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Armageddon Leon Uris 9780385003568 Books

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Armageddon Leon Uris 9780385003568 Books

Armageddon: A Novel of Berlin provides the reader an excellent opportunity to learn about the period in Germany, particularly in Berlin, following World War II. As with most historical novels, Leon. Uris changes the names of the primary players in this historical setting. For example, true historical initiatives and events such as the Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan, and Berlin Airlift are described, but the novel's characters who are instrumental in acting upon those affairs within the German theater are fictional. Notwithstanding Mr. Uris' fictional portrayals, he demonstrates time and again the comprehensive research he accomplished in creating this novel. Notwithstanding the fictional creation of his characters, they were not only believable, but authentic human beings with plausible plights which most likely occurred during that time period in that part of the world. Put another way, the book is so convincing, the reader feels a sympathetic relationship with the characters involved. By the end of the novel, a perceptive reader will have increased his/her understanding of that time period, and finishing the book will cause a poignant loss. In addition, since the book was published in 1964, political correctness did not distort the historical facts. To put it simply, Leon Uris simply told us the way it was.


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Armageddon Leon Uris 9780385003568 Books Reviews

I got this book after finishing Ken Follett's "Winter of the World" since I was hungry for more on the fall of Nazi Germany and the rise of the new superpowers the USA and USSR.

This more than surpassed my expectations. The novel is rich in characters, story and history that all interrelate starting in Jan 1944 with the US and British planners building a team to deal with the governance and running of occupied German towns and cities. This continued with the last year in WWII in 1945 with the collapse of Nazi Germany and then the subsequent tensions that arose between Western Allied forces with the Soviet Union in sharing Europe, particularly Germany and Berlin.

The main character Sean O'Sullivan a US Army Major and appointed Allied Governor of Rombaden will wrestle with the conflict between humanity, duty, disdain and disgust in dealing with the Germans and "ex" Nazi's.

Major O'Sullivan starts with the huge task of wondering how the taming and re-birth of a deeply ingrained Nazi Germany could occur and how hopeless it initially seems. A section at the start of the book lists pages of organizations that were swelled with Nazi sympathisers and fanatics, not just the normal stuff like the SS and Gestapo that we think of but the Professions (Doctors, Engineers, Technicians), Courts, Banks, Transportation, Utilities and Power, Health, Education, commerce, race, culture, women's affairs, police, local government. On moving into Rombaden you, like O'Sullivan start to build up a slow but steady feeling of resentment. You feel his pain and hatred of everything Nazi and to let that roll over into hatred of everything German and what that represented in descending their country into the Abyss. The liberation of the schwabenwald concentration camp and the marching of civilians into the camp to witness the atrocities actually occurred in places like Lambach (Gunskirchen Lager), Muhldorf (Dachau) and Buchenwald. It is in Rombaden that O'Sullivan's life will become inexplicably linked with one of the "Good Germans" Ulrich Falkenstein who was a political prisoner in Nazi German as a Social Democrat.

O'Sullivan and Falkenstein then move onto Berlin which is a much bigger fish to fry and fix but with the added complication of the sharing of the occupation with the British, French and Russians. It is here that tensions start with the Russians and you start to feel the shift in emphasis from the evil of the Nazi's to the evil of the Communists and their new "world order". Berliners having suffered years of hardship bombing and death are then split and bullied mercilessly by the Russians who very quickly, deliberately and aggressively start to put a stranglehold on everything democratic.

The book finishes with the Berlin airlift and the monumental efforts carried out in planning, logistics and shear guts and determination by the Americans and British. By then you have this sense of relief and realize that it all actually took place and if it wasn't for the USA stepping in when they did with the help of the British and eventually with the Marshall Plan to fund the re-building of Western Europe, the whole of Europe or most of it would have plunged back into the Abyss from being Nazi to Communist.

History at times seems so simple and obvious, but if you look at the details that occur when it actually happens, it is often far from the truth or far from a successful outcome that we can look back on today with perfect hindsight.

If you love history and in particular want one of the best "on-the-ground" insights into the struggles of Germany and Berlin after WWII then get this book!
Finally, I read Armageddon on my , a novel I had wanted read to for a very long time. The book covers the events that took place in Berlin from 1945 to 1949. The novel begins with Sean O’Sullivan, whose brother Liam was killed by the Germans, being sent to Germany in 1944. Soon after that, his second brother Tim is killed, also, when his plane is downed. The death of both his brothers and his discovery of a concentration camp leaves Sean as a German-hater. Still throughout the novel, he does his best to turn Germany’s fate around to help build a new democratic nation, but when it comes to his falling in love with the German girl Ernestine whose father was a Nazi, he can’t find a way to overlook his brothers’ demises or his hatred of the Germans.

Although the above thread runs throughout the novel, there are many other interpersonal situations, relationships, and fantastic scenes because the book is much more than a failed love story. It is full of history, the clash of ideologies between Russians and the West, the good Germans versus the bad ones, and the ruin of a country and society after a terrible war. More than anything this story is about the success of the Berlin Airlift and indomitable spirit of humanity. The novel also boasts hordes of characters, most of whom meticulously drawn and presented.

As the novel’s general plot, Interaction among the people of Western nations and Russians, though having started in friendly terms, deteriorates over the years due to the ulterior motives of the Russians, leading to blockades and the airlift, which is precisely and methodically explained and shown through the actions of the characters. In fact, I am awed by the amount and expanse of research that must have gone into it. Plus the writing is exquisite as is the construction of the plot.

The book ends with the ending of the Russian blockade and the Airlift, signaling the beginning of the Cold War, aptly described by a General’s report. Even if one has read many novels and nonfiction about the aftermath of World War II, a reader may be able to find additional eye-openers in this book, which is close to 700 pages. Be warned that it takes a while to read it.
Armageddon A Novel of Berlin provides the reader an excellent opportunity to learn about the period in Germany, particularly in Berlin, following World War II. As with most historical novels, Leon. Uris changes the names of the primary players in this historical setting. For example, true historical initiatives and events such as the Truman Doctrine, Marshall Plan, and Berlin Airlift are described, but the novel's characters who are instrumental in acting upon those affairs within the German theater are fictional. Notwithstanding Mr. Uris' fictional portrayals, he demonstrates time and again the comprehensive research he accomplished in creating this novel. Notwithstanding the fictional creation of his characters, they were not only believable, but authentic human beings with plausible plights which most likely occurred during that time period in that part of the world. Put another way, the book is so convincing, the reader feels a sympathetic relationship with the characters involved. By the end of the novel, a perceptive reader will have increased his/her understanding of that time period, and finishing the book will cause a poignant loss. In addition, since the book was published in 1964, political correctness did not distort the historical facts. To put it simply, Leon Uris simply told us the way it was.