Podcast appearances and mentions of matthias strohn

Today's guest is the funny and brilliant Matthias Strohn. Matthias is Head of the Historical Analysis Program at the Centre for Historical Analysis and Conflict Research and an Honorary Visiting Professor at the Humanities Research Institute at the University of Buckingham. Matthias has also served as a senior lecturer in War Studies at the UK Ministry of Defence and a Military History Instructor at the German Staff College in Hamburg. He is a Lieutenant-Colonel in the German Bundeswehr and as a member of the German Military Attaché Reserve served in Paris, London, and Madrid. Matthias deployed to Iraq with the British Army and Afghanistan with the British Army and Bundeswehr. In 2022, he was awarded the Golden Cross of Honour, the German Armed Forces' highest non-combat decoration. Matthias was educated at the University of Münster before earning his MSt and DPhil at the University of Oxford. He is the author or editor of more than 20 books, including The German Army and the Defence of the Reich (Cambridge), How Armies Grow: The Expansion of Military Forces in the Age of Total War 1789-1945 (Casemate), Winning Wars: The Enduring Nature and Changing Character of Victory from Antiquity to the 21st Century (Casemate), and World War I Companion (Osprey). His forthcoming book Blade of a Sword: Ernst Jünger and the 73rd Fusilier Regiment on the Western Front, 1914–18, will be published by Osprey in 2025. Outside of his military and academic life, Matthias gives battlefield tours through The Cultural Experience. “So join us for an energetic and wide-ranging discussion of speaking English, studying at Oxford, growing up in Muenster (the “most livable place on Earth”), being a historian while deployed, Stalingrad staff rides, pink Stetsons, and Johnny Cash! Rec. 02/08/2024

Junio de 1944: los aliados se ven empantanados en una lucha encarnizada en medio de los setos de Normandía. Los británicos y los canadienses aún no alcanzan el objetivo que planearon para el Día D: la ciudad de Caen. Este episodio cuenta la historia de la sangrienta lucha por la ciudad. David Willey cuenta la historia del as panzer Michael Wittmann; Taff Gillingham demuestra la ametralladora MG42; y Matthias Strohn describe la tormenta del siglo que casi destruyó los planes aliados.

Junio de 1944: los aliados se ven empantanados en una lucha encarnizada en medio de los setos de Normandía. Los británicos y los canadienses aún no alcanzan el objetivo que planearon para el Día D: la ciudad de Caen. Este episodio cuenta la historia de la sangrienta lucha por la ciudad. David Willey cuenta la historia del as panzer Michael Wittmann; Taff Gillingham demuestra la ametralladora MG42; y Matthias Strohn describe la tormenta del siglo que casi destruyó los planes aliados.

This week’s podcast is an interview with David Stahel. I will be talking to him about his 2009 work, Operation Barbarossa and Germany’s Defeat in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2009). One of our previous guests, Matthias Strohn, recommended the book, and I am glad he did. Stahel’s book is an important contribution to our understanding of German planning for and execution of Operation Barbarossa. Stahel highlights the many flaws and paradoxes intrinsic to German thinking about war in the East, not least of which was the deception perpetrated by Halder, who masked the centrality of the drive on Moscow to his own plans in order to avoid confrontation with Hitler. By late August 1941, Stahel argues, the German failure decisively to defeat the Soviet regime (even while winning significant victories at places like Minsk and Smolensk) spelled doom for the Wehrmacht. Nor is Stahel resting on his laurels. By the time I conducted the interview, his second work had just hit the shelves. In Kiev 1941: Hitler’s Battle for Supremacy in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Stahel analyzes in detail the critical battle on the southern front. After talking with Stahel late last year, that one is on my reading list as well. And Typhoon is on its way after that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week’s podcast is an interview with David Stahel. I will be talking to him about his 2009 work, Operation Barbarossa and Germany’s Defeat in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2009). One of our previous guests, Matthias Strohn, recommended the book, and I am glad he did. Stahel’s book is an important contribution to our understanding of German planning for and execution of Operation Barbarossa. Stahel highlights the many flaws and paradoxes intrinsic to German thinking about war in the East, not least of which was the deception perpetrated by Halder, who masked the centrality of the drive on Moscow to his own plans in order to avoid confrontation with Hitler. By late August 1941, Stahel argues, the German failure decisively to defeat the Soviet regime (even while winning significant victories at places like Minsk and Smolensk) spelled doom for the Wehrmacht. Nor is Stahel resting on his laurels. By the time I conducted the interview, his second work had just hit the shelves. In Kiev 1941: Hitler’s Battle for Supremacy in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Stahel analyzes in detail the critical battle on the southern front. After talking with Stahel late last year, that one is on my reading list as well. And Typhoon is on its way after that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week’s podcast is an interview with David Stahel. I will be talking to him about his 2009 work, Operation Barbarossa and Germany’s Defeat in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2009). One of our previous guests, Matthias Strohn, recommended the book, and I am glad he did. Stahel’s book is an important contribution to our understanding of German planning for and execution of Operation Barbarossa. Stahel highlights the many flaws and paradoxes intrinsic to German thinking about war in the East, not least of which was the deception