Blood and steel : the Wehrmacht Archive : Normandy 1944

Overwhelmed by the strength of the Allied air and ground forces, following the D-Day landings and subsequent bitter fighting in Normandy, the Germans were compelled to abandon their efforts to hold France and much of the Low Countries and retreat to the Rhine. The Wehrmacht Archive helps reveal the experience of German soldiers and armed forces personnel as they withdrew through a remarkable collection of translated original orders, diaries, letters, after-action reports and other documentation. The book also draws upon Allied technical evaluations of weapons, vehicles and equipment, as well as transcripts of prisoner of war interrogations. The reader will learn from official documents about the Germans' efforts to cope with Allied air and artillery superiority, create new tactical methods for all arms and maintain discipline in the face of superior numbers. Ordered by Hitler'to hold, or to die'and to fight'to the last grenade and round', the German army was a formidable opponent during the 1944 Normandy campaign. This book depicts the experience of that army in Normandy through its own records and documentation. Blood and Steel, The Wehrmacht Archive : Normandy 1944 is an informative and colourful collection of translated original orders, diaries, letters, after action reports, and even jokes, as well as Allied technical evaluations of German weapons, vehicles and equipment and transcripts of prisoner of war interrogations. The translations also feature comments from wartime Allied intelligence officers which provide an insight into how the German army was regarded by its opponents at the time. As you read the landser''s letters to wives and families in Germany, his forbidden diaries, his gripes about food, officers, and shortages of just about everything, the daily life of the German soldier in the long and bloody summer of 1944 will come to life. You will also learn from official documents about his superiors'efforts to cope with Allied air and artillery superiority, create new tactical methods for all arms and maintain discipline in the face of overwhelming odds with both exaggerated claims of miraculous new'Vengeance Weapons'and threats of the ultimate sanction for desertion or surrender. Ordered by Hitler 'to hold, or to die' and to fight 'to the last grenade and round', the German army was a formidable opponent during the 1944 Normandy campaign. This book depicts the experience of that army in Normandy through its own records and documentation. The Wehrmacht Archive is an informative and colourful collection of translated original orders, diaries, letters, after action reports, and even jokes, as well as Allied technical evaluations of weapons, vehicles and equipment and transcripts of prisoner of war interrogations. You will also learn from official documents about the Germans' efforts to cope with Allied air and artillery superiority, create new tactical methods for all arms and maintain discipline in the face of overwhelming odds. Informative and colorful collection of translations of original orders, diaries, letters, after action reports, and even jokes, as well as Allied technical evaluations of German weapons, vehicles, equipment, and transcripts of prisoner of war interrogations -- Dust jacket The 1944 Normandy campaign in original German documents Drawn from the previously untapped archives of the Canadian Army Intelligence Corps A treasure-trove of information for historians, wargamers, re-enactors and modellers