The Fall of Berlin 1945

Rating:
Summary: WWII history buff weighs in with a review...
Review: Unlike many historical accounts which can indeed be tedious reading at best, from the moment I picked this book up to the moment I finished it I found it excellent, interesting and well researched reading. I highly recommend this book to anyone who has a serious interest in the Battle for Berlin.

The only criticism I have of the book is the pictures and use of illustrations. The pictures were pretty much generic WWII vintage; I would have expected more pictures of key buildings in Berlin before and after. All of the illustrations (maps), are in the front of the book and in my opinion would have been better placed interspersed throughout to reflect the progressing battle.

It's refreshing as well to see the new WWII history books not sugar coat everything the United States did too. Eisenhauer and Roosevelt are tactfully exposed as being naive with respect to Stalin and little that I've read dares to tread on this subject.

Rating:
Summary: An excellent account of another titanic campaign
Review: Beevor traces the appalling war in the East from the invasion of the Reich proper in January 1945 to the fall of Berlin. Beevor's firm grasp of tactics, men and military lore makes for an engrossing read. Personally I found this account more interesting than Beevor's Stalingrad. Stalingrad is a battle than most "enthusiasts" are aware of its details; the invasion of Germany much less so. Beevor also has time to talk about the Nazi leadership more and these people are horribly fascinating. Hitler's tirades and delusions, Goebbel's extraordinary persistance and the suicide of him, his wife and all his many children. Göring's irrelevance, and Himmler's pathetic attempts to command an Army. Beevor also has a superb grasp of drama - the Russians overrunning the Wolfschanze I found gripping. The astonishing resistance that German units put up too is well described: Konigsberg and Breslau both fell after Berlin itself. He also shows us Stalin and Zhukov's waste of Soviet manpower and Stalin's deception (largely it has to be said of the Americans) of the allies over Poland and what would become East Germany. My one regret about the book is that he does not really discuss the aftermath of the fall of Berlin - the division of the city, the squabbles the Nuremberg trials, and the steps to the Cold War, but equally he had to stop somewhere. One thing the book does bring out, which is of course a common thread in all good books about war, is the suffering of the innocent civilians and, as in Stalingrad, he does show us that the Germans and the German nation was catastrophically traumatized and destroyed by WWII in a way that makes it all the more remarkable that Germany today is as successful as it is. Beevor also emphasizes the point that the brutality of the Russians (understandably given the Germans treatment of them) prolonged the conflict and was not helpful in ending the war quickly with minimum casualties on both sides. He makes the point that the US and British armies could probably have taken Berlin without much of a fight if they had not been deceived by Stalin and had also been able to stand up to the Soviets. Once again Beevor succeeds in depicting a terrifying four months of brutal conflict.

Rating:
Summary: Short and sweet review
Review: I can not possibly give you a better review than most of the ones already here, so I will just stick to some facts for those just itching to make a buying decision fast. First, this book blows away Beevor's Stalingrad book, which I liked. In fact, if I had not seen Beevor on the History International channel on this subject, the battle of Berlin and Beevor just did not sound exciting enough to buy. Then Beevor smartly put a excerpts from the book in MHQ and I was hooked.
The Russians raped over 2 million Prussian women. Many committed suicide according to Beevor. Its a shame he was not able to document more of the long term impact on the women, but researching over that large of a number would be quite a challenge. I've been watching my "World at War" DVD's and its funny to see it attribute most of these stories as "German propaganda."
The Russians wanted Berlin for glory and atomic research. Thanks to their spy at Los Alamos along with the capture of the German research lab, its not surprising that Stalin was unfazed when Truman told him about the bomb at Potsdam.
My one nag? More maps. Hate it when authors, and Beevor does this, refer to locations not on any of their maps. "The village of great battle......" Where was that again?
Finally, some useful insights on Hitler in the bunker, which I was surprised too read as I though Kershaw had told it all in his 2nd volume on Hitler.

