Hitler as Military Commander

by John Strawson

Book Overview

Was Hitler 'the greatest strategic genius of all time' as Nazi propaganda would have us believe, or a facile amateur in military affairs? Why was the startling success of his campaigns in Poland and... This description may be from another edition of this product.

• Format: Paperback
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0850529565
• ISBN13: 9780850529562
• Release Date: June 2008
• Publisher: Pen & Sword Books
• Length: 256 Pages
• Weight: 0.56 lbs.
• Dimensions: 0.7" x 6.6" x 7.7"

Customer Reviews

Good BOOK

I found this book to be a great book in explaining the details of Hitler's military tactics of WW2. This book explains how Hitler first came into WW1 and was devistated by deafeat, which later leads to is his ideas to military expansion on all fronts. I personally thought this was a good idea to explain his WW1 experiences before you went into him gaining military power and beginning WW2.Its a good book for people who want to get an in depth look at Hitler's triumphs and his faults as a military commander. Faults that ultimately did him in. The book covers many campiagns from all fronts and even some naval battles. Most importantly this book explains Hitlers motivations as to why he built such a massive German War Machine and created such great military propaganda. I think this book is a must read short book for people interested in WW2. It goes over all of the War's European campiagns and tells the Allied and Axis outlook of each campiagn. The readers before me stated that Strawson thought you knew too much information already and it made it hard to clearly understand problems. This indeed confused me at times but i caught on quickly to what Strawson was trying to explain, so I overlooked this issue. All in all I would rate this book to be a five, for its descriptive pieces and narratives explaining Hitler's reflections on campiagns. This book covers all of the fronts of the war in Europe, all the way from the Blitzkrieg offensive on the west , down to the later years when Germany had deffensive positions from the east, where Russians poured into Berlin.

A GREAT BOOK

Well, my personal thoughts on this book were positive. This book shows how Hitler evolved into the man he later came to be due to his World War 1 experiences and how he effectively shaped the German military into a massive war machine from his ideas.I know a whole lot about World War 2 and the German War Machine, but Strawson's book gave me a more in depth look on how Hitler came to be, and had his faults that ultimately did him in. I enjoyed reading this book, but at times I found it confusing because of my lack of knowledge in certain areas that I feel the writer expected me to already know.This was my only main prblem with this book.This book is a very interesting book because not only does it explain how Hitler seemed to have managed a war from all fronts, but it also gives you a look at the Allied view in certain campaigns as well.The book also explains Hitler's methods of propaganda and his ideas on how to reconstruct a German Army from the ashes that the World War 1 treaties left it in. It's very descriptive on certain tactics like the Blitzkrieg offensive on the Western Front, and how later in the war Berlin fell to the Russians, and Germany was in a very defensive position.All in all, I must say that this book was a great book on the way that it gave such descriptive pieces on the tactics of the German Army. This book is a good short book for projects and such. I gave this book five stars, I felt that I could overlook the fact that John Strawson wrote as if I knew almost everything because it was easy to catch on to what he meant in his writing anyways.

Great Stuff....

This is a great book for "amateur historians" who want to deepen their understanding of WWII, Hitler, and the German War Machine. This review of Hitler's management of German battle campaigns during WWII is very interesting. The overriding aim of this work is to present and evaluate Hitler's prowess as a military leader.I especially enjoyed the frequent references to the thoughts, criticisms,and concerns of the Generals who worked alongside the Fuhrer. Also found the presentation of Hitler's War Directives to be enlightening, as well as relevant to the discussion at hand.This shorter book is a must read for anyone who has an interest in the "nuts and bolts" of WWII.As an aside, I agree with the other reviewer who stated that the author seems to assume that the reader has a deep knowledge of the Campaigns. Yet this limitation doesn't prevent the reader from extracting a great deal of knowledge on Hitler's strengths and weaknesseses as a War Leader.Readers are encouraged to check out the Time-Life (thin) books series on the Third Reich in WWII. Lots of great narrative and pictures on weapons,ships/Uboats,campaigns,politics,propaganda,etc. (I have no connection whatsover to that outfit....)

An excellent analysis.

This book is among the best of the WWII books I have read, and I have read quite a few. As an amatuer WWII historian (hey, I'm 19, but I've done a lot of reading), I had my own thoughts about Hitler as a military commander. I saw this book on sale and bought it without hesitation and I think it is one of the best buys I have made. Strawson makes a complete analysis of every front of the European theater. He analyzes the strategy of not only Hitler, but also those of the French, British, Russian, and American army commanders. Why the strategies succeeded, and why they failed. He quotes and comments on Hitler's War Directives. All in all, a very good argument is made, and I agree with most of it. Strawson also gave me some new ideas and thoughts. My only complaint (and the only reason it got 4 stars instead of 5) is that Srawson assumes a certain level of intimacy with the historical data surrounding the War. I was familiar with most of it, but I needed some refreshment with the names and places of the less famous battles (the Balkan campaign comes to mind). But, despite this, Strawson has a very good work here, and it is a shame it is out of print.