1945: Victory in the West
- Author Peter Caddick-Adams
- Narrator Peter Noble
- Publisher Cornerstone
- Publish Date 19 May 2022
- Run Time 25 hours and 29 minutes
- Format Audio
- Genre European history, History, Military and defence strategy, Second World War, Society and Social Sciences, The Holocaust.
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What to expect
Brought to you by Penguin.
March 1945. Allied troops are poised to cross the Rhine and sweep on into Germany. Victory is finally within their grasp. But if they believe this victory can be easily won, they face swift disillusionment. The final 100 days of the Second World War will prove to be bitterly and bloodily fought, village by village, town by town.
In Victory in the West 1945 acclaimed military historian Peter Caddick-Adams brings this closing stage of the Allies' fight against Nazi Germany brilliantly to life. He explores the immense challenges they faced in crossing the Rhine on a 300-mile front. He tells stories of individual acts of resolve and heroism, of often exhausted troops pressing forward attacks in the face of ferocious resistance. He recounts their shocked first encounters with the barbarities of Hitler's regime as they reached the gates of Buchenwald, Belsen and Dachau. And he goes behind the front line to analyse the strategic decisions made at Allied headquarters and to offer pin-sharp portraits of the military leaders.
Throughout he draws on a vast range of memoirs and personal interviews with survivors to give a vivid sense of what it was like to encounter enemy combatants and civilians face to face. Compulsively readable, this will be the standard work on the closing days of the Second World War for a generation.
© Peter Caddick-Adams 2022 (P) Penguin Audio 2022
Critics Review
Peter Caddick-Adams cements his place as one of our foremost historians of the Second World War with this major new account of the final months of the war in the West. Superbly written and full of wisdom and deep understanding, this will stand as a defining work on these darkest months of the conflict.
Magisterial . . . Peter Caddick-Adams has done full justice to the vast range of the fighting in the west in those last months of the war , in all its complexity, brutality, awfulness and, frankly, pointlessness . . . [he] not only covers these events in detail but also does so with genuinely new and convincing perspectives . . . Caddick-Adams [has] an authority that oozes off every page. He has a particularly enjoyable habit of suddenly ducking down rabbit holes of anecdote, often personal or which delve into deeper history . . . [a] fine, balanced and superb account. It deserves to be read for many years to come.
Caddick-Adams includes vivid anecdotes, small-unit fireworks, and strong, well-informed personal opinions on the often unwise decisions of the leaders . . . A first rate analysis for military buffs.
Excellent. Most accounts of the Second World War in Europe devote only a few pages to the last 100 days. 1945 corrects this balance and makes an important contribution to military history. It is also a great read and powerful reminder of how the Second World War in Europe was definitely not over until the final surrender.
This is the most vivid and detailed narrative of the subject that we are likely to see.
An immersive study of the last 100 days of the Western Front, when the Allies met ferocious resistance from Nazi fanatics who preferred death to surrender.
Pacy and engaging.
A meticulous reconstruction . . . 1945 is an impressive work, lively, informative and comprehensively researched . . . It long stays in the mind.
A thorough and well-researched dive into the often-forgotten final months of the war from the perspectives of the soldiers and commanders of the different army groups.
There is no book like 1945 . . . Written with style and humour . . . Highly recommend.
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