A World at Arms (180 page)

Of the many books on Yugoslavia during the war, Walter A. Roberts,
Tito, Mihailovic, and the Allies,
1941–1945 (New Brunswick, N.J.: Rutgers Univ. Press, 1973); Ladislaus Hory and Martin Broszat,
Der kroatische Ustascha-Staat 1941–1945
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1964); and Hans Knoll,
Jugoslawien in Strategie und Politik der Alliierten 1940–1943
(Munich: Oldenbourg, 1986) are particularly helpful. The most comprehensive account of the diplomatic issues early in the war may be found in Alfredo Breccia,
Jugoslavia 1939–1941
:
Diplomazia della Neutralità
(Milan: Giuffrè, 1978). For a sense of the fighting and the growth of Tito’s partisan movement, Milovan Djilas,
Wartime
(New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1977), is most revealing. Very important is the publication of the memoirs and papers of the German military representative to the puppet state of Croatia, Peter Broucek (ed.),
Ein General im Zwielicht: Die Erinnerungen Edmund Glaise van Horstenaus,
Vol. 3:
Deutscher Bevollmächtigter General in Kroatien and Zeuge des Untergangs des “Tausendjährigen Reiches”
(Cologne and Vienna: Bohlau, 1979–88). For Albania, see Reginald Hibbert,
Albania’s National Liberation Struggle: The Bitter Victory
(London: Pinter, 1991).

The war on the Eastern Front made up the majority of the fighting but, certainly in Western languages, has not been the subject of the majority of the literature. On its origins, Andreas Hillgruber’s recapitulation, “Noch einmal: Hitlers Wendung gegen die Sowjetunion 1940,”
Geschichte in Wissenschaft und Unterricht
33 (1982),
214–26; Robert Cecil,
Hitler’s Decision to Invade Russia
1941 (London: Davis-Poynter, 1975); and Gerhard L. Weinberg,
Germany and the Soviet Union,
1939–1941 (Leyden: Brill, 1954, 1972) will be found helpful. The best general surveys of the fighting are the two books of Earl F. Ziemke,
Moscow to Stalingrad: Decision in the East
(Washington: GPO, 1987), and
Stalingrad to Berlin: The German Defeat in the East
(Washington: GPO, 1968); and the two of John Erickson,
The Road to Stalingrad
(New York: Harper & Row, 1975), and
The Road to Berlin
(Boulder, Colo.: Westview Press, 1983). Peter Gosztony,
Hitlers Fremde Heere: Das Schicksal der nichtdeutschen Armeen im Ostfeldzug
(Düsseldorf: Econ, 1976), surveys the fate of the armies of Germany’s satellites in the campaign.

Important accounts of specific parts of the fighting are Jacob W. Kipp,
Barbarossa, Soviet Covering Forces and the Initial Period of War; Military History and the Airland Battle
(Fort Leavenworth, Kans.: Soviet Army Studies Office, 1987); Klaus Reinhardt,
Die Wende vor Moskau: Das Scheitern der Strategie Hitlers im Winter 1941/42
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1972) which is to appear in English translation; Manfred Kehrig,
Stalingrad: Analyse und Dokumentation einer Schlacht
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1974); Geoffrey Jukes,
Hitler’s Stalingrad Decisions
(Berkeley, Calif.: Univ. of California Press, 1985); Ernst Klink,
Das Gesetz des Handelns: Die Operation “Zitadelle” 1943
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1966); Christopher Duffy,
Red Storm on the Reich: The Soviet March on Germany, 1945
(New York: Atheneum, 1991); and Tony Le Tissier,
The Battle for Berlin 1945
(New York: St. Martin’s, 1988). German strategy in the last year of the war is seen in a new light in Howard Davis Grier, “Hitler’s Baltic Strategy,” a 1991 North Carolina PhD dissertation.

There is an excellent selection of portions of Soviet memoirs in translation in Seweryn Bialer (ed.),
Stalin and His Generals
(London: Souvenir Press, 1970). The dominating role of logistics, which in 1941 precluded any of the brilliant strategies devised for the Germans afterwards, is illuminated by the highly significant book of Klaus A.F. Schüler,
Logistik im Russlandfeldzug: Die Rolle der Eisenbahn bei Planung, Vorbereitung und Durchführung des deutschen Angriffs auf die Sowjetunion bis zur Krise vor Moskau im Winter 1941/42
(Frankfurt/M: Lang, 1987). On the role of partisans and anti-partisan warfare, the most significant work remains John A. Armstrong (ed.),
Soviet Partisans in World War
11 (Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1964). The best account of the Vlasov movement is Catherine Andreyev,
Vlasov and the Russian Liberation Movement: Soviet Reality and Emigré Theories
(Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1987). For the Soviet home front, there is useful information in Mark Harrison,
Soviet Planning in Peace and War, 1938–1945
(Cambridge: Cambridge Univ. Press, 1985), and John Barber and Mark Harrison,
The Soviet Home Front, 1941–1945: A Social and Economic History of the U.S.S.R. in World War II
(New York: Longman, 1991).

