Great Patriotic War (USSR in World War II)

We're approaching the 70th anniversary of the Kursk battle. Here's a good documentary from Russian TV in English

Operation Bagration, the Russo-Belorussian operation that beat the tar out of the fascist war machine started 70 years ago from last Sunday. 

Russo-Belorussian?

It was a Soviet operation.

I keep wondering about the official reason why the operation was named after Bagration in first place. Maybe there is some reason in his tactics. From all I read General Bagration was a commander who most of the time favoured bold aggressive manouvers against his opponents. All out attack, preferebly entangling them in a melee fight while cavalry was flanking and pursuing without hesitating or resting. This is of course when he was not retreating togheter with the Russian army. Then he was also very bold in person. Often found himself midst of a fight. Almost died several times in action while being cavalry officer, later occasionaly fought in the first ranks even when he was general. Was fataly wounded when he and his men were heroicaly defending their positions at Borodino. Apart of that, he was one of the main organisers of the Cossack guerilla operations against the Grande Armee. I rather don't go with a political motivation or a personal motivaton on this.

I make a unified thread for USSR in Word War II (Great Patriot war). I also put a video with the 20 episodes of the documentary television series "The Unknown War " that was presented by Bart Lancaster.

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The Unknown War (The Great Patriotic War) is an American documentary television series. The 20-part series documents the World War II conflict between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. Each episode is about 48 minutes long, similar in format to The World at War. The footage was edited from over 3.5 million feet of film taken by Soviet camera crews from the first day of the war, 22 June 1941, to the Soviet entry into Berlin in May 1945. Most of these films have never been seen outside this documentary series.

The series is hosted by Academy Award Winner Burt Lancaster, who spent three weeks in eight cities in the USSR for location filming. Film footage from Soviet archives comprises a major portion of the series, supplemented by film from both the United States and British archives. Appearing in exclusive interviews would be Russian Commanders like Georgi Zhukov and Vasily Chuikov. Other interviews shot for the series included Soviet Premier Leonid Brezhnev and Averell Harriman, who was U.S. Ambassador to the Soviet Union during WWII.

The series was produced with Soviet cooperation after the release of The World at War, which the Soviet government felt paid insufficient attention to their part in World War II. Released in 1978, The Unknown War is sympathetic to the Soviet struggle against Nazi Germany. It was quickly withdrawn from TV airings after it ran in 1978, possibly because its tone was at odds with the growing tensions between East and West after the Soviet intervention in Afghanistan. Later it returned to airings on cable, including A&E, the History Channel and YouTube.

The Sacred War was one of the most famous Soviet songs associated with the Second World War. It was written by request of Joseph Stalin in 1941, shortly after the beginning of the German invasion of the Soviet Union[citation needed]. The music is by Aleksandr Aleksandrov, founder of the Alexandrov Ensemble and the music composer for the National Anthem of the Soviet Union. The lyrics are by Vasily Lebedev-Kumach.

US Lawmakers Offer Resolution Recognizing Auschwitz Liberation by USSR

Crazy this was 70 years ago...

So no one seems to care the Yalta conference was 70 years ago?

It was the Rippentrop-Molotov agreement with the Soviets and the "Western Powers".

It was very much like the meetings between Britain and France after WWI that created countries in the Middle East that created all the problems we see today.

The Yalta conference just created a buffer zone between Germany and the Soviet Union to make the Soviets feel safer.

it was the US basically accepting the creation of the eastern block as being part of the Soviet sphere of influence.... ironically something the people of the eastern block blamed Russia for after the end of the cold war.

In many ways it was splitting up the spoils on the European theatre, with concessions by the US to get the Soviets to take an active part in the War in the Pacific... the US feared being left to fight Japan on its own and was not totally confident that the nuclear weapons it had would work against the inscrutable Japanese, so they demanded Soviet entry into that conflict within x amount of time after the surrender of Germany.

Ironically this led to the Soviet liberation of China, Manchuria, and north Korea and the return of lost territory in the far east...

15 most important battles of Red Army in WW II

http://sputniknews.com/15battles/20150415/1020888765.html

Battle of Berlin: 70 years on

Videos from RGAKFD- Russian state docimentary photo and film archive in Krasnogorsk

Battles of Khalkhin Gol


Battle of Lake Khasan


Soviet -Finnish war


Siege of Odessa


Siege of Leningrad


Frontline near Moscow


Moscow counter-offensive


Siege of Sevastopol


Battle of the Caucasus


Battle of Stalingrad


Crossing of the Dnieper operation


Destruction on the occupied territory [b][/b]


Liberation of Crimea 1944


To Berlin 1945


To Berlin! (20 minutes long)


Germany surrenders

Also if from the wrong side, my grandfather and my greatuncle were in CSIR (then ARMIR) in the Soviet Union 1941-1943. Both have returned alive, but after a lot of "adventures" and a pretty long walk.

Soviet Storm: World War II — In The East by the talented people from Star Media studios

Total of 18 episodes

Episode 1:


Also the original version in Russian (I recommend this one if you understand the language)



I also recommend checking out the rest of their youtube channel. They have documentaries covering WW1, Napoleon's invasion of Russia, the history of the Romanov dynasty and many more. They all, IIRC, have English subtitles if not already dubbed like Soviet Storm.

