Best book on Operation Barbarossa so far

I have read a number of books on the Eastern Front during World War Two. It was without a doubt much more brutal than the Western Front. This is the first book I have read that provides details on the planning and preparation for Operation Barbarossa. It is quite obvious that Hitler and the German High Command thought too much of themselves and little of the Soviets and knew too little of the conditions where the operation would take place.
Too many books gloss over the planning and preparation phase. A lesson we all should remember is too many efforts fail from a lack of proper planning or no planning at all. Operation Barbarossa was domed to fail from the beginning.

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This Is the Best Book on Barbarossa I’ve Ever Read

I’ve read well over one hundred books on WWII starting in sixth grade. My father was in Patton’s 3rd Army so I felt it was a subject I should understand. I didn’t read a book concentrating on the Eastern Front until 2006. Once I did it fascinated me. I’ve read probably ten books on Barbarossa and another twenty books on the ‘Eastern Front..’ The first time I heard that phrase was from ‘Hogan’s Heroes’ around 1966. One question I’ve had is when did some of the German generals start sensing that the war was heading for disaster. I felt the earliest time was in 1942. But this author feels it was August 1941 and lays out a strong case for that time period. Some of the books I’ve read on just Barbarossa glossed over the first few months of the battles of Summer, 1941. This author’s book is just on that time period, into the month of August. While the feeling of impending doom was certainly not homogenous across all the German military, I feel that some generals did see future failure as early as August 1941, especially now that I have read this book. Highly recommend.

3 people found this helpful

Strenth. Strenth strenth

A comprehensive, detailed study of a major battle with some interesting new findings. I stuck with it to the end, even though he pronounces strength as strenth about 1000 times, it actually interrupted my ability to follow his narrative. I guess if you’re British, this will be much more tolerable.

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Critical analysis of Germany's 1941 campaign

Stahel demonstrates the devastating effects of primitive infrastructure, inadequate logistics, and flawed assumptions of Soviet strength on Germany's June 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union. Makes a very good case both for the operation's failure within two month's of its commencement for also for it as a root cause of Germany's eventual defeat in WWII. Stahel draws in significant part from the diaries of the commanding generals of the Northern, Center, and Southern fronts, and shows how Hitler's strategic vision drove the army's tactical plans into a muddled and often contradictory battle plan on the Eastern Front in 1941. Provocative conclusions about the Wehrmacht's complicity in those decisions as well as in Hitler's goal of eradicating the Soviet, and especially the Soviet Jewish, population. Recommended.

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Incredibly informative- fantastic narration

I've read many books about the Russian-German war, but the amount of new information in this book was remarkable. Perfectly structured and the narration was the best I have ever heard on Audible.

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Original research leads to deeper insights

There is a lot of nuance in how to interpret the early battles on the Eastern Front. The author presents a clear picture as to why Barbarossa failed by August 41.

This is an analysis of German high command. Private soldier battle stories are limited and used only as evidence to support larger points . A decent knowledge of the Eastern Front is probably needed to understand the author’s deep dive analysis .

The author brought insights I felt were fascinating and fresh . Explaining how the Wehrmacht was actually screwed even though they had seemingly achieved enormous victories was framed and argued perfectly . Definitely recommend to fellow WWII nerds .

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Great narrator but…

The narration was great but the production was a bit choppy. Too many edits of one statement after the next. Despite that the book was still a great read

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A brilliant book for study of military operations

A excellent book to understand the way of thinking in all spheres of World War

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Very solid content o. Operation Barbarossa

I thought the content of this book was e cells r and it certainly provided a powerful perspective of how badly the German General Staff organization took into consideration the impact of supply planning and organization. I also thought narration was fine and had no issue with the narration, but I also tend to focus on the content.

Disappointingly shallow and unidimensional

Having read (and listened to) extensive works on the campaign and WWII, I was disappointed by the utterly far-reaching “new” perspective the author pushes for. Without any nod to complexity and ambivalence, which amounts to almost comical passages at times, the Wehrmacht’s first year in Russia is described as a total failure brought about by a badly led army, with very much inferior equipment throughout, and a misconceived strategy under extremely high losses. All that while fighting an underappreciated, strong willed fighting force with good equipment in the Russian Army (I am barely exaggerating). It reads like the Wehrmacht failed its way to 15 miles outside of Moscow.

To clarify, I am all for a realistic view on the subject and there is no need or reason to glorify the Wehrmacht’s early successes. This book, however, fails to explain the ‘why’. It also fails to explain militarily how operations were conducted and where there shortcomings lay. As far as operational history is concerned, the book offers very little and lacks granularity found in comparable, better works. Tactics, doctrine, order of battle, troop movements, war diary notes are few, if at all present or presented in a cohesive manner.

On top, a lot of the more narrative parts seem relatively ill-informed on technical aspects. Stressing the role of KV-1 and T-34 tanks during the first week of the invasion is preposterous. And I don’t mean to criticize mentioning it, but featuring it is out of place.

The author is also prone to repeating himself constantly which makes for a boring read. The first two or three chapters have 3-4 essentially similar passages on how General Halder should not be seen as someone in opposition to Hitler. I am not talking about the author (rightfully) tracking Halder’s scheming to implement his favored strategic concepts. That is important information. The issue is in endless generalizations that are repeated again and again. There is no use for that and an editor should have addressed these issues.

Lastly, the biggest issue is with the books aim to show how the first year of the German invasion went down totally different from what people believe. First, largely without evidence, the author discounts most of the work of other scholars and accounts of witnesses he deems unreliable (without basis in evidence). Second, it forces the author to take somewhat ridiculously one-sided positions on complex topics which detracts from the quality of the work.

A more measured approach would have done this work a whole lot of good. The narration is good!