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Fort Eben Emael: The Key to Hitler's Victory in the West (Fortress) | 
 enlarge | Author: Simon Dunstan
Creator: Hugh Johnson
Publisher: Osprey Publishing
Category: Book
List Price: $18.95
Buy Used: $6.06
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Rating:  7 reviews
Sales Rank: 827467
Media: Paperback
Pages: 64
Number Of Items: 1
Shipping Weight (lbs): 0.5
Dimensions (in): 9.6 x 7.1 x 0.3
ISBN: 1841768219
Dewey Decimal Number: 623.1949346
EAN: 9781841768212
ASIN: 1841768219
Publication Date: May 8, 2005
Availability: Usually ships in 1-2 business days
Condition: Slight Corner Wear
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Product Description
At the outbreak of World War II, Fort Eben Emael in Belgium was the strongest fortress in the world, and it lay exactly across the German invasion route of Belgium and France. The fort’s elimination was essential for the success of Hitler’s invasion of the West. Deemed impregnable to conventional attack, Hitler himself suggested the means for its capture with the first glider-borne assault in military history. On 10 May 1940, ten gliders carrying just 77 paratroopers landed on top of the fort. Using top-secret hollow-charge weapons for the first time in warfare, the assault pioneers of Sturmgruppe Granit subdued Fort Eben Emael within just 30 minutes, and the fortress surrendered within 30 hours. It remains one of the greatest raids in the annals of Special Forces.
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| Customer Reviews: Read 2 more reviews...
Great Description of a Bold Operation July 19, 2005
R. A Forczyk (Laurel, MD USA)
17 out of 17 found this review helpful
Simon Dunstan's Fort Eben Emael is probably one of the best of Osprey's Fortress series volumes produced to date. Rather than just a discussion of dirt and concrete, Dunstan details both the Belgian quest to build an impregnable fortress to protect their eastern border and the German plans to seize the fort in a coup de main. The story of Fort Eben Emael is a dramatic episode in the history of warfare and Dunstan's narrative brings it vividly to life. There is also a subtle cautionary tale in these pages about how expensive weapons programs can be undone by a bold and determined enemy. Indeed, the dramatic capture of Fort Eben Emael by only 85 German paratroopers was, as Dunstan writes, "one of the most remarkable feats of arms in the history of warfare."
Dunstan begins the volume with an 8-page introduction that traces the German threat to Belgium beginning before the First World War and lessons learned from the defense of the Liege forts in 1914. After the First World War, the Belgian Government decided to allocate substantial financial resources to construct a new series of forts around Liege and the Albert Canal to inhibit any future German invasion. The centerpiece of this new fortified line was Fort Eben Emael, which was built at the junction of the Meuse River and the Albert Canal in 1932-35. As Dunstan notes, the fort incorporated all the lessons learned to date about fortress warfare and was designed to resist attack by artillery, ground assault and aircraft. Dunstan describes the fort in great detail, with sections on blockhouses, gun emplacements, armored doors, the underground caserne, observation posts and the garrison. The text is complemented by numerous B/W photos of the fort in the 1940s as well as color photos of the fort as it looks today. The volume has two 2-D maps (the Sichelschnitt Plan of 1940; locations of Belgian forts around Liege) and six color plates (overhead view of Fort Eben Emael; a gun casemate; fields of fire of the fort; hollow charge explosives; the flight path to Eben Emael; glider landings and objectives), all of which assist the reader in understanding the Belgian plan of defense and the German attack plan. Dunstan also provides an appendix which lists all 85 German paratroopers involved in the assault by name, as well as their fate.
