Operational History of Barbarossa

[historygeek2021]

Are there any books that exclusively focus on the operational history of Operation Barbarossa? No anecdotes about the soldiers' feelings, no stories about Stalin drinking himself half-to-death or Hitler's drug injections, just pure army by army, corps by corp, division by division accounts of what happened, where and when? The best I can find is Brian Taylor's "Barbarossa to Berlin", but is very brief, giving only half a page to each day.

[DT-SC]

David Stahel Barbarossa, Glantz Colossus Reborn, Galntz Barbarossa Derailed for actions around Smolensk after July 10th, Christer Bergstorm Black Cross Red Star vol 1 for air battles, Craig Luther Barbarossa Unleashed, even Paul Carrlel Hitler moves East. Erickson’s Road to Stalingrad is still a good and informative read albeit obsolete. There is a new book by Jonathan Dimbleby but I have not read it

[DT-SC]

Plus many books focused on specific areas/aspects, newly translated Munzel’s Panzer Tactic for example and Hoth’s Panzer Operatons, also translation from Die Wehrmacht im Kampf series, numerous memoirs etc

[historygeek2021]

David Stahel Barbarossa

This is the exact opposite of what I'm looking for. Stahel will be discussing a battle in one paragraph, and in the next he talks about the mood of German housewives.

Glantz is better and I have many of his books, but none of them focus exclusively on operations.

[DT-SC]

If you are looking for a single volume/publication, it doesn’t exist, at least not in English. The only book which comes somewhat close to it is The Initial Period of War on the Eastern Front, 22 June - August 1941: Proceedings Fo the Fourth Art of War Symposium, Garmisch. Otherwise you need to chase unit histories and other publications focused on specific aspects of Barbarossa or learn Russian (there are books covering operational aspects in Russian)

[ljadw]

David Stahel Barbarossa, Glantz Colossus Reborn, Galntz Barbarossa Derailed for actions around Smolensk after July 10th, Christer Bergstorm Black Cross Red Star vol 1 for air battles, Craig Luther Barbarossa Unleashed, even Paul Carrlel Hitler moves East. Erickson’s Road to Stalingrad is still a good and informative read albeit obsolete. There is a new book by Jonathan Dimbleby but I have not read it

Hitler moves East is good as toilet paper .
What is essential is Germany and WWII.
And Glantz is much too much focused on the Soviet side .sometimes one has the impression to read Soviet propaganda .

[Cult Icon]

I don't think there is any adequate one-set operational history of Barbarossa. It's more like there are XXX good books (tactical/unit history, operational, etc.), each book is particularly helpful in illuminating various aspects. My personal favorite op history is the Barbarrossa Derailed set.

The Normandy literature is similar.

[TheMarcksPlan]

If you can get it and translate it or read it French, Jean Lopez's La Guerre Absolue looks really good as far as these things go. I've been e-translating bits here and there, including the footnotes.

Of course I'll offer a critique: the strategic scope, while broader than nearly all other works, limits itself to the June 22d German forces. As you know well, I don't think there's any sense in talking about WW2 strategy without talking about how bad Germany's strategy was, why it was so bad, and how it could have been different (at least as important: Allied strategy given their congruent appraisal of Soviet strength in 1941). Lopez goes beyond most intellectually-hobbled historiography in posing a counterfactual but limits himself to "what if the Germans had actually tried to enlist non-Russian Soviet assistance?"

Nonetheless, the footnotes are good and my partial impression is it's a serious work of scholarship with more imaginative/analytical scope than Stahel's work.

[TheMarcksPlan]

I don't think there is any adequate one-set operational history of Barbarossa. It's more like there are XXX good books (tactical/unit history, operational, etc.), each book is particularly helpful in illuminating various aspects. My personal favorite op history is the Barbarrossa Derailed set.

Agreed. It's too big a topic, so far, for one book/series. Even Glantz is good only on one side (Soviet) of a battle that is ultimately only two months of the war on what was then a secondary front.

There's still too much ideological/emotional baggage attached to this war. Heck the allies of the "Good Guys" on this front spent the following years portraying the victors as the "Bad Guys" and supporting regimes that killed millions and often in the most grotesque ways - all in the name of stifling those who actually beat the Nazis.

The world is probably still not ready for a balanced assessment of the Eastern Front, especially not after the latest irruption in Ukraine. The layers of ideological derangement are just too deep to discuss this matter rationally.

[DT-SC]

“The world is probably still not ready for a balanced assessment of the Eastern Front“

Somewhat strange statement considering number of published books which are based on the documents from both sides, Soviet and German.

[historygeek2021]

If you can get it and translate it or read it French, Jean Lopez's La Guerre Absolue looks really good as far as these things go. I've been e-translating bits here and there, including the footnotes.

Seems like a Stahelesque collection of anecdotes rather than an account of operations:

The authors reconstruct as close as possible to the field, the beginnings of the tragedy, its unfolding, the outcome. In the staff room, on the roads to the front, with factory workers, on the edge of mass graves, the greatest care is taken to tell the story down to the smallest detail.

https://www.francetvinfo.fr/culture/pat ... 10853.html

[Cult Icon]

Agreed. It's too big a topic, so far, for one book/series. Even Glantz is good only on one side (Soviet) of a battle that is ultimately only two months of the war on what was then a secondary front.

A few days ago I received a copy of the new book "Guderian's Foxes" by Jason Mark. It is a unit history of the recon battalion/29th Mot. ID in 1941 plus a large photo gallery with a lot of detailed, researched captions under each one.

So this book is just another addition to the Barbarossa saga, this time focused on the spearhead of one of the crack German divisions.