Panzer Leader by General Heinz Guderian

I disagree much with the opinion that Hitler was a military idiot. It was his own ring of burgouises that failed him. Even Zhukov praised Hitler for his brilliant military successes, not to mention those battles on Kharkov, both the capture, and the recapture on 1943, and his decision to strike south to Ukraine instead of Moscow as suggested by most of his generals. Remember the nearly complete triumph he had achieved on France, his exploit of the dawning of Italy's defection, and the complete logical suggestions he advised to the nearly-legend and so-called military genius Erwin Rommel on North Africa (Rommel won his many battles for his "endless" luck military blunders, even gambles, the example is when he should attack the fort at Mechili; most of his fighting troops were scattered tens of miles away, not given a single rest, and he got only a platoon of infantry and a handful of AA-equipped trucks, nevertheless, without a gun fight, the British and Australians surrendered, even in Rommel's astonishment. Why was that? Rommel had disobeyed direct orders from Hitler to stay in defense, and that was logical: Rommel's troop was just not sufficient enough to cover and secure the whole vast desert once he put his boot on the offense. But lucky he was for not obeying that order, for the British had intercepted through their ULTRA machine the clear orders given by Hitler to his Desert Fox. And thus Rommel attacked, on the right foot, as, in a complete surprise, the British defences were not set-up due to the assumption that the Germans won't attack. Surprisingly, it was Hitler's Abwehr who said to him that his Enigma codes won't be intercepted by any means).

Remember that famous Operation Bagration, in mid 1944, when Army Group Center lost more than 80% of its fighting divisions. Who had defected him? It was his Generals, who threw their weapons whilst their hard spirited men always have the will to repel the Soviet hordes. In Hitler's War, the reason of this disaster is explained, thus:

"At first the cause of this catastrophe was a mystery. Zeitzler’s faulty stra-
tegic appreciation alone was not to blame; more serious was the Luftwaffe’s
virtual impotence, paralysed by its first serious fuel shortage. Most omi-
nous of the causes was the sudden war weariness of leading army officers to
continue the fight. As General Jodl put it soon after: ‘Practically the entire
Army Group Centre surrendered to the enemy this summer.’ "

and

"There was evidence that Soviet-trained ‘Seydlitz officers’ had infiltrated
the battle zone in German uniforms, and issued false orders to sabotage the
army group’s defence. After the Fourth Army surrendered on July , Hitler
was shown an order signed by General Vinzenz Müller* of the Twelfth Army
Corps in which that army’s soldiers were instructed to put an ‘end to the
pointless bloodshed’ "

I suggest anybody to read "behind-the-scene" books About Hitler's war, before commenting that he is a poor tactician. Hitler's War and The War Path, or, The Trail of The Fox are examples of excellent behind-the-scene reads.

At least, these little facts alone have showed that Hitler, was not a military idiot. Besides, he was a veteran of World War I, and holder of the prestigious Iron Cross medals.