Book Reviews: Anthony Tucker Jones

Today’s post is another of my occasional ‘trinity’ or trilogy reviews. On this occasion under review we have three titles, all on WWII armour, by author Anthony Tucker-Jones: Allied Armour, Stalin’s Armour and Hitler’s Armour. 

Allied Armour, 1939-45

Whilst well enough written, Allied Armour - and by Allied what’s really meant is British and American - is, to a very great extent, rather cloyingly data-rich and dry, mostly comprising recitations of the many campaigns in which its subject was involved, with a lot of commander’s names, unit numbers and place names, but - unusually and, it must be said, unhelpfully - no maps. 

I can see why some might be critical of such books, as they are neither deep dives into the tanks themselves, nor any of the particular campaigns. Rather what we have is a series of succinct synopses of the various campaigns as a whole, with a focus on the armoured warfare aspects. Still, I think having works of this type provides a kind of mid-level matrix, knowledge of which is very useful. This can then be deepened by works of more detail on specific armour or actions. 

From Matildas at Arras, via Faliase to the Rhine, 16 chapters cover not only the entire war in the west - including the North African and Mediterranean campaigns - but also the Australasian and Pacific theatres. And in the final 17th chapter, Industrial Muscle, we learn the true scale of armour production for each of the various combatant powers. For example, British and German tank production was roughly equal in quantity, if not quality. But against the combined industrial output of Uncles Sam and Joe, the Axis were doomed. Sherman tank production alone being more or less equal to all British and German tank manufacture combined!

Two appendices list all the Allied armoured divisions and, crucially, there's an alphabetical list of tank types. This last section is as important to the book as the foregoing chapters, as it's where a lot of the more specific vehicle related info' is. Despite the text veering, in places, perilously close to being rather dry and info-heavy, and in danger of falling between the stools of detail and generality, I thoroughly enjoyed this book. Enough to read it all the way through, with enthusiasm, and still look forward to following it up with the Russian companion. 

Stalin’s Armour, 1941-45

Having just read the Allied Armour volume of what one might regard as a ‘tank trilogy’, and thoroughly enjoyed it, I’ve dived straight into Stalin’s Armour, 1941-1945. Thank goodness Anthony Tucker-Jones is a good writer! In less capable hands the data-rich material could induce a coma. 

Fortunately the maelstrom of commander’s names, unit titles, and place names is leavened somewhat by, on the one hand, more general descriptive history, such as on the development of Soviet armour - Kotin’s KVs or Koshkin’s T-34? - and on the other, more specific anecdotal reminiscences.

The total absence of maps is an issue with all the volumes in this tank series, leading me to dock a star/kreuz. And it is, for me, even more of an issue in this particular volume, given the scale of operations on the Ostfront. 

Anyone familiar with Hitler’s costly misadventures on the Eastern Front will almost certainly already know that, as a German talking head (ex-soldier) says in, the superb ITV series, The World At War... eventually millions of ant will overcomne even the elepohant (or words to that effect!*). Echoing this, Tucker-Jones concludes ‘Faced by this crude arithmetic the T-34 carried all before it.’

* I've been unable to locate the exact quote!

As with the other companion volumes, there’s a section of black and white photos. Rather oddly most the images in this volume are of damaged, destroyed or captured Soviet materiel, often being inspected by German troops. There are also two appendices, the first listing the many ‘Red Army Tank Units 1941-45’, the second comprising brief descriptions of ‘Soviet Tanks and Tracked AFVs 1941-45’.

For me, with each volume I read, it seems the three titles in this little trilogy are forming a useful ‘matrix’; the more one reads on these subject and campaigns the better and more detailed a picture one develops. The material here does occasionally veer towards the info-heavy side. But all told this a compelling enough read for me to happily and heartily recommend it.

Hitler’s Armour, ...

And so I come last to the one of these three books that most excites my interest, Hitler’s Panzers, The Complete History, 1933-45. This third title in the AFV trilogy by AT-J is organised somewhat differently from the others. Split into four sections, and with larger appendices, 18 chapters tell the fascinating story of Germany’s legendary WWII Panzerwaffe.