The middle part of the volume discusses the German Case Yellow plan for the offensive in the West and the necessity of seizing Fort Eben Emael quickly. Dunstan discusses the formation of Storm Group "Koch" to deal with the Belgian forts as well as the German secret weapons - hollow charges and gliders (probably one of the few occasions in military history where "secret weapons" lived up to initial expectations in combat). Readers should also note the involvement of Adolph Hitler in the tactical details of the operations. After outlining German preparations to seize the fort, Dunstan describes the woeful state of readiness at Fort Eben Emael. Dunstan writes that, "through a combination of manpower shortages, poor moral, inefficient communications and political interference, the strength of the most powerful fortress in the world was seriously undermined..." Although the Belgian High Command issued a war alert five hours before the German attack, many critical positions at Fort Eben Emael were still unmanned and ammunition not issued when the German gliders began to land on top of them. Dunstan notes that the Belgian anti-aircraft machineguns should have decimated the nine German gliders - but they lacked ammunition. Within 30 minutes, the German paratroopers boldly disabled the fort's artillery and observation posts and sat back to await relief. Despite a 10-1 numerical superiority, the Belgian garrison sat passively in their bunkers, completely surrendering the initiative to the Germans. However, the German plan almost came unglued when the destruction of a vital bridge delayed the relief force and the German paratroopers had to spend an anxious night atop the fort, awaiting a counterattack that never came. When the German relief force finally arrived, the demoralized garrison surrendered post haste.
Dunstan also contrasts the aggressive leadership style of the German paratroopers against the passive Belgian command style, which he cites as a major factor in the capture of the fort. When the German officer in command failed to reach the fort due to a glider accident, a senior German NCO assumed command and led the initial assault. Meanwhile, a Belgian artillery NCO failed to use a stairway to carry ammunition by hand to his guns when the electric shell hoist failed. Dunstan makes it clear that in evaluating the value or effectiveness of fortifications, that the relative efficiency of the garrison is a crucial determinant.
Ain't no holt what caint be broke! February 9, 2006
Alan D. Cranford (Carson City, NV USA)
5 out of 7 found this review helpful
A wrestling coach of old was said to tell his wrestlers that there was no escape-proof lock, hold, or other technique in his sport. The same is true of military operations. Eban Emael was said to be impregnable--I forgot; was it politicians or newspapermen who made that claim? Germany exploited new techniques of war to conquer this Belgian fortress, and the Belgian Army appears to have provided less than adequate means to shore up this keystone of the Belgian defenses.
Most modern armchair generals claim that fortifications are holes in the ground that armies pour men and material into for no gain. Permanent fortifications are universally condemned, and even field fortifications are said to sap the offensive strength and morale of the defending armies. It was for this reason that the World War One French Army instituted the spirit of the assault--and suffered massive losses against German barb wire and German Spandau machine guns in 1914 and 1915. Simon Dustan establishes the rational for putting this hole in the ground in the first part of his book. Attempting to understand World War Two in isolation, without considering the bloodbath of 20 years prior, is to ignore reality. The first pages of Fort Eban Emael lay this out quite well, placing the concrete-lined hole-in-the-ground in context of the political and economic climate in Belgium. Note that Dunstan doesn't explore the alternatives to Fort Eben Emael--this is a book about what was, not what could have been.
Hugh Johnson's illustrations clarify how the fort was laid out. Battle is "organized chaos," with the emphasis on "chaos;" the neat diagram of the glider assault on page 50 clarifies how the Germans took the fort, and the text hints at the confusion among the Belgian defenders. Germany developed several new weapons that were first used in this attack: shaped charge demolitions, gliders capable of carrying the heavy equipment needed for reducing gun positions, glider infantry teams task-organized for this mission, and most importantly, the operation was integrated into the campaign. Simply completing a brilliant mission is not enough when that single mission does nothing else. On pages 42 and 43, Johnson's artwork shows how the Luftwaffe circumvented the Belgian wartime blackout (an air raid precaution) to land the glider troops under cover of darkness, and Dunstan's text explains the coordination so that maximum surprise was achieved by the glider assault and the necessary follow-up actions by the ground forces.
Just because the Germans found a countermeasure didn't invalidate the defensive capabilities of Eben Emael. Could the same number of half-trained troops, WITHOUT Eben Emael's powerful fixed artillery batteries, have withstood a German combined arms assault? Resources include men and material--the aircraft and tanks and field artillery used by the allies in 1940 were inferior to the German equipment, and the leadership and common soldier was less experienced and skilled than the German counterparts. I think Belgium was doomed from the moment that Hitler decided to use that small nation as a highway because Belgium couldn't muster resources enough to fight the entire German war machine, and the nation is small! Modern manuever warfare must have manuever room. Belgium tried to remain neutral--couldn't. It takes only one side to start a war. The only chance that Belgium had to remain uninvaded would have been to invade Germany during September of 1939, while most of the German war machine was mobilized for the Polish Campaign--a political impossibility. Besides, Belgium didn't have the mobile, "offensive army" this operation would have required--even if France and Britain would have had the political will and military might to seize the western parts of Germany.
