Military Model Scene

Title: The Balkans 1940-41 (2)
Author: Pier Paolo Battistelli
Publisher: Osprey
ISBN: 978-1-4728-4261-9

Number 365 in Osprey's Campaign series and the second volume exploring the fighting in the Balkan states during the early period of the war. A 96-page soft-cover book in the usual style for the series, well illustrated throughout with the high quality artwork we have come to expect from Osprey along with a good collection of archive images, all to illustrate the text.
The book follows the fairly standard layout for the series, with the opening chapter setting the scene in Origins of the Campaign, along with a Chronology of events. Then the Opposing Commanders, both Axis and Allied. This is something I found especially interesting as it isn't just the German and British officers, but also Italian and Hungarian, and on the allied side, Yugoslav, Greek, Australian and New Zealanders. Commander who I suspect I am not the only one to have previously been unaware of. This is followed with the Order of Battle for both sides, involving the fighting in both Albania and Greece. The story of the Campaign then fills 2/3 of the book, the collapse of Yugoslavia and the Blitzkrieg on through Greece, with the failure of the various defence lines that led to the evacuation of the allied forces. Everything is then brought together in an assessment in the Aftermath and notes on the Battlefield Today.
While I was not totally unfamiliar with the story of the events of the German invasion of Greece, and the evacuation of Allied forces, there are elements in here that I hadn't known about before, or even considered. Hitler was forced into the campaign largely thanks to the Italian campaign in Albania, while it was Churchill whose political decisions forced the Allied military forces to try and defend Greece. Plenty of questions about the reasoning behind the Balkans campaign as well as the basic history of events, which was another successful application of the German Blitzkrieg tactics in the first half of the war. I found this an interesting read.
Thanks to Osprey for the review copy.

Robin