Customer Reviews

Citizen Soldiers: The U.S. Army from the Normandy Beaches to the Buldge to the Surrender of Germany Jun 7, 1994-May 7, 1945

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Though I consider myself to be a "fan" (if that is the right term) of World War II literature, I often find myself shying away from those sorts of books as I tend to get a bit lost in trying to comprehend the entire war at one time. What with events such as Pearl Harbor, D-Day, the European Front, the Russian Front, and the Pacific Front (all of which could fill volumes), it is easy to get lost in such things as trivial details, battalion numbers, and battle strategies.

The beauty of Stephen Ambrose's "Citizen Soldiers", however, is that by focusing on one aspect of the War (U.S. Army, Europe, June 7, 1944 through May 7, 1945, as is listed on the front cover), Ambrose is able to aptly tell the tale of that wartime campaign in the kind of detail it requires. All the major events (D-Day, Market Garden, The Bulge, etc.) are covered in enough detail to give you a picture of what was happening, combined with enough personality to make you understand (if at all possible) what it was like to be there.

Though most of the book follows the events of World War II in chronological order, I actually found my favorite section to be where Ambrose takes a bit of an "aside" to explain such things as:

-Being on the front lines (especially during the long, freezing campaign in the Ardennes Forest)
-How the replacement/reinforcement system worked (and, consequently, didn't work)
-The U.S. Army's considerable air superiority to the German Luftwaffe and what is was like to go to battle in the air.
-The horrors seen and the noble deeds accomplished by the doctors, medics, and nurses who helped keep soldiers both physically healthy and psychologically stable.
-Being a prisoner of war (on both sides).

I found Ambrose to do a marvelous job of attempting to describe the life of a U.S. Army soldier in WWII Europe. Whether it was the major battles and campaigns, or just "a day in the life of a soldier", Ambrose succeeds at capturing the essence of exactly what was transpiring both on the battlefield, in the "down time", and in the mind of each soldier.

Also, I think that the strength of Ambrose as a historian shines the brightest in, of all places, the Afterword section of the book, where he essentially wishes that he could have done more. He recounts a few of the letters written to him from soldiers on that European front, and opines that he could have included all of them. Just knowing that his task's focus couldn't be too big (to risk dilution of the material) or too small (to risk over-specialization on one topic) is, in my mind, enough to cement him as a top historian of all-time. He truly wished that ALL the stories could be told.

So, I would highly recommend this book to anyone wanting to learn more about both the European World War 2 theater, and just what it was like to be a soldier at that time and place in the U.S. Army. It will be even more of an emotional experience if a family member or friend served in army that Ambrose writes about. My grandfather, Ray Koenig, was part of the European campaign, and I came away from this book understanding just a bit more about what he went through for his country.

This Book Shows How Unready, We Were For WW2. How Soldiers Couldn't Speak With Air Cover Or Tanks In Combat Not Because Of The Technology Wasn't There,Just Wasn't Thought Out. How The Men On The Ground Had To Figure Out How To Attack. Germany Had The Best Leadership At The Time. What Won The War For The Allies Was Mass Amounts Of Equipment,We Could Bring To The Fight. And The American And Canadain Soldiers That Used Common Since Learned On The Farms and Streets Of NY. That Turned The Nazi Tide. Not One Man. Not Patton, Not Ike, Not Churchhill, But The Boys That Became Men.