perpetrated by Halder, who masked the centrality of the drive on Moscow to his own plans in order to avoid confrontation with Hitler. By late August 1941, Stahel argues, the German failure decisively to defeat the Soviet regime (even while winning significant victories at places like Minsk and Smolensk) spelled doom for the Wehrmacht. Nor is Stahel resting on his laurels. By the time I conducted the interview, his second work had just hit the shelves. In Kiev 1941: Hitler’s Battle for Supremacy in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Stahel analyzes in detail the critical battle on the southern front. After talking with Stahel late last year, that one is on my reading list as well. And Typhoon is on its way after that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week’s podcast is an interview with David Stahel. I will be talking to him about his 2009 work, Operation Barbarossa and Germany’s Defeat in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2009). One of our previous guests, Matthias Strohn, recommended the book, and I am glad he did. Stahel’s book is an important contribution to our understanding of German planning for and execution of Operation Barbarossa. Stahel highlights the many flaws and paradoxes intrinsic to German thinking about war in the East, not least of which was the deception perpetrated by Halder, who masked the centrality of the drive on Moscow to his own plans in order to avoid confrontation with Hitler. By late August 1941, Stahel argues, the German failure decisively to defeat the Soviet regime (even while winning significant victories at places like Minsk and Smolensk) spelled doom for the Wehrmacht. Nor is Stahel resting on his laurels. By the time I conducted the interview, his second work had just hit the shelves. In Kiev 1941: Hitler’s Battle for Supremacy in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Stahel analyzes in detail the critical battle on the southern front. After talking with Stahel late last year, that one is on my reading list as well. And Typhoon is on its way after that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week’s podcast is an interview with David Stahel. I will be talking to him about his 2009 work, Operation Barbarossa and Germany’s Defeat in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2009). One of our previous guests, Matthias Strohn, recommended the book, and I am glad he did. Stahel’s book is an important contribution to our understanding of German planning for and execution of Operation Barbarossa. Stahel highlights the many flaws and paradoxes intrinsic to German thinking about war in the East, not least of which was the deception perpetrated by Halder, who masked the centrality of the drive on Moscow to his own plans in order to avoid confrontation with Hitler. By late August 1941, Stahel argues, the German failure decisively to defeat the Soviet regime (even while winning significant victories at places like Minsk and Smolensk) spelled doom for the Wehrmacht. Nor is Stahel resting on his laurels. By the time I conducted the interview, his second work had just hit the shelves. In Kiev 1941: Hitler’s Battle for Supremacy in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Stahel analyzes in detail the critical battle on the southern front. After talking with Stahel late last year, that one is on my reading list as well. And Typhoon is on its way after that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week's podcast is an interview with David Stahel. I will be talking to him about his 2009 work, Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2009). One of our previous guests, Matthias Strohn, recommended the book, and I am glad he did. Stahel's book is an important contribution to our understanding of German planning for and execution of Operation Barbarossa. Stahel highlights the many flaws and paradoxes intrinsic to German thinking about war in the East, not least of which was the deception perpetrated by Halder, who masked the centrality of the drive on Moscow to his own plans in order to avoid confrontation with Hitler. By late August 1941, Stahel argues, the German failure decisively to defeat the Soviet regime (even while winning significant victories at places like Minsk and Smolensk) spelled doom for the Wehrmacht. Nor is Stahel resting on his laurels. By the time I conducted the interview, his second work had just hit the shelves. In Kiev 1941: Hitler's Battle for Supremacy in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Stahel analyzes in detail the critical battle on the southern front. After talking with Stahel late last year, that one is on my reading list as well. And Typhoon is on its way after that. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This week's podcast is an interview with David Stahel. I will be talking to him about his 2009 work, Operation Barbarossa and Germany's Defeat in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2009). One of our previous guests, Matthias Strohn, recommended the book, and I am glad he did. Stahel's book is an important contribution to our understanding of German planning for and execution of Operation Barbarossa. Stahel highlights the many flaws and paradoxes intrinsic to German thinking about war in the East, not least of which was the deception perpetrated by Halder, who masked the centrality of the drive on Moscow to his own plans in order to avoid confrontation with Hitler. By late August 1941, Stahel argues, the German failure decisively to defeat the Soviet regime (even while winning significant victories at places like Minsk and Smolensk) spelled doom for the Wehrmacht. Nor is Stahel resting on his laurels. By the time I conducted the interview, his second work had just hit the shelves. In Kiev 1941: Hitler's Battle for Supremacy in the East (Cambridge University Press, 2011), Stahel analyzes in detail the critical battle on the southern front. After talking with Stahel late last year, that one is on my reading list as well. And Typhoon is on its way after that.

