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Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II Mass Market Paperback – April 29, 2003

by Belton Y. Cooper (Author), Stephen E. Ambrose (Foreword)

334 customer reviews

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“Cooper saw more of the war than most junior officers, and he writes about it better than almost anyone. . . . His stories are vivid, enlightening, full of life—and of pain, sorrow, horror, and triumph.”
—STEPHEN E. AMBROSE
From his Foreword

“In a down-to-earth style, Death Traps tells the compelling story of one man’s assignment to the famous 3rd Armored Division that spearheaded the American advance from Normandy into Germany. Cooper served as an ordnance officer with the forward elements and was responsible for coordinating the recovery and repair of damaged American tanks. This was a dangerous job that often required him to travel alone through enemy territory, and the author recalls his service with pride, downplaying his role in the vast effort that kept the American forces well equipped and supplied. . . . [Readers] will be left with an indelible impression of the importance of the support troops and how dependent combat forces were on them.”
—Library Journal

“[DEATH TRAPS] FILLS A CRITICAL GAP IN WW2 LITERATURE. . . . IT’S A TRULY UNIQUE AND VALUABLE WORK.”
—G.I. Journal

Death Traps: The Survival of an American Armored Division in World War II

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Editorial Reviews

From Publishers Weekly

Without a doubt, this is one of the finest WWII memoirs ever written by an American junior officer. Lieutenant Cooper served with the 3rd Armored Division's Maintenance Battalion and saw action from Normandy to Germany in 1944-1945. One of the army's two heavy armored divisions, the 3rd lost 648 M4 Shermans and had another 700 tanks damaged, repaired and put back in service by the time the shooting ended in May 1945. Cooper, as one of the division's three ordnance liaison officers, was in the midst of the division's tank recovery operations. He writes about the tenacity of the maintenance mechanics and their ability to improvise and devise their own policies. Cooper is unsparing in his criticism of George S. Patton and other generals whose belief in mobility over heavy armor kept the Sherman medium tank as the standard. American tank crews quickly learned that these "death traps" were no match for heavier German tanks such as the Panther and King Tiger. Cooper describes the difficult maneuvering in the hedgerow country, the confusion of the Battle of the Bulge, the liberation of Nordhausen concentration camp and the destruction of an entire column of tanks and other vehicles. Cooper demonstrates convincingly that it was the unheralded work of the maintenance section that allowed the 3rd Armored Division to maintain its combat effectiveness. This detailed story will become a classic of WWII history and required reading for anyone interested in armored warfare. Photos not seen by PW.
Copyright 1998 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

From School Library Journal

YA-In a down-to-earth style, Death Traps tells the compelling story of one man's assignment to the famous 3rd Armored Division that spearheaded the American advance from Normandy into Germany. Cooper served as an ordinance officer with the forward elements and was responsible for coordinating the recovery and repair of damaged American tanks. This was a dangerous job that often required him to travel alone through enemy territory, and the author modestly recalls his service with pride, downplaying his role in the vast effort that kept the American forces well equipped and supplied. Readers will not gain any great insights on the causes of the war or the reasons why a campaign went the way it did; however, they will be left with an indelible impression of the importance of the support troops and how dependent combat forces were on them.
Robert Burnham, R. E. Lee High School, Springfield, VA
Copyright 1999 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to an out of print or unavailable edition of this title.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product details

Mass Market Paperback: 355 pages
Publisher: Presidio Press; 33554th edition (April 29, 2003)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0891418148
ISBN-13: 978-0891418146
Product Dimensions: 4.2 x 1 x 6.9 inches
Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review: 334 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #60,810 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
- #221 in Books > Biographies & Memoirs > Leaders & Notable People > Military > World War II
- #352 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Historical > Biographical
- #508 in Books > Literature & Fiction > Genre Fiction > Historical > Military

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Top customer reviews

Must read, and still relevant today.

ByRussell O. Kendallon August 31, 2017

Format: Mass Market PaperbackVerified Purchase

Excellent book of the war in Europe, through the eyes of the officer who was in charge of maintenance and repair. He gives those who did not live in WWII, just how difficult that war was. A medium tank like the Sherman was not as good as the German armor. However, their tanks were not as well built; i.e. many parts had were not interchangeable.The mistakes made by us during design and manufacturing, got many Soldiers killed and wounded; they were expendable, as this was Total War, with Europe and the USA fighting for their lives. Shortages of parts, training, and choosing the Sherman was catastrophic for the fighting men. What we did have was better manufacturing, and the capacity to replace our losses faster than anyone else in the world. We also had the brave men to go up against bigger tanks with bigger guns. What made it even better for me, was the author stresses what the difficulties the maintenance and supply soldiers had to overcome.

