Rating: 
Summary: The Best book on the subject
Review: If you had to read one book on the subject this would be it. Still the standard by what every other book on the battle is compared to.
Rating:
Summary: Outstanding chronicle of one of the most epic battles of WW2
Review: A well written book detailing a pivotal battle of WWII. The book goes into great depth showing the various human elements that culminated in the defeat of the Sixth German army at Stalingrad. Arrogance, stupidity, despair, courage and determination are all brought to life. A great book for those interested in the German/Russian side of the conflict.
Rating:
Summary: The best book written on the battle to date
Review: I first read this book in 1976 and so far I haven't found a better account of this great struggle on the Easter Front during WW2. If you can get a copy of this book it will be money well spent! Over 450 pages of text with a number of black & white photos during which time I'm sure you wont put the book down. Filled with personal accounts that keep you gripped to the narrative, this is an excellent account and I highly recommend it to anyone who really wants to learn about what happened at Stalingrad.
Rating:
Summary: One of the more readable accounts of the great battle
Review: As a by-product of the Cold War, the subject of the Second World War as fought in Russia has been largely ignored, but the Battle of Stalingrad was so decisive, and so horrendous, that even general histories of the war cannot ignore it. The battle was fought out from August, 1942, until the surrender of the German 6th Army on January 31, 1943. Much of the fighting took place in the ruins of the city, which came to be known as, "Verdun on the Volga," among the German troops, and as, "the mass grave of the Wehrmacht," to the Soviet press. Today, the city of Stalingrad (subsequently re-named Volgograd after Stalin's official reduction in status in the Soviet pantheon), is rightly a shrine to Russian sacrifice, heroism and tenacity as well as a memorial to the thousands of soldiers and civilians who died there. William Craig's account of the battle is one of the better, more readable histories of the epic of Stalingrad. Craig masterfully weaves eyewitness accounts to put a human face on a campaign and battle of such immense scope and horror that many other writers have failed to adequately compass the subject. This book treats the decisive battle of the Second World War in Europe with the dispassion necessary to form a solid appraisal of where the errors were made by the rival commanders. In this sense, Craig avoids the pat answer of blaming Adolf Hitler entirely for the catastrophic loss of the 6th Army after it was encircled but could still break out. Craig is one of the few authors who deals candidly and fairly with the plight of the Rumanian and Italian armies shattered in the encirclement battle. _Enemy at the Gates_ personalizes the battle with a montage of memories from the participants. Craig's effort is compelling, readable and very effective. Read in conjunction with such works as, _Last Letters from Stalingrad_, and Heinz Schroter's, _Stalingrad_, Craig's work fills out the gap in the historical lexicon of the Second World War.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent. Would make an excellent movie.
Review: One of the most history enjoyable books I have read. Gripping scenes could be assembled into an interesting movie of the battle. I always wondered why Hollywood has ignored all the great stories that came out of the German invasion of Russia.
Rating:
Summary: Excellent!
Review: This is one of the best books I have ever read about this epic battle of WWII (the blodiest and longest ever fought). Craig carefully follows the battle inserting personal accounts from both sides and telling us what happened to the protagonists after the war. Strongly recommended
Rating: 
Summary: Detailed history of the pivotal battle of World War II
Review: A gripping and detailed history of the battle for Stalingrad in 1942-43. The book gives a good account for the reasons why the German high command and Hitler placed so much at stake in capturing the industrial city of Stalingrad in southern Russia in their 1942 campaign. The level of detail and research into what can only be described as a great human tragedy will be greatly appreciated by any reader wishing to learn more about the much misunderstood war between Soviet Russia and Nazi Germany
Rating:
Summary: Don't be fooled by the movie "tie in," a great history.
Review: This is not a lame novel based upon a movie. This is a well-deserved re-issue of an account of the Battle of Stalingrad written almost thirty years ago. It rivals Ryan's "The Longest Day" as one of the great historical accounts of World War II. "Enemy at the Gates" not only tells the "big picture," of fighting and death on a scale that Americans really cannot imagine. It also makes the horrible fighting more immediate with descriptions from Soviet and German soldiers, as well as civilians. (The movie is based upon a series of these accounts.) While more recent books on the subject have the benefit of some recently declassified Soviet materials, William Craig was able to benefit from more first person accounts. Readers who appreciate the works of Stephen Ambrose will find a real gem in William Craig's work. Since this book did not involve the British and Americans, it was overlooked in the mid-1990's World War II nostalgia. This book is finally on the shelves again, and it certainly deserves to be there.
