War on the Eastern Front

The German Soldier in Russia 1941-1945

By: James Lucas, Robert Kershaw - foreword

Narrated by: Chris MacDonnell

Dawn on Sunday, June 22, 1941 saw the opening onslaughts of Operation Barbarossa as German forces stormed forward into the Soviet Union. Few of them were to survive the five long years of bitter struggle.

A posting to the Eastern Front during the Second World War was rightly regarded with dread by the German soldiers. They were faced by the unremitting hostility of the climate, the people and even, at times, their own leadership. They saw epic battles such as Stalingrad and Kursk, and yet it was a daily war of attrition which ultimately proved fatal for Hitler's ambition and the German military machine.

In this classic account leading military historian James Lucas examines different aspects of the fighting, from war in the trenches to a bicycle-mounted antitank unit fighting against the oncoming Russian hordes. Told through the experiences of the German soldiers who endured these nightmarish years of warfare, War on the Eastern Front is a unique record of this cataclysmic campaign.

©1979 Cooper and Lucas Ltd (P)2020 Tantor

A Focused Telling

Rather than a broad overview of the war in the East, this book offers a deeper examination of the finer points of the German soldier's experience, first in the advance, and then in retreat.

Ww2 Russian army organization, weapons, and tactic

Narration is slightly labored but clear

Informative and excellent COMPLEMENT to IVANS’ WAR. This book details above information. IVAN details day-to-day life of Russian grunt.

Good listening.

I enjoyed this book. But I was hoping to hear more first hand accounts from the soldiers.

Good description of events.

Good, personal exploits described, which gave a real feel for the eastern front. However, the narrator was very slow, and I ended up having to listen to the book at 1.7 times speed so that it didn’t drag.

A Must Read for WW2 Buffs

Chris MacDonnell does an excellent job narrating “War on the Eastern Front”.
I like the way James Lucas has many detailed stories from firsthand accounts of not only combat, but what the combatants on both sides were feeling, fiscally and emotionally. The extreme hell and hardships both sides went through.
I’m not pro-Nazi Germany or Communist Soviet Union by any means, but you must admire the comradery on both sides. Lucas shows this very well in his book.
I also like how he ended with the story tellers’ fates on their life’s after the war.

Interesting Deep Dive

Excellent compilation of the nitty gritty every day war of the German soldiers on the eastern front. Some may be upset that it doesn't mention atrocities but that was not the purpose of the book. Others have delved into crimes of the Wehrmacht and SS in detail. This held my interest and discussed the tactical war in the East.

One of the best Eastern Front books ever.

One of the best WW2 Eastern Front books ever. More of a narrative than all of those books that never seem to go anywhere. The narrator is excellent as well.

Details at many levels make rich, harsh tapestry

I now have a multi-dimensional sense (from a military on-the-ground perspective) of how things went. No book this size could encompass all the details, or render a totally true-to-life picture. But this is a good sampling of stories of how operations went, and what it would be like to be there. An image will emerge with particular sharpness, as in the sight from the German side of endless waves of Soviet soldiers charging (in predictable but chilling mass formations) and dying en masse, with subsequent waves of attackers climbing over (and taking cover behind) piles of their dead and wounded predecessors. I found the stories of the mobile assault gun units to stand out, as something I'd never heard much of. The political sides of things, the ideologies, as well as the plight and treatment of civilians (and prisoners), are mostly stripped out. But here and there, there is interesting detail about some of the customs and behaviors of combatants of both sides, as for example, in dealing with their own dead.

Recommended

This book is full of granular detail from the perspective of the common soldier. I found it compelling.

Fascinating insights into life for the Germans

As the author says, this is not a history of battles and the war in the east. Rather, it is a collection of tales and insights into what life was like for the German soldiers in that campaign. The author would have liked to include Russian accounts but when it was written in 1979, there weren't any (maybe there are now?)

I highly recommend this for any student of the campaigns on the Eastern Front but... it's uphill work. The writing is not great and the narration is flat and dull. Not outright annoying, but I found myself reluctant to return to the book each time, which is unusual for me.

The chapters on the StuGs and Nebelwefers especially shed new light for me on the effectiveness of both of these.