The Storm of War: A New History of the Second World War

by Andrew Roberts

“Gripping. . . . splendid history. A brilliantly clear and accessible account of the war in all its theaters. Roberts’s prose is unerringly precise and strikingly vivid. It is hard to imagine a better-told military history of World War II.” –New York Times Book Review

Andrew Roberts's acclaimed new history has been hailed as the finest single-volume account of this epic conflict. From the western front to North Africa, from the Baltic to the Far East, he tells the story of the war—the grand strategy and the individual experience, the brutality and the heroism—as never before.

Meticulously researched and masterfully written, The Storm of War illuminates the war's principal actors, revealing how their decisions shaped the course of the conflict. Along the way, Roberts presents tales of the many lesser-known individuals whose experiences form a panoply of the courage and self-sacrifice, as well as the depravity and cruelty, of the Second World War.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, World War II, War, Military Fiction, Military History, Audiobook

797 pages, Kindle Edition

First published January 1, 2009

About the author

Dr Andrew Roberts, who was born in 1963, took a first class honours degree in Modern History at Gonville & Caius College, Cambridge, from where he is an honorary senior scholar and a Doctor of Philosophy (PhD). He has written or edited twelve books, and appears regularly on radio and television around the world. Based in New York, he is an accomplished public speaker, and is represented by HarperCollins Speakers’ Bureau (See Speaking Engagements and Speaking Testimonials). He has recently lectured at Yale, Princeton and Stanford Universities and at the US Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania.

Reviews

[Andrew Smith · Rating 5 out of 5]

I’ve been boning up on some history lately and I thought it about time I covered WWII. I already knew the basics, of course, but I’d still regularly come across accounts of battles and other details of the war that would surprise me - I really didn’t have a full mental picture of events. It was time to get the full low-down.

I take in non-fiction best via audio, especially if it’s a long and heavy account and more particularly if it’s full of facts and figures. This way I can let it flow over me and any unnecessary (to me) detail can just get washed away by the part-time focus, I always have when listening to books, on whatever secondary activity I’m involved in at the time. That said, I drank this one in whole, the detailed numbers quoted being mainly confined to documenting the number of dead and injured on all sides in this horrific war; the remaining minutiae significantly being devoted to detailing the unbelievable scale of armament and ammunition utilised and explanations of the military strategies deployed. All of it fascinating and horrifying in equal measure.

I soon realised that my prior knowledge of both the political background and the many military conflagrations had been sketchy at best. I learnt a good deal from this book, which I found to be well structured, evenly balanced and exhaustively comprehensive. There were a few times when I resorted to researching background detail via the Internet (e.g. the rationale for war extending through North Africa), but on the whole the vast canvas was laid out in such a way as to paint the big picture very clearly.

Key take-aways:

- Somehow I’d failed to previously appreciate quite how early in the war the Battle of Britain was fought, but in the context of what was to follow it made perfect sense.
- I also hadn’t realised quite how successful the Japanese were in the early part of the war, or quite how much territory they gained control over.
- The huge contributions (and sacrifices) made by Commonwealth countries such as Australia, New Zealand, Canada and South Africa were really brought home.
- The astounding fact that a number critical mistakes and oversights cost Hitler ultimate victory. It was a close run thing, but if a few key elements had gone the German’s way then victory really could have been achieved.

Along the way there were interesting sections on the work undertaken at Bletchley Park by the code breaking team and on petty rivalries between top ranking officers on the Allied team as the war drew to a close. The most difficult sections to listen to were the many sections discussing and describing atrocities carried out – mainly by German, Russian and Japanese forces. These were horrific to the extent I’m convinced they disturbed my sleep and prompted a number of unwelcome and unpleasant dreams (well, nightmares to be more accurate). It’s hard to comprehend the fact that humans carried out such acts on other humans.

Overall a superb documentation of a key part of modern history. I’m sure there are other brilliant books out there on the subject, but as a one stop shop this one certainly did the job for me.

[Anthony · Rating 5 out of 5]

How the Nazis Lost the War

Andrew Roberts is one of the greatest historians alive today. His books are always engaging, beautifully written and provide an appreciation of importance of the topic being written about. The most unique thing about Roberts however is that his books often have an underlying theory, which challenges popular myths of topic involved. Heavily backed up with fact, his ideas of viewpoints are hard to argue. The Storm of War is no different. Here Roberts shows that the Nazis had several opportunities to win the Second World War, but didn’t simply because they were Nazis. What he means by this is that ideology came first and this overtook any sound tactical, strategic or political decisions which any other state may have taken.

Throughout The Storm of War we see many examples of this taking place, Operation Barbarossa being the major one. The insane decision to declare war on the USSR when the war in the west was not completed. Declaring war on the USA in 1941 also had no advantage or sound reasoning whatsoever and the pure refusal to allow von Manstein to relieve Paulus condemned 275,000 men. They could have got out if Hitler allowed to break out. Dunkirk is another famous example, however Roberts offers many more, including the horrendous murder of six million Jews in the holocaust. Roberts explains that if a state wanted to win a war it would have used these human resources as part of the war machine, instead wasted further resources destroying them. This is the same with Barbarossa, no sound strategist would have invade day that point, but the ideology came first. Hitler had outlined it in Mein Kampf years before.

Roberts is an English historian and within that tradition this is a scope of the whole war. In Russia there is many a history of the great patriotic war, Poland, the Warsaw uprising or in Italy the fall of Mussolini. But the United Kingdom, more broad sweeping histories can be found. There is a reason for this, a huge global empire and an involvement all theatres, but also after France falling in 1940, she stood alone against Germany and Japan. Following Pearl Harbour and Barbarossa this all changed, with the ‘big three’ coming prominent, FDR, Stalin and WSC. Churchill, eventually becoming the junior partner, FDR threw him under the bus to seduce Stalin. However, even though English he is not biased. He shows the Wehrmacht were the better soldiers, that it was amazing what they achieved in the last days of the war and writes that Erich von Manstein was the most talented general in the war. He also shows how Bernard Montgomery was an arrogant, self assured man, but also offers little apology for this asking ‘why shouldn’t he have been?’ With this he also shows the difficult nature of George S Patton’s character, whilst recognising the absolute importance of the American entry into the war.

The sobering static throughout all of this is that four out of every five German soldiers that died in the war that died, did so on the eastern front. Russia’s price in human cost is unimaginable, a secret they have guarded ever since, but estimates reach up to 30 million soldiers and civilians died. Khrushchev himself admitted to around 20 million. This death and destruction was built up like coiled spring and was unleashed as the red army advanced towards Berlin. The heart of the Reich. Up to 20 million women in Eastern Europe and northern China were raped by the red army as a result. Something denied to this day. One good thing about Hitler is that as he was at the helm and was making decisions based on being a Nazi and not a warlord, the war ended earlier than of German command took complete control.

