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  • Thunder in The East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945
  • Marcus Faulkner
Thunder in The East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. By Evan Mawdsley . London: Hodder Arnold, 2005. ISBN 0-340-80808-X. Maps. Photographs. Notes. Bibliography. Index. Pp. 502. £25.00 (HB). (A paperback edition is available.)

Thunder in the East chronicles the war on the Eastern Front between Germany and the Soviet Union spanning the years from 1941 to 1945. The subject is hardly one that has suffered from neglect from historians, with each year adding substantial quantities of new material. The immense magnitude and complexity of the war in the East presents its unique challenges to the would-be author. Notwithstanding the quality of the scholarship, there is a tendency either to delve into the microcosm of the frontline, regaling the reader with the horrors of combat and its deprivations or, at the other extreme of the spectrum, to deal with the grand strategic level with its plethora of place names, formations, and statistics. No approach can claim to be complete.

Evan Mawdsley, a longtime scholar in the field, has adopted a highly successful formula to bridge this gap and present the war in the East in its entirety. This is a high-quality single-volume account of the war, hitherto missing from the literature. To the unacquainted nonspecialist reader likely to feel daunted by the subject matter, this comprehensive introduction will have obvious appeal, yet this the volume also has much to offer to the reader who is knowledgeable about the confrontation in the East.

Organised into two parts, one each for the German and Soviet offensive phases of the war, the narrative adopts a broadly chronological approach. Two characteristics ensure the success of the volume. Firstly, this is an exceptionally informative and compact book whose fourteen chapters are well structured and signposted, preventing the reader from getting lost in the particulars. This has the added benefit of making the book an indispensable reference tool without requiring the reader to examine its contents from cover to cover.

Secondly, Mawdsley approaches the different facets of his subject matter equitably. Although it is a campaign history, discussions of the political dimension, military hardware, occupation policy, personalities, partisan warfare, to name but a few, are integral to the volume's structure. In the analysis of the military campaigns the pages are not dominated by epic battles [End Page 950] such as Stalingrad or Kursk. While important, they are only part of the war. Lesser known engagements such as Viaz'ma-Briansk (1941) or the Soviet 1943 spring offensive need to be addressed for a genuinely comprehensive understanding. Mawdsley admirably executes this balancing act.

The credentials of the source materials used are impeccable, featuring a rich blend of original language primary and secondary sources alongside key foreign language texts. The tone of the volume is authoritative while remaining easily accessible throughout. Rounding off the narrative are clear maps, an extensive chronology, a glossary and reference material. Inevitably some might find fault with a specific detail or interpretation, for it is a big war to cover in 500 pages. Such concerns seem peripheral at best, for in terms of overviews, this is as good as it gets and successfully provides a portal into the most complex and destructive war in military history.

Marcus Faulkner
King’s College London
London, United Kingdom
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