Kharkov 1942: Anatomy of a Military Disaster

by David M. Glantz

Kharkov was one of the last German victories on the Russian Front; this is a detailed examination of Soviet command decisions and German battlefield innovations in an important but neglected battle. In this eagerly anticipated book, America's foremost expert in Russian military studies addresses this neglected. Sandwiched as it is between more famous battles, every military history reader knows "about" Kharkov, but there has never been a book that focused exclusively on that campaign. David M. Glantz has now filled the gap.

Genres: History, World War II, Nonfiction, Military History, Russia, Military Fiction, Germany

288 pages, Hardcover

First published August 21, 1998

About the author

David M. Glantz is an American military historian and the editor of The Journal of Slavic Military Studies.

Glantz received degrees in history from the Virginia Military Institute and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, and is a graduate of the U.S. Army Command and General Staff College, Defense Language Institute, Institute for Russian and Eastern European Studies, and U.S. Army War College. He entered active service with the United States Army in 1963.

He began his military career in 1963 as a field artillery officer from 1965 to 1969, and served in various assignments in the United States, and in Vietnam during the Vietnam War with the II Field Force Fire Support Coordination Element (FSCE) at the Plantation in Long Binh.

After teaching history at the United States Military Academy from 1969 through 1973, he completed the army’s Soviet foreign area specialist program and became chief of Estimates in US Army Europe’s Office of the Deputy Chief of Staff for Intelligence (USAREUR ODCSI) from 1977 to 1979. Upon his return to the United States in 1979, he became chief of research at the Army’s newly-formed Combat Studies Institute (CSI) at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, from 1979 to 1983 and then Director of Soviet Army Operations at the Center for Land Warfare, U.S. Army War College in Carlisle, Pennsylvania, from 1983 to 1986. While at the College, Col. Glantz was instrumental in conducting the annual "Art of War" symposia which produced the best analysis of the conduct of operations on the Eastern Front during the Second World War in English to date. The symposia included attendance of a number of former German participants in the operations, and resulted in publication of the seminal transcripts of proceedings. Returning to Fort Leavenworth in 1986, he helped found and later directed the U.S. Army’s Soviet (later Foreign) Military Studies Office (FMSO), where he remained until his retirement in 1993 with the rank of Colonel.

In 1993, while at FMSO, he established The Journal of Slavic Military Studies, a scholarly journal for which he still serves as chief editor, that covers military affairs in the states of Central and Eastern Europe as well as the former Soviet Union.

A member of the Russian Federation’s Academy of Natural Sciences, he has written or co-authored more than twenty commercially published books, over sixty self-published studies and atlases, and over one hundred articles dealing with the history of the Red (Soviet) Army, Soviet military strategy, operational art, and tactics, Soviet airborne operations, intelligence, and deception, and other topics related to World War II. In recognition of his work, he has received several awards, including the Society of Military History’s prestigious Samuel Eliot Morrison Prize for his contributions to the study of military history.

Glantz is regarded by many as one of the best western military historians of the Soviet role in World War II.[1] He is perhaps most associated with the thesis that World War II Soviet military history has been prejudiced in the West by its over-reliance on German oral and printed sources, without being balanced by a similar examination of Soviet source material. A more complete version of this thesis can be found in his paper “The Failures of Historiography: Forgotten Battles of the German-Soviet War (1941-1945).” Despite his acknowledged expertise, Glantz has occasionally been criticized for his stylistic choices, such as inventing specific thoughts and feelings of historical figures without reference to documented sources.

Glantz is also known as an opponent of Viktor Suvorov's thesis, which he endeavored to rebut with the book Stumbling Colossus.

He lives with his wife Mary Ann Glantz in Carlisle, Pennsylvania. The Glantzes' daughter Mary E. Glantz, also a historian, has written FDR And The Soviet Union: The President's Battles Over Forei

Reviews

[Brett C · Rating 4 out of 5]

This was a detailed narrative about the second Battle of Kharkov in 1942. This was a Soviet counteroffensive that attempted to push out Axis forces and secure both the city and the eastern part of Soviet Ukraine. David Glantz did a terrific job of explaining all the elements of the engagement both strategically and tactically on both German and Soviet leadership angles.

Among the other numerous shortcomings [from the Soviet leadership] during the planning phase of the operation were the failure to organize sufficient fire support, weak intelligence collection and processing, poor force concentration, inaccurate assessment of the correlation of forces, clumsy employment of mobile forces, ineffective co-operation between units, lax combat training and poor use of communications. Once the operation commenced, these faults were exacerbated by weak control of forces in battle, poor and untimely decision-making, and a list of lesser tactical errors. pg 237

This overall was a well-written and detailed account of an important battle and I would recommend this to anyone interested in the Eastern Front of World War II. Thanks!