Rating: 
Summary: Mostly personal remembrances of the memorable battle
Review: Winston Churchill lumps together the Battles of El Alamein and Stalingrad as his two turning points of WWII - both were decisive losses (the first 2) for the Wehrmacht. With all due respect to the British and Germans that fought over the desert in Egypt, however, El Alamein does not compare to the scope and importance of the Battle of Stalingrad, especially on the morale of both the Russian and German forces. Having said that, Stalingrad is best seen as the culmination of the real battle - the rebuilding of the Red Army (after Stalin's near-suicidal decision to liquidate its leadership) and the mobilisation of the Soviet Union's vast industrial postential.
The German 6th Army was fighting its way across the Steppes of Russia with the objective of (a) protecting the left flank of the German invasion into the oil-rich Caucuses and (b) inflicting damage on the Volga basin - both an industrial and agricultural region. The Soviets chose to make a stand at Stalingrad on the banks of the Volga in an attempt to stall the invasion long enough to gather sufficient force to trap and destroy the armies located deep in Russia and the end of tenuous supply lines. This book tells the story, from both sides, of the drawn-out, severe street-fighting that took place as first the Germans fought their way into the city, then had to defend it as the Red Army fought to retake it.
There are a number of things to like about this book. Both the generals and the private soldiers are well-represented in the cast of characters that Craig focusses on. We see Paulus, Chuikov, Hitler, and Stalin as they direct the motions of the armies under their commands. But we also see privates and lieutentants as they run from cover to cover with sniper bullets and artillery rounds raining down on them. The book quickly cuts between little vignettes of action, giving a frantic (and therefore realistic) pace to the narrative. Craig gives a good feel for the developing encirclement and desperation of the trapped soldiers. He describes in vivid (some would say nauseating) detail the nature of the conditions as the German army slipped from a well-oiled machine to a shell-shocked group of soldiers starving to death.
Unfortunately, as mentioned by other reviewers, there is little by way of historical context. There is not much to describe why the 6th Army arrived at Stalingrad at the end of a very long and treacherous supply route. Without explanation of the context, it would seem that Hitler sent them off to die for no good reason, rather than explaining that the same tactics that led to this disaster were universally successful for the previous 3 years - in Poland, Norway, Greece, France, Libya, and the Soviet Union itself. This is what caused the paralysis at OKW - the German high command - after a string of unparalleled victories, they had no idea how to deal with defeat. Likewise, the Germans come off as sympathetic and pathetic victims, when they were the ones that invaded (in a surprise attack), slaughtered millions of innocent people, and sent Red Army personnel off to die on forced marches to slave-labour camps behind the lines. Without this context, it's easy to think of the Soviets as sub-human killer robots under the thumbs of the NKVD political police.
It's easy to see why this happens in a book written in 1973, when it was fashionable to dismiss the Soviet Union as totalitarian and "evil" (which it undoubtedly was) and to admire the fighting quality of the German troops. This forgets the fact that the German soldiers were also pawns (often all too willing) of the totalitarian and evil Nazi government. Likewise, with access to a greater number of German survivors' stories, the author could be forgiven for slipping into a pro-German slant. Even so, it's a bit grating to see such a bias in a supposedly unbiased book.
To sum up, this is definitely a readable and interesting book. It's a bit hard to find - Beevor's book on the same battle is now considered to be a better account - but there is a lot here, especially for those that like first-hand personal accounts. Strategic considerations are thin, however, and so lowers the quality of the book in my eyes, especially as they lend an air of pro-German bias to the account.
Rating:
Summary: A slanted but electrifying and inspiring account
Review: This is the first book I've read on the battle for Stalingrad proper. It's great reading, and I could hardly put it down. As they say, Craig knew how to spin a good yarn. True, he had excellent material to write a great story, but it's one of his merits that he collected much of this material himself, through interviews with many participants of the battle.