The Storm of War is an excellent and exciting book, I wish there was some more focus on the pacific theatre, but even so it would hard to beat this from Andrew Roberts. I highly recommend.

[Susan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is the first one-volume history of World War II that I’d really place in a category of reevaluation by an author who views the war from a comfortable distance in time, but then I’m not expert, not even, really, an amateur aficionado even though I’ve read a lot about the war, including biographies of the personalities and memoirs by the participants.

Roberts’ thesis is that the Allies did not so much win the war as Hitler lost it, in large part by making independent judgments based on intuition and ideology. He was not a military strategist and didn’t trust anyone who was. The smarter his generals, the more likely he was to fire them, as he did von Rundstedt and Guderian more than once, or ignore them when he didn’t like their advice as he often did von Manstein who was maybe his best strategist.

According to Roberts, Hitler’s biggest misjudgment was invading Russia in June of 1941 thereby forcing Germany to fight thereafter on two fronts. He had already made a major error in not pursuing the British Expeditionary Force (BEF) who made the historic evacuation from Dunkirk—which the German army could had prevented had Hitler not called them off. He had not invaded England, having lost the air war of 1940 (The Battle of Britain). He had not beefed up his Navy—especially the submarines which tied up Atlantic shipping until 1943 but thereafter hadn’t the wherewith all (submarines mainly) to continue—or his Air Force whose fighter planes were clearly inferior to Britain’s. (He didn’t halt airplane design or manufacturing but did force a new fighter to be made into a bomber which left him vulnerable in Russia.) He left all that hanging and went after the USSR, seeking “lebensraum” for the German people and success where Napoleon had failed.

Hitler’s second biggest error according to Roberts was declaring war on the United States in December 1941 in the wake of Pearl Harbor. He was not under treaty obligations to Japan to do so and probably would not have felt bound by the treaty had he been so. But declaring war allowed Roosevelt to marshal the enormous (comparatively speaking) resources of the US (war materiel, oil, manufacturing capability) to aid the Western Allies as had not been possible before due to widespread isolationist feeling in the US. Roosevelt had maneuvered some deals already to aid Britain and the Allies, but had no trouble putting the might of the industrial US behind the Allies once Hitler had declared war.

Another major error was Hitler’s campaign to rid the continent of Europe of its Jews. Here was a clear case of ideology trumping strategy. Laying aside all moral issues, Hitler tied up resources and wasted valuable personnel, loyal citizens who could have been badly needed soldiers and workers. Roberts tackles the Holocaust head on in this book, and not only in practical terms.

In fact, Roberts doesn’t skirt moral issues at all in this book, though he finds that some of the conventional moral outrage in the years following 1945 has been misplaced, namely the dropping of the atomic bomb which undoubtedly saved many Allied lives and shorted by war by years. He also questions the condemnation of the fire bombing of Dresden, pointing out legitimate ways in which the city was a military target and asserting that more recent estimates of the number of casualties suggest far fewer were killed than, for instance, Vonnegut assumed in Slaughterhouse Five.

One of the more interesting moral issues he raises is that of the policy of saturation bombing which resulted in far more destruction of German cities than the the Germans inflicted on London or Antwerp. He found little disagreement with the policy at the time, either in the military or among allied populations. Roberts believes that it was only mass destruction of German cities and complete disruption of civil life that ultimately erased the Prussian military tradition which led Germany to start major wars twice in half a century and replaced it with a profoundly non-military-oriented society which hesitates even to participate in NATO missions today.

Generally too Andrews reassesses the ongoing debate on the effectiveness of bombing generally and decides that the post-war analysis which found the bombing relatively ineffective to be somewhat short-sighted.

Another major thread in this book is the role of the USSR. The book is full of the kind of statistics that can only be accumulated and analyzed objectively long after the war, but the statistics show what everyone now recognizes but rarely talks about in this world war, that the major destruction and death occurred in Russia. I have not read Beevor’s Stalingrad (which has been on my list for awhile) but I was impressed by Roberts’ coverage of the decisive battles of Stalingrad and Kursk in 1943. In assessing major errors of decision makers, Roberts, like most others, judges Stalin's major error to have been trusting Hitler, pointing out that Stalin otherwise never trusted anyone.

An interesting point that Roberts makes throughout this book is that of the cooperation among the Allies which, painful as it was in many ways, was a key to their success. Not only did the Axis not have that kind of cooperation, there was not even the free expression of ideas among the German decision makers since Hitler made all decisions and always punished his generals when they made independent decisions. "Strategic Retreat" was just not in his vocabulary. His closest generals, Keitel and Jodl, were among the least effective thinkers and strategists. Interestingly as tenuous as were the negotiations among Churchill, Roosevelt, and Stalin, Roberts found that Stalin listened to his generals and oversaw far more productive cooperation with his advisors than did Hitler.

But speaking of alliances, Roberts writes extensively on British and American cooperation—and the seething egos which often underlay cooperative decisions. There were a bunch of egos among the Allies: effective strategists like Montgomery and Paton who usually had to be forced to share and who competed rigorously with each other and generals like Mark Clark who were also self-aggrandizing but less effective. Roberts acknowledges MacArthur as another ego, but actually says relatively little about him. I wasn’t entirely happy with his treatment of Stillwell—or indeed of the whole China situation. In the Far East, Andrews focuses mostly on General William Slim, about whom I knew little, seeing him as one of the underappreciated heroes of the war.

I recommend this book whole-heartedly as a one-volume history of WWII which reassesses the war from a distance in time not achieved by those who actually participated or grew up in its wake revering "The Greatest Generation". It is told from a British perspective and as such possibly minimizes the war in the Pacific some, but he brings to the fore the strategic “Germany first” decision which the US and Britain agreed upon. Of course that was made possible also by Hitler’s strategic mistake in declaring war on the US in 1941.

One more thing I'd add: Roberts in many different places acknowledges the efforts and sacrifices of men and materiel from the countries of what was then called the British Commonwealth and Empire, especially Canada, Australia, New Zealand and India.

[Tony · Rating 4 out of 5]

I enjoy single volume accounts of WW2. Some things are inevitably missed, but I think WW2’s sweeping narrative lends itself to this kind of book. So I wondered how Roberts would fit WW2 into a mere 600 pages (excluding notes). The answer is pretty well, although he doesn’t manage the comprehensive breadth of Beevor’s The Second World War, and lacks the depth brought by the myriad of first hand accounts in Hastings All Hell Let Loose: The World At War 1939-1945.

