Soon Russians (and not only them, of course) will celebrate the great holiday of the victory in the Second World War. It will be its 66 anniversary. Today we can go back to the history and recollect or just learn some facts about the capture of Berlin.
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The commander of the 1st Belarussian front, the marshal of the Soviet Union G. Zhukov and other members of the high command in staff studies before the attack.
Preparations of the plan for the Berlin operation.
Guarding of the military road.
On approaches.
An artillery near Berlin.
To Hitler in Berlin.
Berlin outskirts.
The metro.
The Reichstag.
Colours placing on the Reichstag.
Katyusha multiple rocket launchers.
The Reich Chancellery.
Soviet soldiers inside it.
Hitler’s globe.
Helmuth Weidling, the last German commander of the Berlin Defence yielded himself prisoner with other members of his staff on the 2nd of May.
Propaganda workers.
Boys that took part in the Berlin Defence.
Soviet military medics help Germans.
Unter den Linden.
Zhukov in a Berlin street.
A Gestapo building.
The German general Hans Krebs arrived for negotiations and offered to make peace, but the Soviet command refused. Russians insisted on an unconditional surrender.
Stalin’s portrait in Unter den Linden.
Location:Berlin
A lot of distruction in Berlin. The Soviets wasted troops needlessly to take the city because they were afraid the Americans might take it first.
And the American had orders to shoot and kill anyone who would try to enter Rome before them, whether they were Allied or Axis.
lol
please find time to read http://www.amazon.de/Soldaten-Protokolle-K%C3%A4mpfen-T%C3%B6ten-Sterben/dp/3100894340
and you will lol with me
The US could have taken it, and the guys on the ground were led to believe that they WERE going to take it. But the Allies had to stop at the USSR sector line, because Berlin was in their territory. The Allies were not allowed to take it. Sad, but it’s that simple.
Funny the soviets sent in their medical corps to “take care” of the Germans, like after they raped the women?? It’s estimated that over a quarter of a million women committed suicide after being (brutally) raped by the soviets.
There’s also some good stories too, like the Russian solider that gave some por starving Germans some food.
Not saying it was all bad, just facts.
Which incidentally is why the Germans were so hot to surrender to the Allies. They knew what was in store for them. Which is more or less (more I guess) payback for what the Germans did to them. So….
Just bad times all around….
Righty, in their biggest buttle in the Pacific it took over 3 month for the Yanks to take Okinawa which was defended by some 100000 Japs, if given the chance to go on Berlin the Yanks would still be fighting the Nazis on the Berlin outskirts.
BTW the russians smashed the one million strong Jap’s army in Aug 1945 answering the plea for help made by the US and the Brits. And it took just over 2 weeks for the Russians to finish the mighty japs off and clean up the Mongolian and Chinese lands which were occupied for over decade.
I think it can easily be agreed upon that the Chinese did more against the Japanese than the Russians did. The Russian came in at the last moment in a land grab. They kept Sakhalin and and beat their chest about beating the Japanese. In truth the Russian contribution in the Pacific was tiny. They should probably give Sakhalin back
First:
To say: Hitler picked on the wrong nation. Mother Russia doesn’t believe in tears.
After this battle, Russian commanders turned the city over to the soldiers for three days. They could do what they liked, and they did. Over 100.000 rapes were reported. Then the soldiers went home – to the hell of Soviet Russia and the whole of eastern Europe was dominated by the evil of communism. English Russia always tries to present Russians as wonderful, clever people, the best people in the whole of Russia! I sometimes think that this site is Putin’s Propaganda Post. A people is the result of its history; it’s no good trying to run away from one’s history. Re-writing it, as the Soviets did, won’t help either.
There should be some blog where Russians are good. After all they had to defend the country by any means. Many criminals joined the army, so expecting that all of these soldiers could be nice to the enemies is a joke. If you don’t like this blog, find something else, like history channel, blockbuster etc., there are always bad Russians there and Americans who saved the planet.
“The Soviets wasted troops needlessly to take the city because they were afraid the Americans might take it first.”
listen, Russians where inside Berlin when your coward wet pants just entered the shores in France.
Really? Cowards? I remember America faught the Japanese too. Where were the Russians on that? Oh right you did beat up Poland in the beginning of the war. That was heroic.
No mention in this post of the week of raping and looting that went on after the Russian Army took the city.