Rating:
Summary: Outstanding research and extremely in depth
Review: I wrote a review earlier, but was compelled to include some other opinions of some of the reviewers on these pages.
1. The research on both books (Stalingrad and Fall of Berlin) are stupendous and very complicated. Trying to find information through foreign sources is not an easy task.
2. Some people on the pages are complaining that Beevor is a journalist so his views are biased. Would you rather him be a professional bass fisherman?
3. I have seen from past experiences that some people read books for the sole reason of finding errors. To me it is pretty sad that one reviewer below is complaining about how the date was really 1942, and not 1943 like Beevor has written. Are you so bored and pathetic that you will read a 400 page book looking for an error that you can relay to all of us. How enlightening. The New York police department should hire you on as a detective with abilities like that.
4. Beevor's research is mind-boggling and beyond what most author's compile. I respect his opinions and perceptions of what happened. Some people give this book one star, but they probably didn't even read it. Awesome book and that is just my opinion.

Rating:
Summary: Amageddon Of The Reich
Review: * The story of Antony Beevor's THE FALL OF BERLIN 1945 begins about
Christmas 1944, when Adolf Hitler's last rash gamble to win the war,
the Ardennes offensive that resulted in the "Battle of the Bulge", was
running out of steam and soon to be crushed. Adolf Hitler believed
that victory was possible and would continue to do so, but the
citizens of Berlin were only too aware of Josef Stalin's massive Red
Army, poised on the Vistula River in central Poland to move on Germany
and seize Berlin.

Hitler dismissed the threat, believing that the Soviets were actually
at the limit of their endurance, but when the Red Army jumped off in
mid-January the defense crumbled and hordes of German refugees fled
before Soviet troops bent on rape, murder, and looting. Red Army
soldiers had a score to settle for German brutality in the USSR.

On reaching the Oder River at the end of the month, the Red Army
stopped to regroup and refit. Stalin also wanted to draw out the war
to consolidate conquests in Eastern Europe. He put up a show of
cooperation with the Western Allies, telling General Dwight
Eisenhower, commander of the Allied Expeditionary Force in the West,
that the Red Army would cooperate in a push into Central Europe and
did not intend to to drive on Berlin.

Stalin lied. When the Western Allies got across the Rhine on the
bridge at Remagen in March, Stalin decided he had to go ahead lest
Berlin be taken from him, and the offensive jumped off across the Oder
in mid-April. Two great armies, under Marshals Georgy Zhukov and Ivan
Konev, operated in twin pincers that quickly encircled the city.
Stalin was in overall command to ensure that the glory would be his,
and played off the rivalry between Zhukov and Konev to goad them on.
The result was excessive haste and unnecessary losses of men -- to
which Stalin was indifferent.

In a little over a week, Berlin was encircled, and the Red Army began
a brutal street fight to capture the city, while Hitler grasped at
straws in his bunker in the city center. Some German units fought on
desperately, particularly foreigners who had signed up with the SS,
but most German Army units were trying to escape West to surrender
to the British and Americans. Hitler committed suicide in his bunker
on 30 April 1945 with his mistress Eva Braun, and the fighting
gradually fizzled out. Germany surrendered on 8 May.

* Antony Beevor's approach to telling this story is about halfway
between that of a traditional military history, detailing strategies
and movements of troops, and that of a novel, giving individual
viewpoints derived from extensive interviews. I find this a very
appealing approach, providing a nice high-level view of the action
with a good view of the fight on the ground.

Many of the stories are fascinating, such as the fact that Stalin kept
the discovery of Hitler's remains a secret even to Zhukov -- and then
kept on calling up Zhukov to ask him if he had found the body yet,
demanding results when Zhukov said no. Another was how impressed
those around Hitler were with Eva Braun's dignity and grace when she
knew she would die soon. Yet another fascinating item was how the
organized stripping of German factories by the Soviets turned out to
be an exercise in Stalinist bureaucracy, most of the machinery
ending up after all the effort as nothing but rusty scrap.

Probably the most amusing story is how the Red Army occupied a huge
underground command center south of Berlin. A caretaker was taking
Soviet troops on a tour when a phone rang. One of the soldiers picked
up the phone to hear a voice barking at him in German. The soldier
shot back in Russian: "Ivan is here. Go to hell." -- and hung up.

Illustrations are fairly modest in extent, with three sections of
black and white pictures, and a section of line-drawn maps up front.
One problem, if I can call it that, with the THE FALL OF BERLIN was
that it gave me more information than I really wanted. I often say
this about histories and biographies, and I do understand that authors
want and have good reasons to be thorough. On the other hand there is
a certain virtue to conciseness, particularly in making it easier to
see the forest for the trees, and the author does get redundant
sometimes, in particular going on at length about the rape of German
women by Soviet troops: "I get the picture, no need to go on about
it."

