Tigers in the Mud: The Combat Career of German Panzer Commander Otto Carius

(000228.79-E000157.73NRLOSUC20V)   

WWII began with a metallic roar as the German Blitzkrieg raced across Europe, spearheaded by the most dreaded weapon of the 20th century: the Panzer. No German tank better represents that thundering power than the infamous Tiger, and Otto Carius was one of the most successful commanders to ever take a Tiger into battle, destroying well over 150 enemy tanks during his incredible career.

Price for Paperback: $20.00

Some Customer Reviews:

Reviewed in Canada on August 5, 2023
I read this in hardcover close to 20 years ago, but it is still one of the best memoirs by a panzer commander. He was physically small and often underestimated, but once he took command of his first Tiger he found his calling and worked his way up the chain of command from a lowly loader to company leader. His exploits on the Ost Front became semi-legendary, but unlike some of his more famous fellow Tiger aces (Wittman, von Strachwitz), he survived to tell the tale first-hand.
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David Havelka

Reviewed in the United States on August 9, 2024
This book tells the story of Otto Carius, one of the greatest of the Panzer Aces during WW2. Although it is missing details such as dates, and misspells Soviet towns and villages, it is a great read.

An excellent first-hand perspective
Reviewed in the United States on September 27, 2013
Unlike some of the other reviewers who have commented here, I read a lot about this book before actually deciding to read this book, and so I knew what I was getting into: a first-hand account by a legendary tanker of the second world war, written primarily for other tankers of the second world war.

I almost gave the book four stars instead of five because, frankly, it’s lacking in terms of accessibility. You will need to keep research materials (or at least Google) close at hand as you’re reading, and you’re going to be looking up a lot of stuff (like, “what the hell is a Kubel?”) if you want to get the full effect of the work, but I found added effort to be worthwhile.

Carius’s voice was surprisingly clear and compelling in this translation–and also surprisingly acerbic! His descriptions of combat and events are thick with sarcasm, at least as they are rendered here in English, and I found myself at once delighted by his tone and curious whether or not, and to what extent, it is present in the original German. Not that I was planning to learn German. The appendices in the last quarter of the book is exactly the sort of dry, blow-by-blow reports and technical data that I expected the entire book to be made of, but the rest of it is pretty darn entertaining.

One caveat for those who are looking for vivid images of the armored battlefront: they just aren’t here. Carius himself states that this manuscript was assembled for his peers rather than for the rest of us, and it is apparent that he doesn’t feel his intended audience needs to be reminded about how things looked and felt. That said, if you are willing and able to read between the lines here and there, I doubt you’ll be disappointed.

A final note: I would very nearly recommend this book on the basis of its final few chapters alone because they paint a picture of the late war Western Front that I had never imagined before–indeed, that I didn’t even realize was possible. The differences between the author’s descriptions of the fighting on the Eastern Front and the last stand on the West are like night and day.