Retreat through the Rhone Valley: Defensive battles of the Nineteenth Army, AugustSeptember 1944 [Hardcover]

Staigers classic work, with the assistance of two capable scholars, Strohn and Lyons, has found itself in a position suitable for military scholars of the English-speaking world to consider as both foundational and essential to the historiography of Operation Dragoon and the defeat of Nazi Germanys Nineteenth Army in the Mediterranean theater of operations.- H-Net ReviewsThe Dragoon offensive in August 1944 was preceded by bombings and sabotage that hit hard the German forces located in the South of Francedamaging communications, railroads and bridges. The landings were then overwhelmingly successful, despite localized German resistance.The following morning a German force the size of around four infantry battalions was able to launch a counterattack, but by the end of the day von Schwerin ordered a retreat under cover of night. What ensued was a race to retreat to the Burgundian Gate, or Belfort Gap, before they were cut off by the advancing Allied troops. The Allies had all the means for a successful pursuit, while most of the German troops, with the notable exception of the 11th Panzer Division, were largely incapable of undertaking an orderly retreat. Some units, including the LXII Corps headquarters, were surrounded and captured.This account, by J?rg Staiger, recounts the German retreat and explains how the 19th Army sacrificed divisions to enable its retreat through the Rhone Valley.The first English translation of the best German account of the German retreat following the Allied Dragoon landings.Die Wehrmacht im Kampf Battles and Problems of the Second World War is a series originally edited by Hermann Teske and published in German in the 1950s and 1960s. Written by former members of the German Army in World War II, it provides valuable and historically significant information on the perspective of the German Army of many crucial campaigns and battles. Now being published in English for the first time, each volume has a modern introduction by Matthiasl<