This book is the second 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 ( read the review of Volume One : Poland ).
This second issue chooses to jump the queue a little chronology-wise by tackling the invasion of the low countries ( Fall Gelb ) before Volume Three tackles Norway which strictly speaking came first chronologically. 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, and is authored by Alan Shepperd, a former Senior Lecturer at the Royal Military Academy, Sandhurst.
With only 96 pages, and only 87 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 rather an overview of the lead-up, the invasion, the smaller battles within, and the conclusion. The intent is to provide the reader with sufficient detail to give them a decent understanding of the main events.
The book opens with a concise explanation of the origins of the conflict before going on to do comparisons of the opposing commanders, opposing plans and opposing armies which attempts to outline how everything shaped up on the day, how each side was placed both physically and mentally, and how it was all supposed to go down.
From there we enter into the actual campaign which covers the German invasion, the feint into Belgium, the crossing of the Meuss, the French counterattack, the efforts of the BEF, what Rommel was doing, how the French disintegrated into a bunch of women running around like headless chickens and of course the victory at Dunkirk.
And that all sums up some of the serious problems with this book because unfortunately it does often seem that the author’s own time in service with the British Army in World War Two has left him with a less than glowing opinion of the French, and that comes across strongly in this book with a somewhat dismissive appraisal of the leadership and a less than flattering account of the French defence which starts to sound a lot like a description of “cheese eating surrender monkeys” where all they ever did was run a way.
Now a lot of what happened may have happened, but this isn’t a balanced account, it pretty much comes down to cowardly French, stalwart tommies, what Rommel did ( oh and a few other Germans did some stuff too ) and the final victory at Dunkirk where the BEF staged history’s most famous advance in another direction.
Perhaps I’m being a bit harsh because if you take the time to sift through you do still get a good enough account of who did what and when, but that all becomes difficult due to the other major failing this book has. It is poorly written. Now I don’t lay that one at the author’s feet, many a wise and scholarly work will numb the brain no matter how learned, because just being an expert in one’s field does not make one Stephen King. That’s the editor’s job and on this one the editor dropped the ball because you consantly feel lost and struggling with the text to keep track of the flow of the battle, primarily because it lacks any decent flow but rather jumps about and requires you to constantly check back to see which area is under discussion when a quick change takes place.
While I’m being harsh I may as well also add that the photos lose serious points too. It seems that no real research went into captioning many of them so we have a Pz.Kpfw.I identified as a Pz.Kpfw.II, several photos where the caption may as well just read “A German Plane” ( one of a French Renault UE does actual say “Two vehicles of a French Motorised Unit”, and maps that lack keys.
If you’re looking for a good concise history of Fall Gelb then I’m afraid this isn’t it. It will give you the information you want but you will have to work for it and you’ll also need to read a number of other accounts to get a balanced view.
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Author : Alan Shepperd Publisher : Osprey Publishing Pages : 96 containing B&W photos and colour maps and drawings Binding : Hardcover Size : 195mm x 251mm ISBN : NA as book is sold as part of an ongoing collection .Click on thumbnails to enlarge image ( opens in new window )
