To Lose a Battle

To Lose a Battle
Author: Alistair Horne
Publisher: Penguin UK
Total Pages: 1243
Release: 2007-06-28
Genre: History
ISBN: 0141937726

In 1940, the German army fought and won an extraordinary battle with France in six weeks of lightning warfare. With the subtlety and compulsion of a novel, Horne’s narrative shifts from minor battlefield incidents to high military and political decisions, stepping far beyond the confines of military history to form a major contribution to our understanding of the crises of the Franco-German rivalry. To Lose a Battle is the third part of the trilogy beginning with The Fall of Paris and continuing with The Price of Glory (already available in Penguin).

How Hitler Could Have Won World War II

How Hitler Could Have Won World War II
Author: Bevin Alexander
Publisher: Crown
Total Pages: 370
Release: 2007-12-18
Genre: History
ISBN: 0307420930

From an acclaimed military historian, a fascinating account of just how close the Allies were to losing World War II. Most of us rally around the glory of the Allies' victory over the Nazis in World War II. The story is often told of how the good fight was won by an astonishing array of manpower and stunning tactics. However, what is often overlooked is how the intersection between Adolf Hitler's influential personality and his military strategy was critical in causing Germany to lose the war. With an acute eye for detail and his use of clear prose, Bevin Alexander goes beyond counterfactual "What if?" history and explores for the first time just how close the Allies were to losing the war. Using beautifully detailed, newly designed maps, How Hitler Could Have Won World War II exquisitely illustrates the important battles and how certain key movements and mistakes by Germany were crucial in determining the war's outcome. Alexander's harrowing study shows how only minor tactical changes in Hitler's military approach could have changed the world we live in today. Alexander probes deeply into the crucial intersection between Hitler's psyche and military strategy and how his paranoia fatally overwhelmed his acute political shrewdness to answer the most terrifying question: Just how close were the Nazis to victory?

How to Lose WWII

How to Lose WWII
Author: Bill Fawcett
Publisher: Harper Collins
Total Pages: 308
Release: 2010-08-10
Genre: History
ISBN: 0062000179

How to Lose WWII is an engrossing, fact-filled collection from Bill Fawcett that sheds light on the biggest, and dumbest, screw-ups of the Great War. In the vein of his other phenomenal compendiums of amazing battlefield blunders, How to Lose a Battle and How to Lose a War, Fawcett focuses on some amazing catastrophic missteps of Axis and Allies alike.

The Greatest Blunders of World War II

The Greatest Blunders of World War II
Author: Horace Edward Henderson
Publisher: iUniverse
Total Pages: 738
Release: 2001
Genre: History
ISBN: 0595162673

Adolph Hitler lost WWII because of his blunders and the U.S. and its allies won WWII in spite of their blunders. Nearly a lifetime of research and study by a veteran of World War II reveals the major political and military errors and mistakes which caused the greatest catastrophe in world history, almost lost the struggle with the greatest evil the world has ever known, failed to end the conflict in a decisive victory for the survival of freedom and democracy, subjected the world to almost half a century of fear and turmoil in the Cold War, and wasted vast world resources on armaments while hundreds of millions of people suffered from hunger, illness and death. This analysis of the major issues and campaigns of World War II concentrates on what went wrong with the conduct of the war which needlessly prolonged its brutal end and reveals how narrow was the margin between victory and defeat.

The Second World War

The Second World War
Author: Antony Beevor
Publisher: Back Bay Books
Total Pages: 848
Release: 2012-06-05
Genre: History
ISBN: 0316084077

A masterful and comprehensive chronicle of World War II, by internationally bestselling historian Antony Beevor. Over the past two decades, Antony Beevor has established himself as one of the world's premier historians of WWII. His multi-award winning books have included Stalingrad and The Fall of Berlin 1945. Now, in his newest and most ambitious book, he turns his focus to one of the bloodiest and most tragic events of the twentieth century, the Second World War. In this searing narrative that takes us from Hitler's invasion of Poland on September 1st, 1939 to V-J day on August 14, 1945 and the war's aftermath, Beevor describes the conflict and its global reach -- one that included every major power. The result is a dramatic and breathtaking single-volume history that provides a remarkably intimate account of the war that, more than any other, still commands attention and an audience. Thrillingly written and brilliantly researched, Beevor's grand and provocative account is destined to become the definitive work on this complex, tragic, and endlessly fascinating period in world history, and confirms once more that he is a military historian of the first rank.