I enjoyed this book because of the details of the fort's layout and construction. The text covered the German countermeasures to the fort's defensive strengths. Eben Emael's communications failed on May 10, 1940, and so the German Luftwaffe glider troops seemed to have had a cakewalk--but Dunstan's text shows that wasn't the case. The issue was in doubt until motorized pioneers arrived to help "mop up" the defenses. It wasn't an easy victory for the Germans.
Excellent description of bold adventure January 7, 2006
Tom (Alexandria, VA)
4 out of 4 found this review helpful
This book is a well done account of a brief and bold operation. It has the illustrations that many other books lack. Highly recommend this amazing book.
Pick me up, I'll dance February 11, 2008
Mr. A. Pomeroy (Wiltshire, England)
1 out of 3 found this review helpful
This book was a pleasant surprise. The German assault on Eben Emael tends to be covered very briefly in general histories of the Second World War, because it was over in a flash, and was quickly followed by even more dramatic events. On the other hand, it is not exactly forgotten, because it was very novel. Even though the wrong side won, it was still an impressive feat of cleverness. The Germans realised that the fort would be a difficult target for their tanks and infantry, so they landed gliders on the roof. It shouldn't have worked, because the fort had plenty of weapons that could beat off gliders and close-range attacks, but it did work, because it was carried out with skill and daring.
This book does a super job of describing the battle, in such a way that it would be entertaining even if you didn't care about the topic. I have flicked through Osprey books that have made major battles seem dull, and it's ironic that this book makes such a small action seem intensely epic. I imagine the German paratroopers must have felt they were participating in the most incredible Boy's Own adventure, and afterwards I bet they walked tall, and got free drinks in pubs, or bierkellers, or any place in Germany in 1939 that sold drinks.
The book starts off by covering the strategic reasons for the fort, which had been under construction since the 19th Century. The fort was was supposed to be a kind of self-sufficient underground town, a contemporary nuclear submarine, except that it was a static nuclear submarine that could not attack. The book covers the political situation leading up to the Second World War, and the German preparations for the attack. It explains why the Germans didn't simply go past the fort. The glider assault plan was complex, and might not have worked if Eben Emael had been running at peak efficiency, staffed with crack troops led by top officers, but the book makes clear that the fort was going through a bad patch. The officers in charge come across particularly poorly. The book is so finely-detailed that the individual Belgian casualties are named, and I hope the men who led them so poorly feel humble.
The assault took only a few minutes, and the book does a lot of cross-cutting, but it still makes sense. In theory the fort could have peppered the German gliders with anti-aircraft machineguns, and blasted the German paratroopers with canister rounds shot from its howitzers, but it was embroiled in administrative chaos. The Germans had their fair share of technical problems - a couple of the gliders fell short, several of the anti-bunker explosives had no effect, the troops attacked dummy bunkers - but overall the Germans made very few mistakes, and successfully improvised solutions to the problems they faced. The Belgians made lots of mistakes, big and small mistakes, institutional mistakes, and they did not deal with them, and they lost.
Overall this is a great read. The assault feels like an action film, a very short action film, one in which the Germans win. The level of detail is sufficient for picky people, and it does a good job of explaining that the victory wasn't a simple matter of flying some planes onto the fort and then jumping out, throwing grenades. By the end you'll find yourself cheering on the brave Germans, and then having to wash yourself to get rid of the nasty guity feeling.
Excellent coverage of a major operation and site March 4, 2006
Stew "the Club" Reading (PA, USA)
The author does a fine job covering the Eben Emael and its design and the German operation that took it. Some other books in this series, like American World War II defenses, the Maginot Line, and the Western Front in World War I do not do just as good a job because their topics cover a greater subject. The book is well illustrated and the commentary is excellent.
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