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Rating: 
- Interesting, diverting
Firstly, this is a far from comprehensive view of the war, as some reviewers have pointed out. Then again, with a conflict as big and sprawling (and as heavily reasearched and written about) as WW2, we can hardly be surprised by this. What the author does do is bring together some very interesting analysis to parts of the war often overlooked, and comes to some quite interesting conclusions.
The analysis that bears the most fruit is that of the economies of WW2, and the contrast between the Axis and Allied powers in how they understood what Total War meant. For the Axis powers, they didn't get it. Germany is a good example - lauded for the technical sophistication of its blitzkrieg forces, it failed decisively to understand that quantity mattered as much as quality. As a demonstration of this lack of understanding, the author points out the inefficiencies in German production. One example cites the Germans using something ridiculous like 0ver 100 different types of trucks - all of course, needing different parts and made in different factories, making the job of a panzer division's mechanic a nightmare. Soviets and Americans however had 1 type of truck, produced on a very few locations. The Soviets took it to almost minimalist levels - for much of the war producing 2 types of rifle, 1 type of tank, 2 types of planes. To say they out produced Germany puts it mildly. Germany may have created blitzkrieg, but they had an economy only ready to fight small short-term conflicts. They didn't step up production under Albert Speer's production until it was much too late in the war to make any difference. What is more, the allies really did embrace blitzkrieg, by the end of the war having completely mechanised and motorized divisions. Germany never had more than a small percentage if its army in panzers divisions - the overwhelming bulk of the wermacht still used horses, walked on foot, dragged artillery.
Another interesting insight is into the air war of Germany. It is of course widely considered that this war was a waste of resources - in material, planes, aircrew and needless civilian deaths for little outcome. The author does however draw attention to the fact that until the Sicily landings, this was pretty much the only way Britain could hit back at Germany, and that the decision to do so was probably as much to keep Stalin happy Britain was doing something as it was based on overly-optimistic ideas of what a bombing war could achieve. The air war was largely a waste of resources for the allies until the Americans built a long-range fighter that could escort the bombers safely from Luftwaffe interceptors. Up to that point, the best that could be said of the air war was that it kept precious aircraft away from the Eastern front. Afterwards, it was truly decisive, withering the Luftwaffe away to almost nothing, and giving almost complete air superiority to the allies. Though as the author points out, this did not create a pre-condition for the allies to win, but did give them the luxury of choosing where to strike.
The naval war is also touched on, especially the Battle of the Atlantic, though unusually the role of ULTRA intercepts in aiding the allies is oddly underwritten. I don't think any mention is made in the book of how the British used ULTRA to guide their convoys around u-boat wolfpacks, or how they used it to trap them. So many British decisions only make sense once you understand how they used ULTRA - it is one of the reasons Britain was able to stay in the war, along with radar.
But the point the author wants to make is that none of this made the allies victory inevitable. The decision Hitler made to keep the 6th army in Stalingrad and to fight at Kursk were probably as every bit important as the economic mistakes. There are plenty of examples in history of a smaller power overcoming bigger ones. Had D-Day been a failure, who knows how much longer the war would have lasted?
Thoughts on Japan are also shared, though only really in relation to the navy and air force. Little is made, for example, on the war in Malaya, Singapore, Burma. Much of the insights are logistical with regards the Japanese; once cut off from regular imports of raw materials, they were left highly vulnerable. Tactics towards the end of the war because more aggressive and simply suicidal against the enormous, overpowering might of the US. Largely speaking I have heard this all before - there are few new insights here.
Overall it's worth a read, and thought provoking. I almost get the feeling with it that the author is being too ambitious, but that doesn't distract from the fact that there are many genuine insights in this book.
Rating: - All the facts and figures you'll ever need...
Overy goes into great depth to find why the Allies won, or in somecases as he put it, how the Axis lost the war.
He examines nearly every possible reason for the Allied victory and backs each point with a great array of statistics.
This is a great book about how the Second World War was won.
Rating:
- Can't say I'd recommend it
Overy asks the question of "Why the allies won?" His first task is to explain away the idea that the allies, namely the US, England and Soviet Union were successful due to their numbers when compared to that of the axis. Drawing on the First World War, Overy shows that numbers, in terms of troops, does not necessarily define who the victor will be. When WWI began the entente had a great advantage in terms of divisions compared to that of Germany and Austria, for some reason Overy excludes the Ottoman empire in his calculations and also ignores the fact that the number of men in one country's division will not necessarily equal that of another.
The next area of interest is the production figures of both sides. While Germany had a tremendous lead, as did Japan, in their conquests up until 1942 they could not take adequate advantage of them for a variety of reasons. Overy seems to think that if they were perfect dictatorships they could have presented more of a problem for the allies. The motorization of the German army is mentioned, or rather a lack thereof which did play a large role in the war on the Eastern Front.
Overy's concentration in the first part of the book is on the war at sea, the land struggle on the eastern front, the offensive from the air, and the reconquest of Europe. Each of these events, in Overy's opinion, played a significant role in how the war progressed and was eventually won. The war at sea was the only link the Americans had to the British and the only way that Lend Lease could be given to the USSR. It is what kept Britain going and what substituted for a second front to the Soviets, more importantly for the Americans it decided the war in the pacific theater of operations. The struggle on the Eastern Front signified the largest and most gruesome offensive the world had ever seen. Tens of millions would perish on the steppes, in the forests, and in the mountainous terrain covered during the German invasion and subsequent offensives throughout 1942. The offensive from the air took away vital resources from the Eastern Front and stranded them in the West to face the daily and nightly allied bombardment campaign. Lastly, the reconquest of Europe made democracy safe for the Western half of the continent and brought the war to a quicker conclusion. The second part of the book deals with technology, the economy, the alliance system, morality, etc.
When Overy talks about the warnings Stalin was receiving he leaves out the fact that most of them were general, ambiguous and contradictory. Overy contradicts himself when, first, he claims on page 137 that the allies would be facing a "...large army in waiting, seasoned with men battle-hardened from the fearful contest in Russia." Then on page 153 he mentions that the German forces in France were a shell of their former selves, many Eastern Europeans and Central Asian being included into the forces now guarding the coastal lines and waiting out for the imminent invasion. Overy does a good job putting the allied deception campaign into context and how much help it gave the allies when the invasion finally did take place.
A good description is offered of what Soviet workers had to endure throughout the war. As well as pointing out that few other populations, if any, were capable of such deeds. On page 200, Overy talks about the Germans when they attacked the Soviet Union commenting that if they had a larger number of tanks then things might have turned out differently for them. He creates this hypothesis in a vacuum since he is obviously leaving out the Soviet reaction to an increasing number of German tanks, and all that comes with them, on their border before the invasion. Overy gives a good overall account of the various industries but I'd say he ignores the strategic significance of Blitzkrieg. Nowhere does he mention that since the German military had adopted the strategy of Blitzkrieg they would need to plan accordingly for that concept to work, this specifically means allocations for small, limited wars. What Overy is discussing, rather, is a total war footing which is what the USSR and US went to when it came to their wars. Thus it was only after the initial Blitzkrieg had failed that Hitler began to do something about the lack of German production in the armaments industry. Throughout the whole chapter Overy dwells on the same issues but not once will bring up how Blitzkrieg strategy affected the wartime economy, which makes this entire chapter lacking.
On pg. 211 Overy trivialized the odds the German tank arm faced against their Soviet counterpart. Also quotes the general number of 15,000 tanks for the Soviets without putting them into context. The fact of the matter is that thousands of those tanks were rusted through and in need of major repairs and overhaul thus eliminating their use from the battlefield. On page 210 Overy comments on the fact that Panzer divisions started the war with 328 tanks and by the summer of 1943 averaged only 73. What he leaves out and only comments on later is that the number of panzer divisions more than doubled and the number of tanks in them cut by 2. Overy makes many blanket statements such as on pg. 216 where he comments that "The incompetence of Soviet forces in 1941 allowed the Panzer armies to penetrate far and fast but by the autumn the toll as very great." No real qualifier is given for what he means when he says `incompetence' and no other reasons are forthcoming, although a plethora of them existed which explain why the Germans had such success in 1941. The entire chapter can be summed up by the idea that the Soviets and US learned from their defeats while both Germany and Japan relied on their proven victorious ways which only lasted so long. And when Germany did try to adopt new technology like the "Tiger" and "Panther" tanks it proved too complicated for the field of battle. The only interesting analysis that I found was when Overy mentions that the Germans began to concentrate on defensive weapons which goes a long way to explain why in the latter part of the war they held out for so long against such overwhelming odds. Even worse the lack of oil for the Germans proved to be the Achilles heel in most of their endeavors, and when it came to the future `wonder weapons' their ideas were ahead of their time, but due to limited funding, resources, and constant political interference nothing could be accomplished which would change the fate of the war, rather, a loss in money and time was the result.
In the chapter on morality was interesting but I don't think it played too much of a role in why either side won or lost. Both the Germans and Soviets, for instance, believed in what they were fighting for the norm was a high morale for the troops, more so in 1941 and 1942 for the Germans than the Soviets, which switched in the last 2-3 years of the war. While high morale and the essence of right and wrong might play a large role in war, it is most certainly not vital. This can be seen with the Japanese in the pacific theater. These soldiers held out in their beliefs in their emperor and their convictions until the end of the war fighting against the allies. A rather large part of the German Wehrmacht also stood their ground until the end, even after Hitler had committed suicide. Thus while morale and a justifiable cause is a large part of what makes a military win wars, it is not a decisive or even vital factor. Overall I can't say I recommend this book, too many mistakes, misconceptions, contradictions, ambiguous statements, and out of context analysis.
Rating:
- Terrible, full of historical errors and misrepresentation of truth
I bought this book after having in recommended to me by several people as a definitive study into why the allies actually won the war as oppose to the Axis forces, but what I found was a book recycling the same old material and answers covered in many other books but allot poorer, there is hardly anything new here.
However some parts of this book are good, for example, where the author covers the areas of industry and the Manhattan Project in more detail then you usually see.
However the rest of the book I find terrible, full of historical errors or grammatical ones too, which ruin what the author is attempting state.
For example, at one point in his book he claims that the T34 during the early war years could only be crewed by 2 men, as oppose to the historical crew total of 4.
He cites the German army strength at being 62 million men at arms; I hope he surely meant the more believable figure of 6.2.
The book from front to back is very bias against the Western Allies, in particular the United Kingdom who he takes many swings at, for example downplaying the role of the Desert War (1940-1943) by misrepresenting the number of Axis troops which were deployed there.
He simplifies the politics, politicians and other information (such as taking quotes out of context) to make the reader jump to the conclusions he is making even if they are historically incorrect.
However the real nail in the coffin for me, is the use of very unreliable sources (sources which any respectable historian would stay away from) to make terrible accusations about the Western Allies conduct of the war in particular towards Prisoners of War, although he fails to mention anywhere the good treatment that they on the whole received by the Western Allies, but admitting that there was not a sense of absolute hate between the West and Germany as there was between the Red Army and Germany would not fit in with his conclusions of a real hatered between the average Western Allied soldier and the average German landser.
Large sections of the book you feel like you are re-reading again as he goes over the same material he already has in pervious chapters, overuses the same analogies and in allot of cases just rambles.
For the glaring errors which are present in this volume I could not recommend this book to anyone and truly believe the author has created a terrible title.
Rating: - Essential reading
I have nothing to add to the other reviews, save to say that this book (the second edition, published in 2005) deserves five stars and is essential reading for anyone studying the Second World War. It is not a general history of the war, but, as the title indicates, concentrates on the reasons behind the Allies' victory.
- Interesting, divertingFirstly, this is a far from comprehensive view of the war, as some reviewers have pointed out. Then again, with a conflict as big and sprawling (and as heavily reasearched and written about) as WW2, we can hardly be surprised by this. What the author does do is bring together some very interesting analysis to parts of the war often overlooked, and comes to some quite interesting conclusions.
The analysis that bears the most fruit is that of the economies of WW2, and the contrast between the Axis and Allied powers in how they understood what Total War meant. For the Axis powers, they didn't get it. Germany is a good example - lauded for the technical sophistication of its blitzkrieg forces, it failed decisively to understand that quantity mattered as much as quality. As a demonstration of this lack of understanding, the author points out the inefficiencies in German production. One example cites the Germans using something ridiculous like 0ver 100 different types of trucks - all of course, needing different parts and made in different factories, making the job of a panzer division's mechanic a nightmare. Soviets and Americans however had 1 type of truck, produced on a very few locations. The Soviets took it to almost minimalist levels - for much of the war producing 2 types of rifle, 1 type of tank, 2 types of planes. To say they out produced Germany puts it mildly. Germany may have created blitzkrieg, but they had an economy only ready to fight small short-term conflicts. They didn't step up production under Albert Speer's production until it was much too late in the war to make any difference. What is more, the allies really did embrace blitzkrieg, by the end of the war having completely mechanised and motorized divisions. Germany never had more than a small percentage if its army in panzers divisions - the overwhelming bulk of the wermacht still used horses, walked on foot, dragged artillery.
Another interesting insight is into the air war of Germany. It is of course widely considered that this war was a waste of resources - in material, planes, aircrew and needless civilian deaths for little outcome. The author does however draw attention to the fact that until the Sicily landings, this was pretty much the only way Britain could hit back at Germany, and that the decision to do so was probably as much to keep Stalin happy Britain was doing something as it was based on overly-optimistic ideas of what a bombing war could achieve. The air war was largely a waste of resources for the allies until the Americans built a long-range fighter that could escort the bombers safely from Luftwaffe interceptors. Up to that point, the best that could be said of the air war was that it kept precious aircraft away from the Eastern front. Afterwards, it was truly decisive, withering the Luftwaffe away to almost nothing, and giving almost complete air superiority to the allies. Though as the author points out, this did not create a pre-condition for the allies to win, but did give them the luxury of choosing where to strike.
The naval war is also touched on, especially the Battle of the Atlantic, though unusually the role of ULTRA intercepts in aiding the allies is oddly underwritten. I don't think any mention is made in the book of how the British used ULTRA to guide their convoys around u-boat wolfpacks, or how they used it to trap them. So many British decisions only make sense once you understand how they used ULTRA - it is one of the reasons Britain was able to stay in the war, along with radar.
But the point the author wants to make is that none of this made the allies victory inevitable. The decision Hitler made to keep the 6th army in Stalingrad and to fight at Kursk were probably as every bit important as the economic mistakes. There are plenty of examples in history of a smaller power overcoming bigger ones. Had D-Day been a failure, who knows how much longer the war would have lasted?
Thoughts on Japan are also shared, though only really in relation to the navy and air force. Little is made, for example, on the war in Malaya, Singapore, Burma. Much of the insights are logistical with regards the Japanese; once cut off from regular imports of raw materials, they were left highly vulnerable. Tactics towards the end of the war because more aggressive and simply suicidal against the enormous, overpowering might of the US. Largely speaking I have heard this all before - there are few new insights here.
Overall it's worth a read, and thought provoking. I almost get the feeling with it that the author is being too ambitious, but that doesn't distract from the fact that there are many genuine insights in this book.
Rating:
- All the facts and figures you'll ever need...Overy goes into great depth to find why the Allies won, or in somecases as he put it, how the Axis lost the war.
He examines nearly every possible reason for the Allied victory and backs each point with a great array of statistics.
This is a great book about how the Second World War was won.
Rating:
- Can't say I'd recommend itOvery asks the question of "Why the allies won?" His first task is to explain away the idea that the allies, namely the US, England and Soviet Union were successful due to their numbers when compared to that of the axis. Drawing on the First World War, Overy shows that numbers, in terms of troops, does not necessarily define who the victor will be. When WWI began the entente had a great advantage in terms of divisions compared to that of Germany and Austria, for some reason Overy excludes the Ottoman empire in his calculations and also ignores the fact that the number of men in one country's division will not necessarily equal that of another.
The next area of interest is the production figures of both sides. While Germany had a tremendous lead, as did Japan, in their conquests up until 1942 they could not take adequate advantage of them for a variety of reasons. Overy seems to think that if they were perfect dictatorships they could have presented more of a problem for the allies. The motorization of the German army is mentioned, or rather a lack thereof which did play a large role in the war on the Eastern Front.
Overy's concentration in the first part of the book is on the war at sea, the land struggle on the eastern front, the offensive from the air, and the reconquest of Europe. Each of these events, in Overy's opinion, played a significant role in how the war progressed and was eventually won. The war at sea was the only link the Americans had to the British and the only way that Lend Lease could be given to the USSR. It is what kept Britain going and what substituted for a second front to the Soviets, more importantly for the Americans it decided the war in the pacific theater of operations. The struggle on the Eastern Front signified the largest and most gruesome offensive the world had ever seen. Tens of millions would perish on the steppes, in the forests, and in the mountainous terrain covered during the German invasion and subsequent offensives throughout 1942. The offensive from the air took away vital resources from the Eastern Front and stranded them in the West to face the daily and nightly allied bombardment campaign. Lastly, the reconquest of Europe made democracy safe for the Western half of the continent and brought the war to a quicker conclusion. The second part of the book deals with technology, the economy, the alliance system, morality, etc.
When Overy talks about the warnings Stalin was receiving he leaves out the fact that most of them were general, ambiguous and contradictory. Overy contradicts himself when, first, he claims on page 137 that the allies would be facing a "...large army in waiting, seasoned with men battle-hardened from the fearful contest in Russia." Then on page 153 he mentions that the German forces in France were a shell of their former selves, many Eastern Europeans and Central Asian being included into the forces now guarding the coastal lines and waiting out for the imminent invasion. Overy does a good job putting the allied deception campaign into context and how much help it gave the allies when the invasion finally did take place.
A good description is offered of what Soviet workers had to endure throughout the war. As well as pointing out that few other populations, if any, were capable of such deeds. On page 200, Overy talks about the Germans when they attacked the Soviet Union commenting that if they had a larger number of tanks then things might have turned out differently for them. He creates this hypothesis in a vacuum since he is obviously leaving out the Soviet reaction to an increasing number of German tanks, and all that comes with them, on their border before the invasion. Overy gives a good overall account of the various industries but I'd say he ignores the strategic significance of Blitzkrieg. Nowhere does he mention that since the German military had adopted the strategy of Blitzkrieg they would need to plan accordingly for that concept to work, this specifically means allocations for small, limited wars. What Overy is discussing, rather, is a total war footing which is what the USSR and US went to when it came to their wars. Thus it was only after the initial Blitzkrieg had failed that Hitler began to do something about the lack of German production in the armaments industry. Throughout the whole chapter Overy dwells on the same issues but not once will bring up how Blitzkrieg strategy affected the wartime economy, which makes this entire chapter lacking.
On pg. 211 Overy trivialized the odds the German tank arm faced against their Soviet counterpart. Also quotes the general number of 15,000 tanks for the Soviets without putting them into context. The fact of the matter is that thousands of those tanks were rusted through and in need of major repairs and overhaul thus eliminating their use from the battlefield. On page 210 Overy comments on the fact that Panzer divisions started the war with 328 tanks and by the summer of 1943 averaged only 73. What he leaves out and only comments on later is that the number of panzer divisions more than doubled and the number of tanks in them cut by 2. Overy makes many blanket statements such as on pg. 216 where he comments that "The incompetence of Soviet forces in 1941 allowed the Panzer armies to penetrate far and fast but by the autumn the toll as very great." No real qualifier is given for what he means when he says `incompetence' and no other reasons are forthcoming, although a plethora of them existed which explain why the Germans had such success in 1941. The entire chapter can be summed up by the idea that the Soviets and US learned from their defeats while both Germany and Japan relied on their proven victorious ways which only lasted so long. And when Germany did try to adopt new technology like the "Tiger" and "Panther" tanks it proved too complicated for the field of battle. The only interesting analysis that I found was when Overy mentions that the Germans began to concentrate on defensive weapons which goes a long way to explain why in the latter part of the war they held out for so long against such overwhelming odds. Even worse the lack of oil for the Germans proved to be the Achilles heel in most of their endeavors, and when it came to the future `wonder weapons' their ideas were ahead of their time, but due to limited funding, resources, and constant political interference nothing could be accomplished which would change the fate of the war, rather, a loss in money and time was the result.
In the chapter on morality was interesting but I don't think it played too much of a role in why either side won or lost. Both the Germans and Soviets, for instance, believed in what they were fighting for the norm was a high morale for the troops, more so in 1941 and 1942 for the Germans than the Soviets, which switched in the last 2-3 years of the war. While high morale and the essence of right and wrong might play a large role in war, it is most certainly not vital. This can be seen with the Japanese in the pacific theater. These soldiers held out in their beliefs in their emperor and their convictions until the end of the war fighting against the allies. A rather large part of the German Wehrmacht also stood their ground until the end, even after Hitler had committed suicide. Thus while morale and a justifiable cause is a large part of what makes a military win wars, it is not a decisive or even vital factor. Overall I can't say I recommend this book, too many mistakes, misconceptions, contradictions, ambiguous statements, and out of context analysis.
Rating:
- Terrible, full of historical errors and misrepresentation of truthI bought this book after having in recommended to me by several people as a definitive study into why the allies actually won the war as oppose to the Axis forces, but what I found was a book recycling the same old material and answers covered in many other books but allot poorer, there is hardly anything new here.
However some parts of this book are good, for example, where the author covers the areas of industry and the Manhattan Project in more detail then you usually see.
However the rest of the book I find terrible, full of historical errors or grammatical ones too, which ruin what the author is attempting state.
For example, at one point in his book he claims that the T34 during the early war years could only be crewed by 2 men, as oppose to the historical crew total of 4.
He cites the German army strength at being 62 million men at arms; I hope he surely meant the more believable figure of 6.2.
The book from front to back is very bias against the Western Allies, in particular the United Kingdom who he takes many swings at, for example downplaying the role of the Desert War (1940-1943) by misrepresenting the number of Axis troops which were deployed there.
He simplifies the politics, politicians and other information (such as taking quotes out of context) to make the reader jump to the conclusions he is making even if they are historically incorrect.
However the real nail in the coffin for me, is the use of very unreliable sources (sources which any respectable historian would stay away from) to make terrible accusations about the Western Allies conduct of the war in particular towards Prisoners of War, although he fails to mention anywhere the good treatment that they on the whole received by the Western Allies, but admitting that there was not a sense of absolute hate between the West and Germany as there was between the Red Army and Germany would not fit in with his conclusions of a real hatered between the average Western Allied soldier and the average German landser.
Large sections of the book you feel like you are re-reading again as he goes over the same material he already has in pervious chapters, overuses the same analogies and in allot of cases just rambles.
For the glaring errors which are present in this volume I could not recommend this book to anyone and truly believe the author has created a terrible title.
Rating:
- Essential readingI have nothing to add to the other reviews, save to say that this book (the second edition, published in 2005) deserves five stars and is essential reading for anyone studying the Second World War. It is not a general history of the war, but, as the title indicates, concentrates on the reasons behind the Allies' victory.