Take Budapest! (Will be out this July)

[Jukka Juutinen]

I wrote the following on another forum in 3 parts over some time late this summer:"I have my copy in my hands now, and so far I have read about 60 pages. I find the book so far excellent as far as the content is concerned. Nevenkin describes the events from German, Soviet and Hungarian perspectives. Plus he writes well. The beginning of the book has an emphasis on the political development. Hitler's failures as a statesman need not be repeated, but Churchill's failure as such is evident in this book as well, and this is to be commented given the prevalence of the hagiographic accounts on him even today. Stalin who never forgot that a war must always have a political goal treated W. C. like a marionette. Perhaps the best short description of the latter is by Captain Russell Grenfell who wrote that Churchill tried to be too much a Whitehall warlord when he should have been the Downing Street politician.
The book has extensive apendices, and one is a most interesting glimpse on the ideological traditions of the Red Army. In an order (signed by Rodion Malinovsky) to prevent looting etc. on Hungarian civilians, the text begins "The enemy should be beaten and annihilated with the utmost hatred...". While one can imagine that e.g. Eisenhower might have signed such a piece of text, I bet that e.g. for Montgomery it would have been simply unbearable language for a disciplined professional officer to sign.
Nevenkin's reasoning that "...prolongation of the struggle for the Hungarian Plain and the hostile atmosphere that surrounded the Red Army,..." explained Soviet troops' misbehaviour is in my opinion too simplistic for the core reason lies most probably with the combination of Russian people's cultural characteristics coupled with Bolshevist ideology.
The book is overall very well designed with a pleasant reasonably small font, though placement of maps could be better. However, whoever edited the text has made some odd choices. E.g. all ordinal numerals are written as normal numerals, e.g. "3 Army", not "3rd Army" or "3. Army". Germans are Germans and Soviets are Soviets, but Hungarians are mostly "Magyars". Then there are inconsistent mixed language terms like "23 Panzer-Division", yet "4 Police-Panzer-Grenadier-Division". One one spread (pgs 66-67) German General Friessner is spellt "Friessner", "Freissner" and "Frissner".
But, overall so far an excellent book!

I have progressed a bit further, and I did note that occasionally Soviet units have an ordinal indicator (e.g. "3rd") while tables and listings seem to have the proper dotted ordinal indicator.
And based on the source notes, Nevenkin has used plenty of Russian archival sources. And he keeps writing well. I E.g. compared to David Glantz Kamen writes much more livelier text while still not succumbing to "poetics". I do have to add that the maps can be described as lukewarm only.

I have now roughly finished the book (most time spent on following the Olympics), and the original comments still apply. A very well written book with plenty of very detailed information and a very good analysis as well. Highly recommended!"

[John W. Howard]

Good review Jukka!! Thanks.

[Kamen Nevenkin]

On my Facebook page I just posted color versions of most of the maps published in the book.

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Take-Buda ... 2607928079

[donwhite]

Just recently finished reading this title. The most illuminating and interesting section for me was the outline of the political situation between the allies and its effects on military decision making of STAVKA/Stalin and the pressures in turn placed on the Army/Front Commanders to achieve objectives for their political value in a post war Europe (possibly a whole book waiting to be written here alone!). Having said that the description of the see-sawing Soviet offensives and Axis counter attacks was also very educational. The Divisonal/Corps OB's in the text were very handy and their graphic representation very catching. Also the appendices and footnotes by themselves I could spend all my time perusing. Rarely does a historical book provide this level of OoB and strength data for both sides considerably fleshing out the units mentioned in the text. My only negative impression involved some of the maps. Anway overall I await with the impatience of kid before Xmas the release of the East Prussian title. Keep up the great work Kamen.

Cheers