[Kris · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book is the prototypical book by David Glantz. He wrote this as he was unearthing the large amount of archival records that became availble after the fall of the Soviet Union. He even reprinted entire documents in the book as part of the narrative he used to exam the battle of Kharkov (translated into English). Glantz is at his best for me when he breaks down the battles of the eastern front in this one volume format. He gives enough background to let you know where that particular operation fits in the over all war on the eastern front and then he gives you tons of details about the force composition for both sides and the battle plans that each side had before the battle. He then breaks down each day with a full accounting of the action almost unit by unit in some cases as well as the actions of higher command and the influence that supporting elements have like air power and artillery. He uses all the direct reports while still managing to inject his own analysis into the story in a seamless manner so that you move from each item effortlessly in the story. This battle in particular needs the detailed treatment and attention to detail that Glantz uses as it is a complex battle fought out over a hundred miles of territory with hundreds of thousands of men and thousands of pieces of equipment invovled. I will say that he did slant his attention toward the Soviet accounts more than German but given this was alot of new material that is understandable to me. With the usual caveat about reading a David Glantz book (not for the casaul reader) this is a good book that covers the battle and its larger implications to the war and the two sides invovled very well.

[John · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book was my introduction to David Glantz when it first came out in 1998. It's a scholarly examination of the (then) newly declassified Soviet post-battle analysis of the operation that resulted in the 2nd Battle of Kharkov. A prelude to the Battle of Stalingrad that resulted in a massive Soviet defeat.

While I wouldn't recommend it for someone with just a casual interest, it's a rewarding read for anyone with a more serious interest in Eastern Front operations during WWII.

[Askatasuno · Rating 3 out of 5]

Molta informació, molt crua però molt complerta.

[Lawrence · Rating 4 out of 5]

Kharkov was one of the last German victories on the Russian Front; this is a detailed examination of Soviet command decisions and German battlefield innovations in an important but neglected battle. In this eagerly anticipated book, America's foremost expert in Russian military studies addresses this neglected. Sandwiched as it is between more famous battles, every military history reader knows "about" Kharkov, but there has never been a book that focused exclusively on that campaign. David M. Glantz has now filled the gap.

[Ian Willey · Rating 4 out of 5]

Interesting Russian view, most of the book is an analysis written in the 1960's with fill in detail by Glantz. Well worth picking up for any WWII Eastern Front fan.

[Odyssey · Rating 3 out of 5]

Another book that took me a year and a half to finish, is this a judgement on the book? To some extent yes, but lets take it one step at a time.

First things first, I both loved the book and found it lacking at the same time.

Book starts off outlining political and operational realities prior to the operation, moves on listing forces participating, goes into compositions, brief histories and leaders of the Soviet forces and briefly outlines the German ones, then moves on to the day by day account of the operation, from 12 - 30 May 1942. Finally it looks at some analyses, comments and conclusions.

The book is well researched, from the point of view of Soviet army, the appendices and operational maps are amazing and really let you visualise the operation day by day. Reading the orders in the appendices was a really nice touch as well. However there are some serious flaws.

First is accessibility, the moment I have hit the wall listing armies, divisions and brigades participating in the operation my will to plod on evaporated. The writing can be very dry and that's what made me shelve this book away for more than a year. On top of that the narrators point of view jumps from being impartial voice to Soviet to German side without acknowledgement that a document from that side is being quoted. This reads like it was sloppily put together with editor not bothering to go through it.

Finally for a military history book, I was hoping to see some analysis from the author and conclusions, instead we have a collection of analyses compiled from variety of sources followed by similarly compiled conclusions. Final tiny paragraph is from the author but reads more like an afterthought.

Overall this felt not like an author was presenting a thesis in this book, but more like he was an archivist and simply compiled a bunch of sources together, sometimes in a bit of a haphazard fashion.

This review might read a little negative, but it still doesnt take away from the fact, that the subject matter was well researched with the maps and orders really making the book shine.

[Alex Frame · Rating 3 out of 5]

The little known WW2 eastern front Kharkov offensive and disastrous defeat launched by the Soviets against the Germans in May 1942 is described drily with what available source material could be found from the Soviet archives .
At this point in the war the Germans were poised to launch their summer offensive from the southern front towards the Volga and the Caucasus oil fields which would confuse the Soviets who expected a renewed drive towards Moscow.
The Soviets were not ready or organised to conduct such an offensive as yet and after early promising results , the Germans counter attacked successfully closing a ring around the armies and destroying 250,000 troops.
This would be the last major victory the Germans would have on the eastern front and would lead to their reaching the Volga and the foothills of the Caucasus mountains.
The Germans were still well manned and organised on the ground and in the air at this stage and were able to defeat any enemy of similar strength on the battlefield.
The Soviets would demote this massive battle to a footnote and spend decades trying to find scapegoats.

[Jason · Rating 4 out of 5]

A comprehensive, if unadorned description of the Battle of Kharkov. Told from the Soviet point of view, it covers the forces involved, the commanders and the decisions made that led to one of the lesser well known defeats of the Red Army during WW2. Copious use of maps allows the reader to follow the day by day movement of forces and decipher the strategy employed by the commanders.
Worth a read to see how not to plan and implement an offensive.

[Fred Schwarz · Rating 3 out of 5]

Ah, David Glantz, the molasses of WWII military history. Don’t get me wrong, this book is chock full of information it is just that I find Glantz’s writing style to be thick and dry. Lots of detail presented in a matter-of-fact style that you have to wade through to get to his analysis. Maps were hard to read, and they are critical.

[Les · Rating 3 out of 5]

Dry as a bone. But thorough.

[Richard · Rating 3 out of 5]

the Glantz specialty is access to the Soviet side's documents, and he makes extensive use here. Lots of detail for the wargamer, not much for the general historian.

A useful book.