Part I, ‘Designing Tractors’ looks at the development of the various main tank types, from the Versailles-busting but otherwise fairly innocuous Pz I through to the awesome but over-engineered and under-produced Tiger II. This is one of the best and most interesting parts of the trilogy, for my money. 

Parts II, III and IV - Off To War, Sturmgeschütz Not Panzers and Wasted Opportunities - cover the war itself. The balance of bigger picture, and close-up detail, is better here, for my money, than in the Allied or Russian titles, in both of which the maelstrom of campaign info’ can be overwhelming (and without maps hard to make sense of). 

Guderian is referred to more than any other Panzer enthusiast, the theme of his tug of war with Hitler - the latter obsessed with both his idea of the ‘triumph of the will’ and size (big guns, big tanks!) - being something of a theme throughout the book. There are those who feel Guderian overstates his own role and importance in all of this. ATJ doesn't raise this issue.

Whereas the Allied volume ranges across Europe, bridging to North Africa via the Med’, and even the conflict with Japan in the further flung Pacific theatre, and the Russian volume has an early Eastern episode in the Russo-Japanese conflict on the edges of Northern China, this German themed volume kind of ties them all together, via the two Eastern and Western Fronts on which all three of these combatant powers fought.  

David Willey's terrific Tank Chat on the Pz IV.

To those familiar with WWII, Germany’s issues of over-engineering, too much diversity, and insufficient levels of production will all be familiar themes. And, as in other areas, these issues bedevilled tank and AFV development and deployment. But these are also amongst the things that make WWII German tanks the most fascinating. And it doesn’t hurt that they also looked so damn cool! 

Anthony Tucker-Jones ultimately concludes that of all the Panzers Germany produced and fielded during WWII, the best, in terms of efficacy, reliability and sheer weight of numbers, was the Pz IV. Germany built approx’ 8,500 Pz IV, according to T-J, whilst Russia’s factories churned out 55,000 T-34s. And Sherman output totalled about 50,000, all told. The more celebrated Panthers and Tigers are critiqued for being rushed into service (and therefore plagues with technical issues), and their impact dissipated, never being built or deployed in large enough numbers to have a decisive impact. 

Hitler’s Panzers also benefits from more picture sections, and more extensive appendices. The latter include production figures, Panzer and Panzergrenadier Division lists, and individual appendices for each of the Pz I-VI, listing and describing variants. Rather oddly these go I, II III IV, and then VI (Tigers) precedes V (Panthers). A bit odd!? There are, regrettably, no maps or glossary. 

CONCLUSIONS

I’d say that, together or separately, these books are a worthwhile additions to the library of any self-respecting WWII history enthusiast. I read them all, one after another, without losing enthusiasm. In fact the interest and excitement mounted with each new volume. I also think they get better progressively (I don’t know what order the author wrote them in?), the Allied book being pretty good, the Russian one a little better, and the German one the best of the three. 

Their best points are that they cover all the major theatres of war, and do so in a readable manner, albeit occasionally being somewhat dizzyingly data-rich. There are one of two things that might be improved on future editions, such as remedying the complete absence of maps. The picture selections could also be better and more diverse. Maps would help the reader follow the actions described, and the picture segments could do a better job of covering the many AFVs mentioned in the text. 

I can see why for some, these might in places fall between the stools of generality and detail. Taken as a whole, however, I think they form an excellent core of information on the development and combat histories of these mighty brutal metal beasts of war. All told, I really enjoyed reading them, and would definitely recommend them. 

Book Review: Dark Valley, Piers Brendon

NB: This is one of my occasional archival posts, regarding a book I read and reviewed years ago, but haven't posted here, that I thought might be of interest.

A small departure here in that this not strictly a book about WWII, as such, but the dark decade of the 1930s, that prepared the way. I won't go into any detail regarding the contents. There are lots of decent reviews and synopses to be found online. I simply want to add my voice to the general chorus of acclaim this book has deservedly garnered.  