Despite that, Andrew Roberts has written a very readable, broadly chronological history covering the major events - although the war at sea is demoted to a single thematic chapter. Roberts pays due respect to the contributions of allies large and small (with Canada singled out for particular praise) although I’d say it’s primarily a British-centric history.

He also presents some interesting arguments, for example his justification of the bombing of German cities, or the evidence that there was widespread knowledge amongst German generals of the atrocities being committed.

However the extensive quoting of recent secondary sources increasingly bothered me, and made me think that this book doesn’t really live up to its subtitle “a new history”. And while I can swallow quotes from Max Hastings, Patrick Bishop, Antony Beevor, James Holland, etc, as much as I like Stephen Fry (the English actor & writer), why would I be interested in his views on the dambusters?

In summary I thought this was a decent and easy to read account, but I’m not sure it’s genuinely new, and in my opinion it’s not as complete as the single volume histories from Beevor or Hastings.

[Sean O'Hara · Rating 2 out of 5]

Someday, someone will write a great one volume history of the Second World War. But it won't be Andrew Roberts.

The book is all right when it comes to the European/African theaters, though Roberts does indulge in Anglo-American triumphalism. But when he turns to the Pacific, the triumphalism turns to Eurocentricism and piss-poor research. Although his narrative of the European conflict begins before the war with the Anschluss, dismemberment of Czechoslovakia and "Peace for our time," he begins his account of the Pacific War on 7 December 1941 with minimal background on the political crisis leading up to it and bare mention of the Sino-Japanese War. Nor does the Chinese theater get much more attention once the conflict begins, and that all from the Euro-American perspective. We're told about the dangers of flying supplies over "the Hump" from India to China, but he devotes more time to land campaigns in Burma than to the Chinese contributions to the war effort, conditions in occupied territories, or Japanese colonization efforts.

The reason for this is painfully obvious -- Roberts doesn't know Chinese or Japanese and relied on secondary sources and the few primary sources translated into English. Which is problematic since the Japanese source he makes most use of is Fuchida and Okumiya's Midway: the Battle That Doomed Japan, a book known to shade the truth to make the authors look better. Political and military decisions within the Japanese government are given short shrift compared to the battles of personality in the Anglo-American alliance and Hitler's inner circle. The Japanese decision to surrender is handled in a couple paragraphs with only a single sentence devoted to the attempted coup against Hirohito and nothing on the question of whether the atomic bombs or Soviet declaration of war was the deciding factor -- despite the fact that the Japanese government's official report on events leading up to the surrender is readily available in English.

Why Roberts would go to the effort of writing on subjects he's ill equipped to handle is beyond me. He could easily have limited his subject matter to the European theater and come out with a perfectly decent book. But by taking on the whole conflict, he did a half-assed job. If you're interested in the Pacific side of the conflict, pretty much anything is better than this. If you're interest is in the European theater, this is fine, but I'd recommend you pick up Richard Evans' The Third Reich at War along with the earlier books The Coming of the Third Reich and The Third Reich in Power.

[Joe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Andrew Roberts adds yet another volume to the expansive list of World War II books - the causes, the battles, the leaders and key military figures - which begs the obvious question, "Do we really need another one?". Having read more than my fair share of books on this topic - and having just finished reading The Storm of War - my answer is yes - this book is for both the World War II novice and expert alike.

This is labeled a "new" history and there are a few new tidbits chronicled here. For instance, during the war, German POWs were run through a facility in Great Britain, allowed to mingle and unbeknownst to them, recorded. These audio tapes, capturing candid conversations, refute the claim made by many Nazi officers after the war that they were ignorant of, or at least not as naïve as they claimed to be, about Nazi atrocities. The author has also gained access to communiqués and letters which until now have not been published.

But what truly separates The Storm of War from the multitude of other books on the war is the author's perspective and writing - for this book rarely bogs down. Roberts provides a "big picture" view of the war, both on and off the battlefields, without glazing over the reader's eyes with military tactics and armaments. Major players are introduced with concise bios; their actions and decisions analyzed concisely - all without losing the thread of this engaging narrative. Sprinkled throughout are little gems of the author's sardonic sense of humor, i.e. Roberts refers to the "former historian" David Irving, which may elicit if not a chuckle, at least a smile from the reader. Not a usual reaction when reading such a non-fiction book.

I also found the "story" fairly well balanced with respect to the European and Asian theatres of war, as well as the battles fought on the land, sea and in the air. Cogent analysis is also provided concerning major decisions, i.e. the Normandy Invasion, air bombing of cities and the use of the atomic bomb. The author also focuses on a handful of decisions Hitler made - postponing the battle at Dunkirk, invading Russia and declaring war on the U.S. - which in hindsight inevitably led to his defeat.

This last bit of analysis may disappoint some readers. I mention this simply because in the Introduction the author does claim his book with its "new" perspective will provide a key to understanding the ultimate demise of the Axis. These boneheaded decisions made by Hitler and their repercussions are nothing new to any student of World War II history. Personally this wasn't an issue for me - the claim may be a tad over-blown, but by no means is it a detriment. The Storm of War is an excellent, all encompassing chronicle of the war.

Highly recommended.

[Ionuț Anastasiu · Rating 5 out of 5]