That said, some flaws of the book bothered me even while I was enjoying the narrative:
1) Craig often adds the "von" particle to the name of the German commander Friedrich Paulus. This mistake is more serious than it seems, as it may give the reader the impression that Paulus was of noble origin and, therefore, in all likelihood, the heir to a long family tradition of military service. This is not the case: Paulus was of relatively humble origins, and this may arguably be an important element to understand the man and his behavior both during the battle and in the years that followed.
2) I was surprised to read about the "Kazakh" villagers at the Don that had expelled their Russian liberators and were all murdered in retaliation. One reviewer clarified that it was actually a Cossack village, which makes more sense. Again, an apparently minor mistake may lead to very wrong conclusions which affect our whole view of the war in Russia. Cossacks were opposed to the Bolshevik regime from the start, and suffered a lot under Soviet rule.
3) To some extent, Craig fails to convey to the reader the moral dimension of the battle. Sometimes, it seems we are reading the account of a duel between two opponents with an equally valid claim to the stakes. Craig does tell some harrowing stories, most notably that of a baby torn apart by two German soldiers just for the fun of it. He also tells episodes of cruelty by the Red Army (and the NKVD). However, one of the main aspects of this war that made it different from all other wars was the SYSTEMATIC perpetration of atrocities - in an unprecedented scale - in the wake of Wehrmacht victories everywhere. By failing to present this context (or, perhaps, by assuming readers have it in mind), Craig makes it difficult for us to understand the harsh treatment Russians dispensed on German prisoners after victory, and makes it look like sheer, gratuitous cruelty. Without condoning the Russian attitude, Craig could have told us more about the reasons that led to it. Among these, the horrendous treatment of Soviet POWs, over one million of which died under captivity in the winter of 1941-42. Not surprisingly, a common motto in Russia at the time was "Comrade, kill your German."
4) As a consequence of the above - and this, paradoxically, is also a tribute to Craig's undeniable narrative skills - the reader could easily catch himself rooting for the Germans, especially in the second part of the book, which focuses on the plight of the Sixth Army under encirclement. One reader mentioned that Germans in the book are usually much more lifelike than Russians. I had the same impression. I think I'm much more familiar with Paulus and other German commanders and soldiers than with many Russians that are mentioned but that we never really get to know in depth. In fairness, let us admit it must have been much easier for Craig, in the late 1960's and early 1970's, to interview German veterans in West Germany than Soviet ones in Brezhnev's USSR (some of these accounts were obtained in Israel and elsewhere). And he certainly had much easier access to German documents and letters than to Russian ones.
Why, then, four stars? Because, as I said above, the book is a great read. Also, Craig's account of the battle seems to be fairly accurate, within the limitations of the time when it was written, and in spite of the slant toward the German side. (This must not be confused with sympathy for the Nazis. Craig has none.) I thought I learned a lot in the chapters describing Stalin and Hitler making decisions on the conduct of the battle. One can easily understand why so many German officers and soldiers became disillusioned with the Führer after Stalingrad. No wonder so many high ranking veterans of the Russian campaign eventually got involved in the "officer's plot" to murder Hitler on July 20, 1944. A little episode Craig tells makes a lot of sense to the reader at this point. In the last weeks of the battle, a group of German soldiers were listening to a radio broadcast from Germany. They were weeping at the sound of the national anthem, "Deutschland über alles" (music by Haydn, remember). But then, when the "Horst Wessel Lied" (song of the Nazi Party) followed, someone smashed the radio to pieces. No one protested.
As the example shows, Craig has an eye for the telling detail, and many of the episodes in the book really move you, make you think and give you a most revelatory picture of the mind of men (and women) in extreme circumstances. The description of cannibalism among Italian prisoners of war, the sense of duty of the German doctor (who would pay dearly for his decision to return to his men in the battlefield even though he had a chance to stay away), the feelings of comradeship, the Russian nurse who lost all her limbs: these are some of the episodes I think I will not forget. As I will never forget - and I cried when I read it - the story of Mikhail Goldstein's violin playing on New Year's eve. I won't spoil your pleasure here, but this story alone was, for me, worth the price of the book!
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