From The Realm Of A Dying Sun

Douglas E. Nash has by this point become well-known amongst Second World War historians for providing painstakingly researched and well-written accounts focused on German military operations. With From the Realm of a Dying Sun he continues his streak of welcome additions to the existing body of research on the greatest war in history. This time, Nash focuses on the formation of IV-SS Panzerkorps and its combat operations near Warsaw in the late summer and fall of 1944.

By early in August of 1944 the Third Reich seemed to be on the verge of collapse. The seven week stalemate in Normandy had been shattered by the U.S. Army's Operation Cobra. In Italy, The Allies had finally broken free of the bloody attritional battles both south of Rome and west of the city along the coast near Anzio, liberated the ancient seat of the western world, and were moving north through Tuscany. On Germany's Eastern Front the Red Army's Operation Bagration had delivered the greatest defeat suffered by the Wehrmacht during the entire Second World War. The lead Soviet Fronts had followed this victory by surging into Eastern Poland, and facing seemingly nothing to stop them short of Berlin.

Yet, one month later Allied forces would be bogged down on the German Gothic defensive line in Italy and had run out of steam along the Western German border amidst the fortifications of the Siegfried line. Fighting in these regions would drag on for the next six months. Meanwhile, in Eastern Poland there were no defensive fortifications to fall back upon. Yet the Wehrmacht still managed to finally bring to a halt the rampaging Red Army. Even more impressive was how the Germans stopped one of the Red Army's premier formations and finest operational commanders: K.K. Rokossovsky and his First Belorussian Front. Playing a primary role in stopping Rokossovsky's juggernaught was the IV SS-Panzerkorps. 

In this book Nash offers critical insight into how this German panzer corps (and its peer units from the German Ninth and Second Armies) managed to refashion a strong defensive front from Army Group Center's remnants and recently redeployed reserves while bringing the Red Army to a halt in Eastern Poland. A halt that would last for the better part of the fall of 1944 in spite of the Red Army's continued efforts to pry the IV-SS Panzerkorps from its deathgrip on the vital terrain just northwest of Warsaw. This geographical area marked the confleunce of the Bug, Narew, and Vistula rivers as well as the key bridges therein that provided access to the Polish interior and German eastern border. Simply put, if the Red Army was to be forced into an extended stop then this land had to be held.

The detailed coverage of the IV-SS Panzerkorp's actions during this phase of the war also adds much in the way of context to the massive tank battles that occured south, east, and northeast of Warsaw's suburb of Praga east of the Vistula River. In a book covering the decision-making from the Army Group down to Army, down to Corps, down to divisional, down to the actual tactical situations at the front - the author has produced a comprehensive look at the IV-SS Panzerkorps and the armored battles more than matching those fought in France during August-September of 1944. Furthermore, this work covers how this panzer corps helped change the face of the war during a time when the Allied and Soviet campaigns in Europe went from seemingly having decided the war prior to the end of the year to protracted and bloody fighting that would forestall the complete collapse of Nazi Germany until well into 1945. I very much recommend this book to my readers.