O excelentă monografie a celui de-al Doilea Război Mondial, în care sunt analizate destul de detaliat toate etapele și operațiunile importante ale conflictului, precum și principalele personaje istorice, politice și militare care au influențat în mod direct cursul războiului. În plus, trebuie menționat că lucrarea lui Andrew Roberts este bine scrisă și reușește să țină cititorul conectat, în ciuda faptului că o mare parte a evenimentelor narate în carte sunt binecunoscute publicului care are măcar un nivel mediu de cunoștințe despre subiectul în cauză.
În paranteză fie spus, este posibil ca unii cititori de la noi să nu se simtă prea confortabil atunci când vor citi această carte deoarece autorul nu îi tratează deloc cu mănuși pe aliații europeni ai lui Hitler, printre care s-au aflat bineînțeles trupele române implicate în a doua ofensivă de vară, Fall Blau (Operaţiunea Albastră), din anul 1942. Iată cum comentează Andrew Roberts decizia lui Hitler de a implica trupe din Italia, România, Ungaria și Slovacia: "Aruncarea în luptă a trupelor nongermane a fost asemenea unui pact cu diavolul, pentru că, deşi acestea aveau efective suficiente pentru frontul din Rusia, nu se vor dovedi demne de încredere şi eficiente, precum cele germane şi austriece". De altfel, Hitler însuși nu manifestă nicio urmă de încredere în aliații săi români - spre deosebire de finlandezi, ce, spune el, "se vor lupta cu vitejie" - , despre care afirmă în martie 1941 că "nu sunt de niciun folos". Mai mult decât atât, Hitler era convins că "soarta marilor unităţi germane nu trebuie să depindă de incertitudinea rezistenţei forţelor române”. Autorul nu scapă prilejul de a comenta ușor cinic: "Cu toate acestea, Hitler nu şi-a luat în serios propriul sfat, pentru că exact asta se va întâmpla la Stalingrad".
Pe de altă parte, este evidentă admirația profundă pe care autorul o arată față de Winston Churchill. Nu este însă o formă de lingușire, căci Andrew Roberts nu se sfiește să scoată în evidență erorile de gândire și strategice ale acestuia din diverse momente ale războiului. Însă, în ceea ce privește arta oratorică a lui Churchill, precum și abilitatea premierului britanic de a inspira curajul, de a ține ridicat moralul trupelor aliate chiar și în momentele cele mai negre ale războiului, aici autorul manifestă un respect pe deplin justificat față de liderul britanic. În cuvintele lui Andrew Roberts, "frazele nemuritoare" ale lui Churchill erau "darul său cel mai de preț".
Așa cum spuneam, cartea are numeroase puncte tari, de exemplu, sunt analizate în paralel relațiile cel puțin ciudate dintre conducătorii țărilor ce făceau parte din Axă, ce nu considerau deloc necesar să-și informeze partenerii despre planurile lor - de exemplu, Mussolini nu l-a anunțat pe Hitler că intenționează să invadeze Grecia pornind din Albania, nici Hitler nu a spus nimănui că va ataca, duminică, 22 iunie 1941, Uniunea Sovietică, dar nici japonezii nu i-au informat pe germani că vor ataca baza americană de la Pearl Harbor, forțând SUA să intre în război. Spre comparație, relația de cooperare dintre Winston Churchill și Theodore Roosevelt a fost mult mai strânsă (este greu de spus dacă îl putem include aici și pe Stalin, a cărui agendă a fost dintotdeauna radical diferită față de aceea a liderilor occidentali), în ciuda competiției feroce nu numai dintre feldmareșalul britanic Montgomery și generalii americani George Patton sau Omar Bradley, ci și dintre Jukov și Konev, ce avea ca miză cucerirea Berlinului.
Așa cum era de așteptat, este analizată strategia catastrofală a "caporalului Hitler" (titlul i-a fost conferit de Winston Churchill, ce "voia să-l transforme într-un subiect de batjocură și de amuzament"), ale cărui decizii lipsite uneori de orice rațiune sunt șocante inclusiv la aproape 80 de ani distanță de terminarea războiului; de exemplu, decizia de a amâna invazia Rusiei cu șase săptămâni, timp în care a ocupat "relativ neimportanta Iugoslavie" și de a nu dota trupele germane cu echipamente de iarnă, convins fiind de faptul că Rusia se va prăbuși în patru luni (de altfel, Operaţiunea Barbarossa este considerată de Andrew Roberts "principala greşeală [a lui Hitler] din timpul războiului"), dar și decizia de a declara război SUA - "Führerul declarase în mod inutil război unei ţări imposibil de invadat, oferindu-i lui Roosevelt scuza pentru politica „Mai întâi Germania” - , precum și ordinele demente de tipul "rezistaţi sau muriți" impuse propriilor armate etc. Privind retrospectiv, este cu adevărat uimitor cum un asemenea personaj grotesc și stupid a putut să inspire atât de mult fanatism și cum oamenii au fost capabili de atâtea orori inspirați fiind de acest scelerat. Cât despre japonezi, ce poți să mai spui: brutalitatea cu care au dus acest război a întrecut-o adesea pe cea nazistă, singurul lucru în favoarea lor fiind faptul că nu au pus în practică ceva de talia Holocaustului, dar modul înfiorător în care s-au comportat cu populația civilă din zonele ocupate și cu prizonierii de război constituie o pagină neagră în istoria Japoniei.
În fine, este interesant de observat că autorul a întreprins numeroase călătorii în unele dintre locurile unde s-au desfășurat momente cheie ale celui de-al Doilea Război Mondial, de exemplu la Stalingrad sau la Monte Cassino, iar observațiile sale cu referire la prezent adaugă un nou element de autenticitate cărții. Cu siguranță, nu este cea mai bună lucrare despre Al Doilea Război Mondial (probabil că fiecare cititor interesat de subiect are o carte favorită sau poate mai multe), însă este o lucrare fundamentală, ce reușește cu succes să reconstituie cel mai crunt episod din istoria umanității. Lectură plăcută!

[Armin · Rating 3 out of 5]

Deutsches Original unten

Probably the moust superfluous newer representation, so much I have longed for the end of the second world war in no other Book in this topic. But even a such book has its good sides, you learn to better appreciate the classics.
The biggest shock is to while the bias of a recent historian, who justifies the almost unnecessary battle/bloodbath in WWI-Style of El Alamein by the imminent landing of the Americans in Morocco, with Britains need to do something for their own self-consciousness, before the Americans arrive.
There is more than one reason why this untimely chauvinistic representation appeared fully national stereotypes and the justification of the wartime bombing as successful character training for the German people so far not on German anyway.



Wahrscheinlich die überflüssigste neuere Darstellung, so sehr habe ich mir noch bei keiner Sicht auf die Ereignisse zwischen 1938/39- 1945 das Ende des Zweiten Weltkriegs mehr herbei gesehnt. Aber selbst ein derartiger Schmöker hat seine guten Seiten, man lernt die Klassiker um so besser schätzen.
Der größte Schock ist für dabei die Befangenheit eines jüngeren Historikers, der sich nicht entblödet zu schreiben, Großbritannien hätte die durch die bevorstehende Landung der Amerikaner in Marokko eigentlich schon überflüssig gewordene Schlacht von El Alamein noch schlagen müssen, um etwas fürs eigene Selbstbewusstsein zu tun. Dabei war die Schlacht das dümmste Anrennen gegen feindliche Linien seit dem ersten Weltkrieg.
Es gibt jedenfalls mehr als einen Grund, warum diese unzeitgemäß chauvinistische Darstellung voll nationaler Stereotypen und der Rechtfertigung des Bombenkrieges als erfolgreiche Charakterschulung für das Deutsche Volk bislang nicht auf Deutsch erschienen ist. Das Holocaust-Kapitel ist auch eine ziemlich lieblose Pflichtübung, die ohne rechten Zusammenhang mit dem restlichen Kriegsgeschehen abgespult wird.

