Stalin’s Favorite - the Combat History of the 2nd Guards Tank Army from Kursk to Berlin: From Lublin to Berlin July 1944-may 1945: Vol 2. Dieser Artikel ist nicht verfügbar.Stalin’s Favorite - the Combat History of the 2nd Guards Tank Army from Kursk to Berlin: From Lublin to Berlin July 1944-may 1945: Vol 2

The author Igor Nebolsin continues with his detailed chronology of the 2nd Guards Tank Army’s combat operations. This volume includes the hard fighting outside of Warsaw in the summer of 1944; the 2nd Belorussian Front’s winter offensive in the Vistula – Oder operation and the ensuing combat in Pomerania; and the final assault on Berlin, when the 2nd Guards Tank Army enveloped the German capital from the north and entered the city from north and west, fighting its way to the Tiergarten Park in the heart of Berlin. The author also briefly discusses the 2nd Guards Tank Army’s subsequent history as part of the Group of Soviet Forces in Germany, its eventual disbanding in 1997, and its reconstitution four years later on 4 September 2001. As with the first volume, the author’s study is based upon the Army’s operational documents from the Central Archives of the Russian Defense Ministry and recollections of its veterans, and received the active cooperation of Major-General Anatoly Shvebig, who was formerly a deputy commander of the 2nd Guards Tank Army’s 12th Guards Tank Corps. It includes objective after-action reports from the Army’s commander General Bogdanov and its subordinate formation commanders. Of note in this volume are General Bogdanov’s recommendations for a tank army’s table of organization and equipment and its proper use in combat operations, written shortly after the war ended. Illustrated with numerous images and supplemented with detailed tables, this volume completes the exhaustive study of the 2nd Guards Tank Army, “Stalin’s favorite".

Igor Nebolsin is the author of three documentary monographies of the combat history of the Soviet Guards Tank Armies and other publications on military history. He was born in the Soviet Union in 1976 and graduated with Honors from the Academy of the National Economy under the Government of Russia in Moscow in 1998, and earned a Masters degree at the University of Warwick (UK), where he successfully completed his dissertation in 2010. The history of the Second World War has been a passion from an early age, as his grandfather and father were both Soviet officers; Igor's research focuses on the Eastern Front's armored battles of 1943-1945. His books are strictly based on the analysis of archival documents from both Russian and German viewpoints, and materials provided by the Russian Second World War veterans' councils - including the United Council of the Soviet Tank and Mechanized Forces, and the Guards Tank Armies' museums. The inclusion of recollections from veterans help to make Igor's book a fascinating read, and among his consultants are Major-General Analii Shvebig (2nd Guards Tank Army), Lieutenant-General Yuri Zavizion (Chairman of the 6th Guards Tank Army Veteran Council), Colonel Alexander Bochkovskii and Nikolai Kosterev (Chairman of the 1st Guards Tank Army Veteran Council). Igor is an active participant in international military forums and is married with two sons.

Stuart Britton is a freelance translator who resides in Cedar Rapids, IA. He is responsible for a growing number of translated Russian military memoirs, battle histories and operational studies, which saw an explosion in Russia with the opening of secret military archives and the emergence of new Russian scholars who take a more objective look at the events and historical figures. Two works that received prizes or prominent acclaim were Valeriy Zamulin's Demolishing a Myth: The Tank Battle at Prokhorovka, Kursk 1943 and Lev Lopukhovsky's The Viaz'ma Catastrophe, 1941: The Red Army's Disastrous Stand Against Operation Typhoon. Notable recent translations include Valeriy Zamulin's The Battle of Kursk: Controversial and Neglected Aspects and Igor Sdvizhkov's Confronting Case Blue: Briansk Front's Attempt to Derail the German Drive to the Caucasus, July 1942. Future translated publications include Nikolai Ovcharenko's analysis of the defense, occupation and liberation of Odessa, 1941-1944, and Zamulin's detailed study of 7th Guards Army's role and performance in the Battle of Kursk against Army Detachment Kempf.