The role of Stalin in the conduct of operations and the control of the Soviet war effort at home remains one of the most difficult topics to examine; it was so loaded politically that it came to be a function of the current official line–with little relationship to the realities of the war years. The biography of Dmitri Volkogonov,
Stalin: Triumph and Tragedy,
ed. and trans. by Harold Shukman (New York: Grove & Weidenfeld, 1991) is the first major effort to penetrate the veil of distortions. There is no doubt more to come.

Soviet foreign policy during the war is likely to be greatly redrawn on the basis of new material just beginning to become available. Of the existing literature, Alexander Fischer,
Sowjetische Deutschlandpolitik im Zweiten Weltkrieg 1941–1945
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1975); Jan T. Gross,
Revolution from Abroad: The Soviet Conquest of Poland’s Western Ukraine and Western Belorussia
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1988); Vojtech Mastny,
Russia’s Road to the Cold War: Diplomacy, Warfare, and the Politics of Communism, 1941–1945
(New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1979); and Anna M. Cienciala, “The Activities of Polish Communists as a Source for Stalin’s Policy Towards Poland in the Second World War,”
International History Review
7 (1985), 129–45, are particularly noteworthy.

On the German occupation, mistreatment of prisoners of war, and the transformation of the German army which made its large-scale participation in the most horrendous crinles possible, see Alexander Dallin,
German Rule in Russia 1941–1945: A Study in Occupation Policies
(London: Macmillan, 1957); Theo Schulte,
The German Army and Nazi Policies in Occupied Russia
(Oxford: Berg, 1989); Christian Streit,
Keine Kameraden: Die Wehrmacht und die sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen 1941–1945
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1978); and two books by Orner Bartov,
The Eastern Front, 1941–45: German Troops and the Barbarization of Warfare
(New York: St. Martin’s, 1985) and
Hitler’s Army: Soldiers, Nazis, and War in the Third Reich
(New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1991). The last of these is in my opinion overdrawn, but it deserves attention.

The central figure in the American war effort and home front was undoubtedly Franklin D. Roosevelt. A superb introduction to his role is William R. Emerson, “F.D.R. (1941–1945),” in Ernest R. May (ed.),
The Ultimate Decision: The President as Commander in Chief
(New York: George Braziller, 1960), pp. 135–77. A fine biography is James M. Burns,
Roosevelt: The Soldier of Freedom
1940–1945 (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1970). Important papers from his files are in Elliott Roosevelt (ed.),
F.D.R.: His Personal Letters,
1928–1945, 2 vols. (New York: Duell, Sloan & Pearce, 1950). The correspondence between Roosevelt and Churchill has been published in two editions, Francis L. Loewenheim
et al.
(eds.),
Roosevelt and Churchill: Their Secret Wartime Correspondence
(New York: E.P. Dutton, 1975), and Warren F. Kimball,
Churchill and Roosevelt: The Complete Correspondence,
3 vols. (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1984). Robert E. Sherwood,
Roosevelt and Hopkins: An Intimate History
(New York: Harper, 1948), remains essential to any understanding of the period.

American strategy in general as well as the country’s foreign policy during the war were subjected to two schools of revisionist writings; the first designed to show that the leadership of the United States was a combination of stupidity and short–sightedness with treasonous “softness” toward the Soviet Union, the second arguing the precise opposite, namely that the same leaders were scheming to confront, weaken, and in other ways act to the detriment of the Soviet Union and thereby brought on the Cold War. Most of the writings of these schools illuminate currents of thought in the United States at the time they were written rather than the events they are supposed to describe. I have found very few of them useful in the writing of this book.

Not substantially affected by these problems are Waldo Heinrichs,
Threshold of War: Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Entry into World War II
(New York: Oxford
Univ. Press, 1988); Kent Roberts Greenfield,
American Strategy in World War II: A Reconsideration
(Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Univ. Press, 1963); Robert Dallek,
Franklin D. Roosevelt and American Foreign Policy, 1932–1945
(New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1979); Gaddis Smith,
American Diplomacy during the Second World War 1941–1945
(New York: John Wiley, 1965); John L. Gaddis,
The United States and the Origins of the Cold War, 1941–1947
(New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1972); Richard W. Steele,
The First Offensive, 1942: Roosevelt, Marshall, and the Making of American Strategy
(Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana Univ. Press, 1973); Mark Stoler,
The Politics of the Second Front: American Military Planning and Diplomacy in Coalition Warfare
, 1941–1943 (Westport, Conn: Greenwood Press, 1977); and Warren F. Kimball,
Swords or Plowshares? The Morgenthau Plan for Defeated Germany, 1942–1946
(Philadelphia: Lippincott, 1976).

