Customer Reviews

The Greatest Battle: Stalin, Hitler, and the Desperate Struggle for Moscow That Changed the Course of World War II

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3 star:		(16)
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1 star:		(6)

 

 

For some time, the Battle of Moscow has been forgotten and at times disregarded by scholars and others who have argued that the Battle of Stalingrad was the key battle and turning point in the war against Nazi Germany. Andrew Nagorski has written a very interesting and highly accessible book on the months leading up to the near-takeover of Moscow by the Germans, the battle itself, and its aftermath and consequences, demonstrating that the Battle of Moscow was larger in scale than any other battle during the war and may have played an even greater role in the survival of the Soviet Union and the ultimate defeat of Hitler. "The Greatest Battle" is highly enjoyable because it focuses not just on military minutiae, but because it also draws a fabulously rich and detailed picture of the horrors of the Nazi invasion of Russia, the battles leading up to Moscow, and the senseless death and destruction wrought not just by Hitler but also by Josef Stalin, who, as Nagorski takes pains to show, played a key role in the deaths of millions of Russians because of his cruelty and military/strategic negligence.

Nagorski does a great job by weaving in personal stories from various Russian soldiers, workers, doctors, would-by-spies, and others who are still alive and took part in the Battle of Moscow and other events surrounding the June 1941 invasion of the Soviet Union. These vivid accounts that Nagorski unearthed for the first time add rich detail and help establish the incredible magnitude of destruction of the Battle of Moscow. I for one, had no idea that there were millions of casualties in the Battle of Moscow, far surpassing Kurst, Stalingrad, and Leningrad, for example.

Beyond that, Nagorski does well to establish that the Battle of Moscow has often been disregarded, particularly in Russia, because it is filled with many unseemly chapters and stories that Stalin and his successors never wanted to come to light: namely, that Moscow was gripped by complete panic and mass exodus as the Germans closed in, that nearly everyone believed Hitler's capture of the capital city was inevitable, and that Stalin himself was to blame for the Germans' lightning quick advance across Russia from June to October 1941. Indeed, because Stalin had purged many of the nation's great military leaders prior to the war, the army had no real leadership when Germany invaded, leading to early Nazi routs and the near-collapse of Russia in 1941. Nagorski contends that on many levels, Stalin's brutality against his own people was no worse than Hitler's cruelty, but that in the end Russia survived in large part because the Soviets who initially welcomed the Germans as liberators in hopes that Hitler would oust Stalin, quickly turned on the invaders when it became apparent that the Nazis were no better than Stalin's thugs. Indeed, the Russian victory at Moscow thus does not fit neatly within the accepted framework of the Great Patriotic War, as it was incredibly ugly, destructive on an almost unimaginable scale, and won despite the criminal recklessness by Stalin.

"The Greatest Battle" does not give the author's opinion as to whether or not a German victory at Moscow would have ensured that Hitler would have won the war. He does note, however, that besides the massive industrial and strategic rewards Moscow would have provided to Hitler, more than anything else the capture of the Soviet capital would have been a devastating psychological blow to the Soviets. Further, Nagorski does a good job analyzing how Hitler's late invasion of Russia and stalled drive on Moscow -- William L. Shirer labeled the former Hitler's greatest blunder -- contributed heavily to the Nazis' eventual defeat on the outskirts of the capital and in the war itself

If nothing else, "The Greatest Battle" is a great tale of one of the key battles that turned the tide against Hitler, and is much more readable than other excellent studies of the Russian-German war, such John Erickson's "The Road to Stalingrad: Stalin's War With Germany", and R.H.S. Stolfi's "Hitler's Panzers East" (a very good examination of the Battle of Moscow written mostly from the German perspective). It delves into rare, vivid personal accounts of the Battle itself which are invaluable and fascinating (such as how Stalin ordered the evacuation of Lenin's body from Moscow as the Germans closed ub, the great and then-ignored work of Russian master spy Richard Sorge who may have single-handedly saved Russia in 1941 with his intelligence reports, and other superb nuggets), and gives a great appreciation of the terrible scale of the Nazi invasion of Russia and how Stalin's monstrous leadership just barely let Russia escape being conquered by Hitler. "The Greatest Battle" is a quick read, and even casual students of World War II should enjoy it.