However, since the text is only about 425 pages it's not like the
book is overlong, either. Another small matter is that the author
makes a few infrequent attempts to psychoanalyze Hitler that are a bit
hard to take seriously.

These are nitpicks. Overall, this is an excellent book, well
researched and in particular backed up by massive numbers of
interviews with both German and Soviet participants. THE FALL OF
BERLIN 1945 is vivid and good -- if not necessarily light -- reading.
Highly recommended to both military buffs and general readers who are
not too squeamish.

Rating:
Summary: Just a few examples of the depths that humanity can sink to
Review: Other reviews are very complete, so I'll just say that the most interesting thing about this book was the emotional exploration that took place. War turns us into primitive animals, especially wars such as this. As accurately as I can remember, these are a few of the frightening occurances Beevor explores:

1. The Soviets force a German soldier/pianist to play and threaten to kill him if he stops. Something like 14 hours later he finally collapses, sobbing, and the Soviets shoot him.

2. The Soviets force a man to drag a plow up and down a field and, after he collapses, they laugh, pat him on the back and shoot him.

The rapes and sinking of retreating ships is also a disturbing area. Beevor's books are the best I've read on this horrible war.

Rating:
Summary: Informative, Enjoyable, and Balanced
Review: I read this book hoping to get a better understanding of the war on the Eastern Front in 1945, and to see how much credence there is to the commonly accepted tales of Soviet plunder. From this perspective, I found the book very informative and enjoyable (if reading of such tragic events can be described as "enjoyable"). In a very readable writing style, Beevor provides sufficient names, dates, maps, and details to keep the reader abreast of the big picture as it evolved, but also gives us insight into the daily lives of the soldiers and civilians on both sides during these months.

You won't walk away from this book inspired, as you may after reading Ambrose's accounts of the Western Front, but you'll walk away with a better understanding of one of history's watershed events, from both the big picture and "on the ground" perspectives.

Further, I believe that Beevor provides an unbiased account. He writes of the unimaginable horrors committed by both the leadership and soldiers on both sides of the conflict, but also makes note of the bravery and compassion exhibited by individuals on both sides.

Rating:
Summary: Not credible
Review: I have to agree with some of the negative reviews of this book: the factual basis for the author's allegations is almost non-existent. The author just took whatever unverified information of personal nature he could get and used it in support of his agenda. There are a lot of accusations. History - I just don't see it in this book.

Rating:
Summary: Poorly researched and poorly written
Review: I've noticed that reviews for this book vary widely depending on the cultural background of the reviewer. Our Russian friends are understandably upset by the allegations made in the book. Some reviewers from the West are happy to see yet another Russia-bashing book to grace book stores worldwide.

Trying to keep this review outside of natonal borders and ideological camps, I will point out two things (to a certain extent already mentioned by other readers):

1. "The Fall of Berlin 1945" does not qualify as a history book. This would require serious research, study of official documents and archives, deep understanding of the subject. All of this is missing from "The Fall..." Research is superficial, official documents rarely mentioned and author shows little knowlege of the actual events and chronology of the battle for Berlin.

2. With all of its drawbacks in the history department the book is also weak in the literary sense. It is dry and I found it to be seriously boring. It's just not well written which is a shame.

My impression from reading the book is that it was written in a rush to be a commercial product, not a history book. The author preferred hype to research and did not put the work needed to adequately address the delicate issues he touched.

Technical errors and literary dryness I can live with. Slacking off and cutting corners - there's no excuse for that. One star to the graphics designer for the nice cover.

Rating:
Summary: Another must-read from Beevor
Review: Beevor's books are among the best in the latest wave of historical works on Russia's participation in World War 2. Benefitting from access to Soviet-era archives (and outwitting his Russian minders), Beevor has been able to bring to shed new light on such already seemingly thoroughly covered events as battles for Stalingrad and Berlin. The result is a far more gritty and more realistic depiction of the war than can be found in many other historical works. The honesty with which Beevor has tackled his subject has apparently even earned him the hostility of the Russian government.