Synopsis
Volume IIB is the second volume relating to (and completing) the Wehrmacht, and the German mobilisation and war-economy, from June to December 1941. It includes the most detailed Orders of Battle ever published on the German Heer, Luftwaffe, Waffen SS and Kriegsmarine, in all areas of the Reich, between 22nd June and 4th July 1941. Even small and obscure units are included, such as: flak companies, artillery HQs, observation battalions, bridging columns, Landesschutzen battalions, MP battalions, railroad companies, and Luftwaffe Kurierstaffeln, Verbindungsstaffeln and Sanitatsflugbereitschaften. The Luftwaffe OOBs also include details on aircraft types and strengths in each air unit.
Also scrutinised in detail are: the personnel and equipment allocated to combat-units in each army, army-group or reserve-force, in all areas across the Reich during the initial phase of Barbarossa; the ground and air units used as reinforcements as well as those newly mobilised; the total available military personnel and equipment in the Reich from June to December 1941; the Replacement Army; the overall mobilisation process and resources used; the available replacements and those sent east; the logistical supply of the Wehrmacht (i.e. the changing Supply Distribution Efficiency); the Kriegsmarine forces in the east; and the Wehrmacht and Waffen SS casualties from June 1941 to February 1942. The latter includes details on killed, wounded, missing/POW, sick and unfit, and recuperated casualties.
Operation Barbarossa: the Complete Organisational and Statistical Analysis collates an immense amount of information from many sources, and presents it with contextual history and analyses. The professional or amateur scholar is provided with comprehensive details of all the armed forces on the East Front during 1941, as well as the relevant economic and logistical support. The complete work represents the most accurate and comprehensive quantitative analysis yet, of the East-Front campaign. Currently no other single work provides a comparable reference on what was the most decisive and destructive campaign of WWII.
Review
"An extremely useful resource to military historians seeking detailed assessments of the armed forces on the Russian Front in 1941. They are based on extensive archival research, and provide a level of detail far beyond that found in conventional military histories. Even for Russian Front specialists, they provide a valuable synthesis of data that is otherwise scattered through specialist studies and archival resources, and they offer an unprecedented data-base for military historians studying the 1941 Barbarossa campaign".
Steven Zaloga, Journal of Slavic Military Studies.
"Askey's book is totally unique. It provides the reader with a most valuable key to the understanding of the huge war on the Eastern Front during World War II. It is a goldmine of information that answers the many, many question that rise from reading other Eastern Front books. Nigel Askey also deserves praise for the very detailed source references, and the high quality of sources that he has used. When the whole series is completed, it is bound to become the major reference work on the Eastern Front on the same level as John Erickson and David Glantz. Without doubt, Askey's work is a milestone, and an indispensable reference work on Operation Barbarossa for probably decades to come".
Christer Bergström, forum.axishistory.com. Author of Operation Barbarossa 1941: Hitler against Stalin (2016), Black Cross/Red Star: Air War over the Eastern Front (2000-2006), Kursk: The Air Battle (2008), Bagration to Berlin (2008), and other books on the Eastern Front.
"When complete, this series on Operation Barbarossa will be without peer." David. M. Glantz, Editor-in Chief, Journal of Slavic Military Studies.
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