Origin Of The Second World War

Origin Of The Second World War
Author: A.J.P. Taylor
Publisher: Simon and Schuster
Total Pages: 324
Release: 1996-04
Genre: History
ISBN: 0684829479

From the Back Cover: From the moment of its publication in 1961, A.J.P. Taylor's seminal work caused a storm of praise and controversy, and it has since been recognized as a classic: the first book ever to examine exclusively and in depth the causes of the Second World War and to apportion the responsibility among Allies and Germans alike. With crisp, clear prose and brilliant analysis, Taylor established that the war, "far from being premeditated, was a mistake, the result on both sides of diplomatic blunders." He argued that Hitler was more an opportunist than an ideologue who owed his successes to Great Britain's and France's tacking between resistance and appeasement, and to an American policy akin to "the significant episode of the dog in the night, to which Sherlock Holmes once drew attention. When Watson objected: 'But the dog did nothing in the night," Holmes answered: 'That was the significant episode.' "The Times Literary Supplement called The Origins of the Second World War "simple, devastating, superlatively readable, and deeply disturbing," and it remains so now-a groundbreaking book of enduring importance.

Attack on Pearl Harbor

Attack on Pearl Harbor
Author: Alan D. Zimm
Publisher: Casemate
Total Pages: 480
Release: 2013-10-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 1612001971

ÒNothing previously published has offered such a close examination of Japanese strategy . . . an in-depth study of the Japanese planning, preparation and execution of the attack with particular focus on factors not thoroughly considered by other historians, if at all . . . detailed analyses that lead to a much better understanding of what the Japanese did, why they did it, and especially how the attack was very nearly an abject failure instead of a stunning success."ÑNaval Institute Proceedings "For seven decades, conventional wisdom has extolled the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor as brilliant in its planning and execution . . . this masterful analysis topples that pillar of Pacific War history . . . with its amazing depth of meticulous research and analysis, this forceful book is essential reading for anyone with a serious interest in Pearl Harbor."ÑWorld War II "The first militarily professional description of the Pearl Harbor attack, and for those who are serious about military history and operations, it is a joy to read. . . . a superb military analysis of the attack . . . not only renders all other histories of Pearl Harbor obsolete, it has set the bar high for other histories of the Pacific War."ÑWar In History

Hitler's Mistakes

Hitler's Mistakes
Author: Ronald Lewin
Publisher:
Total Pages: 184
Release: 1987
Genre: Biography & Autobiography
ISBN: 9780688072896

Based on a wide-ranging synthesis of specialist sources, this account explores the flaws in Hitler's character and how they translated into military blunders and compound failures.

The Wehrmacht Retreats

The Wehrmacht Retreats
Author: Robert M. Citino
Publisher: University Press of Kansas
Total Pages: 440
Release: 2016-09-16
Genre: History
ISBN: 0700623434

Throughout 1943, the German army, heirs to a military tradition that demanded and perfected relentless offensive operations, succumbed to the realities of its own overreach and the demands of twentieth-century industrialized warfare. In his new study, prizewinning author Robert Citino chronicles this weakening Wehrmacht, now fighting desperately on the defensive but still remarkably dangerous and lethal. Drawing on his impeccable command of German-language sources, Citino offers fresh, vivid, and detailed treatments of key campaigns during this fateful year: the Allied landings in North Africa, General von Manstein's great counterstroke in front of Kharkov, the German attack at Kasserine Pass, the titanic engagement of tanks and men at Kursk, the Soviet counteroffensives at Orel and Belgorod, and the Allied landings in Sicily and Italy. Through these events, he reveals how a military establishment historically configured for violent aggression reacted when the tables were turned; how German commanders viewed their newest enemy, the U.S. Army, after brutal fighting against the British and Soviets; and why, despite their superiority in materiel and manpower, the Allies were unable to turn 1943 into a much more decisive year. Applying the keen operational analysis for which he is so highly regarded, Citino contends that virtually every flawed German decision-to defend Tunis, to attack at Kursk and then call off the offensive, to abandon Sicily, to defend Italy high up the boot and then down much closer to the toe-had strong supporters among the army's officer corps. He looks at all of these engagements from the perspective of each combatant nation and also establishes beyond a shadow of a doubt the synergistic interplay between the fronts. Ultimately, Citino produces a grim portrait of the German officer corps, dispelling the longstanding tendency to blame every bad decision on Hitler. Filled with telling vignettes and sharp portraits and copiously documented, The Wehrmacht Retreats is a dramatic and fast-paced narrative that will engage military historians and general readers alike.

Blinders, Blunders, and Wars

Blinders, Blunders, and Wars
Author: David C. Gompert
Publisher: Rand Corporation
Total Pages: 329
Release: 2014-11-26
Genre: History
ISBN: 0833087789

The history of wars caused by misjudgments, from Napoleon’s invasion of Russia to America’s invasion of Iraq, reveals that leaders relied on cognitive models that were seriously at odds with objective reality. Blinders, Blunders, and Wars analyzes eight historical examples of strategic blunders regarding war and peace and four examples of decisions that turned out well, and then applies those lessons to the current Sino-American case.