[Mark · Rating 2 out of 5]

It’s clear from this book that Andrew Roberts is a fan of recycling, as this book is little more than a rehashing of the war as covered by others. Contrary to the subtitle, there is little that is “new” here; instead the reader gets a fairly standard interpretation of the war that is largely dependent on the work of others. Worse, his account concentrates heavily on the ground war involving Germany; the war against Japan in Asia is covered in only three of the book’s eighteen chapters, while the air and naval campaign in the West is crammed into a fourth. Roberts’s readable writing style will make this a good introduction for readers new to the conflict, but to someone already familiar with the war this book will be a reworking of what they have already read elsewhere.

[happy · Rating 4 out of 5]

Good overall history, but not a whole lot of new information. For US readers a really good overview of the India/Burma theater. I also thinks he glosses over the Pacific Operations a little.

[Ushan · Rating 2 out of 5]

I want to read Winston Churchill's six-volume history of World War II, and before doing that, decided to go through a modern British one-volume popular book on the subject. This is a rather conventional history book; the author is a British patriot who berates Eire for being neutral in the war, since had Hitler won, he would have trampled this neutrality. It makes gross mistakes having to do with the Soviet Union. A million and a half former Soviet POWs were sent to the Gulag or labor battalions in Siberia? Col. Gen. Krivosheyev says that the number is closer to 200,000. Hitler could have told the Japanese ambassador about Barbarossa so Japan could join in the attack on the Soviet Union and seize Siberian oil? Oil was only discovered in Siberia in the 1960s. It uses curious turns of phrase (German bombing turned Stalingrad into a lunar moonscape? What other kind of moonscape is there?). The last chapter asks, how Hitler could have won the war, and gives many answers: he could have started the war later and built up his submarine force that could asphyxiate Britain; he should not have declared war on the United States; he should have allowed his Jewish subjects to serve in the Wehrmacht, as they did in World War I, instead of killing them. I find these answers questionable; Hitler did not want to fight the British, whom he regarded as fellow Aryans, and was caught by surprise when they declared war on him; the United States was anything but neutral; the German Jews were too few to make a difference.

[Mark · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a quite large volume to read and one should take it's time with it or pick the time when you can really sit down with it.

This book on the general history of WOII is not something to read when you have little or NO knowledge of the WOII. Even if this book is rather thick it does never explain everything it would have made the book far thicker in pages.

The thesis of the writer is that AH lost the war instead of the Allies winning it. He does a decent job of proving it but at the end there is enough space for disagreement. For me this book delivered some parts of the war that were largely unknown to me and are interesting enough for me to go looking for some reading material that enhances my knowledge.

A well written and good documented book that gives you a great oversight on the happenings of WOII. It places a lot of historical moments into a larger frame which is interesting.

[Genni · Rating 3 out of 5]

Four stars for history, and two stars for reasoning.

Roberts argues throughout the book that Germany needed to have the "lust for war" beaten out of her, and therefore, every action taken by the Allies was justified. I am not convinced that because a goal was accomplished by doing "A" then "A" is the only way to accomplish a goal. What other options there are, I do not know, but seriously. Has humanity had the imagination to do anything other than war or traditional diplomacy? Surely people smarter than me could come up with creative ways to accomplish things?

Reading this book also has me wondering if there is a real way to assess why wars are won or lost. Attempting to apply lessons learned from WWI to WWII resulted in blunders. With both wars (and with others,) there is a real mix of successful and unsuccessful strategies, weather conditions, influential (and uninfluential) personalities, etc. I am not saying we cannot learn anything from history because it rhymes rather than repeats, I just think far more humility is required when assessing these things than is usually applied. Each perspective sheds different light, but I am unsure whether one is necessarily more true than another.

All of this aside, this is my second book by Roberts and I highly doubt it will be my last.

[Karen · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book took a little bit for me to get into, but once I was used to the style, I found that despite the topic, an enjoyable read.

I was trying to determine if this would be a good first single volume work on WWII. I realize that I can't really say, because 5 years ago I read the The Liberation Trilogy Boxed Set by Rick Atkinson, so I had some grounding on the topic.

Roberts does have an interesting take on the war, in that he explains all the mistakes that all sides made.

[Tariq Mahmood · Rating 4 out of 5]

The numbers and scale of the Second World War is truly great, which completely justified the huge interest it still creates. Although the author manages to talk about many wars on the Asian front, but his focus is really on the Western front. He leaves many questions unclear.
Why did the Japanese enter the war? What were their reasons as they clearly could not attack mainland USA so what were they hoping to achieve?
Would communism have prevailed in China if Chiang Kai Shek was given equal billing, like inviting him to the Yalta conference?
I would have liked to understand more about the role of French Vichy government against the Allies.
But the book does answer a lot of questions like the
ultimate factor in winning was numbers. Allies won eventually due to their superior production of armament, higher number of soldiers, and more advanced defence technology. Factors like bravery, honour and patriotism made small dents but we're not able to win wars on their own. Similarly the generals who were able to understand and harness these factors eventually won.

Also the British fought off the Japanese invasion of India instead of simply vacating it at the hands of the merciless Japanese. They choose to give India independence a few years after the culmination of the war instead, thus paving the way for a more fruitful and lasting relationship.

[Jeff Rosendahl · Rating 2 out of 5]

For a single volume history of WWII, I really didn't think it was very well done or contained new information. It focuses nearly exclusively on the European conflict and doesn't deal much at all with the causes of the war. I much prefer A Short History of World War II by James L. Stokesbury when it comes to single volume histories of WWII. Stokesbury spends much more time discussing the causes of the war, which is more interesting to me, as well as at least trying to cover some of the subtopics (resistance movements, Allied conferences) and deals with both the European and Pacific theaters. Roberts also used quite a bit of terms and jargon in non-English languages, which became annoying after a while. While there were a few good nuggets in this book, I can't say I recommend it.

[Michael Flanagan · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is the best single volume on the history of World War II that I have read to date. The amount of details and information Andrew Roberts cram into this book is amazing.

As well as what you would expect in such a book, the author's analysis of key battles an characters are masterful, as well as a few new pieces of information recently de-classified This is definitely one author who know his stuff. As
a self confessed World War II buff I found this book an enthralling and educational read

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

These stories. Born in '52, the war over just 7 yrs. The immense scale is astounding. Thousands die in a day. People lived through this, yet there are times I can barely get out of bed. Humans are predators. If there isn't enough trouble in the world they'll go and make some.

This book is full of battles, events, thought processes that I had never read of. Once again behind the scene revelations. The central thesis being that Hitler lost the war because of egregious errors. The Allies democratic ability to lead through committee prevailed. Of course someone made the final decisions but the road map was vetted by hashing out the course of actions available.

A tremendous book.

