Customer Reviews

Hitler's Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich

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Bartov does a fine job revealing how the average German soldier thought, how the savagery of the combat combined with their own racialist attitudes towards their opponent to allow them to commit or tolerate the commission of atrocities. Bartov also describes how the vaunted mechanized Panzer army quickly bogged down into WWI-style infantry combat, and that the high rate of casualties destroyed German unit integrity. Bartov's description of German soldiers' "war tourism," including photographing mass executions of Jews, dispels myths about the "good" Germans. They may not have all been Nazis, and they were not all war criminals, but by and large they did share Hitler's racial attitudes. This accounts for their grim fanatical resistance as well as the atrocities. Highly recommended.

I had to read Bartov's book for a college class years ago and recently re-read this wonderful book. As historians, I like to believe that most of us want to know why things have happened vs what has happened. Bartov's "Hitler's Army" does just that. It is common for Americans 50 years later to want to believe that the whole of WWII Germany were good, patriotic people fighting for a cause that they were brainwashed into believing. Bartov's "Hitler's Army" explains how the average German male, growing up in Nazi Germany, joining the Hitler Youth, and being just as patriotic as GI Joe was, came to be the tool of Nazi ideology, especially on the Eastern front. Bartov's comparisons of "average" soldiers on the Eastern front vs "average" soldiers on the Western front gives a prime example of how Nazi ideology had influenced the minds of German youth. Given the psychological and physical impact of such intense combat under the gruesome conditions the Eastern front soldier had to deal with, it is common for men to cling to beliefs in order to justify their actions. Beliefs instilled in them through years of conditioning, backed by severe punishment if they failed to follow such beliefs and actions forced upon them by their commanders. German soldiers were no different than Marines of the Pacific theater. Marines who collected Japanese ears and gold teeth as souvenirs. Bartov does a superb job of placing blame where it needed to be placed. At the same time, Bartov allows the reader to understand how the accused were breed into such positions of blame. An excellent read for anyone who wants to understand the mindset of the "average" German soldier during WWII.

One of the most troubling and horrific aspects of the four-year long Eastern campaign begun in June 1941 by the Germans is the effect it had on their soldiers, who were pounded mercilessly by the evolving circumstances of the battle month after month along a thousand mile front. When that front gradually turned into a quicksilver panorama of different conflicts in quick succession over a variety of terrain, against an ever-changing cast of millions of Russian soldiers, the war became a living hell for the foot soldier of the Wehrmacht.

In this excellent exposition by Harvard fellow Bartov, the focus remains on the nature of the blood-thirsty struggle between the forces of the Wehrmacht on the one hand, and their seemingly indefatiguable Soviet opponents on the other. From the beginning the Germans were horrified by the fighting ferocity of their foes, who would fight literally until they were dead, who seldom surrendered, and who seemed propelled by an energy and life-force quite unlike anything the Germans had witnessed up to that point. They would fight until the ammunition was exhausted, and then fight on with fixed bayonets, with swords, and with knives, hand to hand, until they were all dead.

Of course, the Germans were no strangers to savage warfare, and had been forged in the crucible of prior conflicts into a rugged hardiness that made them formidable foes indeed. Yet they were singularly unprepared for the energy and determination the Russians showed them at every turn. The experience was quite educational, and made the Germans even more savage in their own execution of the war. Given the long chain for logistics support and the elusive nature of the much-hoped for collapse of the Soviet Army and a subsequent capitulation by the communist regime, the average German foot soldier found himself forced to commit his own series of personal day to day atrocities just to survive in the harsh and unforgiving winter conditions of rural, agrarian Russia.

This tome is an explorations of the depths of depravity and savage circumstances the German soldier found himself subjected to, and how this experience molded him more and more into the shape of the Hitlerian conception of the Eastern war as a war for the survival of the Aryan race against the sub-human Slavic hordes. Seen in this way, the German soldier fought for the survival not of himself and his comrades, but for the survival of the German race as well. Given the extraordinary set of existential circumstances present, it is not hard to understand how Hitler's world view and his racist ideas eventually became so widespread and so fervently believed among the German troops along the Eastern front. Stripped of their original comrades, and thrown together into a constantly changing set of organizations with an ever-changing cast of individual players, 0ne found oneself more and more hypnotized by the facile rhetoric and actions of the Third Reich. This is an absorbing and thought-provoking book, and one I am sure you will take pleasure in reading. Enjoy!

This book is a "micro history" that uses a case study of three German army units, as well as information about other units, to detail the experience of the German army on the Eastern Front. Bartov seeks to prove and then to explain why and how the German army engaged in war crimes on the Eastern front that have previously been blamed on only the SS.
The one fault I have with this book is there isn't really much new information that isn't in Bartov's previous work on the Eastern front. I do wish he would have included further information on additional units for this book.

The information used to form the arguments in this book was very weak.Many letters from the eastern front were used,to show how the German soldiers still had faith in Hitler. I would like for the author to show ANY letter from any soldier from any country that made it through censors that was not upbeat and full of faith in their leadership. Needless to say I was very disapointed with this book. It is of minimal use as any sort of a refernce.

Bartov discusses here the potential causes for the endurance of the German soldier on the Eastern front as well as for his ferocious barbarism during that conflict.

