I'm a keen military history enthusiast. I've recently graduated from university with a degree in history, which covered more of the early modern era - but military history is my first love. I've written a thesis on the battle of Stalingrad and I take a keen interest in the second world war. I'm currently reading about Napoleon and the Napoleonic wars. Hopefully you guys can help me answers questions I have from time to time, and I'll do my best to answer what I can where I can!
Hello Tom, Napoleon, how timely, as we are quickly approaching the bi-centennial of the Waterloo Campaign. And a thesis on Volograd. Wow. Did you access either German orRussian achieves? Or both? Does that mean you can read either language? Or does it mean you are a wargamer?
Hi Interrogator. Yes indeed, there's been an absolute flood of books in the last year on Waterloo - difficult to know where to start! I went to university in London, so I had access to the British national archives in Kew. I was surprised at how much German signal intelligence the British government intercepted and handed to the Soviet Union; so those documents featured heavily. I used Mansteins autobiog for my German primary source and some of Chuikovs book - luckily the British Library had copies. I can read some German, Russian not so much. Having said that, because Stalingrad/Volgograd is so infamous lots of the primary sources were translated (more German sources than Russian - which I assume had something to do with availability to the west). I love strategy game like the Total War series, and the first call of duty games (the tank warfare in the first one especially is epic). How about you? What's your specialist subject?
Tom -- I have no specialty, though I am versed in several. I admit to having read too much on WWII, espcially Ultra/Magic. I have also read other eras, such as Invasion of Russia (1918-20), Great War (1914-18), Boer War (1898-1900), East Africa (Sudan) (1884-85), Zulu War (1979), Franco-Prussian War (1870-71), ACW, Napoleonic Wars, Anglo-Dutch Wars (there were three or four depending on historian).... As you can see I am too broadly drawn. A professor of mine, the one who taught me WWII, met Manhein, as well as Guderian, Rommel, Jodel, and many more. He had been chief interrogator at Nuremberg prison (Dustbin/Ashcan). He inspired me to follow his path. But please don't ask me to translate, as I have had strokes and lost some things. Are you familiar with the English-language Russia documentaries on Youtube? There is an excellent one comparing the German and Russian 'kit' during Stalingrad. As I recall they proved the well-equiped German soldier was still 10-15 degrees F. colder than his Russian counterpart. One can imagine what that meant in calories burned. If I mention 1/285th scale Micro-armour do you understand?