Like William Shirer's Rise And Fall Of The Third Reich this is sweeping, compelling history that really draws you in. The kind of thing that'll threaten to end your fiction reading. Why read fiction when real world events are so massively interesting? The 1930s are a particularly fascinating decade, with totalitarian regimes, be they fascist or communist, gaining a worldwide foothold unparalleled before or since.

As others elsewhere have observed, Brendon has an excellent writing style, and is truly masterful at weaving together complex narrative and small anecdotal details. What a period the first half of the C20th was, and - leaving aside WWI - what a period the 1930s were. With Stalin, Franco, Hitler, Mussolini, the Hawkish Japanese military, the latter already at war in China, and more besides, all sandwiched between the cataclysms of two world wars! 

I borrowed this from a friend many years ago, and liked it so much I had to get my own copy after reading his, in a repeat of what had already happened with the aforementioned Shirer book.

The material relating to Japan is, I find, particularly fascinating, as so much historical literature on this period and the two world wars is so Euro-centric. Also the militarism of Japan differed markedly from that of Russia, Germany and Italy, in that it was much more broad based, rather than focussing on a charismatic figurehead. Indeed, the Japanese emperor seems to have been carried along on a martial current that flowed through a whole class (primarily the officer class), ultimately more or less saturating the whole culture.

One specific episode amongst the many in this brilliant book that really struck me - haunted me even, for a little while after reading it - was the horror of Magnitogorsk, in Stalinist Russia. The name of the city alone sounds both awesome and terrifying! A hint of what was happening can be inferred from the fact it was declared a closed city, i.e. off limits to foreigners, in 1937. But I won't say why here. Buy this superb book and read about it yourself.

Book Review: Stalingrad, Antony Beevor

Antony Beevor has a talent for writing military history that reads almost like an action novel. His account of the demise of the German 6th Army - the largest in the entire Wehrmacht at the time - during the fight for Stalingrad, is gripping.

The colossal scale of war on the Ostfront, and the barbarism of both sides, driven by pitiless ideologies, make this theatre particularly and ghoulishly fascinating. And, as is often said, Stalingrad is commonly viewed as the turning point both in this conflict, and the war at large.

A saluting skeleton greets German troops arriving in Stalingrad. [1]

The Germans pressed all available resource into their service.

Hitler and Stalin both became maniacally obsessed with imposing their will in this contest, neither permitting their beleaguered troops to give up or retreat. The profligacy of lives on both sides is truly appalling. Beevor, like the reader, is clearly enthralled by the carnage.

It strikes me that Hitler allowed himself to be deflected from his original goal of securing the breadbasket of the Ukraine and the oil of the Caucuses, and was lured into a wasteful concentration on prestige targets, namely cities: Leningrad, Moscow, and Stalingrad.

Germans dug in beneath a knocked-out T-34.

A famous pic. of German troops amidst the rubble of Stalingrad.

These battles favoured the Russians, as they denied the Germans the undoubted advantages of their mobile 'blitzkrieg' tactics, drawing them into static battles of attrition, in which the weight of Soviet numbers could be used to wear the Germans and their sometimes less than enthusiastic allies (Italians, Romanians, Hungarians, etc.) down.

The detail of the battle itself is well conveyed. Although I'd have liked a few more maps to have helped track how things developed. And Beevor manages to move pretty deftly around the theatre, from the action amidst the rubble to developments elsewhere on the flanks, without spoiling the narrative flow.

Soviet troops fighting in the ruined City..

You can easily see how arduous such street-fighting must've been.

He also moves smoothly through the various gears, from the top brass, with their concerns of ideological and personal prestige, down the chain of command to the God-forsaken 'grunts', fighting for their lives in a Dantean inferno, the hellishness of which is made all the worse by the inhumanity of the political ideologies that drove this conflict.

On that topic, one thing that really strikes me, the more I read about Russian history during Stalin's reign, is that - whilst Hitler singled out certain groups, in particular the Jews, for merciless persecution - 'Uncle' Joe seems, whilst preserving a glacially cool exterior (unlike the often apoplectic Führer), to have been a psychotic mass murderer of a far more wide-rangingly brutal and paranoid type.

