Tannenberg 1914

"Tannenberg 1914" is a clear, concise narrative of this famous battle. In reality, it was not the complete catastrophe the Germans symbolically made of it, but it was close enough. One should be grateful for everything of substance written about the eastern front during the first world war, and this book is a nice supplement to Shovalter's classic on Tannenberg. These books are very different. Shovalter draws the large canvas... Read Full Review

Tannenberg 1914 by John Sweetman is a well written book describing one of the key battles of the First World War. In 1914 Russia and France had entered into an alliance which compelled Russia to launch offensive military operations soon after Germany began the war in the West. The purpose of Russia's offensive was to take pressure off the Western Front, give France some breathing room and force the Axis to fight a two front... Read Full Review

I read this book in three days last August and it is a good account of a battle that hasn't been covered very well in the English-speaking world. What makes this book even more interesting is how the author connects it with the 1410 battle when the Teutonic Knights were decimated by the Poles. If there were only more books in print on this little-known front of the First World War

The critical battle of Tannenberg in 1914 that set the tone for the rest of Imperial Russia's involvement in the First World War has long been a neglected subject in English language histories. This deficiency was rectified in 1991 when Dennis E. Showalter wrote Tannenberg: Clash of Empires, and for eleven years that book has stood as the best on the subject. No longer. John Sweetman's Tannenberg 1914 totally outclasses... Read Full Review