Four stars.

Anton Chekhov was certainly prophetic when he wrote that line, perhaps no more so than in connection with the titanic clash between the USSR's Red Army and Germany's Wehrmacht in the opening months of the war on the east front in 1941/1942. Andrew Nagorski's "The Greatest Battle: Stalin, Hitler, and the Desperate Struggle for Moscow that Changed the Course of World War II" is a compelling, well-written examination of an epic and bloody battle for survival.

Winston Churchill once wrote that "history is written by the victors". Nagorski takes the view here that sometimes history also is not written by the victors when that history doesn't serve the victor's purposes. At the outset of the "Greatest Battle" Nagorski points out that while much has been written of the battles of Leningrad, Stalingrad, and Kursk for example the battle that ended on the outskirts of Moscow has been subjected to far less scrutiny by historians. Nagorski suggests that a primary reason why Moscow has received less historical scrutiny is the fact that the victor, in this case Stalin's USSR, had little to gain by promoting a battle that would cast Stalin in a less favorable light than Stalingrad or Kursk. Documents locked in NKVD/KGB archives stayed locked well past Stalin's regime. However, since the fall of the USSR a great amount of previously uncovered records has led both Russian and western historians to take a new look at the battle for Moscow.

Nagorski has done an excellent job here in amassing a tremendous amount of research material and presenting it in a way that can be appreciated by readers with either a general or specific interest in the subject matter. One of the great strengths of the book is Nagorski's wide-ranging approach to the battle. He does not rely on the old chestnut that it was simply the winter that stopped Hitler's armies. Rather, Nagorski spends a good deal of time (productively) setting out a whole range of interconnected decisions that had an impact of the course of the battle. For example, we see how Stalin's horrific purge of the Red Army in 1937 and the army's disastrous campaign in the Russo-Finnish war helped lead Hitler to conclude that a war in the east would be nasty, brutal, short and victorious. At the same time Nagorski points out how a good showing by the USSR's soldiers against Japan in Mongolia in 1939, led by Georgy Zhukov, was most likely a factor in Japan's decision not to support the German invasion by attacking Russia in the east. This decision allowed the USSR to rush 250,000 Red Army soldiers from Siberia, equipped with winter clothing, to join in the defense of Moscow. As Nagorski points out their arrival was critical to successful defense of Moscow.

Nagorski also does a good job of weaving individual stories into his `big-picture' narrative. This adds a bit of real flavor to the story he is telling and also avoids the trap of writing solely from the actions of the large players on the stage. I would note, however, that "Greatest Battle" is not really what I would call a military history. You won't see an order of battle or a narrative detailing military strategy. This is not a criticism as much as it is a notice to readers that this is an excellent general overview of the first seven months of the war in the east and was not intended to be a military treatise in the style of the incomparable David Glantz.

Last, there are three books that would serve as an excellent complement to "Greatest Battle". Nagorski makes favorable mention of the writing of Vasily Grossman a wonderful journalist and writer. His book Life and Fate (New York Review Books Classics)is a classic account of the great war as any I have read. Grossman's war reporting for the Red Army newspaper is mentioned by Nagorski often and can be found in - A Writer at War: A Soviet Journalist with the Red Army, 1941-1945. Last, Nagorski did an excellent job in connecting the fateful decisions made by Hitler, Stalin, and others. Ian Kershaw's Fateful Choices: Ten Decisions That Changed the World, 1940-1941really compelements what Nagorski has done so admirably in his Greatest Battle.

Highly recommended. L. Fleisig

The book would be better titled, "The political background to the greatest battle." With its actual title, you expect to learn of the movement of divisions and street-to-street fighting, but the author spends more time on Stalin's dacha's water pipe leaks, secret police machinations, and the preservation of Lenin's body. He's good at describing the mindless terror that Stalin perpetuated on his own people, but the book is terribly mis-titled and misleading in its promotion. There are interesting details about the desperate provisions of the Russian strategy to save the city, and of Stalin's foolish refusals to believe that Hitler would attack him in the first place. But, as a saga of battles for great cities, the book can't begin to compare with the likes of "The 900 Days" about the siege of Leningrad, just as one example. It's an average read, not outstanding, and not what you'd think you'd be reading about.

One of the most astonishing books I have ever read in my life.
Nobody has ever done anything like it! It reads like Tolstoy's "War and Peace". Once you start it you won't be able put it away. It's amazing that nobody until now had enough courage to put it all on paper.
Very few had access to the sources used by author. It's a gigantic undertaking and it shows on every page.
The book has changed my understanding of what went on in the East in 1941. Nagorski also explains Stalin's war techniques which allowed him later to gain control of half of the European continent. I hope the book gets translated first of all into Russian and also into other European languages. They need to have a better understanding of the unknown episodes of WW II.

Andrew Nagorski seems to be a borrower of techniques, most notably from Studs Terkel (The Good War: An Oral History of World War II) and Anne Applebaum (Gulag: A History).

Nagorski's "The Battle of Moscow" is not an academic history by any means. Nor does it have the compelling power of Stephen Ambrose's works. Rather it is an extended narrative of the contest for Moscow between German and Soviet forces in 1941.

Nagorski attempts to weave military, political and personal histories together in a coherent narrative. To a large extent, he succeeds. The serious military or political historian will probably be disappointed by Nagorski's generally superficial treatment. Often he sounds like a jaded tour guide, which is creepy when he describes the aftermath of battle with hundreds or thousands of mangled corpses on the field.

To his credit, though, Nagorski has done a credible job of digging out Soviet survivor stories, both of soldiers and civilians. For decades, the Soviet government suppressed anything other than the official line which trumpeted the triumph of the state and Stalin and minimized the role of individuals. Too often, however, Nagorski appears to think he is writing for a local newspaper and pops in survivor's tales for "color".

Further, to his credit, Nagorski pulls no punches in his criticism of people like Walter Duranty, the New York Times "reporter" who won a Lenin Prize for his outrageously dishonest stories about the Soviet Union and people like Harry Hopkins, the notoriously pro-Soviet Roosevelt advisor who suppressed the truth about Stalin's evil.

Overall, Nagorski does a reasonably good job of covering the enormous scope of the battle for Moscow, Stalin and Hitler's incredible power to kill millions, the heroism of individuals, the misery of way. The chronological approach works to Nagorski's disadvantage because he can't devote sufficient attention to many aspects of the war, the battle and the respective political systems.

"The Greatest Battle" is a good place to start for those who want to dip their toe into military history, particularly the too long neglected Soviet contribution to Allied victory in WWII.

Jerry

Having heard both good and bad about Nagorski's book I was interested to finally get to it. Sadly, from page one I knew I was going to be disappointed. To begin with, generalizations are not a good way to start off a book. Yet the author quickly claims that "Stalin sent many of his troops into battle without guns, since he hadn't prepared the nation for the German onslaught." Source? None. How many is many? Where and when did this happen? While there would be a few examples of this throughout the book, as I'll point out later in this review, they are either taken out of context or not given enough context to conform to the author's initial revelation.

Nagorski makes a claim as to why the battle for Moscow was so important by invoking the casualties sustained during the battle, which, he says, ranged for 203 days. He then juxtaposes them with Stalingrad, claiming that the two sides lost 912,000 troops. The reality is that the Soviet side alone suffered over 1.1 million casualties during the Stalingrad defensive and offensive phase. Note that this does include sick and wounded as well as irrecoverable losses. This isn't to say that in the end the Battle for Moscow probably did consume more casualties, but why not then present the accurate numbers?