Giulio wrote:Also if from the wrong side, my grandfather and my greatuncle were in CSIR (then ARMIR) in the Soviet Union 1941-1943. Both have returned alive, but after a lot of "adventures" and a pretty long walk.

A very long cold walk with many fewer man then when they started the retreat.

Yes, a very long cold walk, on which many did die and did not make it to the end.

akg images

Stalingrad photos here

http://www.akg-images.co.uk/C.aspx?VP3=SearchResult&VBID=2UMESQVDM1M1M&SMLS=1&RW=1366&RH=625

Using Google Earth many dugouts, trenches and fighting positions can still be seen at Stalingrad, especially in the ravines west and northwest of Gumrak and Pitomnik airfields.

Very interesting new information about the controversial Molotov pact..
between Germany and soviets.. of non aggression.

It shows how Stalin was forced into being neutral in the conflict at the start..
because Britain and France but also Poland refused to create a join alliance with soviets
against Germany.  

So literary Poland sabotage any efforts to avoid the war to start in Europe, by interfering
with the request of soviets of creating a unified alliance between UK-France and Poland with Soviets..  

And alliance that Only was accepted 2 years later after western Europe was invaded by Germany and they had no other choice but to accept deal a pact with the soviets that the western allies Poland ,UK and France did not liked any more NAzis.

The classified documents reveals


http://russia-insider.com/en/history/stalin-planned-send-million-troops-stop-hitler-if-britain-and-france-agreed-pact/ri6770

how Britain and France ,pressure checkoslovaquia to be friendly to Germany and give away its territories with german minorities inside. Of collaboration of the so called Good Allies in the west Allies with Nazi Germany,allowing its army to become bigger and to continue expanding its borders.. and blocking any Soviets offers of an unified alliance against Hitler early when they were weaker.

That shows Stalin that the west was not really interested to avoid a major war in Europe by containing Hitler and that the Soviets were alone on their own.. against Hitler..who wanted to defend Checoslovaquia..This naturally forced Stalin to be neutral and sign the non agression pact with Germany.. knowing they were alone and the west was not going to help.

http://russia-insider.com/en/history/stalin-planned-send-million-troops-stop-hitler-if-britain-and-france-agreed-pact/ri6770

For me it was clear that the so called allies in the west.. had other plans and they hoped to get
Soviets and Germany in a fight and not them having to fight hitler..
But stalin ,then saw the game.. and decided to sign a non agression pact.. with turned the focus of Hitler in Poland ,France and UK.. allowing Soviets to gain some time.. in a war they saw was coming against them sooner or later.

So you see today how the west talk so much about how evil was hitler and how they stopped him.. but what they will not say is how they helped ,contributed to create the conditions for the war start.. Specially Poland who provoked Germany into a fight.. (As Georgia did with Russia ,that provoked Russia into a fight in 2008 following orders of USA.. and as Ukraine are doing now to Russia ,provoking them into a fight with their ridiculous hostilities and repression ,and provovations against Russian people)  under the promise by UK and France that they help them.. which didn't happened..

If anyone goes to the conclusions ,that it looks as if history repeats again today, same "good guys" in the west but with a different enemy..,provoking a major war to weaken their major opposing competition.

GarryB wrote:Yes, a very long cold walk, on which many did die and did not make it to the end.

Yes, about 50% died, or wounded or frozen. 230.000 left Italy, only 115.480 returned safely. The last 10.030 (missing in action) returned between 1946 and 1954. A lot of support from Ukrainian and Russian people ...
My great uncle was captured by the Germans in Hungary and sent in Germany in war industries. After september 8, 1943, Italians treated as prisoners of subject countries, so work like slaves. The food was poor even for the Germans, for prisoners nothing at all ...
My great uncle was released in Cottbus in 1945, saved by Siberian Soviet troops. He was 37 Kg and he had had several diseases, including hepatitis, malaria and typhoid. When he saw that the Siberians were coming, almost died of fear. He did not know that they could have almond eyes. The prisoners they thought they were going to die by some strange foreign SS unit, arrived to exterminate prisoners in order not to leave witnesses.
But a Soviet Siberian soldier he pointed his machine gun and laughing said: "You! Are you bad people, or good people??? We will kill immediately all the bad people!". And my great uncle was free and safe. He was in the military service and far from his home eight years, since 1937, in Africa.

AirCargo wrote:
 
 Old news from 2008 by Lev Sotskov, the former SVR general and typical party line since WWII Vann.

Why Putin Treats Fantasy as History
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-05-11/why-putin-treats-fantasy-as-history

Nope it's the opposite view that's fantasy and BS....even this anti-Putin drivel that you post as evidence indirectly supports the fact that a anti Nazi pact was being offered by the USSR

The Soviet narrative about the pact has been decisively proven wrong. Britain and France were unwilling to do a deal with Stalin in 1939, because he demanded passage through Poland for his troops. This would have amounted to Russian occupation, which the Western powers suspected to be Stalin's true goal. The secret Molotov-Ribbentrop protocol and its implementation validated those suspicions. The allies, of course, proved much more amenable to Stalin's expansionism once Hitler was nearly crushed, but their 1939 reservations were understandable, even in hindsight.

I suppose I don't have to get into the Spanish Civil War and who supported who and who fought against who directly, do I?

War between Russia and Germany was inevitable