Eastern Front books by Prit Buttar

[Willi Z.]

IMO the books by Prit Buttar are some of the best I have read on WWI and WWII Eastern Front battles. Great research, analysis, personal experiences, and discussion of personalities, and from both sides. My only critical comments are that there are not enough maps. Tough to follow the movements through various unfamiliar towns and cities, and I have this criticism with several authors.

I have already read the top 3, and am working on the bottom 3:

[pasoleati]

I have only read Battleground Prussia and Between Giants. Between Giants was very severely criticized by a Finnish military historian Sampo Ahto (he reviewed the Finnish edition). Here are some comments from his review:

-"Reading the first chapter my reservations turned into a total shock. Of our winter war Buttar does not discuss much but at least something:"The winter war took place between Finland and the Soviet Union on a narrow strip north and west of Leningrad from November 1939 to March 1940". Finnish KIA is reported by Buttar three times higher than the actual losses. At least about our Winter War Buttar knows absolutely nothing."

- "But strange misconceptions continue about Baltics as well. One such is that the author that Estonia was the last of the 3 to be converted into Christianity. ... Buttar states that Latvian population in the 1930s was approx. 1 million. The actual figure is twice that. Buttar's knowledge on the history of our neighbourhood isn't particularly strong, despite having waded though appropriate literature."

-"..,.strange claim about heavy resistance encountered by Germans in Memel in the early stages. The idea is naturally impossible, for Memel was then part of the German Reich and there was no fighting at all."

-"Worth recognition are battle descrioption on especially 1944 and 1945 battles accompanied by good maps. However, the reliability of the test suffers from repeated minor and major errors. ...A few examples. The rank of the then commander of the Estonian Legion Franz Augsberger was not lieutenant but colonel (Standartenfuhrer). There was no Nord-named division fighting in Novgorod for such division did not exist. 6. SS-Gebirgsdivision Nord was however familiar to us Finns, but it was then in Kiestinki, Finland. During the anti-partisan operation Winterzauber it was not possible to scorch 99 Latgallian villages for the operation took place White Russia and Russia. Latgallia is a Latvian county."

-"The author constantly refers to evil acts of Gestapo in Baltics. Actually Gestapo did not work in Baltics as Baltics was under SD and Sipo like other occupied eastern areas. Buttar's error displayes that he simply lacks the professionlal qualities in these questions."

CONTINUED SHORTLY

[pasoleati]

Ahto continues:

-"As typical for most current authors, Buttar devotes a lot of space for the holocaust. For Latvian events his prime source has been the so-called Jäger-Bericht allgedly written by SS-Colonel Karl Jäger. This has been most aggressively "marketed" by Wolfram Wette, a "peace" researcher and a frontline man of the "critical" study of his country's history. [NB. Wette is a hardline communist.] When using the report it should be mentioned that the report is suspected to be concocted by Soviet and DDR intel agencies."

-"Traditionally the display window for Nazi atrocities in Baltics has been the Salaspils aka Kurtenhof concetration camp near Riga. ---It was claimed that at least 100,000 inmates were killed including up to 40,000 children, of whom blood was sucked out to German wounded. Of Salapils Buttar says nothing. He should have. Either Salaspils was a horrible place, so it should not be set aside. But i shopuld not be set aside either even as according to Latvian government's studies the figures were typical products of Soviet propaganda. Acording to these accurate studies "only" 2000 - 3000 people dies in Salaspils and mopst of them of illnesses."

Ahto concludes that Buttar's main sources are either outdated or otherwise less than stellar. He states that key sources not used by Buttar include Estonian basic reference "Estonia 1940-1945" and the German Das Deustche Reich und der Zweite Weltkrieg. He also ponders that how come the bibliography includes large numger of books in German, Latvian, Polish, Russian, Lithuanian, Finnish and Estonian with Pruttar surely not able to speak all these. Quote:"It does not seem plausible that he has studies these books with the aid of a dictionary. Another explanation is that he had assistants doing the translations. However, the most likely explanation seems that the bibliography is just a smokescreen."

-"The basic question is: was this book even worth translating into Finnish?"

[Willi Z.]

Well heck, I guess I should just throw the book out.....

Have you ever read a book which wasn't criticized by someone? Ahto's works are also criticized.

[pasoleati]

Which works by Ahto? Since his works are in Finnish only, the reviews are also in Finnish. Do you speak Finnish?

I do know that some people hate Ahto for his staunch conservative national liberalism (i.e. he believes in democracy, freedom of speech, the right of independent national states without rampant facelesd big capital capitalism). He finds betrayal of one's ideals a heinous act. Despite being staunch anti-communist, he has written that he has more respect for those East Germans who refused to turn their coats when it would have been politically correct.

[Mil-Archive]

...For Latvian events his prime source has been the so-called Jäger-Bericht allgedly written by SS-Colonel Karl Jäger. This has been most aggressively "marketed" by Wolfram Wette, a "peace" researcher and a frontline man of the "critical" study of his country's history. [NB. Wette is a hardline communist.] When using the report it should be mentioned that the report is suspected to be concocted by Soviet and DDR intel agencies."....

I would not be a fan of Wette, I have his book 'The Wehrmacht: History, Myth, Reality' which seeks to condemn the Wehrmacht en masse. He leaves out critical details in my view. This Wette book was mainly based on an exhibition which had to be withdrawn after much of the evidence was found to be inaccurate. This fact is not mentioned on his wiki page or in the book from what I can recall.