On page 9 we have the infamous Molotov-Ribbentrop pact being brought up, apparently this was to signal the beginning of WWII. Somehow I don't recall Hitler actually wanting to go to war with either England or France over Poland. The basis for his supposition that Hitler and Stalin were "alike" and "mirrored" each other is a survivor of the war and a citizen of Moscow who served six years in a GULag camp, apparently Nagorski cannot find someone with more authority on the subject of two of the most deadly dictatorships and their leaders. The author talks about the similarities in both Hitler and Stalin's upbringing, specifically their authoritarian fathers. Then quickly backtracks to say that most others probably grew up in the same type of environment yet turned out perfectly fine.

Once again one hears about the 'man-made' famine in Ukraine, no proof or sources or the fact that it affected other parts of the country aside from Ukraine, page 13. For an author who self-admittedly knew little to nothing about the battle for Moscow and had to take years to research it, he's quick to make a variety of ambiguous and generalized statements about issues he also knows little to nothing about. Nagorski parrots the idea that the Balkans were the cause of the delay when it came to Barbarossa, pgs. 24-25 (the invasion was also delayed because of the extra long rasputitsa, but we don't read about that here). He claims that Richard Sorge's predictions were "right on target", far from it in fact. If they were "right on target" Hitler would have attacked the Soviet Union on at least 3 different dates before June 22nd.

On page 37 we have the claim that the 41st infantry division, this is an error in and of itself since Red Army divisions were 'rifle' not 'infantry', contained 15,000 men. A quick glance through Alexei Isaev's book "Ot Dubno do Rostova" shows that the division, part of the 6th Rifle Corps, had 9,912 men. While Nagorski does provide endnotes he does a horrid job with them. It is, at this point, that I came to the realization that I will very rarely be able to use this work as a source when it comes to Nagorski's commentary and analysis. On the other hand, while the author gets the number of men in the division wrong the following account of the division's commander and his interaction with an agent of the NKVD is quite fascinating. Even though there was an order to arrest the commander for shooting back at the invading Germans, which contradicted the first order that came out on June 22nd, the NKVD agent allowed the commander to go back into his dugout where he was visited by his aides as the fighting continued. Eventually, the commander would join the fight with his troops as the pretense for his arrest was dropped.

At last, we come to the source for the idea that Red Army troops were sent into battle without guns. A political officer from the 375th Regiment, a regiment that does not exist (after searching through the OoB for the Northwestern front, which the author says this unit belonged to, I searched through the Order of Battle of ALL Red Army Divisions which existed on June 1941, there was no such regiment, perhaps the author mixed it up with another, if anyone does know of its existence, please, leave a comment), says that he asked his commander to give them weapons, since they were fighting without guns...etc. If this was a real unit, I could try to look up it's table of organization and equipment and see how many weapons they had, but as this appears to be a 'phantom' unit, I can only do so much.

Another incident is related when a father, long after the war, would tell his son how his unit was given one weapon per ten men. Although it isn't clearly stated if they did any fighting, if they did it isn't mentioned where or when. 1941 was a chaotic year, many things were possible and this might have occurred, but the author does little to assure the reader that he's thoroughly researched each event he is writing about. An interesting account is given as Khrushchev calls in from Kiev saying that the factory workers want to fight but they need weapons, the response is that no weapons will be forthcoming as they have been sent to Leningrad. Rather, they should use home made weapons and anything else at their disposal. A story is related of when a volunteer of a unit is sent off to the front without a military ID, when captured by NKVD agents he has only his civilian and student ID which makes them assume he is a spy. After being interrogated and beaten he is sent to another NKVD officer who has the forethought to listen to him and check his story out, the end result being that he is released.


On page 70 the author, for some reason, mentions order No. 227, which was issued in the summer of 1942 before Stalingrad was besieged, why is this mentioned in a book that talks about the battle for Moscow in the winter of 1941/1942? Nagorski exaggerates what happened to POWs after they were liberated or escaped to their own lines saying those who managed to escape were lucky to be arrested, if they weren't lucky they were executed. Somehow he misses how millions of them were integrated back into the Red Army, sent to construction battalions, joined convoy troops, etc. He also takes order 270, from August 16, 1941, out of context and makes an error when paraphrasing it, he makes it seem as if the 1st part applies to all soldiers when in fact it only applied to officers and political workers.

