Killing Rommel - Book Review

Jerry D. Morelock, PhD, ARMCHAIR GENERAL Editor in Chief | May 02, 2008  | one comment  | Print  | E-mail

Killing Rommel. Steven Pressfield. Doubleday, doubleday.com, 2008. 335 pages.

Reading Killing Rommel is the closest thing to actually participating in one of these daring WWII raids.

We’ve come to expect “ripping good yarns” from best-selling novelist Steven Pressfield, but usually his historical novels are set in the ancient world and feature the likes of Alexander the Great or Leonidas the Spartan. This time out, however, Pressfield moves the target of his unmatched skills as storyteller 2000 years forward to World War II’s desert war in North Africa where the Desert Fox, Germany’s Erwin Rommel, reigned as Britain’s nemesis in 1942. But, chiefly, this is a compelling, thoroughly-researched story based upon the exploits of Britain’s Long Range Desert Group (LRDG), the daring, often eccentric commandos who roamed the vast stretches of North African desert in jeeps and light trucks conducting reconnaissance missions and raids on Axis units far behind the front lines. Rommel himself declared that “man for man, the LRDG had done more damage to the Axis cause than any other outfit in the North African campaign.” Pressfield shows you how they did it.

Long Range Desert Group checks its weapons

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