An essential and critical component of the orders German front-line formations received in the ideological war against the Soviet Union was the Commissar Order of 6 June 1941. This order, issued by the High Command of the Armed Forces prior to the German invasion of the Soviet Union, required that front-line military formations, as well as SS and police units attached to the Army, immediately execute Soviet political commissars among prisoners of war. Soviet political commissars were attached to the Red Army at virtually every operational level, and were viewed by both Hitler and the High Command as the foremost leaders of the resistance against the Nazis because of their commitment to Bolshevik ideology. According to the Commissar Order, "Commissars will not be treated as soldiers. The protection afforded by international law to prisoners of war will not apply in their case. After they have been segregated they will be liquidated." / While there is no paucity of information on the existence and intent of the Commissar Order, this directive has only been investigated by scholars as a portion of a much greater ideological portrait, or subsumed in the larger context of overall Nazi criminal activities during "Operation Barbarossa." / Examining the extent to which front-line divisions carried out the charge to shoot all grades of political commissars is necessary if we are to understand the role and depth of involvement by front-line troops of the Wehrmacht in a murderous program of extermination during the German attack and occupation of the Soviet Union. Such an examination has simply not taken place to-date. My dissertation seeks to address this issue. The result is both a narrative on the genesis of the Commissar Order and its attendant decrees and agreements between the Army leadership and the SS ( SD) and Security Police, and a quantitative analysis of how many commissars were reported captured and shot by the front-line forces of the 17th Army over a seven month period.

Mechanization signaled the end of the cavalry but the renaissance of heavy cavalry doctrine. The tank heralded the return of breakthrough operations and maneuver warfare. Initially, the western cavalries refused doctrinal revision and chose instead to fight bitter rear guard actions against Fullerist zealots. / The Canadian Cavalry, prompted by Blitzkrieg's triumphs, effortlessly evolved into a tank force---virtually overnight. Canadian doctrine, however, was ersatz. Denied its own vast training areas, the RCAC was sandwiched into southern England and saddled with British warfighting techniques developed in the Western Desert. In Normandy, Canadian operational art was driven by Generals Simonds and Crerar, both gunners, who had neither the skill nor experience to conduct armoured warfare. Hampered by General Montgomery's inability to reproduce a strategic offensive comparable to that demonstrated on the Russian front, Allied armoured forces were squandered in mismanaged frontal attacks. / In the United States, the attempts to protect the horse forced a praetorian's revolt that ended with General Chaffee garroting the US Cavalry, eliminating it from future battlefields. The doctrinal dominance of the American Armored Force was subsequently threatened by a cabal under artillery General Leslie McNair who imposed the Tank Destroyer philosophy. Internecine squabbles and economic nationalism prevented America from producing a tank capable of meeting German panzers on even terms. Though failing technically, the US Armored force succeeded doctrinally via the Louisiana maneuvers and produced a balanced Armored Division. General Bradley's 12th Army Group arrived in France with a purposeful dogma that had been further refined at the Combat Command, Divisional, and Corps level in North Africa and Sicily. / American armour maneuvered during Operation Cobra but it did not fight massed panzers; this was soon redressed in Lorraine where American armoured doctrine reached tactical maturity. Canadian armour fought tank battles throughout Operations Spring, Totalize and Tractable, but it did not maneuver. American and Canadian armour's best opportunity for strategic victory occurred in Normandy. The Canadians, despite better tanks and favourable terrain, failed operationally and received no second chance.

Thesis (doctoral)--Universität Göttingen, 2004. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 411-451) and indexes.

Thesis (doctoral)--Rijksuniversiteit te Utrecht, 1983. / Errata slip and "Stellingen" (1 leaf) inserted. Includes bibliographical references (p. 282-292).

Thesis--Cologne. / Includes bibliographical references (p. 284-291).

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of Texas at Austin, 2007. / Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

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published_or_final_version / History / Master / Master of Philosophy

This research has two objectives. The first objective is to analyze how former combatants of World War II now present the 'facts' of that struggle to their current student population. To accomplish this, eight secondary school history textbooks were selected with the assistance of the International Textbook Institute in Braunschweig, Federal Republic of Germany. The chosen texts are from The United States, England, Italy, West Germany, The Soviet Union, Poland, Hungary, and East Germany. The six non-English textbooks were literally translated into English. The second objective is to create comparative education research methodologies that are compatable with the incipient power of microcomputers. The 92,707 words in the bodies of the textbooks are submitted to six analytic techniques to assess the nature of the information within them. The first three techniques are 'time-centered', and the last three are 'event-oriented'. All of the six techniques are structured as ad interim algorithms that are imposed onto a generic 'electronic calculating sheet' software program for microcomputers. All appendices included in this study are data outputs from the computer program. This research suggests certain conclusions. First, that the specific affiliation of selected countries during World War II is not significant in the presentation of the 'facts' in their textbooks; whereas, the present affiliation (Nato/Warsaw Pact) is significant. Second, the communist texts are, relative to the Western texts, quite political; however, the Western texts are generally academically less rigorous. Third, all of the selected texts tend to be ethnocentric by selecting and avoiding 'facts', and ignoring some of their negative behaviors in the struggle.