Yeah, and you’ve destroyed 2 cities with innocent people there by your nukes. How heroic.
Yes and the war was won. If we had invaded the islands of Japan, millions of people would have been killed. Probably not as many as were killed in the gulags, but still, less people died the way things happened.
The Japanese were willing to negotiate a peaceful solution after the bombing of Hiroshima. The United States purposely bombed two civilian targets for an unnecessary reason.
@Testes, Zhukov beat the sh1t out of the Japanese in Manchuria in 1937, payback for 1905. The Japanese did not want to mess around with the Russkis again. Learn some history please.
1937 predates WW2. It has no bearing on the fact that they did nothing on that front until the Japanese already collapsed. It wasn’t even a real war.
Good post!
Sorry to disappoint you. Stalin was terrified of the Japanese and a 2 front war. He did everything he except send flowers to Hiro Hito to avoid that war. Kind of silly when you think of it. If the Pacific had been secured America would have turned all it’s efforts towards Europe and the back door to Russia would have been open for troops and supplies.
The Allies did everything they could to help Russia. However, they were dealing with a multinational force (the Russian weren’t) with a lot of political hurdles to cross on every move. Put an Englishman, an American, a Canadian, Austrailian, New Zealander, Frenchman,Pol, Dane, Fin, Belgian, Etc in the same room and try to get them to agree on anything.
Zhukov does not deny he turned the troops lose to do as the pleased to the German civilians after Berlin fell. He couldn’t have stopped it if he tried. The rapes gangs happened. No one was safe. It wasn’t that there were no German men around. They were hiding so they wouldn’t be killed.
There is no doubt Germany attacked Russia and they got what they deserved. However, Russia did not know the Allies had throttled back their advance and Stalin was desperate to get to Berlin first. If the allies wanted Berlin they could have taken it. German troops were surrendering in mass numbers to the Allies to avoid being taken prisioner by the Russian. The German army was melting like butter in front of the allies while fighting tooth and nail against the Russians.
The fact of my original comment still stands. If the Russian had taken a break to mass more troops and actually plan a detailed offensive, less Russian troops would have died. They were in such a hurry to take a devestated Berlin they threw away lives of soldiers that didn’t have to die.
First!
Go Russia!
Yes, please, go… as far away as you can.
Looks like a German Nightmere, poor filthy nazi scum. I love these old pictures, thank you for posting.
I suppose it would be indelicate to mention the mass rape of German civilians and Russian prisoners by the Red Army.
How did it end for Zhukov?
Stalin had him killed, there was only room for one great leader.
Not to mention that all Russians that were taken prisoner by the Germans were treated like criminals, often executed, by the Russian Army when they were repatriated. POWs became traitors just by surviving
As someone who lost family on the hands of the Nazis, and someone who finished COD, these images make me emotional.
People here in the USA think the we won WWII all by ourselves. But I watched a video recently about the Russian Front and the Russian prisoners that Germany captured and much of the hardships they faced. So the country of Russia has never been recognized for their efforts in fighting Germany. I will say now “Thank You Russia for the sacrifices and all that She and her People did to help crush the German menace during WWII. Thank you for the good fight you delivered to help the World.”
American ignorant. Maybe you will see another movie about how “good” was the comunist regim for all the countries that has infected.
Remember that American weapons and supplies kept Russia afloat until the means of production could be relocated and restored outside the reach of the German Army. A fact Russians don’t want to remember.
Also, many of the repressed minorities and countries under the Soviet thumb actually joined the Germans against Russia. What a great system that your own people join your enemies army.
@testes, Lend-lease contributed about 5% to Russian war materiel and it was initial British help that helped the most.
That’s not to say American Lend-Lease did not help.
Quality v. Quantity. Also the timing of the US aid was very important. It came in the darkest hours
Not very much quality. The allies did not supply much of their best equipment. It was useful, though, but not decisive.
That is true, Russia was an Ally, but one must not forget the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact. The plan was to divide up Europe: Germany gets Western Europe; Russia gets the Eastern countries. The plan was put into effect with Germany invading Poland, and Russia invading Finland. Eventually one betrayed the other, but in the beginning, Russia and Germany were in it together.
A. Bunka here. Maybe you thought the USA won WW2 (the big one) by themselves, I never did. Speak for yourself please, there are 300 million Americans now and not all are ignorant of history.