[Carey · Rating 2 out of 5]

I’m not sure what was new about this history. What was new was the bizarre structure of the book. Ninety percent of the focus was on the European theater. The Pacific was treated as a weak afterthought. The primary focus was on the Nazis and Adolf Hitler, which I think is the easy, low hanging fruit for a historian.

[Parth Sarthi · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book covers all events of the world war 2 along with brief history of Hitler’s rise in Germany.Capturing whole of WW 2 in a book of just 750 pages itself is a tough task.Yet author is successful in the task.
What it lacks is a soldier’s perspective, it is written from the strategic point of view. But this small issue can be ignored as the author has to cover such a wide subject.
Anybody interested in course of events of ww2 should go through this book.

[Caleb A. Gerber · Rating 5 out of 5]

Review of The Storm of War by Andrew Roberts

I picked up Andrew Roberts’ The Storm of War because the audiobook was free, and because I’d already read his Churchill biography and knew he’s a solid historian. I’m pretty into WWII, but I wasn’t expecting to be this hooked. Roberts delivers a no-nonsense, brutal, yet thrilling narrative of WWII that doesn’t hold your hand or dumb things down. The book is massive in scope, yet he never loses sight of the human and ideological chaos behind the military movements. It’s honest, blunt, and packed with insight.
First off, Roberts is clearly a diligent scholar—he’s done his homework. His use of sources is impressive, quoting top historians like Keegan, Beevor, and Gilbert, but he writes with a distinctly British conservative slant. That comes through in who he highlights and how he views the war’s characters, but it never feels like propaganda. Instead, it’s a sharp lens, focused especially on why Hitler and the Axis lost, and why the Allies won.

Hitler’s Catastrophic Comedy

Roberts spends nearly half the book on Adolf Hitler’s decision-making—and thank God for that. The way Roberts lays out Hitler’s blunders made me laugh out loud more than once. His hubris, paranoia, and delusions are on full display, and Roberts doesn’t sugarcoat it. The decision to launch Operation Barbarossa when the German army was barely ready, the idiocy of declaring war on the U.S. after Pearl Harbor, and the way Hitler meddled directly in military campaigns doomed Germany from within.
Roberts makes Hitler’s mistakes almost farcical without diminishing their deadly consequences. You can see why Hitler’s personality was such a destructive force: his overreach and petulance dragged Germany into battles it couldn’t win, wrecked alliances, and ultimately sealed the Nazi regime’s fate.

Generals and Commanders: Heroes, Villains, and Eccentrics

Roberts doesn’t just analyze Hitler—he dives deep into the men who fought the war for both sides, and his treatment of these commanders is one of the book’s most compelling parts.
Rommel is painted as a brilliant but flawed tactician, the "Desert Fox" who often had to clean up Hitler’s messes in North Africa. Roberts respects Rommel’s skill but doesn’t mythologize him; he’s portrayed as a soldier trapped by politics and Hitler’s strategic blunders.
Montgomery, by contrast, gets a lion’s share of praise. Roberts is unapologetically pro-Monty, and he makes a strong case that Montgomery was the steady hand the British desperately needed. That’s a viewpoint some may contest, especially Americans who favor Patton, but Roberts backs it up well, contrasting Montgomery’s caution and planning with Patton’s recklessness.

Speaking of Patton, Roberts is tough on him and Omar Bradley, preferring to give credit to Montgomery and Eisenhower. That said, Roberts’ portrayal of Eisenhower is nuanced and, in my opinion, one of the best parts of the book. Eisenhower is shown as a pragmatic, intelligent leader, an excellent coordinator of the Allied forces, and a steady political figure who managed huge egos and complicated alliances.
Roberts also includes de Gaulle, describing his stubbornness and political complexity, though not in as much detail as the others. De Gaulle certainly shares the author's respect and admiration, though not his l love, and Roberts distinctly shows how self-centered and hypocritical the anglophobic Frenchman could be.
On the German side, Roberts gives solid attention to generals like Kesselring, Guderian -father of Blitzkrieg-, Manstein, and others. They are depicted as skilled professionals trapped by Hitler’s increasingly erratic commands. Manstein stands out as a brilliant strategist who tried to salvage the Wehrmacht’s fortunes despite the impossible situation.
On the Soviet front, Roberts treats commanders like Rokossovsky and Zhukov fairly, showing how their leadership was crucial to turning the tide against Germany. He avoids romanticizing Stalin’s generals, showing them as effective but operating in a brutal and often politically dangerous environment.

The Eastern Front: Hell on Earth

Roberts’ coverage of the Eastern Front is balanced and brutal. He neither sugarcoats the Soviet atrocities nor diminishes the horrors inflicted by the Wehrmacht. The sheer scale of suffering and carnage on this front is staggering, and Roberts conveys that with chilling clarity. The Soviet counteroffensive, especially at Stalingrad, is shown as the decisive moment in the war. The battle descriptions are sharp, vivid, and insightful.

The Western Front and Beyond

The Battle of Britain is treated well—not too long, but enough to show its strategic importance and Churchill’s leadership. The campaigns in North Africa and Italy, like the Battle of Anzio, also get solid treatment.
The Pacific Theater, particularly the Battles of Midway and Leyte Gulf however, get short shrift. He does spend much time talking about the Japanese invasion of Singapore and the destruction of the British Empire's forces in Asia, but doesn't seem to spend much time on Macarthur's exploits in Japan or the Battle of Guadalcanal. Roberts is clearly more interested in the European and Soviet fronts, and the Japanese side feels like an afterthought. For anyone wanting a thorough understanding of the Pacific war, this book will leave you wanting. It’s a glaring gap in an otherwise comprehensive work.

Morality, Ethics, and Civilian Suffering

Roberts doesn’t shy away from the darkest aspects of the war. The carpet bombings of German cities are analyzed in detail, including their moral ambiguity; however, he is not a progressive liberal, and clearly explains how these were absolutely necessary to winning the war and also morally justifiable according to just war theory. The atomic bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki are covered briefly but fairly.
The Holocaust deserves special mention: Roberts devotes an entire chapter to it, confronting the horror head-on without flinching. The accounts are gut-wrenching and necessary.
Civilian suffering, especially on the Eastern Front and in Germany itself, is depicted honestly -maybe too honestly. Roberts makes it clear Hitler, Göring, and Jodl bear direct responsibility for the atrocities.

Sources, Bias, and Interpretation

Roberts’ scholarship is top-notch. His sources are broad and authoritative. The British conservative lens colors some interpretations, especially in the emphasis on Montgomery and the critique of American generals. That said, the bias doesn’t distort the facts, and Roberts offers a sharp, honest take on many figures and events.

