Reviews

"How does one explain the mind set of the high command and the strategic framework within which the Germans lost the war? How did the high command reach and implement its decisions? No one has answered these questions systematically before. This extraordinary and fascinating book fills that gap in the literature on World War II."--Williamson Murray, author of The Luftwaffe, 1933-45 "Comprehensive, well written, important. Megargee does a first-rate job in describing the personalities of the high command and their relationships."--James S. Corum, author of The Roots of Blitzkrieg "Megargee permits us a fresh perspective on both the magnetic figure of Adolf Hitler and his military advisers."--J�rgen F�rster, Militargeschichtliches Forschungsamt "Hitler emerges from these pages as an adept manipulator. He took full advantage of the tensions in the command structure to divide it and focus it on himself. But he took the officers nowhere they were not at least ready, if not immediately willing, to go."--Dennis Showalter, author of Tannenberg: Clash of Empire

"One of the most persistent myths to come out of WWII is that the Third Reich failed because a militarily incompetent Adolf Hitler and a small circle of yes-men consistently overrode the professional judgment of the German General Staff. If Hitler had left his commanders to their own devices, the story goes, we might all be speaking German today. In this meticulously documented work, Megargee does much to dispel this longstanding belief. . . .An immensely illuminating work that casts plenty of blame all around, this will surely provoke much discussion among historians and readers with an interest in the Third Reich."--Publishers Weekly"One of the most important recent books to appear on the German army in some time."--World War II"Here, in the book's broadest context, appears a window of insight into more recent confrontations: the pursuit of war objectives that become increasingly more irrational subverts and erodes the rationality of the military charged with the attainment of those very aims."--Army