Russian POWs who starved to death in Stalingrad captivity.

Stalingrad literally became a blitzkrieg graveyard.

Another striking thing is how many Russians sought to join the Germans. Some might well have done so just as a means to survive. But many, especially those persecuted under Communism (e.g. Kulaks, Cossacks, Poles, Ukrainians) initially saw the Germans as liberators from the Stalinist/Communist yoke.

According to Beevor the NKVD, part of Stalin's internal police/terror apparatus, were shocked and appalled when they discovered how many Russians were collaborating with the German invaders. These 'Hiwis' (from 'Hilfswillige') in places made up as much as 25% of German forces, and some estimates - unsurprisingly uncertain in the fog of war - run as high as 80,000 for the battle at Stalingrad itself.

The pitiful remains of VIth Army, passing into captivity.

Young aryans of the vaunted 'master race', reduced to troglodytes.

In typically Stalinist fashion, such people became 'former Russians'. Caught between two such appallingly inhumane ideologies the sufferings of all concerned were, frankly unimaginable. But Beevor does a damn good job of trying to convey how things were, and it makes for terrifically gripping reading.

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NOTES:

In researching images for this post I found a really cool post (click here) on abandoned German armour at Stalingrad. Some great images/info!

[1] Little did they know how prophetic this macabre roadside attraction would prove to be.

Film Review: Liberation, 1969-71

The DVD I bought on Amazon.

A contemporary Russian poster.

LIBERATION (Russ: Освобождение, Translit: Osvobohzdenie) I - The Fire Bulge, II - Breakthrough, III - The Direction of the Main Blow (parts I & II), IV - The Battle of Berlin, V - The Last Assault.

Wiki: 'The films are a dramatized account of the liberation of the Soviet Union's territory and the subsequent defeat of Nazi Germany in the Great Patriotic War, focusing on five major Eastern Front campaigns: the Battle of Kursk, the Lower Dnieper Offensive, Operation Bagration, the Vistula-Oder Offensive, and the Battle of Berlin.'

A rather snazzy French poster for the films.

I was made aware of these films thanks to a long time buddy, Dan (thanks Dan!), who tells me he saw 'Fire Bulge' - what a title! - whilst flying on a work trip. Kind of an odd in-flight movie! This was several years ago now: I googled it, and found it on YouTube, in Russian, sans subtitles. I found that version difficult, on account of the lack of being able to follow dialogue/exposition, of which there appeared to be rather a lot. But it looked mighty interesting.

Some years later, I decided to look again, only this time on Amazon. Lo and behold, the film was available, as part of the complete Liberation set; 5 films, all crammed into a single double-sided DVD! (As detailed at the top of this post.) There are succinct and reasonable synopses of each films'  content here, on the Wikipedia page for the series. So I won't go over it all here.

Tzvetaev is one of the main characters we follow through this epic..

On some levels this is pure Communist propaganda, so one has to bear that in mind whilst watching these films. But in many ways these are just fantastic war films. It's certainly a very welcome thing, in our global village, that we can see how Russia told its own story of what has to be one of the most apocalyptic campaigns of the previous century.

The set pieces are properly epic...

... often emotionally charged ...

... and sometimes even quite beautiful.

An official Mosfilm production, which involved the collaboration of the Russians, East Germans, Yugoslavs, and even Italy (Dino de Laurentis again!), the series is both enormously lavish, and highly expository - one can easily imagine it being played in classrooms, everywhere from schools to military academies - and nothing like the later independent Ukrainian film 'Come And See', which has a very specific focus on the horrors of conflict, as perpetrated in this virulently racist war for 'lebensraum'.

The Germans attempt to recruit a Russian unit from prisoners. [1]

So neither Nazi, nor, for that matter, Soviet atrocities feature here. And in fact portrayals of many characters of many nations, from Roosevelt to the Yugoslavian partisans, and even most of the Germans, seem pretty balanced and moderate. Indeed - aside from the ever-ranting Hitler - only Churchill seems to be blatantly viewed (and to some extent understandably so, given historical events) as something of an 'ideological enemy'. [2]

Mussolini meets Hitler, after being rescued by Skorzeny.

