One of the central arguments that Beevor advances throughout Stalingrad is that the dictatorships of Hitler and Stalin had a negative impact on the military capacity of both their nations. The outsized importance of their personal opinions caused inefficient, and sometimes disastrous, decisions. The effects of these were overwhelmingly by other people than the leaders themselves, such as soldiers, civilians, and the military chain of command. These dictatorships were characterized by a prioritization of personal power over long-term strategy and humanitarian considerations, exemplified by the willingness of both leaders to engage in attritional warfare at Stalingrad.

This theme is made most apparent in Beevor’s parallel depictions of Operation Barbarossa and Operation Uranus. In both, the dictators are unconvinced by the scale of the threat facing them and so do not order their generals to take appropriate actions to prepare for it. This allows for the offensives to be met with great successes, as exemplified by Beevor’s statement that “[s]eldom had an attacker enjoyed such advantages as the Wehrmacht in June 1941” (21). In these cases, the personal flaws of the dictators—namely, misunderstanding of the situation and underestimation of their enemy—became amplified by a political system in which military professionals cannot challenge their whims.