[1] The book was published simultaneously in the United Kingdom, France, West Germany, Italy, Spain, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, the Netherlands, Finland and Portugal, when it appeared in March 1966.

[2] Also receiving publicity were assertions of an American general quoted in the book, General William Hood Simpson, commander of the Ninth United States Army in World War II, that he is convinced his Army "could have captured Berlin well ahead of the Russians if it had not been stopped on the Elbe River on 15 April 1945".

[3] The Soviet Communist Party newspaper Pravda accused Ryan of trying to smear the Red Army in his depiction of the Battle of Berlin.

[4] After Ryan's death, it was revealed that the author had written to the publisher of the works of Stephen Ambrose, accusing Ambrose of plagiarism: in September 1970, Ryan addressed a letter to Doubleday, alleging the use of two quotations from The Last Battle in the Eisenhower biography The Supreme Commander without proper attribution.

[5] Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer planned a joint American-Soviet co-production film version to be released in 1968 but due to financial trouble experienced by the studio, the project was never produced.