(Ebook) White Hell: The German Army Faces the Russian Winter by Gordon L. Rottman ISBN 9789623611527, 9623611528

(Ebook) White Hell: The German Army Faces the Russian Winter by Gordon L. Rottman ISBN 9789623611527, 9623611528

Winter! This theme forms the centerpiece around which this photographic volume is built. Despite being delayed by the need to invade the Balkans, Germany expected an early conquest of Russia when it attacked on 22 June 1941. When the expected victory did not come as easily as anticipated, the German Wehrmacht soon found itself embroiled in Russia's brutal & bitterly cold winters. A quarter of a million German soldiers suffered frostbite in that first Russian winter simply because they were ill-equipped and poorly supplied with the requisite cold-weather gear. Soldiers who survived this first bitter winter actually received a specific medal for it (called the Medaille Winterschlacht im Osten 1941/42, and which the soldiers often called "Frozen Meat Order")! This book is thus full of snow and mud! =