Into the Den of the Bear, A Memoir of the Eastern Front

Into the Den of the Bear is an eyewitness account of the Eastern Front unlike any other. The 17th Panzer Division served as the fist for General Heinz Guderian's 2nd Panzer Army in Operation Barbarossa and the author, Hermann Pfaeffle, was there. Flung into Operation Winter Storm - the attempted relief of Sixth Army at Stalingrad - the unit was nearly cut-off and encircled itself. Hermann Pfaeffle was there. Joining up with 13th Panzer in the momentous retreat across the Hungarian plain, Pfaeffle escapes annihilation at Budapest only to face captivity in the hands of Résistance fighters. Facing death in numerous encounters, this is the story of a survivor and his four-years on the Eastern Front, the bloodiest killing fields in the history of warfare.