He convincingly dismisses the "primary group" (social nuclei of soldiers from similar geographical origins) as a cause because of the large losses, especially among replacements, and of the large turnover of soldiers at the Eastern front.
His dismissal of harsh discipline as a cause is not quite as convincing, especially since he uses the soldier's fear of punishment and of his commanders as an explanation for his barbarity against Russian POWs and civilians (as some sort of cathartic emotional release). He also recognizes that the soldier was faced with a choice between likely death at the front or certain execution fleeing from the front when caught. And the flying court martials used during the end of the war did use the death penalty to enforce last stand fighting among the troops.
He finally assigns the German soldier's endurance to his indoctrination in Nazi ideology (especially in "Weltanschauung" or, in my own loose translation, "view of the world as it should be"); in religious faith in the Fuehrer as the savior of Germany and of its "Volk" and "Kultur"; to his long-standing racial prejudices (after all, except for older soldiers, he was raised in Nazi Germany since 1933 and had been a member of the Hitler Jugend and the Reichs Arbeits Dienst where he was thoroughly indoctrinated and trained); and to his fear of reprisals by the Russians both on German civilians and on German soldiers for the atrocities he committed in the East. All valid points in my opinion but since there is quite a bit of literature (mentioned and analyzed in Bartov's book) that depicts the German soldier as first a victim of brutality and only second as a perpetrator of brutality (what Bartov calls the reversal of cause and effect) the reader will have to form its own opinion. Still I think that not only indoctrination, but indoctrination combined with harsh discipline, was the cause of the soldier's determination, especially since indoctrination and discipline reinforced each other.

Bartov also discusses what he termed the "demodernization of the front" brought about by the terrific losses in tanks and other heavy weapons and reverting the Russian front to trench warfare similar to 1914/18. Although losses in materiel were indeed heavy and could not be made up by German war production, one (such as Professor Citino who, in his Death of the Wehrmacht: The German Campaigns of 1942 (Modern War Studies) , concluded that the Wehrmacht was not that modern to start with) can argue that the German operational tactics were already rooted in 14-18 and prior wars such as 1870/71.

Finally, it is interesting to note that at the end of his book, which he wrote during the German reunification, Bartov expresses concerns about the new German superpower (FRG+GDR) overcoming "prejudices against the "other"", still existing in both republics under the surface in his opinion. Sounds like Bartov's own prejudice against the Germans for the sins of mostly their grand-parents (2 generations removed from the war).

Omer Bartov challenges the conventional wisdom that the Germany army was an apolitical organization that Hitler horribly misuses. He examines the degradation of the army on the Eastern front and shows how the apolitical army (if it ever existed) was largely destroyed in the first year of fighting and reconstituted with individuals who had not been steeped in the old independent army culture, but were products of the Nazi political state. I found it very persuasive.

Bartov's book focuses on the German Army fighting on the Eastern Front. Bartov challenges the previous, although outdated, thought that the German military was apolitical and a wholly professional fighting force. The author points out that the Army was eventually molded in Hitler's image, with the army eventually seeing the war as a fight to defend German civilization from Jews and Bolsheviks. Although I don't agree with every little detail of the book, it is very interesting. The only downfall is that Bartov does tend to repeat himself and that the book can be dry at times. Still, though, it is worth a read.

The book is actually rather short, less than 200 pages. But the book might have been better received by me if it were an article. First off, Bartov includes too many sources and excerpts most of which demonstrate the same point, over and over. Additionally most of the excerpts were not necessarily of exception quality, which meant the reader reads account after account of the same type of entries about ideology or the horror of war. At one point, it was just better to read only one excerpt and skip the rest.

Bartov also just simply doesn't convince me of his thesis. In the last three chapters, there were so many excerpts I simply forgot what he was trying to prove. And when he did go back to his ideas, he would suddenly make, in my opinion, great leaps of logic. After a few excepts he might say something like, that demonstrated that the soldiers were completely indoctrinated in Nazi ideology. Well, I'm not so convinced because even though they were fed propaganda, who is to say they didn't already have their predispositions and prejudices against "jewish bolschevism," before joining the army, and more importantly, before Hitler even came to power? He also concludes at the end that the Germans removed themselves from hitler and made themselves victims and that, so-to-speak, "others" committed the crimes of WWII, whether it be on the east front or Holocaust. Regardless of whether or not that's true, the conclusion came seemingly out of nowhere and I have a hard time believing his statement, because he doesn't explain it. He doesn't explain how they remove themselves, etc.

Lastly, this is probably just a pet peeve, but I hate how random german words pop up in excerpts and in the text that aren't translated, but others are. He talks about an author having heard a veteran in a "german Kneipe," but didn't bother translating it to bar. Or in my translated texts, he leaves some german phrases in brackets. I just find it redundant and at the very least, inconsistent.

The first chapter, however, is a rather good description of "demodernization on the front," and worth reading. The rest of it is rather, mediocre.

Bartovs dubious method to prove that the German soldiers were influenced by Nazi-Ideology by using letters which were edited by the german Ministry of Propaganda (!!!!), isn't a serious scientific method. He selects his sources with view to his wished findings and ignores many other, more scientific editions of letters of German soldiers, because they would contradict his theories.
In some cases he has interesting ideas, but he can't prove them by sources. In general he simplifies to much and doesn't try to get a more differentiated view.
There are much better books which fulfil scientific claims, like the books of Wolfram Wette, Harald Welzer, Hannes Heer and Gerd Ueberschär - but they aren't translated up to now. Maybe "The War behind the Eastern Front" from Alexander Hill is an alternative.