The Myth of the Eastern Front: The Nazi-Soviet War in American Popular Culture

From the 1950s onward, Americans were quite receptive to a view of World War II similar to the view held by many Germans and military personnel on how the war was fought on the Eastern Front in Russia. Through a network of formerly high-ranking Wehrmacht and Bundeswehr officers who had served on the Eastern Front, Germans were able to shape American opinions into an interpretation of World War II that left the Wehrmacht with a 'clean' reputation in World War II history. A positive view of German military conduct, opposed against a newly dismissive view of the Russian military in light of Cold War prejudices, was absorbed by many Americans during the 1950s, and continues to this day in a broad subculture of general readers, German military enthusiasts, war game aficionados, military paraphernalia collectors, and re-enactors who tend to romanticize the German army and its history.

Professor Ronald Smelser is former president of the German Studies Association and the Conference Group for Central European History as well as a former member of the American Advisory Board of the German Historical Institute in Washington Professor Edward J. Davies II served on the advisory board for National Geographic's Concise History of the World