"Willful. Decisive. Has initiative and knows how to apply it to his work. Disciplined. Persistently demanding. Personally a little cold and insufficiently tactful. Has a significant streak of obstinacy. Painfully proud. In military matters well prepared. . . . Loves military affairs and is constantly striving for perfection." This assessment of the talents and traits of Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov, the future World War II hero of the Soviet Union, was made by a superior officer not long after the 34-year-old cavalry officer assumed command of his first brigade in 1930. In 1946, still basking in the public's adulation after the...