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Armageddon - Max Hastings
by Jake Speed Armageddon: The Battle for Germany 1944-45 was written by Max Hastings and published in 2004 (I think). This is an audio version read by John Sessions. The book covers ground that is very familiar by now (perhaps too familiar really given the extensive literature already available) but is still nonetheless darkly compelling as the ... momentous and often harrowing story of the the last desperate stand of Nazi Germany is told yet again. I find Hastings a rather stodgy and dull writer sometimes in comparison to contemporaries like Antony Beevor and Andrew Roberts (and I would certainly recommend Ian Kershaw's The End and Beevor's Berlin over this book) but his research is always exhaustive enough to illuminate a few areas in a manner the reader may well have not encountered before. One thing about Hastings I do find irritating sometimes is his penchant for lacing the narrative with his own personal subjective thoughts more than many history writers do. This is of course a strength at times but it does make him seem a bit pompous now and again. An armchair expert. The book begins as the Allied operations in Normandy have proved to be successful. The Anglo-American invasion force is firmly established in France and with their huge material superiority (most crucially in air power) over the Germans it appears highly likely that the war could be over by the end of 1944. This optimistic hope fails to transpire though and Hitler's increasingly shattered armies grimly fight on well into 1945. The main themes of the book are essentially why the Allies couldn't end the war early and advance more quickly (as a consequence of this Eastern Europe was condemned to Soviet satellite status until the 1990s) and why the Germans continued to fight on when it was long since apparent that the war was lost and their military situation was hopeless. As Hastings reminds us, the once invincible German war machine had been blunted with catastrophic losses in the frozen wastes of Russia and never again regained its equilibrium or strength. After the launch of Operation Barbarossa, two thirds of the Wehrmacht was always engaged on the Eastern Front fighting the Red Army and so it was the Soviet Union that did the Lion's share of the heavy lifting when it came to thwarting Hitler's plans for a Nazi Empire that would last for a thousand years. In the other books by Max Hastings I've read I was somewhat taken aback by his obstinate refusal to give Britain any (military) credit whatsoever for anything it did during the war and he seems to rope the United States into the same bracket in Armageddon. Hastings suggests that the United States romantically inflates its own combat role in the European theatre of World War 2 and that its huge industrial resources were more important than its military contribution. The Americans were shipping large quantities of material to the Soviet Union and although Stalin and the Soviets never gave them much thanks for it those supplies were crucial. The Red Army was never too impressed by the planes and tanks they recieved from the West and used them sparingly because their own weapons were often superior (the Soviets produced the best tanks in the war) but with the vast size of their army they desperately needed things like jeeps and lorries, canned foods and sturdy boots. It was the United States who supplied most of these much needed essentials and plugged the shortfall that would otherwise have existed. Just to put the two theatres in perspective, the author says that the Allies killed 200,000 German soldiers in the course of their operations while the Soviet Union killed four million. One can of course bear in mind that the Soviets had been fighting the Germans non-stop since 1941 but the statistics still illustrate the unimaginable scope of the war in the East. Hastings, like many, believes the Germans were pound for pound the best soldiers of the war but he also suggests the Red Army were superior to the Allies too. He praises the Red Army generals to the rafters while the Allied commanders are incessantly criticised for being slow and cautious. Hastings seems to loathe Montgomery (I find criticism of Montgomery in these types of books is so predictable as to be tedious by now) and is also highly critical of Eisenhower. This again is nothing new as Eishenhower is lauded more for his extraordinary diplomatic skills (he was of course in charge of a multi-national army) rather than his military acumen. After Normandy, Eishenhower steadfastly refused the "single-thrust" approach favoured by some (most notably Montgomery because he wanted to be in charge of it) whereby the Allies would attack in a single concentrated point of impact as the quickest way of entering Germany and ending the war. Eisenhower decided it was too risky a strategy and preferred the "broad front" approach. They would "break" the Germans and keep them strung out by steadily advancing across a long front. Hastings is quite interesting in this section. He believes that the Germans were too weak to threaten long Allied flanks by this stage of the war anyway and so Eisenhower was far too conservative in his strategy. The author remarks at one point that Montgomery achieved no great encirclements of the German armies that opposed him - as if this was some great damning assessment of his ability. To the best of my knowledge Montgomery was never asked or required to "encircle" any German armies in his sector of Western Europe. Anyway, Hastings believes the Soviet generals (Zhukov, Rokossovsky, Konev etc) were much better than their Allied counterparts because they were bolder and more daring in staging operations. That is true of course but the Soviets were much harsher and more unemotional when it