07-19-2009, 07:32 PM
A number of different sources.
Two old two volume sets of the war are by Erickson (Road to Stalingrad, Road to Berlin) and Ziemke (Moscow to Stalingrad, Stalingrad to Berlin) are great to get a broad view of who was where. For the front and Army level Zimeke’s maps are great. For OB there are the old reliables: Poirier and Charles Sharp.
For more detail there is all of Glantz; his works are very specific, and include maps (often frustratingly small text!) and OBs. He’s also got a large series of monographs and translations of which I have a few (his Special Studies, Forgotten Battles, translations of Soviet General Staff Studies, and a bunch of Atlases).
And the RKKA in WWII site.
Multiple sources can be both good and bad. Lots of people just copy what someone else has done and, voila, we now have “proof” because “everyone says it!” :-) Glantz is the go-to guy as far as I’m concerned, because he does direct translations of old Soviet docs. His interpretations (ie his reading of what the history means and why things happened) piss some people off, but I’ve never heard anyone question his facts of translation. And for the who-was-where-when questions that’s what really matters.
Two old two volume sets of the war are by Erickson (Road to Stalingrad, Road to Berlin) and Ziemke (Moscow to Stalingrad, Stalingrad to Berlin) are great to get a broad view of who was where. For the front and Army level Zimeke’s maps are great. For OB there are the old reliables: Poirier and Charles Sharp.
For more detail there is all of Glantz; his works are very specific, and include maps (often frustratingly small text!) and OBs. He’s also got a large series of monographs and translations of which I have a few (his Special Studies, Forgotten Battles, translations of Soviet General Staff Studies, and a bunch of Atlases).
And the RKKA in WWII site.
Multiple sources can be both good and bad. Lots of people just copy what someone else has done and, voila, we now have “proof” because “everyone says it!” :-) Glantz is the go-to guy as far as I’m concerned, because he does direct translations of old Soviet docs. His interpretations (ie his reading of what the history means and why things happened) piss some people off, but I’ve never heard anyone question his facts of translation. And for the who-was-where-when questions that’s what really matters.
Steiner: "Why do you want it so badly? It's just a worthless piece of metal. Look."