Ike and Uncle Joe chatting amiably at Yalta.

One point worthy of note is how incredibly good, particularly in terms of physiognomy, many of the 'world leader' actors are: the guys playing Hitler, Roosevelt and, most especially, Stalin, are dead-ringers. Churchill, as well as being the least sympathetically portrayed, is also the least successful face/body double. Even many of the secondary figures (generals, etc.) are close likenesses. As to the behavioural mannerisms, one feels one is dealing - especially with the perpetually ranting Hitler and the ever avuncular 'Uncle Joe' - with popular stereotypes.

The strikingly handsome Tzvetaev, played superbly by Nikolay Olyalin.

Always smiling, Valery Nosik is utterly charming as the 'tankist', Dorozhkin (left).

Throughout the five films, we follow events on a series of levels, from top brass - the world leader sequences are in black and white for some reason - to operational and strategic (with much reference to maps and explanation of manoeuvres!), down to the tactical, i.e. the sharp end, where the lowly soldier faces the storms of steel. Artilleryman Tzvetaev (Nikolay Olyalin), nurse Zoia (Larisa Golubkina), and 'tankist' Dorozhkin (Valero Nosik) as  are all very engaging. Following their fates is compelling.

Tzvetaev in combat at the front, as Kursk begins.

Having met Tzvetaev, we soon meet Zoia, a nurse.

All in all it's pretty amazing; starting at Kursk, the five component films follow the phases in which the Russians roll the Germans, all the way back to Berlin. No expense has been spared: the battlefields are huge, the materiél involved stupendous. One minor gripe is that they repeatedly dwell on this epic aspect, with lengthy fly-overs of various battle scenes. If you've seen Sergei Bondarchuk's Waterloo (or his War and Peace), you'll have seen something similar.

A Tiger I. Pretty good! [3]

More Tigers. Also visible, Russian T-62 tanks. Not so good! [4]

Apparently this is an IS-2, masquerading as a Panther. Pretty Poor!

Gear nuts will be both impressed to see fairly convincing faked up Tigers, and genuine German half-tracks, etc. But disappointed also, I imagine - I was - that sometimes (although captured enemy gear would be used by both belligerents) a lot more/better fakery wasn't achieved.

This was a colossal conflict, and these five films in one package represent an impressively colossal attempt to tell the Russian side of this utterly fascinating episode in recent history. Ok, it's didactic and propagandistic, but there's a lot of good acting, many characters we can genuinely take an interest in - from the groundlings to the demagogue dictators - and some incredible battles.

A T-34 charges across the battlefield.

There are lots of aerial long-shots of battles, like this.

This T-34 wants to join the air-force!

And not only does this series cover the Russian campaigns from Kursk to the capture of Berlin, but there are also numerous sub-stories, from the paratroop rescue of Mussolini, to the bomb-attempt on Hitler, or the Yalta conference, and the partisan war in Yugoslavia.

The English subtitles aren't perfect. In fact sometimes they're pretty hilarious! But having the film available in a form those of us who don't speak Russian can appreciate is terrific. Not perfect, but worth the full five balkenkreuz nevertheless.

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NOTES:

Hitler after the assassination attempt at the Wolf's Lair.

Bukhuti Zaqariadze's resemblance to Joseph Stalin is spooky!

[1]  This is the only German camp scene. Considering what both Germany and Russia did to themselves, each other, and the hapless civilians in the war zones, this is omission is a biggie, but not altogether surprising.

[2] For example, Churchill is portrayed as pleased that the attempt to assassinate Hitler at the Wolf's Lair fails, fearing that a success might lead to Soviet dominance of Europe.

[3] Built on a Soviet T-44, according to the (very useful) IMFDB.

[4] T-62s weren't introduced until, er... '61!

The view from a T-34 in combat at Kursk.

Clearly no expense was spared.

All those T-34s... fab!

Tzvetaev in fighting takes cover behind an SdKfz 7.

Mikhail Ulyanov as Zhukov.

Panzer attack!

Celebrating Soviet style.