Where Roberts Overreaches

Sometimes Roberts flies too close to the sun with graphic descriptions or sexual references. A few of his judgments, especially about commanders or political figures, feel like they’re pushing a thesis rather than letting the facts speak entirely for themselves. The overly favorable treatment of Montgomery and the harshness on Patton and Bradley might raise some eyebrows, though it's a version you don't often hear from an American narrative.
The limited coverage of the Pacific war is a big weakness, and his discussion of the war’s consequences feels a little thin. More could have been said about how the war reshaped the world post-1945. He also spends a lot of time explaining the strengths and weaknesses of different types of tanks, which is ok for some people, but not that interesting for me.

Final Verdict

The Storm of War is easily one of the best WWII histories I’ve read. Roberts blends deep research with a razor-sharp writing style and a refusal to gloss over mistakes or moral complexity. His portrayal of Hitler’s catastrophic decisions alone makes the book worth it, often with dark humor that makes the tragedy even more palpable.
If you want a sweeping, insightful, and brutally honest account of WWII—especially from the European and Eastern Front perspectives—this is a must-read. Just be ready for some glaring gaps on the Pacific front and to hear a lot of praise for Montgomery and Eisenhower, along with some sharp critiques of Roosevelt and Patton.
Bottom line: The Storm of War is a brilliant, clear-eyed, and sometimes hilarious history of the deadliest war in human history. You won’t get a perfect, fully balanced global account, but you will get a deeply intelligent and entertaining one.

Would I recommend it?
Absolutely. Anyone interested in the 20th century or the dynamics of war needs this on their shelf or playlist. It’s a rigorous, riveting, and honest account that brings clarity to a chaotic era.

[Alex · Rating 5 out of 5]

It's hard to know where to start. This is a remarkable book, both for how it summarizes the war in just over 600 pages while still including great detail and for how it places the developments of the war within the relevant ideologies, which while many and varied, are primarily Communism and Nazism. Perhaps more specifically, and more accurately, the developments of the war generated mostly from the minds of Hitler and Stalin.

Roberts shows how you cannot separate Nazism from how the war was conducted and unleashed--and lost. Hitler wanted to dominate the Euro-Asian landmass so the Aryan race could grow and prosper. This led to some of his greatest blunders, namely invading the Soviet Union, rather than consolidating and pursuing additional gains in Africa, the Middle East, and southeastern Europe. Even the Holocaust--apart from being a monstrous evil--was a grave military mistake for it removed millions and millions of people from the workforce and the German military.

Roberts also shows you also cannot separate Stalin's brand of barbaric Communism from how the war was conducted--and won. The Russian soldier fought fanatically, knowing if he retreated, he'd be shot by the Soviet security agency (NKVD), and knowing if he surrendered, he'd either die in a POW camp or be killed by the Soviets (yes, the Soviets) when that POW camp was later liberated. A pluralistic democracy may simply have not had the stomach to defeat Hitler in the east. Stalin did.

The book somewhat makes the war in the Pacific a sideshow. It wasn't. But as Roberts tells it, it simply didn't have the multi-varied complexities that the war in Europe and Africa did. Ideology played a role there, too, for the Japanese army's sense of honor prolonged the war greatly, leading to hundreds of thousands of more deaths and the decision to use the bomb.

This book is very good. For a history book, it's surprisingly gruesome. Roberts devotes a chapter to the Holocaust and describes in detail the logistics and mechanics of how the Nazis killed 6,000,000 Jews. It's reasonable to do some math and conclude that number just doesn't seem possible. Roberts shows that it was. It was truly an around-the-clock genocide. Roberts describes the atrocities, mainly committed by the war's losers and the Soviets, in enough detail to sober the reader and to understand the realities of the war and the ideologies that spawned it. But, even he, in a few occasions, writes "further detail just isn't appropriate here."

A very good and necessary book.

[Gerald Churchill · Rating 4 out of 5]

What "The Storm of War" does, it does fairly well. The book covers the war, at least the European part of it, comprehensively, although too breezily in places. It points out that while all of the members of the Grand Alliance made valuable contributions, the Soviet Union did the bulk of the fighting and the dying. Andrew Roberts points out that the Axis powers did or failed to do certain things that might have prolonged the war or even created a different outcome. He lays to rest certain myths, such as the casualty count of the bombing of Dresden. Roberts's writing style is very good, and he argues his points cogently.

"The Storm of War," however, is uneven. Even in the European war, which is what the lion's share of the book is about, unevenness exists. For example, the period of the Desert War from November 1941 to August 1942 is covered in just four pages. The greatest unevenness, however, is the excessive emphasis on the European war. Only three of the book's 22 chapters say anything about the war in Asia and the Pacific. Virtually nothing is written about the Second Sino-Japanese War, which was one of the wars that comprised the Second World War. Some historians believe that World War II began with Japan's attack on China in July of 1937, and given the fact that 30 percent of the deaths in the Second World War were Chinese and that China tied down hundreds of thousands of Japanese troops who would otherwise have been employed elsewhere, more should have been written about the Second Sino-Japanese War. Beyond this, nothing was written about the Southwest Pacific campaign after the end of the Guadalcanal operation. Simply put, too little attention was given to the war against Japan.

In addition to the large omissions, a number of typos and factual errors exist. For example, Roberts describes the surrender of 8,000 Americans at St. Vith as "the largest capitulation of American troops since the Civil War." Fifteen thousand Americans, however, surrendered at Bataan, to say nothing of 60,000 Filipinos. The elimination of the errors in future editions will make this book better and more valuable.

Given what I have written, a three-star or two-star rating would be justified. However, Roberts is provocative, and being made to think is never bad. Moreover, I did learn a few things and will return to this book from time to time. For these reasons, I give "The Storm of War" four stars.

[Bettie]

Description: From "Britain's finest military historian" (The Economist) comes a magisterial new history of World War II and the flawed axis strategy that led to their defeat.

The Second World War lasted for 2,174 days, cost $1.5 trillion, and claimed the lives of more than 50 million people. What were the factors that affected the war's outcome? Why did the Axis lose? And could they, with a different strategy, have won? Andrew Roberts's acclaimed new history has been hailed as the finest single-volume account of this epic con?ict. From the western front to North Africa, from the Baltic to the Far East, he tells the story of the war—the grand strategy and the individual experience, the cruelty and the heroism—as never before.

In researching this magnificently vivid history, Roberts walked many of the key battlefields and wartime sites in Russia, France, Italy, Germany, and the Far East, and drew on a number of never-before-published documents, such as a letter from Hitler's director of military operations explaining the reasoning behind the FÜhrer's order to halt the Panzers outside Dunkirk—a delay that enabled British forces to evacuate. Roberts illuminates the principal actors on both sides and analyzes how they reached critical decisions. He also presents the tales of many little-known individuals whose experiences form a panoply of the extraordinary courage and self-sacrifice, as well as the terrible depravity and cruelty, of the Second World War.

