Of course, this book does not deal with the tactical history, and that's what makes it so good. It's a daily diary of a dumb, bumbling teenager in the midst of some of the most horrifying carnage in human history. I, like many people, still hate the Nazis, and would gladly have lobbed a grenade into Sajer's trench during WW II. But Sajer's muddled devotion and incomprehension of duty did nothing, for me, to promote Nazism. Quite the opposite. The fact that he sometimes spouted a confused version of Nazi blather while struggling for his life in subzero temperatures across the Russian steppe made it all sound ridiculous.
What was he doing there, I asked myself. The truth came quickly: Guy Sajer was a blockhead, cow-like. He was sent to the Russian front because he was French, something he never comprehended. He survived the horrors he described so well because he wasn't brave and wasn't smart. He was like an animal, really, who knew only to hit the ground at the first sound of fire, and protect his head at all costs. Other than that, he seemed to be pretty useless as a soldier.
God protects fools, and that's how Guy Sajer survived to tell us this harrowing tale. I'm glad he did, because for me, it really shows not only that Hitler and the Nazis were evil and brutal, but stupid as well.
This book is written in the first person point,hence, the view of war at the ground level. The author's resolution and attention to detail is unmatched. His perspective encompasses that of a lower enlisted man who goes with the flow. He does not advocate his personal feats of courage -- he was a doer with minimal leadership potential. This adds credence to his ability to recreate his personal experiences, situations and battlefield calculus. He goes as far as to talk to the different texture and smell of the soil. This supports his position of digging holes versus oversight of the digging.
His attention to detail has raised the ugly head of the skepticism. However, one must remember the rigid German educational system, coupled with, the German draft system. These conditions, generally speaking, earmarked the best and brightest to serve in the infantry. The quality is relative to the war years proper.
In closing, the author does a fantastic job of describing the hellish nature of War.