A Blood-Dimmed Tide: The Battle of the Bulge by the Men Who Fought It

Astor ( The Last Nazi ) synthesizes interviews, diaries and correspondence in this evocative treatment of the Battle of the Bulge from a first-hand, front-line perspective. Through the testimony of German and U.S. participants, he re-creates the confusion and brutality of the war, the Germans' determination to break through at any cost, and the desperate American resistance that frustrated Hitler's last offensive. Many of Astor's interviewees, overrun by the German advance, became prisoners of war. Their accounts of their experiences in a collapsing Reich are the most original contribution of a work that, with its focus on the human aspects of the fighting in the Ardennes, brilliantly complements Charles MacDonald's A Time for Trumpets. Military Book Club main dual selection. 

Copyright 1992 Reed Business Information, Inc.

Vivid account of the Wehrmacht's final offensive, by Astor (The Last Nazi, 1985, etc.). Exhaustively researched, much of it narrated by participants, this is a chronicle in the style of the new military history, conveying an experience as well as a report on a military action. The immediacy and clarity of enlisted men's accounts form the core reality here, giving a palpable sense of infantry and tank warfare. Comparisons with George Feifer's Tennozan (p. 368) are inevitable, but Astor is less culturally concerned, more closely focused on this final, deadly spasm of Hitler's inspiration. The German leadership is unforgettable--flamboyant Otto Skorzeny (who arranged for Germans to masquerade as Americans); alcoholic Sepp Deitrich, Hitler's old buddy, now an incompetent general; and, above all, the cunning, sinister SS Lt. Col. Jochen Peiper, already associated with Russian front atrocities. Astor begins with a grim military comedy of errors: Deitrich's refusal to supplement radios with carrier pigeons, German soldiers who can't speak English, and a nightmare parachute drop in a gale. The Allies oblige, refusing to believe tanks can be used in the Ardennes, failing to grasp the reality when it's upon them, losing crucial information and bickering. The progress of Kampfgruppe Peiper is a black thread of terror running through the narrative. As its tanks grind forward, tiny US units sacrifice themselves. A cook covers the retreat of his unit with a machine gun, then is captured and killed; the SS massacres inconvenient prisoners; Pfc. Mel Biddle is sent on a mission during which he kills 17 Germans and takes out a machine gun with his M-1. Eventually, the 101st Airborne holes up in Bastogne and will not be dislodged, and Kampfgruppe Peiper meets a flaming G”tterd„mmerung, its men escaping on foot in the snow. Strong narrative, sound history, and a good read. (Photos and maps--not seen.) -- Copyright ©1992, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved.