ledo Road, stuff like that. Slim's book is quite possibly the most honest general officer memoire ever written, even if you could care less about China-Burma you should read it.

Churchill's memoires are pretty much the definitive "big picture". He of course is a bit biased towards the Commonwealth (I don't fault him) but he is a genius at seeing the strategic point, and his command of English is, well, Churchillian.

Speer's Inside the Third Reich is not war history per se, but if you want to get a good look at how the Nazi regime ticked (which you won't really, if you read Manstein or Gudarian), then Speer lays it out clearly.

[junk2drive]

For Cliff's Notes kind of people like me, BFC forums and Axis History Forums are all I read.

I've learned more about WWII here than I ever did in American public school, movies and TV.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by jacobs_ladder2:

[snips]

What books, covering any and all aspects of WWII, should be considered "must haves"?

Well this would be an outrageously long list if I attempted all aspects of WW2, and for that you might just as well get a copy of Keegan's "The Battle for History" and try to get copies of all the hundred or so key books he mentions.

I shall confine myself to those personal accounts that deal with life at the sharp end and the lowest levels of command (company and below) in the ground battle.

The very best of these, I'd say, are:

"Mailed Fist", by John Foley (Churchill troop commander in NWE)

"Alamein to Zem-Zem", by Keith Douglas (Crusader troop commander in Western Desert)

"Flame Thrower", by Andrew Wilson (Crocodile commander in NWE)

"Tank!", by Ken Tout (Sherman tank commander in NWE)

"18 Platoon", by Sydney Jary (Infantry platoon commander in NWE)

"Quartered safe out here", by George Macdonald-Fraser (Infantry private and corporal in Burma)

"The recollections of Rifleman Bowlby", by Alex Bowlby (Infantry private, OK, rifleman, in Italy)

"Popski's Private Army", by Vladimir Peniakoff (Special Forces Major, Italy)

"The Guns of Normandy", by George Blackburn (Candian gunner, NWE)

"Those devils in baggy pants", by Ross Carter (US Paratrooper NWE)

"Goodbye, Darkness", by William Manchester (US Marine, Pacific)

"My just war", by Gabriel Temkin (Red Army razvedchik)

These are all IMHO excellent books, many with substantial literary merit in addition to their interest to the student of warfare -- Douglas was a poet, Wilson a journalist, and Macdonald-Fraser's contributions to literature should be known to all.

There are plenty of other personal accounts from this level, but I think that the ones listed above are the indispensable ones. The list is clearly biased in favour of British accounts, probably because I find British writing preferable to American, available Russian accounts are few, and those German accounts I have seen either suffer in translation or were not so digestible in the first place. I have never seen any Japanese recollections apart from a short collection edited by John Nunnely, who wrote his own memoir "Tales from the King's African Rifles".

All the best,

John.

[J Ruddy]

jacobs_ladder2, I see you are in Canada.

D-Day Dodgers: Canadians in Italy by Dan Dancocks is one important book in my library that isn't mentioned here.

It is completely from the Canadian point of view and well worth the read.

[Michael Dorosh]

As far as Canadian accounts, the best armoured regiment history is SOUTH ALBERTAS by Donald Graves - would teach you about any CW tank regiment in general.

AND NO BIRDS SANG by Farley Mowat shows life as an infantry platoon commander in Sicily and Italy.

Anything by Strome Galloway is good, especially BRAVELY INTO BATTLE. He commanded a company of the Royal Irish Fusiliers in North Africa, then returned to the Royal Canadian Regiment to fight in Sicily, Italy and Holland.

Denis and Shelagh Whitaker wrote some good books, including Tug of War about the Scheldt, Rhineland about the fighting west of the Rhine in Feb 1945, and A Soldier's Story, about Falaise. Whitaker was an officer in the Royal Hamilton Light Infantry at Dieppe - was the only officer of the RHLI to return unwounded from the beaches, and then he commanded a company in Normandy and eventually the battalion - retired as a Brigadier after the war. He is unique in that he used German sources as well as Canadian ones.

And the best overall book on Canada's participation in Italy is Daniel Dancocks and D-DAY DODGERS.

[John D Salt]

Originally posted by Michael Dorosh:

[snips]

AND NO BIRDS SANG by Farley Mowat shows life as an infantry platoon commander in Sicily and Italy.

Damn. That one slipped my mind. I think it merits inclusion in my list of the very best. Another professional writer, too.

All the best,

John.

[JonS]

Blackburn was a jurno, IIRC.

[The_Enigma]

someone brought up Ambrose's Dday ... i have it, its a good book but in the same breath i didnt really like it that much (if that makes sence which it probably doesnt)

anyone else sorta feel the same way bout it?

[stoat]

I feel that way about all of Ambrose's books.

[Tiredboots]

Thanks to Dorosh & D salt for corecting Mowat's book title.Thanks for the head-up on Macdonald-fraser wartime memoirs(this should be interesting since he is one of my favorit author with the Flashman & MacAusley stories.) P.S.: to Dorosh & Salt. You blokes gonna have to demob sometime. Correction,the name was Pierre Clostermann,still available in english as "the big show".Sauvage's book seems to have disapeared int he fog of time.Too bad. It was a unique experience of being immersed in the soviet war jalopy.He was a black man from the Martinique(the russian girls went crazy),loved his yak 3 & scored 7 +. Have the book on my shelves,37 year old french paperback,so it does exist.

[JasonC]

FWIW, I second the recommendations on Manchester (Goodbye, darkness), Erickson (east front history), and Churchill (for high level stuff). All are great reads.