The whole range of issues in the conduct of war by the United States can probably be followed best in the second and third volumes of Forrest C. Pogue’s outstanding biography,
George
C.
Marshall, Ordeal and Hope, 1939–1942
, and
Organizer of Victory, 1943–1945
(New York: Viking Press, 1965, 1973). On the home front, John M. Blum,
V Was for Victory: Politics and American Culture during World War II
(New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1976) is particularly good. The extensive literature on the internment of Japanese-Americans is now supplemented by Stephen Fox,
The Unknown Internment: An Oral History of the Relocation of Italian-Americans during World War II
(Boston: Twayne, 1990). Of the innumerable books dealing with operations by American forces in all parts of the world, the official histories remain most helpful. Only where the cryptographic material had to be withheld when those works were published but can now be integrated into a new narrative is the more recent literature an essential supplement; a good example is William T. Y’Blood,
Hunter-Killer: U.S. Escort Carriers in the Battle of the Atlantic
(Annapolis, Md.: Naval Institute Press, 1983). To the literature already mentioned and the official histories, the following need to be included for the fighting in the West from D-Day to the end of the war: Hermann Jung,
Die Ardennen-Offensive 1944/45: Ein Beispiel für die Kriegführung Hitlers
(Gottingen: Musterschmidt, 1971); John Keegan,
Six Armies in Normandy
(New York: Viking, 1982); Richard Lamb,
Montgomery in Europe, 1943–1945: Success or Failure?
(London: Buchan & Enright, 1983); Dieter Ose,
Entscheidung im Westen, 1944: Der Oberbefehlshaber West und die Abwehr der alliierten Invasion
(Stuttgart: Deutsche Verlags-Anstalt, 1982); and Russell F. Weigley,
Eisenhower’s Lieutenants: The Campaign of France and Germany,1944–1945
(Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana Univ. Press, 1981).

On the relationship of the United States to its British ally, there is a substantial literature. Especially good are Alex Danchev,
Very Special Relationship: Field Marshal Sir John Dill and the Anglo-American Alliance 1941–44
(London: Brassey’s, 1986); David Reynolds,
Lord Lothian and Anglo-American Relations, 1939–1940, Transactions of the American Philosophical Society
73, Part 2 (1983); Axel Gietz,
Die neue Alte Welt: Roosevelt, Churchill und die europäische Nachkriegsordnung
(Munich: Fink, 1986); Robert M. Hathaway,
Ambiguous Partnership: Britain and America, 1944–1947
(New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1981); and Lothar Kettenacker, “‘Unconditional Surrender’ als Grundlage der angelsachsischen Nachkriegsplanung,” in Wolfgang Michalka (ed.),
Der Zweite Weltkrieg: Analysen, Grundzüge, Forschungsbilanz
(Munich: Piper, 1989), pp. 174–88.

The American relationship with France is treated extensively in the book by Gietz listed in the preceding paragraph. There is a useful recent work, Raoul Aglion,
Roosevelt and De Gaulle: Allies in Conflict, A Personal Memoir
(New York: Free Press, 1988).

The alliance of the Western Powers with the Soviet Union is dealt with by an extensive body of works of which the pioneering study, William H. Mac Neill,
America, Britain, and Russia: Their Cooperation and Conflict, 1941–1946
(1953 ed. reprinted, New York: Johnson Reprint, 1970), remains extremely useful. The most helpful memoir remains James R. Deane,
The Strange Alliance: The Story of Our Efforts at Wartime Cooperation with Russia
(New York: Viking, 1946). Important scholarly works are Mark Elliott,
Pawns of Yalta: Soviet Refugees and America’s Role in Their Repatriation
(Urbana, Ill.: Univ. of Illinois Press, 1982); George C. Herring, Jr.,
Aid to Russia 1941–1946: Strategy, Diplomacy, and the Origins of the Cold War
(New York: Columbia Univ. Press, 1973); Richard C. Lukas,
Eagles East: The American Air Force and the Soviet Union, 1941–1945
(Tallahassee, Fla.: Florida State Univ. Press, 1970); John D. Langer, “The Harriman-Beaverbrook Mission and the Debate over Unconditional Aid for the Soviet Union, 1941,” in Walter Laqueur (ed.),
The Second World War
(London: Sage, 1982), pp. 300–19; Joan Beaumont,
Comrades in Arms: British Aid to Russia, 1941–1945
(London: Davis-Poynter, 1980) and her article, “A Question of Diplomacy: British Military Mission in the U.S.S.R. 1941–1945,”
Journal of the Royal United Services Institute for Defence Studies
118 (1973), 74–81; Steven M. Miner,
Between Churchill and Stalin: The Soviet Union, Great Britain, and the Origins of the Grand Alliance
(Chapel Hill, N.C.: Univ. of North Carolina Press, 1988); Lothar Kettenacker, “The Anglo-Soviet Alliance and the Problem of Germany, 1941–1945,”
JCH
17 (1982), 435–58; Jan Karski,
The Great Powers and Poland, 1919–1945
(Lanham, Md.: University Press of America, 1985); and Sarah M. Terry,
Poland’s Place in Europe: General Sikorski and the Origin of the Oder-Neisse Line, 1939–1943
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton Univ. Press, 1983).