Matthias Strohn‘s The German Army and the Defense of the Reich: Military Doctrine and the Conduct of the Defensive Battle, 1918-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2011) is an important challenge to the existing literature on interwar German military doctrine. The stunning German victories in 1939 and 1940 have usually been attributed to their practice of “Blitzkrieg” (Lightning War). The inventive use of armored divisions and airpower allowed the Wehrmacht to sweep its enemies from the battlefield with relatively low casualties (on the German side, at least) and with little negative impact on the German homefront or domestic economy. James Corum, Robert Citino (a recent interviewee) and others have traced the roots of this combined arms doctrine in the interwar period, focusing on the “stormtroop” innovations World War One and the advocacy of mobility above all else by planners like Hans von Seeckt. But Strohn believes that this understandable fixation on the roots of Blitzkrieg has blinded us to the practical importance of defensive doctrine in the 100,000 man Reichswehr. With no hope of challenging France (a fact brought painfully to life in the 1923 occupation of the Ruhr) and little prospect for success even against the Polish army, German strategists (Joachim von Stulpnagel more than Seeckt) concentrated on defensive doctrine, hoping to survive an initial attack long enough to organize (perhaps) a guerrilla campaign or to die gloriously in arms. Based on extensive archival research, Strohn’s book should provoke a conversation among scholars of the German army that will refresh the debate about interwar doctrine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthias Strohn‘s The German Army and the Defense of the Reich: Military Doctrine and the Conduct of the Defensive Battle, 1918-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2011) is an important challenge to the existing literature on interwar German military doctrine. The stunning German victories in 1939 and 1940 have usually been attributed to their practice of “Blitzkrieg” (Lightning War). The inventive use of armored divisions and airpower allowed the Wehrmacht to sweep its enemies from the battlefield with relatively low casualties (on the German side, at least) and with little negative impact on the German homefront or domestic economy. James Corum, Robert Citino (a recent interviewee) and others have traced the roots of this combined arms doctrine in the interwar period, focusing on the “stormtroop” innovations World War One and the advocacy of mobility above all else by planners like Hans von Seeckt. But Strohn believes that this understandable fixation on the roots of Blitzkrieg has blinded us to the practical importance of defensive doctrine in the 100,000 man Reichswehr. With no hope of challenging France (a fact brought painfully to life in the 1923 occupation of the Ruhr) and little prospect for success even against the Polish army, German strategists (Joachim von Stulpnagel more than Seeckt) concentrated on defensive doctrine, hoping to survive an initial attack long enough to organize (perhaps) a guerrilla campaign or to die gloriously in arms. Based on extensive archival research, Strohn’s book should provoke a conversation among scholars of the German army that will refresh the debate about interwar doctrine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthias Strohn‘s The German Army and the Defense of the Reich: Military Doctrine and the Conduct of the Defensive Battle, 1918-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2011) is an important challenge to the existing literature on interwar German military doctrine. The stunning German victories in 1939 and 1940 have usually been attributed to their practice of “Blitzkrieg” (Lightning War). The inventive use of armored divisions and airpower allowed the Wehrmacht to sweep its enemies from the battlefield with relatively low casualties (on the German side, at least) and with little negative impact on the German homefront or domestic economy. James Corum, Robert Citino (a recent interviewee) and others have traced the roots of this combined arms doctrine in the interwar period, focusing on the “stormtroop” innovations World War One and the advocacy of mobility above all else by planners like Hans von Seeckt. But Strohn believes that this understandable fixation on the roots of Blitzkrieg has blinded us to the practical importance of defensive doctrine in the 100,000 man Reichswehr. With no hope of challenging France (a fact brought painfully to life in the 1923 occupation of the Ruhr) and little prospect for success even against the Polish army, German strategists (Joachim von Stulpnagel more than Seeckt) concentrated on defensive doctrine, hoping to survive an initial attack long enough to organize (perhaps) a guerrilla campaign or to die gloriously in arms. Based on extensive archival research, Strohn’s book should provoke a conversation among scholars of the German army that will refresh the debate about interwar