A rather ignorant error is made when discussing an NKVD report dated October 10, 1941, which lists soldiers who were rounded up after escaping from the front. He insists that the majority, who were used to form new units, were used to create penal battalions. This is not possible since penal battalions were only created with order 227 in the summer of 1942. The author also claims that GULag prisoners were put into penal battalions, this is untrue, they joined regular units.

A largely exaggerated number is given of Poles who were deported in the two year period of 1939-1941. I find it hard to fathom how the author can make the statement that "neither side had time to lay down mines" while he is searching a part of the battlefield with a Russian research group who explain that children were dying after the war due to ordinance left in the woods and other areas. Was it that neither side had time when located in the vicinity which he was visiting? Was it that few mines were laid down in 1941? As I recall millions of mines were used throughout the Eastern Front. Perhaps context isn't an integral part of the research for this book.

On pages 217 and 218 the author talks about 400,000 troops being moved out from the Far East to help the Red Army fight the Germans, of whom 250,000 helped defend Moscow in late 1941 and early 1942. No real evidence is given, no units are listed, and no sources presented to back this assertion up. There were quite a few divisions moved from the Far East, that is the Far Eastern Front and the TransBaikal Front, to the West, starting in June of 1941 (two divisions were ordered to move in June) and eventually 9 divisions participated in the Battle for Moscow up until October, some of which were tank divisions. The majority of those were alerted in October and arrived at the front in November. I think the numbers given are in fact exaggerated, but forces from the Far East, and various other fronts/districts, were constantly on the move to bolster those fighting the Germans. I see no reason to give so much credit to just 'Siberian' divisions when so many others also participated.

I found it interesting and enlightening that when a veteran recalled seeing NKVD blocking detachments for the first time, he even today approved of them, stating that "such toughness brought us victory." Again and again one will find interesting stories being related by veterans that the author has interviewed, but that's mainly the only worth I can see in this book. The chapters are not really arranged chronologically as again and again each new chapter brings with it a back story from the 1930's or even earlier. The author's conclusions are reaching, baseless, and in many instances lack context. The only positive side, is once again, the veteran recollections, and sad to say that at times those might not be totally accurate.

A thought while reading this book was, "if you're not going to do it justice, why do it?" This book never got settled on what it was supposed to be. The proportion of space devoted to pre-invasion conditions versus what the title implies: a massive battle that began the Nazi war machine on its path to defeat is one problem with it. The battle itself is given short shrift for all its purported magnitude. For example, details surrounding the defense of Tula, the strategic and human story of how it was held, what made it one of the "hero cities" is missing and Tula is given only passing mention. Another example, if one is not going to cover the clashes in much detail, there are certainly many yet to be explored dimensions of the feat of moving whole factories from Moscow and surroundings to beyond the Urals and how this was accomplished. Instead we get an ultimately pointless story of how Lenin's body and his embalmers were moved beyond the Urals. Why? Apparently because the author became acquainted with a family involved and for no other reason.
Much time is spent on what caused the weakness and vulnerability of the Soviet Union by June 22, 1941. This is better detailed elsewhere beginning with Robert Services books. For the Nazi/Soviet pact, "The Deadly Embrace" by Read and Fisher covers this better. The book does not bring anything new to these issues, except for one or two new anecdotes. The early phase of Barbarossa, which Nagorski covers in an unsatisfying way is much better rendered by Alan Clark in "Barbarossa", a book much wider in scope, but which does a pitch-perfect job of covering this disastrous phase of the war. My point here is that either these aspects should have been covered more briefly and more given about the battle itself or much more fleshing out was needed of the events leading up to a more detailed, deeper story of the battle of Moscow, that is a bigger book. Instead we get middling versions of both these phases. Even things I liked evoked the inadequacies of the book. For example, Nagorski exceptionally describes the fate of one of the oft-mentioned German soldiers who crossed the lines to warn of the attack and this is commendable and tantalizingly showed what the author might have accomplished more fully as far as the events that led up to the "greatest battle". All in all this was an uneven work that seemed haphazardly edited. The story of the blocking battalions is introduced twice within a few pages as one example. A book like this might make one wonder what had to be left out based on a plethora of material that had to be edited down. Instead, I sensed that the author and editors apparently managed to string together relatively little material and give it a grandiose title.

