This book is the first in a series of books from Osprey that are being republished in hardcover and released as a fortnightly series that can be bought from your local bookshop with the first one costing $4.95 NZD, the second and third costing $19.95 NZD together and the fourth to sixth costing $19.95 each together with a DVD ( thereafter all $19.95 per book for a total of 75 books ). This series covers the major battles of World War Two and are also available in their original softcover format. I thought that as I go through this series I would do an accompanying brief review of each book in turn.
This first issue in the series logically enough starts with the German invasion of Poland in 1939 and is authored by Steve Zaloga, an American military historian recognised as a bit of an expert on Second World War armour in particular. It comes ( as do all the books in this series ) in a hardcover and provides writen commentary combined with colour maps depicting a chronology of events, black and white period photos, and a couple of two page spread colour artists paintings.
With only 96 pages, and only 89 of those the actual subject including photos, maps and drawings, this was never intended to be a completely in depth study of the battle, but what you do get is a very good overview of the lead-up, the invasion, the smaller battles within, and the conclusion, with sufficient detail to give the reader the feeling that they have been given a very good education of the core issues and events.
The book opens with a concise but helpful explanation of the origins ( very difficult to do in a concise manner when one considers just how complex the origins of the Second World War are ) of the conflict before going on to do comparrisons of the opposing commanders, opposing plans and opposing armies which outlines very accurately the various factors that contributed to the quick victory and why it wasn’t quite the total walkover that history often portrays it as.
From there we enter into the actual campaign which covers the German invasion, the protracted siege of Westerplatte, the Polish counterattack, the Russian invasion and the inevitable outcome, whilst also managing to cover the French and English inaction and touching on some of the myths of this campaign such as the very emotive but historically inaccurate portrait of horseborne cavalry attacking tanks.
The book then wraps up with a brief look at the outcomes for the participants, some of the lessons learnt, and interestingly a brief look at the battlefield as it is today which is a bit of an eye opener to see how things are viewed from those actually involved. Also very useful is a compendium of recommended reading which is limited to books printed in english, though mention is given to several others that are not.
All in all a very informative book that gives a good, accurate, and most importantly balanced ( I loathe U.S. “documentaries” that insist on refering to anything German as “nazi” ) account of one of the most pivotal actions in modern history. Possibly equally important is that the style of writing makes this an easy and pleasurable read where so many historical text may be informative but seem like an effort to get through.
So whether you buy it as part of the fortnightly series or just pick up the softcover version this is a very good short history of “Fall Weiss”, the German invasion of Poland in 1939 that kicked off World War II.
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Author : Steven J. Zaloga Publisher : Osprey Publishing Pages : 96 containing B&W photos and colour maps and drawings Binding : Hardcover Size : 195mm x 251mm ISBN : NA as book not sold seperately .Click on thumbnails to enlarge image ( opens in new window )
“D-Day was all about america landing at Omaha to free the world”
That’s the one I watched just the other day – that title would have fit it perfectly!
Sounds like the one I only made it half an hour into. No mention of all the support from the royal navy, no mention of the yanks firing their rocket ships to far out or launching their DD tanks too early, no mention even that none of them landed where they were supposed to.
ditto (the German’s and Nazi comment), and also when you watch Yank docos on the history channel, when it was the YANKS v Germany, and Russia and the British allies ‘were there too’ almost. Cringe-worthy.
Yeah I’m not a big fan of US docos like that, especially the “D-Day was all about america landing at Omaha to free the world” ones. I’m also not into “history according to a vet”. My grandfather was a US vet and bellonged to the VFW here ( their version of the RSA ) and I heard old vets telling the same stories over and over that got more embelished with each telling, and even occassionally two or more telling the same story with slight variations. So much as I respect vets I don’t think 60 year old memories are a reliable source on which to base history.