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Great Book

ByEric C. Petersenon January 4, 2014

Format: Mass Market PaperbackVerified Purchase

Clearly written and presents a perspective lacking in other books on events from D-Day on. I'll not repeat the subject of the book here that's well covered by others, but the failure of the US military to recognized the impending threat from Tiger (and Panthers) seems inexcusable. The first Tigers were put in action by Hitler - against the advice by his military - to aid in the siege of Leningrad in late 1942, a bad idea because the area was marshy and forested - not good ground for this heavy beast. A few were knocked out and the Soviets immediately set about figuring out how to counter the Tiger. (They were less-than-impressed with the Tiger's welds and some other aspects that showed Germany was short critical metallurgical materials.) The next appearance of the Tiger was in Tunisia to shore up the German retreat from North Africa. Tigers beat the crap out of American tanks, but this threat seemed to have gone unnoticed - especially by Patton. Both the Soviets and the US and Brits were lucky in one regard - very few Tiger Is were made (1,300) and less than 400 IIs. Plus they had significant transmission and other problems; their maintenance cycle was 100 km, and they didn't do well in the mud. However, in the right terrain and with an experienced crew they were lethal and could take out anything out to 2,500 yards. The US didn't run out of tanks in Europe - Cooper says 60,000+ M4s were shipped over before the end of the war; we ran out of tanks crews, thanks to Mark IVs, Tigers, Panthers, 88s, Panzerfausts and other stuff the M4 was incapable of dealing with. One has to feel great compassion for US tank crews that must have known they were on suicide missions.

0Comment One person found this helpful. Was this review helpful to you?YesNo

This is the real war that American tankers faced in WWII Europe

ByWyo JOTon March 7, 2015

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

This is one of the best descriptions of what it was like in the American armored divisions in Europe. The Sherman tank was one of the best available tanks in 1939, but by 1944 it was outclassed by every German tank on the battlefield. A Sherman had to be within about 600 feet of a German tiger tank during a frontal attack to have any chance of a penatration while the tiger had a near 100% kill rate from 2000 yards. The Germans called Sherman tanks Ronsons because they lit up the first time, every time. The American boys kept coming and we overwhelmed them with numbers and courage. The author discusses the M-26 which was finally a match for German tanks and could have been available in numbers by the time of the invasion. We finally got a few into the war in the last few weeks of the war. The author tells of his own experience with the first M-26s.

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Thoroughly enjoyed this.

Bydcastroon September 26, 2015

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

This is a ground level perspective of the Second World War, giving the perspective of a soldier witnessing the aftermath of the battles fought across Western Europe. While some other reviewers have criticized the author for larger scale factual inaccuracies (e.g. The Pershing story) this does not detract from the book as he is sharing a point of view by someone who actually dealt with the fallout from the problems. So his perspective is an accurate account of how some soldiers thought and felt about the whole situation. He highlights some areas which would have gained a sentence in a book about the combat operations alone, giving this book a more rounded feel towards the entirety of the war than others. Stories on building cutters for bocage and getting sand for sandblasters from the Normandy beaches are curious and yet raise practical problems that had to be solved. Thoroughly enjoyed this.

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Hopefully Never To Be Repeated

ByJ. Slavitton March 7, 2013

Format: Kindle EditionVerified Purchase

There were a number of areas where the United States acquitted itself extremely well in the early days of the war and in war planning. Then there were some terrible fiascos that cost the loss of countless lives -- aircraft development, naval strategy -- particularly in the use of anything but a battleship, most of which were sunk at Pearl Harbor -- and armored strategy certainly rank at the top. Nowhere is this more evident than the U.S. Army's shameful development and deployment of tanks. The Sherman was relatively robust and easy to maintain. Beyond that, it was inferior in just about every way to German armor and the battlefields that it would fight on. It's armor was too thin. It's tracks were too narrow. It's original gun was a poor match to the conditions of tank warfare in the 1940s -- it never really got the right gun in sufficient numbers. Worst of all, we had plenty of intelligence coming in from the English and the Russians about fighting the various Panzer variants AND we had designs -- the eventual Pershing -- that could have put us on more equivalent footing with the Germans and would not have involved the complexities involved in German armor production. Or we could have just copied the T-34, which essentially was a stolen American design to begin with... Death Traps does an excellent job of cataloging what happens when military primodonnas -- Patton among others -- mingle with back office strategists (i.e. those never having served in combat) to produce an inferior design that literally kills American soldiers. Death Traps, more than anything, is really a credit to the American tankers and their support systems -- retrieval, repair, etc. -- who paid a terrible price in human lives in order to make the Sherman work in spite of all of its shortcomings.

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Most recent customer reviews

... right to the frontline in a Ambrose style very easy to read history book

Cooper takes you right to the frontline in a Ambrose style very easy to read history book.

Published 1 day ago by I. Ezpeleta

Five Stars

Great!

Published 3 days ago by Bill Corwin

Five Stars

A very honest book on WWII. I think anyone interested in the war should read it.

Published 3 days ago by BigDave

Tanks but one more..

He is good at writing about the sherman tank but he can't denial the fact that he didn't like the germans.Read more

Published 1 month ago by Venator5

Great book to read

I have heard of this book over the years and I finally got a chance to read it. Great book to read.

Published 1 month ago by Andrew

Five Stars

Excellent book

Published 1 month ago by avarner11

Death Traps and the Movie Fury

I read this book because it was read and used by David Ayer in his writing and directing for the movie Fury (2014). I saw the movie Fury in many places in the book.Read more

Published 1 month ago by Dave

Great first hand account of an armored division soldier.

Very readable and enjoyable account of being an ordnance officer in an armored division from D-Day through the wars end.Read more

Published 1 month ago by Philip Hones

Not everybody is or wants to be a critic, im just trying to get back to my library please!!!!

Get my library up!!!
Read the damn book!!! This deal of who cares I'm just typing crap now!!
Mother of God!!!!

Published 2 months ago by Dondeo

Five Stars

very detailed book on Allied tank warfare in WW ll Europe

Published 3 months ago by J. Peterson

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