Nagorski has written a decent general overview of the struggle between Nazi Germany and Soviet Russia, detailing the rise of the respective regimes and their relations up until about 1942. The only problem is, the book is supposed to be specifically about the Battle of Moscow and how it was the most important battle of the war. He begins the book by claiming that this battle is often overlooked in favor of Stalingrad as the turning point of the war, and sets out to explain how Moscow was the biggest and most significant battle the world has ever seen. This may very well be true, but unfortunately, I just wasn't convinced by this book.

Aside from the introduction, he barely even mentions Moscow until halfway through the book. He spends way too much time detailing political and diplomatic events leading up to, and during the war, including whole chapters on the diplomatic experiences of American and British ambassadors, for example. He also concentrates too heavily on the general machinations of the Nazi and Soviet war machines which have been thoroughly covered elsewhere. In other words, he wastes page after page on details that describe aspects of the war in general, rather than details specific to this particular campaign. This is not to say that this information was incorrect or unenlightening, but I found it to be wholly superfluous to the topic at hand. That being said, several other reviewers have pointed out some glaring factual errors. I can neither confirm or deny these, but it should be noted.

Overall, I would say that while there is some worthwhile information about the eastern front here, the book is way too scattered and broad in scope, and because of this, ultimately fails to deliver on its intended promise. 3 stars.

Breezy may seem a strange adjective for a book about perhaps one of the most tragic and bloody battles in human history, but Nagorski's talents and style as a Newsweek reporter and editor do indeed make this excellent book a very readable, almost breezy account. The Greatest Battle is disturbing, engrossing, and educational. Like many others, I possessed at least a passing familiarity with the great battles that occurred between the Soviets and the Germans in and around Leningrad, Stalingrad and Kursk, but knew very little about the battle for Moscow and how chillingly close the Germans came to conquering the Soviet capital. The Greatest Battle is a very well documented study with much new material drawn from recently released KGB and other previously unavailable Russian files. What makes Nagorski's book so readable and gripping though is his obvious and successful effort to show the battle from the viewpoints not only of the big guys like Hitler and Goebbels and Stalin and Molotov but also from the viewpoints of frustrated generals on both sides, the foot soldiers who suffered almost indescribably, and individual civilians. While many of us are aware of some of the hardships endured by soldiers and civilians during this horrible conflict, Nagorski succeeds in both describing and quantifying that suffering in a way that makes one almost gasp at the magnitude and inhumaneness of it all. All the while he constantly reminds us that all of it resulted from the perverse minds of two egomaniacal madmen for whom human life, with the possible exception of their own, meant nothing at all.

I'd expected a history book like Bevoir's about Stalingrad, but Nagorski's work is more of journalistic than a military history. Rather than describing, say, how the 35th Panzer Division maneuvered against the 104th Cossacks and which village was captured when, Nagorski intersperses descriptions of the war and national leaders like Stalin and Molotov with interviews of soldiers, lesser politicians, and citizens who lived through it.

I hadn't realized that many of the Russians who lived through the war are still alive and available for the first time. We are probably at the end of the time when they could be interviewed and Nagorski has done that, creating an oral history of the war and the battle along with the more conventional sources. The story by the family responsible for continuing to embalm Lenin's corpse got to me the most for sheer creepiness. But the accounts of how troops were shot if they retreated or were captured adds a dimension of understanding to what had seemed inexplicable fatalism among Soviet soldiers.

An exception and extremely interesting work. I only wish similar histories had been written about earlier wars.