doctrine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthias Strohn‘s The German Army and the Defense of the Reich: Military Doctrine and the Conduct of the Defensive Battle, 1918-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2011) is an important challenge to the existing literature on interwar German military doctrine. The stunning German victories in 1939 and 1940 have usually been attributed to their practice of “Blitzkrieg” (Lightning War). The inventive use of armored divisions and airpower allowed the Wehrmacht to sweep its enemies from the battlefield with relatively low casualties (on the German side, at least) and with little negative impact on the German homefront or domestic economy. James Corum, Robert Citino (a recent interviewee) and others have traced the roots of this combined arms doctrine in the interwar period, focusing on the “stormtroop” innovations World War One and the advocacy of mobility above all else by planners like Hans von Seeckt. But Strohn believes that this understandable fixation on the roots of Blitzkrieg has blinded us to the practical importance of defensive doctrine in the 100,000 man Reichswehr. With no hope of challenging France (a fact brought painfully to life in the 1923 occupation of the Ruhr) and little prospect for success even against the Polish army, German strategists (Joachim von Stulpnagel more than Seeckt) concentrated on defensive doctrine, hoping to survive an initial attack long enough to organize (perhaps) a guerrilla campaign or to die gloriously in arms. Based on extensive archival research, Strohn’s book should provoke a conversation among scholars of the German army that will refresh the debate about interwar doctrine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthias Strohn‘s The German Army and the Defense of the Reich: Military Doctrine and the Conduct of the Defensive Battle, 1918-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2011) is an important challenge to the existing literature on interwar German military doctrine. The stunning German victories in 1939 and 1940 have usually been attributed to their practice of “Blitzkrieg” (Lightning War). The inventive use of armored divisions and airpower allowed the Wehrmacht to sweep its enemies from the battlefield with relatively low casualties (on the German side, at least) and with little negative impact on the German homefront or domestic economy. James Corum, Robert Citino (a recent interviewee) and others have traced the roots of this combined arms doctrine in the interwar period, focusing on the “stormtroop” innovations World War One and the advocacy of mobility above all else by planners like Hans von Seeckt. But Strohn believes that this understandable fixation on the roots of Blitzkrieg has blinded us to the practical importance of defensive doctrine in the 100,000 man Reichswehr. With no hope of challenging France (a fact brought painfully to life in the 1923 occupation of the Ruhr) and little prospect for success even against the Polish army, German strategists (Joachim von Stulpnagel more than Seeckt) concentrated on defensive doctrine, hoping to survive an initial attack long enough to organize (perhaps) a guerrilla campaign or to die gloriously in arms. Based on extensive archival research, Strohn’s book should provoke a conversation among scholars of the German army that will refresh the debate about interwar doctrine. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Matthias Strohn‘s The German Army and the Defense of the Reich: Military Doctrine and the Conduct of the Defensive Battle, 1918-1939 (Cambridge University Press, 2011) is an important challenge to the existing literature on interwar German military doctrine. The stunning German victories in 1939 and 1940 have usually been attributed to their practice of “Blitzkrieg” (Lightning War). The inventive use of armored divisions and airpower allowed the Wehrmacht to sweep its enemies from the battlefield with relatively low casualties (on the German side, at least) and with little negative impact on the German homefront or domestic economy. James Corum, Robert Citino (a recent interviewee) and others have traced the roots of this combined arms doctrine in the interwar period, focusing on the “stormtroop” innovations World War One and the advocacy of mobility above all else by planners like Hans von Seeckt. But Strohn believes that this understandable fixation on the roots of Blitzkrieg has blinded us to the practical importance of defensive doctrine in the 100,000 man Reichswehr. With no hope of challenging France (a fact brought painfully to life in the 1923 occupation of the Ruhr) and little prospect for success even against the Polish army, German strategists (Joachim von Stulpnagel more than Seeckt) concentrated on defensive doctrine, hoping to survive an initial attack long enough to organize (perhaps) a guerrilla campaign or to die gloriously in arms. Based on extensive archival research, Strohn's book should provoke a conversation among scholars of the German army that will refresh the debate about interwar doctrine.