DarkHorse2
Posts: 77
Joined: 2/4/2022 Status: offline
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Third Axis, Fourth Ally Romanian Armed Forces in the European War, 1941 thru 1945 By Mark Axworthy, Cornel I. Scafeș, Cristian Crăciunoiu · 1995 ----- Probably a little more fair toward the Romanians than other works. quote:
John Mar 31, 2021 Complete coverage of Romania's involvement in WWII from the politics and diplomacy leading to its involvement, to the development of its major weapons systems, to the operations of all three of its armed forces (army, air force, and navy). The title of the book is indicative of one of the authors theses: that their greater involvement on the Eastern Front, and control of the Ploiesti oil fields, make them the third most important Axis power behind Germany and Japan. That they then changed sides and fought on the side of the Allies, he argues, makes them the fourth most important Ally behind the USSR, the US, and the UK (a less convincing argument than the first one). His other thesis is that German criticism of Romania for the debacle at Stalingrad is misplaced. With evidence given that Romanian troops were poorly equipped and supported compared to their German allies, and that German troops would not have achieved any greater success given equal circumstances. He doesn't spend time in the body of the book arguing either thesis, instead simply presenting the known facts of what happened. A good book filling a gap in the history of WWII. Book is fairly expensive if you purchase it outright. However, if you look, you should be able to find a free PDF download.
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