BATTLE OF THE BULGE (Images of War) [Paperback]

Andrew Rawson (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 2005 | Series: Images of War

Hitler's desperate last throw during the depths of winter 1944/45 came perilously close to being a major disaster for the Allies. Their offensive through the Ardennes fell on the Americans and caught them totally by surprise. Unaccustomed to setbacks, the situation was for a time extremely serious and in some areas panic set in and events went out of control. It was only after the most bitter fighting and massive reinforcement that the rot was stopped. In this book the drama of those worrying weeks is captured in superb photographs.

Product Details

• Paperback: 112 pages
• Publisher: Pen and Sword (April 2005)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 1844151859
• ISBN-13: 978-1844151851
• Product Dimensions: 9.5 x 7.3 x 0.4 inches
• Shipping Weight: 12.6 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
• Average Customer Review: 3.5 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (6 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #483,979 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Great Collection of Photos, October 1, 2007

By 

Kevin R. Austra (Delaware Valley, USA) - See all my reviews
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This review is from: BATTLE OF THE BULGE (Images of War) (Paperback)

As a collector of almost every book available on the Battle of the Bulge, I added this soft cover volume to my library. In many ways this could be considered the "bargain" version of much heavier books such as THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE: THEN AND NOW.

There is no new material here. Included is a decent selection of photographs, but I regret I have seen them all before in other books. One curious aspect of some of the photos is that some of them bear, what appear to be, military censor scribbles on the pictures. Some village names are scribbled out, as are the faces of American POWs being marched into captivity. Unfortunately there is no narrative explaining where these particular photographs (or their duplicate negatives) originated. What editor or censor saw fit to cross out information, scratch out faces and road signs? This would have made for interesting reading in knowing that we are looking at the same copies of censored photos originally submitted to newspapers and other publications.

Considering the number of journalists and combat photographers in the European Theater at the time, it is amazing that so many aspects of the Bulge were never photographed. Maybe in the heat of battle no one thought to snap a picture of a tank here and burned out hulk there. Of course, serious amateur historians like myself pour over maps and photographs for more info about the many "high water marks" of the battle. The problem is that back then no one could have known what was the high tide, low tide, or spearhead of the offensive. Many still disagree. Indeed, several years ago I authored an article on the German 2nd Panzer Division's push toward Dinant. A US Army veteran, who fought bravely at Elsenborn Ridge, wrote me a letter to impress on me that Elsenborn Ridge was the location of the German spearhead.

It is difficult to predict significant moments in history in advance.

Still IMAGES OF WAR: BATTLE OF THE BULGE is a good book and I keep it nearby when reading (or re-reading) other text-heavy books on the Ardennes Offensive. If you are really intersted in photographs of the Battle of the Bulge, I recommend you pick up THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE: THEN AND NOW or the Goldstein, Dillon and Wenger book NUTS! THE BATTLE OF THE BULGE. THE STORY AND PHOTOGRAPHS.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Close to Perfect Pictorial of Operation Wacht am Rhein, May 28, 2007

By 

Mr. Truthteller (Los Angeles, CA USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: BATTLE OF THE BULGE (Images of War) (Paperback)

As a pictorial history, this book provides a very good perspective on the fighting in the Battle of the Bulge, Dec. 1944 - Jan. 1945. The included photos cover almost every aspect of the battle, such as bridge defenses, artillery emplacements, soldiers in the field, house to house fighting, and, of course, many tanks and tank destroyers.

There are often two to three pictures to a page and the photos themselves are very well reproduced, especially given that this is a paperback. Each picture is also contained to one page, always a sign of good editing. With only a few exceptions, the photos are published for the first time in this volume. Each picture includes a well-written paragraph of text, often anecdotal, describing the context of the photo.

Overall though the text is light on the history of the battle itself and you will not understand what happened in this battle or its importance by reading this book. It is, however, an excellent pictorial supplement to one of the many available books analyzing the entire battle.

There are several imperfections that prevent a five-star rating, including numerous typos, misspellings, and misstatements or exaggerations. Also, the photos are primarily from the American point of view with a smattering of German photos and even fewer still depicting the British.

The photos also include several pictures of soldiers killed in action, primarily Germans. There are two photos that both clearly show a dead American soldier. (These are unusual since such depictions were highly censored by the American Army.) One, sadly, is of a commander of a tank destroyer unit, who has fallen beside his vehicle but his comrades are too actively engaged in the fighting to stop and bury him. I trust he got the hero's burial he deserved.

2 of 2 people found the following review helpful:

1.0 out of 5 stars Some Interesting Pictures, Lots of Bad Information, December 2, 2009

By 

John Guilbault - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: BATTLE OF THE BULGE (Images of War) (Paperback)

What Mr. Rawson has done is publish a semi-interesting collection of pictures, most of which have been published before, and that's about it. His captions are grossly inaccurate and poorly written. He has several pictures of M5 Stuart Light Tanks which he constantly refers to as "Grant" tanks. The Grant was the British version of the M3 Medium Tank. He must like the name Grant, because he also calls a photo of a disabled German tank destroyer a "Grant"! He also calls the M10 Tank Destroyer a "Hellcat", which was actually the name of the M18 Tank Destroyer. Those are just a few of the many examples of inaccuracies I noticed on my first pass through the book. The list goes on far too long to include in this review, but include things such as more misidentified vehicles, incorrect descriptions of where certain units were engaged, photos from places and times that were not part of the battle, etc.

The problem with these types of mistakes is that the author loses all credibility. How can you trust any of his descriptions of the photos if he makes such obvious errors on so many? The shot of some US soldiers sneaking through the woods could be GI's from the 2nd Infantry Division, as the caption says, but how can you know for sure when just a page before he describes a picture of an M10 Tank Destroyer as a "105mm howitzer"? On top of this, his text contains excessively poor grammar, with run-on sentences and poor (or completely absent) punctuation.

Mr. Rawson has obviously not checked his facts, and that makes for a very poor historical work. The prose written at a 5th grade level (my apologies to any 5th graders who take offense) makes it just a bad book in general. I wouldn't waste my money on this. In fact, mine is going back to Amazon tomorrow.