Meticulously researched and masterfully written, The Storm of War gives a dramatic account of this momentous event and shows in remarkable detail why the war took the course it did.

OFF TOPIC BY ANDREW ROBERTS

'Historian Andrew Roberts imagines what disasters will befall Scotland if the country votes for independence on Thursday, What will happen to the debt? Why did Britain veto Scotland's membership of the EU? How did Alex Salmond get it so disastrously wrong and what job is Sir Sean Connery hankering after?' Read further

[Greg Pettit · Rating 4 out of 5]

An incredibly well-researched and brisk history of the battles of World War II that illustrates how personalities impacted the outcome as much as planning.

The author argues that World War II was one of the first wars waged for political reasons, rather than military ones, and that this was ultimately what caused the Germans to lose. The book itself covers all the campaigns from beginning to end and offers a staggering amount of detailed figures of the troops and arms involved.

The strategies of the battles are described succinctly but clearly, and throughout the book there are extensive quotes from leaders and other participants to add personal perspectives.

Because there is so much history to cover in the span of World War II, no one book could really be completely comprehensive without spanning multiple volumes. That said, this one really does an impressive job of providing a great overview sprinkled with detailed facts. If nothing else, it succeeds in covering nearly everything while whetting one's appetite to learn more about specific events.

[Ben Adams · Rating 5 out of 5]

Andrew Roberts’ history of World War II is simple, elegant, and incisive. It offers an understanding of the critical conflict that underpins our entire world and way of life today by unveiling the horrors of the war and zooming in on the titanic personalities that led the world through this incredible struggle.

Roberts writing, to me, is perfect. He gives adequate detail while not lingering for too long on any subject, curtails any rabbit trails into mere detours that you are glad to have taken, and only uses detailed numbers and statistics to produce a sense of awe in the reader at the sheer scale of the conflict.

If you’re looking to know more about WWII as a whole, then this is the book for you. Other books can give the minutiae of certain units or specific battles, but this book is unbeaten in its treatment of the entire war.

[Rafal Jasinski · Rating 5 out of 5]

W minionym roku zgłębiałem historię średniowiecza, w tym sięgam ku trochę nowszej i bliższej nam historii. Padło na "Wicher wojny" Andrew Robertsa, stąd też w trochę w ponurym klimacie rozpoczynam ten rok, jeśli chodzi o dobór lektur. Padło na "Wicher wojny" Andrew Robertsa. Jakkolwiek, wybór tej książki był strzałem w dziesiątkę!

Czy da się omówić wszelkie zagadnienia związane z II Wojną Światową na niespełna 700 stronach?... Wszystkie być może nie, ale książka Andrew Robertsa jest bodajże najlepszą syntezą, obejmującą okres od genezy i przyczyn wojny do końca i jej następstw. Lektura tej publikacji, dostarcza kompleksowego przeglądu najważniejszych wydarzeń i bitew tej wojny, a także kontekstów politycznego, społecznego i kulturowego, w jakich miały one miejsce.

Roberts ponadto, bada, analizuje i snuje hipotezy odnośnie motywacji i pobudek, które stoją za działaniem kluczowych postaci zaangażowanych w konflikt, w tym Hitlera - przede wszystkim! - Stalina, Churchilla i Roosevelta i - jakże by inaczej - wybitnych - dowódców armii, biorących w nim udział.

To również książka, która otwiera zupełnie nowe perspektywy, wśród których poruszyła mnie analiza i ewentualne następstwa zamachów na Hitlera. Nigdy wcześniej nie brałem pod uwagę, że ich powodzenie mogłoby pogorszyć sytuację i przedłużyć czas trwania II Wojny Światowej... Wybaczcie ignorancję, ale z interpretacja, jaką prezentuje Roberts spotkałem się po raz pierwszy, i - pośród kilku innych błyskotliwych tez - zaskoczyła mnie ona.

Książkę, oczywiście, polecam! Doskonała pozycja aby odświeżyć sobie historię konfliktu a nawet na nowo rozbudzić pasję do nowożytnej historii świata! Polecam bezwzględnie!

[Bram Rawlings · Rating 4 out of 5]

Excellent primer on WWII for those who, like me, needed a refresher. His thesis is that Nazi ideology and strategy were mutually exclusive: “The real reason why Hitler lost the Second World War was exactly the same one that caused him to unleash it in the first place: he was a Nazi.”

I found particularly helpful his chapter on the Allied bombings of German cities. The goal was not only to stifle armaments production (which it did successfully), but to undermine national morale. If Germany as a whole—that is, civilians included—wasn’t made to pay for the consequences of its chauvinist and expansionist ideology, then it likely would not be the peace-loving democracy it is today.

Robert’s rightly resists the tendency to bring the Allies and Axis powers to moral equivalence. The Nazis shot mentally ill 10-14 years olds in Soviet Russia for no reason, and the Japanese chopped off women’s breasts and killed infants in the Philippines. Anyone who claims we were not fighting a moral war is ignorant.

I wish Roberts had discussed the role of the Soviet Union’s invasion of Manchuria in the Japanese surrender, but this only gets one passing mention.

[Florina · Rating 4 out of 5]

Finallyyyyyyy.
A great, but exhausting military history. I know some folks will be able to dash this off their reading list on a rainy afternoon or two, but I'm a slow reader when it comes to big event histories, and even though I found this book very compelling and informative (and yes, accessible for a layman), I still slogged through it, because war is a nasty, bleak and sorry business, no matter the strategies or heroics involved. Still, a great WW2 volume that I would recommend to all who want to get an "on the ground" feel of all the different theaters of war. It's also a treat to read all of Roberts' personal touches and caustic style, especially when he superbly underlines the sheer stupidity of the tyrants and sycophants who orchestrated this terrible war.

[Yakov · Rating 5 out of 5]

4.5 Stars - Probably one of the best general histories of WW2 ever written. Naturally, Andrew Roberts focuses less on the Asian fronts and more on the European ones, and this can be tolerated considering the scope and breadth of the book. I particularly liked that Roberts’ doesn’t stick to the chronological script of the stories but strays away from time to time with insightful comments about the personalities we come across. The book could perhaps have been accompanied with better maps to illustrate the battles, and I also think the discussion of the Barabarosa operation in chapter 5 was somewhat less in-depth than the rest of the book chapters. But nonetheless this book is a fantastic achievement, and I could only highly recommend it if you enjoy military history.