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Most Helpful Customer Reviews
19 of 21 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Great overview,
By
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This review is from: Barbarossa: The Air Battle July-December 1941 (Hardcover)
Christer Bergstrom did an excellent job with the "Black Cross/Red Star" series and he does the same with this new series. He constantly has a wide range of sources which he calls upon to provide an excellent narrative ranging from primary sources such as former Soviet and German archives to interviews and memoirs of participants and periodicals from the time period as well as a plethora of secondary sources. While the book concentrates to a large degree on the air war Bergstrom also tells us what's happening on the ground, the various affects that the air war had on ground operations helps to put the story in a better context and light as well as the fact that Bergstrom intermixes personal accounts from both sides with the wide picture of what individual fronts, air armies, corps, etc were doing. Losses are constantly tallied and compared against what both sides had claimed, many times it is evident that both Soviet and German pilots exaggerated and at times even under counted what they had accomplished or failed to accomplish!
Some of the more memorable stories would be about a group of 9 Red Air Force (VVS) bombers who were all hit and burning but still flying in formation! They reached their target, released their bombs, and then parachutes could be seen as the crews began to bail out (pg. 55). These heroic exploits can be encountered on practically every page. Bergstrom gives a lot of attention to the suicidal courage that gripped Soviet bomber crews in the first weeks of the war as they constantly went up to bomb enemy targets without fighter cover again and again. It is to a large degree these men that he claims helped save the Soviet Union and held up the Germans again and again as they recklessly risked their lives to give an hour's pause to the German advance. Bergstrom also tackles the myth that the Soviet Union had superiority in 1941, providing reasons for why the VVS was restricted to how many planes it could deploy in the West and at the same time keep up a presence in the South, against the Turkish border, and the East, against the Japanese. Highly rated and recommended for those who want a better understanding of what happened in 1941!
8 of 8 people found the following review helpful:
4.0 out of 5 stars
Highly recommended!,
By Falk (Oslo, Norway) - See all my reviews
Amazon Verified Purchase(What's this?)
This review is from: Barbarossa: The Air Battle July-December 1941 (Hardcover)
The book is based on Black Cross / Red Star vol. 1, and rectifies many of its predecessor`s faults.
This time, the quality of the print is outstanding, with (mostly) crisp, good-quality photos. There even are some color photos and illustrations sprinkled throughout, and the layout is excellent. A much better editing job has also been performed, eliminating the poor language that plagued BC/RS 1. It also benefits from having just one author, giving it a better and more consistent flow. Whereas some felt BC/RS 1 was "fighter-biased", Barbarossa gives a bit more coverage to other aspects of the air war, as well as chronicling the actions on the ground. That being said, it does have its minor flaws: Perhaps not unexpectedly, much of the information and most of the photos have been recycled from BC/RS 1 ( though it appears that a lot more research has been put into this book). On the other hand, BC/RS 1 has been out of print for quite some time, so this might not matter much to the average buyer. It is also considerably shorter, but considering the scope of the campaign, it does succeed in giving quite a good overview of the aerial part of Barbarossa. Numerous peronal experiences make the story come alive. The intention to give the story a balanced view is commendable, and indeed, is one of the book`s strongest points. But I can`t quite escape the feeling that this principle was a little bit too rigidly adhered to ( i.e , if I write one page from the German POV, I`ll have to write one page from the Russian POV as well). An example is the German raids on Moscow, which are given approx. one page of special coverage. The Soviet raids on Berlin are given the same amount of space and actually more text, while the total number of sorties dispatched were only a fraction of the number of even a single German raid. Many of the claims stated are crosschecked with the relevant enemy loss lists, an excellent feature (and time-consuming to research, no doubt), highlighting the sometimes considerable discrepancies so common to air combat. I would have liked this to be done consistently, however. Whether this was not done due to lack of time, lack of space or simply because the records themselves were unavailable, is unclear. But these minor details do not detract from the overall value of this book, and considering the amount and quality of info packed into it, it is quite reasonably priced. Highly recommended! (I have already ordered the other volumes in this series, Stalingrad and Kursk!)
7 of 7 people found the following review helpful:
5.0 out of 5 stars
Black Cross- Red Star revised, updated and written in English,
By
This review is from: Barbarossa: The Air Battle July-December 1941 (Hardcover)
While the first two Black Cross-Red Star volumes were rightly acknowledged as classic works on the air war over the Eastern Front, the lack of copy-editing made those titles a little difficult to read in my view - the author is not a native English speaker and it showed - too many pilots baling out and 'losing their conscience ' for one. These new Ian Allan titles reprise those earlier works but have here taken on a strategic slant and more to the point have been entirely revised and updated. In addition the text has been thoroughly proofed and re-worked by an English writer (Neil Page - translator of the massive JG 300 unit history) making it now possible to read these magisterial overviews of the Eastern Front air war without grimacing. Completed with new personal accounts, new & rare photo selections and much detail from both sides the new volumes in this series are highly recommended
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