Slaughter at Halbe (Destruction of 9th Army)

[KG_Kharkov]

There is a new book out by Tony LeTissier on the Destruction of the 9th Army called "Slaughter at Halbe" http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...s=books&n=5011

Here's the book description:

Operation 'Berlin', the Soviet offensive launched on 16 April 1945 by Marshals Zhukov and Koniev, isolated the German Ninth Army and tens of thousands of refugees in the Spreewald 'pocket', south-east of Berlin. Stalin ordered its encirclement and destruction and his subordinates, eager to win the race to the Reichstag, pushed General Busse's Ninth Army into a tiny area east of the village of Halbe. To escape the Spreewald pocket the remnants of Ninth Army had to pass through Halbe, where barricades constructed by both sides formed formidable obstacles and the converging Soviet forces subjected the area to heavy artillery fire. By the time Ninth Army eventually escaped the Soviet pincers, it had suffered 40,000 killed and 60,000 taken prisoner. Teenaged refugees recount their experiences alongside Wehrmacht and Waffen-SS veterans attempting to maintain military discipline amid the chaos and carnage of headlong retreat. While army commanders strive to extricate their decimated units, demoralised soldiers change into civilian clothing and take to the woods. Relating the story day by day, Tony Le Tissier shows the impact of total war upon soldier and civilian alike, illuminating the unfolding of great and terrible events with the recollections of participants.

This looks like a great book. Busse's attempts to lead 9th Army to freedom is one of the most compelling parts of "The Last Battle" by Cornelius Ryan. It will also fill in the picture for those who remember the map room scenes from "Downfall."

[KG_Cloghaun]

Damn you Kharkov!! Would you just stop? I can't keep up with your damn book recommendations! Half of the 10 unopened books sitting on shelf are from you and your damn book alerts!

I just bought "A Hymn before Battle" because of you and AGC!

This Slaughter at Halbe looks very very cool,..... thanks, thanks alot,....lol

[KG_Kharkov]

I broke down and bought it since I had a gift certificate to Amazon. I'll let you know how it is. It will go in the library which is already full of books I haven't read. No point in having a library if you've read everything in it . . .

[KG_Kharkov]

Angelina Jolie arrived at my house yesterday and her name is "Slaughter at Halbe."

The book is beautiful. Great dust jacket. Well bound. A little over 200 pages of text with 2 appendices listing the German and Russian OOB, plus bibliography and about 10 pages of photos. Best of all, there are 20 situation maps!!! My big beef with many history books is the lack of good maps -- don't have to worry about that here.

This is a day by day account of action in the pocket, and draws heavily on interviews and other first person accounts. Le Tissier has written several books on the end of the war fighting around Berlin including The Battle of Berlin (which I amazingly found in hardback about 10 years ago), and more recently With Our Backs to Berlin.

After 2 chapters of introduction/operational overview, the following eleven chapters cover the eleven day period in the pocket from April 21 to May 1st. One chapter for each day. You can't ask for more!

My wife let me have a threesome last night with "Slaughter" and the "Raiders v. Patriots" (Go Collins!) and I was able to read most of the first chapter --- very well written. I'll let you know how the rest of the book is once I'm done. Only $20 from Amazon (normally about $30).

This should whet my appetite for this book which comes out in December:

http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/tg...books&n=507846

[KG_Cloghaun]

I just got done writing a huge post on the subject of late-war books and their authenticity and I accidently hit the back button and lost the whole damn thing!

Anyway, the basic jist was that I find myself always checking source notes in these late-war East Front books because of the liberties authers are able to take based on lack of information. Specifically with regard to my book "Drama Between Budapest and Vienna", by Maier. He talks about the problem of factual documentation of events and how they really happened. Documentation from divisions would conflict with OKH or Army Korps, etc,.. A Korps would have their division in one place resting behind front lines when in fact they'd be 50 Km somewhere else fighting for their lives.

That's what makes "Drama" such a great book. If Maier (chief of staff for 6th SS Panzer Army) didn't have information for a particular day, he'd tell the reader why. His basic message was "buyer beware" with regard to late-war accounts.

[KG_Kharkov]

Le Tissier does a great job with this. He identifies units when he can and explains discrepancies between their designations and their actual contents. For example, V SS Mountain Corps had no SS mountain troops in it. He relies on both Soviet and German sources and eyewitness accounts to help mesh together his account. What I'm surprised by is how few units I actually recognize in 9th Army. Most are divisions/detachments that I had never heard of prior to this, like the 32nd SS Tank Hunting Battalion. Of course, the 502nd Heavy Panzer is there leading one of the spearheads with 12 to 14 King Tigers . . .

[KG_Cloghaun]

So was Slaughter at Halbe a great read overall?

[KG_Cloghaun]

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/075...books&v=glance

I think I'm going to buy the combo, which comes with "The Siege of Budapest" for $44 total.

[KG_Kharkov]

Slaughter at Halbe was a wonderful book. Not overwhelming, just right for a moderate read on a specific late war battle. The book is blessed with great maps which really help you to understand the flow of the battle. Le Tissier has done a splendid job of bringing coherence and understanding to a crazy battle involving tons of units. I highly recommend this book for late war buffs. Some of the battles here would make wonderful CM scenarios and campaigns.

I read Siege of Budapest as well. It's a very thorough scholarly book which focuses mainly on the Hungarian point of view. It's a great book in that it's told from a perspective we wouldn't normally see here in the west. However, you will be very disappointed if you buy this expecting an in-depth history of German military operations around Budapest. German operations are covered by not to the same extent as you would have seen if this book was written by a German. So, for example, you won't see discussion of the 502nd Heavy Panzer in it. It's written by Hungarian who clearly spent a lot of time interviewing Hungarian participants and researching this book. I'd still recommend it, but only for hard-core East Front readers who are looking to fill a gap in their library (which this will fill 99% of the time -- I can't think of another book like it on the subject).

[KG_Cloghaun]

I just realized that the last book link you gave, "TO THE BITTER END : The Final Battles of Army Groups A, North Ukraine, Centre-Eastern Front, 1944-45, is written by Rolf Hinze. He wrote "East Front Drama 1944", which I read and it was very good. It covered Bagration.