What WWII material are you reading?

The Allies didn’t have “a” plan to wage the Battle of the Atlantic, and neither did the Germans.  The Battle of the Atlantic was a complex battle of attrition on a gigantic scale which lasted all the way from September 1939 to May 1945, and it was characterized by constant changes of plans and tactics and weaponry on both sides as it progressed, with each side trying to overcome every new enemy development with a suitable counter-development.  The campaign see-sawed several times, with one side or the other gaining the advantage at various points; some methods of waging the campaign became ineffectual as time progressed, but were highly effective in earlier stages and therefore were entirely correct to use at those points.

Narvik wrote:

On top of that, the average and casual Italian at this point had a very low morale, since they by now knew that Italy would loose, even if the Axis won the war.

That statement rings false. Germany did not have plans to enslave Italy after the war. In his writings, Hitler pointed out that if a nation wants allies, it must establish a reputation for treating its allies well. It was a logical conclusion for the leader of any nation, and I have seen no evidence to suggest Hitler had deviated from that logic.

I agree Italian morale was low. There were several reasons for that.

Mussolini seized power through military means. His views were not necessarily representative of those of most Italians. Mussolini did not build a strong relationship with the Italian people after seizing office. He had no reason to rely on the Italian people to stick with him through thick and thin. Most Italians did not believe in Mussolini’s dream of a revived Roman Empire, and thought his foreign adventures were rather pointless. Italy was unprepared for war. It lacked a strong military culture and strong military traditions. Its army was not afforded the weapons which would have been necessary to destroy Britain’s Matilda tanks. Its military leadership was lacking. It’s hard to maintain high morale when it’s obvious that your opponent has a much better sense of what he’s doing than your own military has of what it’s doing.

Note that all four problems existed before Hitler came to power in Germany. It’s not as though Mussolini’s Italy had a great military tradition, which then collapsed once Hitler and Mussolini became allies. On the contrary: Italy’s military tradition and military preparedness were greatly lacking both before and after Hitler and Mussolini became allies.

Thanks Marc. Exactly right. Wi try and paste and post in the right place, although I suspect Worsham will see it here.
Was at work when I posted and my head was in the wrong place, obviously.

I bet, many of you are like me, I grew up reading the Bantam WWII series of books. I starting looking at the number of books produced and realized how many i have not read.

What is your favorite? I love Iron Coffins, Samurai & Company Commander.

@strategic:

I may would have been a proponent of continuing the war to Moscow to obliterate Stalin after 1945, so communism would be nothing but a fad and dead.

If I remember correctly, the USSR had something like 300 divisions in Eastern Europe at the time of the Potsdam Conference – a rather large figure compared to what the Anglo-Americans had in Western Europe.  I doubt the Americans and the British could have beaten those kinds of numbers.  I also don’t imagine that a radical move like expending one of America’s rare and priceless A-bombs on Moscow would have done anything other than get those 300 veteran Soviet divisions (who had just helped whip the Wehrmacht) really, really angry at them.  The US and the UK being democracies, they would have also found it a trifle hard to convince their war-weary voters and servicemen to start a whole new war against the country which had just helped them defeat Nazi Germany, and which was getting ready to help them finish off militarist Japan.

At any rate, if you exclude Cuba and China and North Korea, Communism today is in fact pretty much a dying fad…espcially when you consider the amount of free-market capitalism with which China has been flirting for the past decade or so.

of course i forgot about Ray Spruance…the true hero of Midway and one of the best Admirals of the war

@frimmel:

Agreed. It is sometimes like he can’t remember what it is he wants to tell us. Or he has so much to tell he forgets not to say it all at once. I like that it is taken a lot from the common soldier’s experience but Ambrose does get off track frequently and a little too mired in the details.

Although that can be good too. In D-Day when he talked about all the stuff the guys carried I felt weighted down with equipment.

He’s still quite readable.  I just feel like Cornelius Ryan beat him to the punch and did a much better job.  Ambrose certainly goes for the empathy angle.

@frimmel:

@tcnance:

the war of the rats is a good book, made a movie out of it  cant remember the name but it is based on the german-russian front. it centers on 2 dueling snipers in stalingrad

Enemy at The Gates?

Exactly what I was thinking.

yea, like I’ve got 1,100 bucks…not including the bbs and batteries, ect.

http://www.wwiiguns.com/index.php

They got all kinds of awsome stuff here, airsoft and even those cap firing. Basicaly there mock shells with a cap on each one, when fired, it gives off smoke, flying catrages, and looks real. But still too expensive for me…that is if someone wanted to loan some money over  :wink: