Books
Gotterdammerung 1945
Germany’s Last Stand
in the East
1st Edition
Publisher: Eastern Front Books/Warfield Books, 1998
Available on Amazon
ISBN: 0-96-55683-1-8/Fiction
Dimensions (in inches): 1.5 x 9.25 x 6.25
Pages: 562
Photos: 84, black and white
2nd Edition: Military Book Club, 1999
from the Book Jacket
“In the past, few titles have covered the final battles
on the Eastern Front during the months of January through May 1945.
Gotterdammerung 1945: Germany’s Last Stand in the East, breaks
new ground in this area bringing to light the desperate operations
and battles in and around Budapest, East & West Prussia, Pomerania,
Silesia, and Courland.
Russ Schneider has collected a graphic selection of
memoirs from German infantrymen, panzergrenadiers, and panzer commanders
and crewmen who participated in these horrific battles of annihilation.
He relates the common German soldier’s experiences fighting
the Soviets, the attacks by massed Soviet infantry, the never-ending
artillery barrages, the endless retreat, life encircled in the trenches,
fighting and dying in a panzer, street fighting in Budapest, evacuation
by sea, and the reactions to Soviet brutality and reprisals against
German soldiers and civilians.
Schneider follows the hard-pressed Wehrmacht as it
tried to defend Germany against the overwhelming might of a Red
Army bent on victory and revenge.”
from the Introduction
“East Versus West in 1945—The Last Blow in the West
The only German offensive on the Western Front in 1945 began just
a few minutes before the year of 1944 came to a close. Artillery
fire, preliminary scouting raids, and scattered air attacks had
already commenced before midnight. The official starting date was
January 1st.
The German objective was the city of Strasbourg and
the American and French armies deployed in Alsace. SS Reichsfuhrer
Heinrich Himmler, with no previous military experience, had been
placed in nominal command of this operation, which the Germans christened
Nordwind—the North Wind.”
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