came to accepting causalities. The Soviet High Command were desperate to reach Berlin before the Western Allies and so decided to use their numerical superiority to bludgeon their way to the German capital, sacrificing vast numbers of men in suicidal attacks until the inevitable moment of breakthrough arrived. To use a boxing analogy, the Red Army was like a fighter prepared to take three or four punches just to get into position to land one themselves. Hastings accepts that this brutal approach would never have been stomached by the Allies and that any American or British commander who sacrificed lives on such a scale would have been sacked in disgrace. Similarly, the ferocity of the German and Red Army soldiers was a result of coming from totalitarian systems (a very militaristic one in the case of Germany) and the conscripted "citizen" armies of Britain, America and Canada could never be expected to replicate the bestial fanaticism of war in the East. So, like Ian Kershaw's The End (great book but he did end up chasing his tail), Armageddon is somewhat circuitous at times with the author repeatedly hammering at a theme that both he and the reader can already explain. Hastings doesn't have too much new to say about the reasons why Germany fought for so long but then I don't think there is much more to say on this matter. Fear of Soviet occupation and revenge of course was the primary motivation but he does tend to remind us of the first World War more than Kershaw did in his book (if memory serves). One of the fundamental pillars of the Nazi movement was the belief that Germany had remained undefeated on the battlefield of World War I and been betrayed by traitors (and then an unfair peace settlement). This time the Nazi High Circle (or what was left of it by 1944) was determined to fight to the bitter end - until "one minute after midnight" if necessary. What the author does really well is to present the war from the ground up rather than reduce it to a series of battle maps. There are many, many accounts from ordinary people caught up in the storm of the conflict and the atrocities committed are harrowingly told to us in unflinching fashion. In particular, the Red Army rampage through Eastern Europe and into Germany. Things that tend to be glossed over or hardly mentioned in many books I've read are addressed by Hastings here. For example, the population of Holland nearly starving to death and the futile and bloody attempt of Polish guerilla fighters to usurp the Red Army. It's one of the great ironies of World War 2 that Britain and France declared war on Germany because Poland was invaded and yet Poland ended the war as a puppet state of a dictator who was every bit as evil as Hitler. Once the Red Army had reached Eastern Europe in their millions there was really nothing that could be done to shift them. This of course doubles back to the question of whether the Allies should have made more of an effort to reach Germany before the Red Army and prevent them from dominating the East. Churchill certainly felt they should have done this but the Americans were never much interested. They probably should have been in light of the Cold War that would soon descend but at the time they were more concerned with defeating Japan and getting their troops home than European geopolitics. One other thing Hastings is good on too is the intensive Allied bombing campaign. He believes it was not only morally dubious (Dresden etc) but also a misguided strategy that took money and resources that might have been better spent elsewhere. It's a sober book naturally but there are a few moments of levity and some good anecdotes. I like the story of a Canadian Brigadier who took a German surrender near the end of the war and was asked what his background was by the German general who was surrendering to him. The Canadian officer suspected that the German wanted to make sure he had an extensive and decorated military background so at least he would be surrendering to a long serving professional soldier. The Canadian did have a long and distinguished military background but told the German officer that he had no military experience and sold ice creams before the war started. Armageddon: The Battle for Germany 1944-45 is an impressive volume but I think the wide range of literature in this field is an unavoidable drawback and while I admire the obviously huge amount of knowledge and research that Hastings brings to his work I must admit to finding him a bit dull sometimes compared to some of the countless writers who inhabit this well worn territory. I got this out of the library but at the time of writing you can buy it used for about seven pounds. It's worth considering the printed version but I would read Beevor's Berlin first if you haven't already done so. Read the complete review |
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Doctor Who: Blood of the Daleks Part 1 - Steve Lyons (Audio CD)
by SpiderJamb Idly travelling alone in his TARDIS, The Eighth Doctor is interrupted by the materialisation of Lucie Miller, a nineteen year-old northern lass from 2006. Affronted by this intrusion into his home, the Doctor attempts to return her back to Earth, but is blocked by some kind of barrier, sending them spiralling onto the human colony of Red ... Rocket Rising - a planet that has been ravaged by asteroids and suffering from an Impact Winter. But things are set to get worse for the inhabitants of Red Rocket Rising and its recent visitors, when the Daleks arrive under the guise of rescue... These Eighth Doctor Adventures form their own Range outside of the monthly Doctor Who releases and are set later in the 8th Doctor's timeline than his other adventures with Charley Pollard. This range also featured on BBC Radio 7 and is set out in 'seasons' which make them feel more compatible