Gunther von Kluge

Closing the Falaise Pocket

By Mike Phifer

After almost two months of bloody and desperate fighting, the Allies had failed to break through the German defenses that had been limiting their hold on Normandy since D-Day. Read more

Gunther von Kluge

“Do You Recognize My Voice?”: The Question That Ended Operation Valkyrie

By Blaine Taylor

At 12:40 PM on a hot, sultry July 20, 1944, German Führer and Reich Chancellor Adolf Hitler, 55, was seated on a wicker stool in a conference hut at his principal Eastern Front headquarters at Wolf’s Lair, Rastenburg, East Prussia, for the mid-day wartime map meeting. Read more

Gunther von Kluge

Heinz Guderian: Author of the Blitzkrieg

By Phil Zimmer

Hitler was enraged as he stalked his way around the room during the waning months of World War II. Read more

Gunther von Kluge

The Battle of Kursk: Showdown at Prokhorovka and Oboian

By Ludwig Heinrich Dyck

With the German Sixth Army destroyed at Stalingrad, the Soviet juggernaut lunged west and southwest across the River Donets. Read more

Gunther von Kluge

Adolf Hitler’s Elite Bodyguard at Mortain

By Major General Michael Reynolds

By the morning of July 27, 1944, General Omar Bradley’s First U.S. Army had won the “Battle of the Hedgerows” in Normandy and stood ready to break out to the south. Read more

Gunther von Kluge

Operation Barbarossa: Holding the Line at Smolensk

By Victor Kamenir

After crushing the first-line Soviet armies in brutal three-week cauldron battles at the border, the steamroller of German Army Group Center continued deeper into Soviet territory during the opening days of Operation Barbarossa, the invasion of the Soviet Union, which began on June 22, 1941. Read more