Product Details

• Amazon Sales Rank: #342538 in Books
• Published on: 2005-03-31
• Original language: English
• Binding: Paperback
• 520 pages

Synopsis
With the opening of long-sealed Soviet archives beginning in the 1990s, English-speaking readers have begun to better comprehend the enormity and decisive nature of the fighting between Germany and her many allies and the Soviet Union. Despite the massive scale of the fighting, much of its history remains obscure and imperfectly understood. Slaughterhouse is the first book of its kind to present a history of the Eastern Front that includes up-to-date information culled from long-sealed archives and synthesized by some of the foremost historians of the Soviet and German militaries.

* 2 chapters by famed Sovietologist David Glantz - Chronology of events that occurred on the Eastern Front, with nine detailed maps; Forgotten battles of the Eastern Front * Thumbnail histories of 487 units - army groups, armies, corps, and divisions - that saw combat on the Eastern Front with the German Armed Forces and their allies * Thumbnail histories of 881 Red Army and Air Force units - fronts, armies, corps, and divisions - on the Eastern Front * Biographical sketches of 57 key Axis and Soviet wartime personalities * Highly-detailed organizational diagrams of 55 types of Axis and Red Army divisions that served on the Eastern Front * Comprehensive, meticulously-researched performance data comparisons of hundreds of Axis and Red Army weapons, including small arms, mortars, artillery, tanks, assault guns, combat aircraft, and more

Customer Reviews

something is missing
Author forgot to mention slovak units, who fought with Germany - not a single word about..

Detailed, balanced overview of the Eastern Front
Slaughterhouse really is what it says: a handbook. It's a sourcebook of WW2 in the East.
In the 512 pages you get: an introduction by David Glantz (14 pages, and it's interesting in its own right), a chronology of war on the eastern front (52 pages), bibliographies on important German and Axis commanders and Soviet ones (80 pages altogether), a description of German units, other Axis units and Soviet units (germans and their allies down to Divisions, Soviets down to Corps) (244 pages), organizational diagrams of assorted units (48 pages), a summary of weapons used (32 pages) and finally a summary of Forgotten Battles by David Glantz.

The book deals with a lot of different subjects, and cannot be exhaustive on even one of them. But it does give a good deal of information on all the above subjects and is a good starting point or referencebook. Particularly the brief biographies of the commanders are interesting, because one usually doesn't find them neatly together. Also the unit histories (though very brief) give a good idea of what units where involved at certain locations at certain times. And the tables with information on all sorts of weaponry are of interest. I would have liked the organizational diagrams to go down to section level though, but they don't go beyond company level most of the time.

Because so much information is packed into this title you'll find only a few pictures and maps, and these aren't the best part of the book. The pictures aren't of the best printing quality (though they do serve their purpose) , and could perhaps have been a bit clearer at times. The maps are well drawn but cover the entire front on a single page and as a consequence lack fine detail. But this off course is not meant to be the strength of the book; that's the information.

When I received this book I compared it with another book I bought decades ago and that always was my handbook till now: The Russian Front by J. Dunnigan. That one contains more information on unit organizations (by type) and on weapons, but lacks information on the units themselves and their histories. The fact that after so many years a better, more balanced title is available has made me a happy man.

So, if you're interested in the Eastern Front, and you're looking for a title that gives you information on all aspects you can't go wrong with this book.