with the relaunched series. In fact, the 8th Doctor and Lucie's relationship is similar to that of 10th Doctor and Donna, even down to the very similar entrances by both ladies. There is a nice bit of banter between the two, added with the intriguing mystery of where she came from, and what she knows and can remember. I really enjoyed the characterisation of both the 8th Doctor and Lucie - Paul McGann's Doctor was seldom explored in his one and only TV appearance, featuring more heavily in book and comic strips during the series' absence between 1996 - 2005. These audio adventures (and the earlier ones from the main range) are the closest thing to an actual canon appearance for the 8th Doctor and delve more into the personality of this incarnation of the Time Lord. I like his whimsical soul and the gentle humour he possesses throughout the story - he doesn't feel as hardened as his subsequent incarnation, but judging by this Doctor's alluded involvement in the Time War, he is set for more difficult decisions ahead. Lucie, as I mentioned, feels similar to Donna in as much as she is a brash, opinionated and distrusting of the Doctor. While she fits the same age as Rose Tyler, she is totally different in personality and doesn't seem as in awe of the cosmos as she did - even feeling disappointment at the state of her first alien world. She is a great companion to entice new listeners to the audios, as she does represent much of the New Series' popularity, so it's an easy transition to go from the series to this audio and not feel the cultural divide between 'Classic Who' and 'New Who' as much as some people do. The Daleks are an obvious choice to use to draw people in to a new series and they are utilised well here - as with 'Evil of the Daleks' and 'Victory of the Daleks', they adopt a benevolent and peaceful façade to their victims, in order to lure them into a trap. I like this approach as it showcases the intelligence and cunning of the Daleks, which isn't highlighted enough, in my opinion. The side characters are pretty intriguing, although I did find it a little bit tricky to tell the difference between Klint and Asha at times as both actresses had similar voices and when they were talking to each other, I would occasionally get lost in who was saying what and had to replay those chapters. I'm not sure whether this is something anyone else would experience, but I found everyone else to have more distinctive accents or voices, apart from those two. The sound effects and score are really good - I am a sucker for audio effects and love turning the sound up and getting sucked into the visual world that the sounds conjure in my mind's eye. The score evokes the mood perfectly and in some places reminds me of the initial Resident Evil game - it's strange how certain bits of music stick in your head. Overall, this was a great starting point! As this is the initial release for the Eighth Doctor Adventures, it is frequently on offer and has introductory prices, so it is worthwhile following Big Finish on Twitter to see if they are having any sales on these discs, but I would recommend it even at full price, especially if you're a fan of the current series and have never experienced the Classic Doctors properly - it's very new listener friendly and doesn't feel tied up in both TV or Big Finish continuity. As long as you know who the Daleks and Time Lords are, you can enjoy this first part of Blood of the Daleks! I purchased the second part at the same time, so I shall be reviewing that shortly. Read the complete review |
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Twilight Zone The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms
by Jake Speed "The cast of characters in order of their appearance: a patrol of General Custer's cavalry and a patrol of National Guardsmen on a maneuver. Past and present are about to collide head-on, as they are wont to do in a very special bivouac area known as the Twilight Zone..." This is a 2010 radio drama adapted from a 1963 Twilight ... Zone episode written by Rod Serling. The story is not the most inspired to ever drip from the pen of Serling but it's solid enough and works quite well as a radio play. It has to navigate the impossibility of injecting the visual cues Serling laced the story with and the dialogue (something Serling usually excelled with) isn't the most purple here but this format is able to take advantage of the power of suggestion. The original television episode had to do this several times because of budget constraints and "suggest" action offscreen. Obviously this isn't a major hurdle for a radio drama. You can do anything you want because you don't have to show it. The story is fairly simple and reasonably Twilight Zone in essence and deploys the well worn "timeslip" plot device so beloved of fantasy shows. Time travel stories in The Twilight Zone are usually either great (A Hundred Yards Over the Rim, The Last Flight) or forgettable (Execution, Back There) and The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms resides somewhere in the middle. The premise for this story begins with a tank crew taking part in some National Guard training exercises near Little Big Horn. It's supposed to be a fairly routine assignment but a strange sequence of unexplainable events begins to eerily unfold in escalating fashion and spook the National Guardsmen. They hear what sounds like gunfire in the distance and stumble across an old fashioned Wild West teepee (a tent made with animal skins and associated with Native Americans) and a canteen engraved with "7th Cavalry". This was the formation led to their doom by General Custer at the Battle of the Little Bighorn in 1876. The tank crew are understandably puzzled by these discoveries but this is only the start of the strange occurrences for the men. They