Last Victory in Russia: The SS-Panzerkorps and Manstein's Kharkov Counteroffensive, February-March 1943 (Schiffer Military History Book) Hardcover – October 30, 2000

"Last victory in Russia" is a very comprehensive and amazing book about the winter 1943 Harkov counteroffensive (also known as 3rd Battle for Harkov).

The book starts with the actual front situation at the beginning of 1943 and the conditions which led to this operation. (Battle of Stalingrad, the destruction of the Hungarian and Italian armies) and continued with the chapter dedicated to the creation of the SS Panzerkorps.

The author made an extensive research and showed in full detail the skilful mobile operation orchestrated by Manstein which destroyed/crippled four soviet armies, regained much of the territory lost during previous months (including Harkov) and restored the front line almost as it was almost a year ago before operation Blau.

The book is from a clear German perspective and focuses mainly on 2nd SS Panzerkorps actions, which despite being newly created; having an HQ which lacked the experience to perform several operations; and had recently arrived on Eastern Front managed, in only three months, to stall the Russians. The operations of the adjacent units (GD mainly) are also presented, but less detailed.

Several German commanders' command decisions and orders were researched, discussed and presented with accuracy for the reader.

The book is heavily illustrated and I found almost 200 interesting photos with the main German commanders and equipment. One error: on pages 68 and 153 the same photo showed an SS officer with different names.

Even the SS operational maps are quite remarkable. The SS Divisional structure and commanders are presented in a comprehensive appendix.

One thing is debatable: Harkov was and it is a Ukrainian town. At that time the name of the country was USSR, not Russia (Ukraine and Russia were one of the 15 republics of the USSR), so the book should be named "Last victory on Eastern front/USSR/Soviet Union".

Definitely a very good study authored by an historian who knows how to write a book and who composed a book with a surgical precision and accuracy as Manstein's counteroffensive.
In spite of the price, it really deserved all the money.

Very detailed account of the Kharkov counteroffensive in early 1943. If you're interested in the Eastern Front, this book should be a must read. Movements are detailed down to the battalion level, sometimes covering companies. Nipe's work goes beyond the SS Panzer Korps, to include the relevant army divisions. XXXXVIII Panzerkorps and Korps Raus, along with Armeeabteilung Lanz/Kempf are covered in detail. Nipe covers the actions of Totenkopf's Regiment Thule as it supports GD and 320 ID in detail. However, I have to say that this book is seriously lacking when it comes to maps. No maps appear until almost halfway through the book. Those that are presented are German military maps from the campaign. Where they are presented, they go along with the text well. I just wish there were more of them. I ended up finding 50+ year old maps on the internet and marking the progess of the divisions on them. I also had the map book from the LAH II/III history at hand, which was very helpful. More maps or a map book like included with the Zhitomir Bredichev series would have been excellent, as most of this book deals with the movements of x unit to y village on z date. In a few places it gets a little dry, but there is enough human drama and flavor to keep it interesting. I would highly recommend the SS divisional histories, along with Platz der Leibstandarte and Restayn's Battle of Kharkov for photo coverage. Again, this work is well researched but the lack of quality maps really let it down. Especially in the early chapters on the German response to Operations Star and Gallop. If you're unfamilar with the area, you'll end up needing a good lesson in geography.

This is the best operational book on Kharkov 1943 that I've found and though its not "perfect", I couldn't' give it less than 5 stars. After the losses at Stalingrad and after three months of AG Don, AG B, and AG A being pushed back from either the Don River or Volga River or from deep into the Caucasus and incurring heavy casualties, Manstein institutes a clever counterattack that practically destroys 3rd Guard Tank Army as well as the 40th, 69th, 6th Armies, retakes Kharkov, Belgorod and the surrounding sector.
Manstein's lead unit was the SS PzC which consisted of the Das Reich, LAH and Totenkopf Divisions but Grossdeutschland, the remnants of 2nd Army to the north,4th PzA, 1st PzA and Groups Lanz, Raus and Kempf assisted in a coordinated orchestration of deployments that was brilliant that ended the Soviet offensive.
The first half of the book covers the hard fought offensive of the 40th, 69th, 3rd Tank Army and the 6th Guard Cav Corps in clearing the Donets River line and capturing Belgorod and Kharkov. In the last half of the book Mr Nipe covers Manstein's impressive counter-attack that recaptures the river line and these important cities. Some of the passages are difficult to wade through with all the detail but with this detail it can be clearly seen how the Russians slowly but surely surrounded and then captured Kharkov and how it was lost again by the clever counter-attack.
Its really surprising that more books haven't been written on this critical sector and time; Mr Nipe has done a true service for the history community by writing this book.

In the first couple chapters, Mr Nipe sets the stage by discussing Operation Gallop which started in late January in the south and Operation Star which started in early February and was directed to the north in the Kharkov, Kursk, Orel area. These Soviet offensives, which followed Little Saturn, were successful, reaching the Donets River line and taking the ruined city of Kharkov that Stalin was obsessed to liberate but the warm glow of Soviet victory didn't last long for by mid March Manstein had retaken Kharkov, Belgorod and much of the Donets line.
The level of detail, which was on a daily basis, is very impressive and succintly presented and since the main theme of the book is the German counterattack, its written from a German perspective using mostly German primary sources. Some may disagree with this technique; it may be said that it will slant the story to the German side but the author didn't abuse the process. If after reading the account, you feel otherwise, reading David Glantz's fine book "From the Don to the Dnepr" will give you more of a Soviet bias and between the two books you should have a more balanced understanding of the planning, battle action and post action analysis.

Intermingled with the operational coverage, the author includes some experiences of indiviuals in the action on the ground, giving the book more appeal. Photos of many of the people discussed are included. Some of the people mentioned are in other books but it was the first time for me of seeing their portraits which was interesting. The whole narrative was very well done.
There are 12 full page maps to assist the story but I found them disappointing. The maps were authenic German war maps but were imprecise and not that helpful in following the narrative. For me, this was the only feature that would detract from a five star rating but not enough to give the book only 4 stars. The maps in "From the Don to the Dnepr" helped me follow the action in "Last Victory" and having the two books side by side made it easier to align the right map with the dialog throughout the book.
There were also many battlefield photos which were very good and will add to the reader's experience. An Order of Battle is included for the SS PzC and the book closes with an extensive Index.

The operational detail of battle and the coverage of the German commanders and soldiers was greatly appreciated but a casual reader may find it a little too heavy and the book is therefore recommended for serious students of the Eastern Front.

Probably the best work on this subject