Gives an account of the Waffen-SS on the Eastern Front, its battles, organisation, tactics and equipment.

They were the soldiers sworn by an oath of loyalty to follow Hitler into a maelstrom of genocidal barbarity. They were the elite of the German military in World War Two. They were the Waffen-SS. On June 22, 1941, before dawn, German troops invaded Russia. The Barbarossa campaign included some of the greatest episodes in military history: it also allowed Hitlerʼs ideological warriors, the Waffen-SS, to give full vent to their ideological way of war. It provided the killing ground in which some of the worst atrocities seen by humanity were committed. In Valhallaʼs Warriors, author Dr. Terry Goldsworthy, meticulously chronicles what has become one of the most famous fighting elites in World War Two. Discovering the truths behind the legend by drawing on hundreds of sources - including first hand accounts of Waffen-SS veterans - and spanning five years of research Dr. Goldsworthy leads the reader through the events that occurred on the Eastern Front, both on the front lines and behind. This book is an exploration of the Waffen-SS, and by necessity of evil. The Waffen-SS are commonly regarded as the elite of Germany's armed forces during World War II. They gained much of this reputation whilst fighting on the Eastern Front in Russia. Germany's war against the Soviet Union in World War II, in particular the role of the Waffen-SS forms much of the subject matter of this book. The death and destruction during this conflict would result not just from military operations, but also from the systematic killing and abuse that the Waffen-SS directed against Jews, Communists and ordinary citizens. This book provides a clear, concise history of the Waffen-SS campaign of conquest and genocide in Russia by looking at the actions both on and behind the front lines. By drawing on the best of military and Holocaust scholarship, this book dispels the myths that have distorted the role of the Waffen-SS, in both the military operations themselves and the unthinkable crimes that were part of them. The conventional wisdom that the Waffen-SS in World War II fought a relatively clean fight, unsullied by the atrocities committed by the Nazis, is challenged-and largely demolished. Focusing on the Eastern Front, the book contends that the Nazi vision of a racial-ideological death struggle against Slavic hordes and their Jewish-Bolshevik commissars resonated with soldiers of the Waffen-SS, steeped in traditional anti-Semitic and racist dogmas. In doing so this book clearly shows that the Waffen-SS was an organisation that committed widespread atrocities, and were truly soldiers of evil. DR. TERRY GOLDSWORTHY is a Detective Senior Sergeant with over 25 years policing experience in Australia. He has served in general duties, watchhouse and traffic branch before moving to the Criminal Investigation Branch in 1994. Dr. Goldsworthy has completed a Bachelor of Commerce, Bachelor of Laws, Advanced Diploma of Investigative Practice and a Diploma of Policing. As a result of his law studies Dr. Goldsworthy was admitted to the bar in the Queensland and Federal Courts a a barrister in 1999. Dr. Goldsworthy then completed a Master of Criminology at Bond University. He later completed his PhD focusing on the concept of evil and its relevance from a criminological and sociological viewpoint. In particular Dr. Goldsworthy looked at the link between evil and armed conflicts using the Waffen-SS as a case study. He has also contributed chapters to the tertiary textbooks Forensic Criminology and Serial Crime, published by Academic Press. He has also written a chapter to the general crime book Crime on My Mind published by New Holland Publishing.

Dawn on Sunday 22 June 1941 saw the opening onslaughts of Operation Barbarossa as German forces stormed forward into the Soviet Union. Few of them were to survive the five long years of bitter struggle.??A posting to the Eastern Front during the Second World War was rightly regarded with dread by the German soldiers. They were faced by the unremitting hostility of the climate, the people and even, at times, their own leadership. They saw epic battles such as Stalingrad and Kursk, and yet it was a daily war of attrition which ultimately proved fatal for Hitler's ambition and the German military machine. ??In this classic account leading military historian James Lucas examines different aspects of the fighting, from war in the trenches to a bicycle-mounted anti-tank unit fighting against the oncoming Russian hordes. Told through the experiences of the German soldiers who endured these nightmarish years of warfare, War on the Eastern Front is a unique record of this cataclysmic campaign.

An illustrated history of Nazi Germany’s Panzer units along the Eastern Front during World War II. Hitler’s invasion of the Soviet Union, codename Operation Barbarossa, was arguably the pivotal moment of the Second World War. Initially the onslaught was staggeringly successful with, as the superb contemporary images in this book show, Waffen-SS armored divisions leading the charge. But the Nazis had underestimated the Russians’ determination to defend their homeland and the logistical problems compounded by the extreme winter weather conditions. After early victories such as the recapture of Kharkov in early 1943 and the Kursk offensive, commanders and crews of armored vehicles such as Pz.Kpfw.I, II, III, IV, Panther, Tiger, King Tiger, assault and self-propelled guns had to adapt their tactics and equipment to what became a desperate defensive withdrawal eventually back across a scarred and devastated Eastern Front. Even during the last months of the war as the Panzers withdrew through Poland and into the Reich, these exhausted elite units, broken down into small battle groups or Kampfgruppen, fought to the bitter end. With authoritative text supported by a plethora of rare fully captioned photographs, this classic Images of War book informs and inspires the reader revealing the key role played by Waffen-SS Panzer units in this most bitter campaign.

Extraordinary story of a Dutch volunteer in the Waffen-SS. Vivid details on SS training and combat on the Eastern Front. Account of the little-known siege of Breslau in early 1945.

A gripping first-person memoir of soldierly sacrifice, heroism and fierce combat against numerically superior Soviet forces during World War II, by a charismatic Belgian writer and politician turned Waffen SS front-line infantryman. In a laudatory review appearing in an official US Army Department magazine, US Army Brigadier General John C. Bahnsen wrote: "The pace of the writing is fast; the action is graphic, and a warrior can learn things from reading this book. I recommend its reading by students of the art of war. It is well worth the price." Here is the epic story of the Walloon Legion, a volunteer Belgian unit of the World War II pan-European SS force, as told by the legendary figure whose unmatched frontline combat experience and literary talent made him the premier spokesman for his fallen comrades. Captures the grit, the terror and the glory of Europe's crusade against Communism in absorbing prose. Includes fascinating first-person descriptions of Hitler, Himmler and other Third Reich personalities. Degrelle vividly describes how he and his comrades endured danger, privation and torrents of shot and shell -- on the sun-baked steppes of Ukraine, at the foothills of the Caucasus, in the depths of bone-chilling winter, through the stinking mud and the flaming hell of Cherkassy, and across the rolling plains of Estonia and the Pomeranian lake country. You'll learn what moved the 35-year-old Degrelle -- a brilliant intellectual and his country's most colorful political leader -- to enlist as a private in the volun-teer legion he himself organized to join with Third Reich Germany and its allies in their titanic fight against the Bolshevik enemy."

Histories of the German army on the Eastern Front generally focus on battlefield exploits on the war as it was fought in the front line. They tend to neglect other aspects of the armys experience, particularly its participation in the racial war demanded by the leadership of the Reich. This ground-breaking book aims to correct this incomplete, often misleading picture. Using a selection of revealing extracts from a wide range of wartime documents, it looks at the totality of the Wehrmachts war in the East. The documents have previously been unpublished or have never been translated into English, and they offer a fascinating inside view of the armys actions and attitudes. Combat is covered, and complicity in Hitlers war of annihilation against the Soviet Union. There are sections on the conduct of the war in the rear areas logistics, medical, judicial and the armys tactics, motivation and leadership. The entire text is informed by the latest research into the reality of the conflict as it was perceived and understood by those who took part.

This book offers a detailed account of a soldier's life on the eastern front in the former USSR. Written from the participant's point of view, the author reveals the horror and brutality of the war between Nazi Germany and Russia.

On June 22, 1941, Hitler began what would be the most important campaign of the European theater. The war against the Soviet Union would leave tens of millions of Soviet citizens dead and large parts of the country in ruins. The death and destruction would result not just from military operations but also from the systematic killing and abuse that the German army, police, and SS directed against Jews, Communists, and ordinary citizens. In War of Annihilation, noted military historian Geoffrey P. Megargee provides a clear, concise history of the Germans' opening campaign of conquest and genocide in 1941. By drawing on the best of military and Holocaust scholarship, Megargee dispels the myths that have distorted the role of Germany's military leadership in both the military operations themselves and the unthinkable crimes that were part of them.

Nazi Germany's invasion of the Soviet Union in June 1941 and events on the Eastern Front that same year were pivotal to the history of World War II. It was during this year that the radicalization of Nazi policy -- through both an all-encompassing approach to warfare and the application of genocidal practices -- became most obvious. Germany's military aggression and overtly ideological conduct, culminating in genocide against Soviet Jewry and the decimation of the Soviet population through planned starvation and brutal antipartisan policies, distinguished Operation Barbarossa-the code name for the German invasion of the Soviet Union-from all previous military campaigns in modern European history. This collection of essays, written by young scholars of seven different nationalities, provides readers with the most current interpretations of Germany's military, economic, racial, and diplomatic policies in 1941. With its breadth and its thematic focus on total war, genocide, and radicalization, this volume fills a considerable gap in English-language literature on Germany's war of annihilation against the Soviet Union and the radicalization of World War II during this critical year. Alex J. Kay is the author of Exploitation, Resettlement, Mass Murder: Political and Economic Planning for German Occupation Policy in the Soviet Union, 1940-1941 and is an independent contractor for the Ludwig Boltzmann Institute for Research on War Consequences. Jeff Rutherford is assistant professor of history at Wheeling Jesuit University, where he teaches modern European history. David Stahel is the author of Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East and Kiev 1941: Hitler's Battle for Supremacy in the East.