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...on the spin and propaganda that suits those doing the writing. You could say that history is rewritten by the winners. With this in mind, it is easy to forget that in the case of Wars, in this instance the Second World War, the actual battles are fought largely by normal, everyday people, with only a uniform to distinguish the two sides. Much is made these days of the politics of the Nazi regime and the horrors that it created, and it is right that these themes should be examined for the sake of prosperity, but it is also refreshing to come across an Account of a normal, balanced Soldier, doing his duty and just trying to survive, like the majority of the millions of combatants that were engulfed in the conflict. Guy Sajer and E.B. Sledge have both written accounts close to being boisterous and boastful with almost for a form of glory in hellish acts and not to enlighten future generations with absolute truth.
The Forgotten Soldier is an account of Guy Sajer, half French, half German recruited into the German Army and sent to fight on the Russian Front in the summer of 1942. Sajer was one of thousands of recruits brought to the Russian Front to keep the momentum of Hitler's dream of beating the Soviets and obtaining the vast resources, particularly oil fields, that this would bring him. In his first year, he was a truck driver running supplies and men to the front but in a relatively safe position. As autumn turns into winter, the real hardships begin to show themselves, not the Russian army, which at this point is falling back, but the cold. This is his first taste of the hell of 'total war" that is to be his next two years. In the spring of 1943, Sajer and his friend volunteer for the Gross Deutschland division, a sort of German equivalent of a guards Unit, encouraged to do so mainly out of comradeship, but also drawn by the status and better treatment that...
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