Monte Cassino: The Hardest-Fought Battle of World War II

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A gripping chronicle of the greatest and most terrible confrontation between Allied forces and the Nazi army, based on groundbreaking archival research and the compelling first-person accounts of four hundred survivors on both sides of the conflict. Before D-Day there was Monte Cassino, the desperate six-month struggle in the ains of central Italy that left more than 350,000 men dead or wounded. Hitler had declared that the Allied drive toward Rome must be stopped at all costs, and in the winter of 1943–44 the German commander Kesselring chose the fortress-like monastery of Monte Cassino as the centerpiece of the Gustav Line, one of the most impressive feats of defensive engineering ever conceived. With months to prepare his position, Kesselring took advantage of the treacherous terrain to establish a virtually impregnable position. As the Allied forces?which included Americans, British, Canadians, Indians, South Africans, Tunisians, Algerians, Moroccans, Senegalese, Brazilians, and royalist Italians?pushed their way forward, the coldest, rainiest winter in Italian history rendered air and armor power useless, and turned the landscape into a hellish killing ground. The Battle of Monte Cassino is a story of the horrors of war seen from the perspective of the soldiers on the battlefield. Through interviews with hundreds of survivors, as well as wartime letters and diaries, Matthew Parker vividly captures the savagery of conflicts fought with grenades, bayonets, and bare hands. His extensive research in the archives of the participating nations brings to light how incessant disagreements and backbiting at the Allied command level contributed to the carnage and confusion. The destruction of the fourteenth-century monastery itself becomes a powerful symbol of the toll war takes on history and culture. Monte Cassino was one of the most sacred sites in Christendom and the home to valuable religious artifacts, artworks, and manuscripts. In massive Allied bombings, the building and many of its irreplaceable treasures were reduced to rubble. The first book in twenty years about Monte Cassino, this monumental work of history conveys the human face of war with authoritative power and unforgettable emotional resonance.