In one week the Germans in Rumania lost the rich oil fields of Ploesti; Constanta, Rumania's chief port on the Black Sea; Bucharest, the "little Paris" of the Balkans. Worst of all, by choosing to fight for the Wallachian plain, Adolf Hitler had lost the better part of 30 divisions which might otherwise have pulled back to defend Germany proper. Moreover the Russians, now heading for a junction with Marshal Tito's forces in Yugoslavia, threatened to cut off all the remaining Wehrmacht divisionsestimated at 15 to 20in the southern Balkan peninsula.
Across the hot plain, through dust clouds so thick that headlights...