start to hear snatches of Indian war cries in the distance and see smoke signals on the horizon. It gradually dawns on them that they seem to have slipped through the known boundaries of time and space and aren't quite sure if they are in the present day or 1876. Perhaps they are somehow in both. They seem to be in pursuit of the past and being dragged into this historical massacre. The question they begin to ask themselves is should they intervene in the battle? This particular radio adaptation is narrated by Richard Grieco with Stacey Keach performing the narrating duties so famously taken on by Serling himself in the late fifties/early sixties television series. I had to look up Richard Grieco and he seems to be a staple of washed up celebrity type blogs. It transpires that Richard Grieco was (briefly) a nineties heart-throb and starred in the television series 21 Jump Street that made Johnny Depp famous. Grieco was actually considered by some of the fans to be better looking than Depp and obviously destined for stardom. You can imagine how he probably feels now each time a new Johnny Depp film comes out and he gazes wistfully at the blank spaces on his curriculum vitae. Anyway, Grieco is a trifle bland as the guest narrator but he's fortunate in a sense because there is no powerhouse Jack Klugman or Robert Duvall performance from the screen incarnation to measure him against. The actors in the 1963 version of The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms were a fairly nondescript bunch if I recall. The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms has a decent enough ghostly time travel premise with a lot of historical fact although like the television version it's a bit of a stretch at times the way that the characters seem to have a forensic knowledge of Little Big Horn and the historical event they are being slowly dragged into. Perhaps as National Guardsmen they naturally have an interest in American military history and know the area well. I don't know. It just seems a trifle too convenient at times to have the characters so well informed. The atmosphere in this is enjoyably strange and I like the restrained music cues and use of sound effects in this radio series. While exposition that runs the risk of becoming clunky (or at least flirts with it) is required at times as you can't just have the characters stumbling across a teepee (and see their reactions like the television series) but this also works in favour of the audio medium. Distant war cries and unsettling silences are more ominous here and when we get the sounds of battle we can picture what is going on with our imagination. In the television episode battles were offscreen because they simply couldn't afford to stage them and one was always aware of this drawback. It doesn't matter so much here. I'm somewhat confused as to the suitability of this as a radio story even listening to it and I think I would say that it isn't one of the better entries in this radio series but does work quite well at times. One slight problem of course is the fact that the men seem to presume Custer to have been on the side of good and have to debate throwing a tank into the fray. I'm no expert on American history in this period but that feels like a somewhat simplistic and one-sided take. The battle was deemed unnecessary by many experts in the first place and even the idea of deploying a tank to slaughter Native American Indians seems a bit off. Serling was usually the most socially and politically conscious and liberal of writers so it's strange that with The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms he didn't seem to have anything of note to say and merely appeared to present a fantastical time travel story. The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms is consequently not one of his very best stories. This is not then the most memorable in the Twilight Zone radio series either and the guest star narrator is a bit dull (sorry Richard Grieco) but I enjoyed it as far as it went and at 32 minutes it doesn't run the risk of outstaying its welcome too much and stands as one of the shorter entries amongst the radio adaptations. At the time of writing you can download The 7th Is Made Up of Phantoms for £1.19 or buy it as part of one of the Twilight Zone radio collections. Read the complete review |
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1 review Publisher: Macmillan Digital Audio / Audio Book / 2nd Edition: 21 April 2006 |
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Publisher: Big Finish Productions Ltd / Audio Book / Released: 30 April 2009 |
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1 review Publisher: Blackstone Audiobooks / Audio Book / Unabridged Edition: July 2012 |
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Paperback: 414 pages / Audio Book / Publisher: Avon / Published: 4 Aug 2011 |
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Publisher: BBC Audiobooks Ltd / Audio Book / Unabridged Edition: 3 April 2006 |
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Publisher: BBC Audiobooks Ltd / Audio Book / Abridged Edition: 2 July 2007 |
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2 reviews Audiobooks Genre: Documentary - Travel / Audio Book / Author: Stephen Fry / Release Date: 2011 / BBC Audiobooks Ltd |
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1 review Publisher: Blackstone Audiobooks / Audio Book / Published: May 2012 |
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1 review Listening Length: 13 hours and 26 minutes / Audio Book / Publisher: Oakhill Publishing Ltd / Release Date: 21 Sep 2012 |
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1 review Publisher: Brilliance Corporation / Audio Book / Published: 15 July 2009 |
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