Looky here you old polecats. Mother Russia and her people, certainly bore the brunt of the NAZI military machine. England, stood alone against them for some time. America, played a very large role, especially in Japan. But no one suffered more than Russia and China in WW2. Many did suffer though, everywhere.
The politics are another matter. Stalin, made a deal with the NAZI’s and split Poland in half. This was and is, unforgivable, and Poland will never forgive you for it.
This does not diminish, in any way, the courage, resolve and bravery of the Russian people. The non-agression pact between Hitler and Stalin, drove a stake through the heart of many a dedicated communist abroad. After the non-agression pact was signed, the folly of “internationale” moral communist Russia was exposed. International communism never fully recovered after this fact. You can say, “well Stalin had to buy time” and maybe he did. This does not excuse the betrayal of your slavic brothers in Poland. It was criminal.
Right on @archy baby.
By this pact Russia didn’t get the Eastern Europe. It onle take some territories it lost after the WWI 20 years ago.
WW2 was about Germany and Russia.
All else, including Japan, was a sideshow.
Here’s some stats to turn you all in your tracks (you’ll have to dig for sources, I can’t find my notes)
- Germany used around 85% of its military resources against Russia.
- Germany lost 75% to 90% of its mens fighting against Russia.
The eastern front was the most brutal war in all history, in terms of scale and savagery.
I think those that we’re slaughtered by the Japanese would disagree with you.
Probably, they do. If the USSR would have entered in a war against Japan instead of Germany (a real possibility then), the US would not had to enter at all in the war. But mad man Hitler attacked the Soviets first, unleashing the most tragic battles the world have seen… and the rest is history.
Arschlöcher.
Mongoloids beating Eurotrash nazis. Did your mother have any kids that lived?
wow more ww2 photos please!!
Mongoloids destroying Europe’s culture
Too bad Germany (through the Spartacus League) didn’t join the Communist movement in 1919 by way of the Third International. Instead it became weak and fragmented which allowed fascism to rise. Long live Rosa Luxemburg (a true Marxist heroin).
Right. Shame on Germany for forgetting native son K. Marx and letting an anti-intellectual lead them to ruin. And I know you meant “heroine.” Long week, right Comrade?
A great lost opportunity. A Communist Germany in the 20s would have helped Trotsky and Zinoviev’s worldview and probably saved them and the Soviet Union from an all-powerful Stalin.
Now your playing, “what if” history and I am afraid you are on very thin ice when you go there. Russia tried communism, what did she get? A criminal thug who made a deal with the sworn enemy of communism, the NAZI’s. Do you honestly believe if Germany had somehow gone communist afer WW1 that Trotsky in USSR would have somehow prevailed? This is nonsense. This is fantasy.
Stalin prevailed after Lenin because he was stronger. He was sneakier. He was more manipulative. You can sit there till doomsday and wax poetic about intellectual Marxists all you want. These are the traits that create leaders when any and all legal restraints are absent, and very often when they do.
Look at Kirov, a good man, he was mincemeat when he opposed Stalin.
My friends, don’t forget Darwin, that’s what it boils down too. Stalin was supreme in that environment, he prevailed, period.
Perhaps Rosa Luxemburg was a true Marxist heroine MW, but do you seriously believe that a German majority would follow a Polish-Jewish woman?
Aw Arch, you’re throwing cold water on our internationalist dreams. No, Rosa would not be a leader. But I do agree with Comrade Bogdanov that history would have changed. It was not predestined that Stalin would prevail. Don’t you see that a Communist Germany would have been a Lenin/Trotsky/Zinoviev triumph and Stalin would have been the outsider? And I don’t forget Darwin. I just don’t believe in social darwinism. Have to play “what if?” since we lost. It’s been a long week.
What if Eleanor Roosevelt could fly? Would she have led
B-17′s over Germany through the fog?
Did you know that my aunt (by marriage) was Frederick Ebert’s (the first prez of the Weimar Republic)neice? Ebert did a good job breaking communist’s heads in postwar Germany. Unfortunately, for Germany, he didn’t do much of anything else.
Didn’t Zinoviev, align himself with Stalin? Against Trotsky? All these personalities competing, this is what sunk your ideological pipe dream.
BTW the red flag on the Reich-stag was installed first not by Yegorov and Kantaria (a Russian and a Georgian), as Soviet propaganda concocted, but by a Kazakh – Koshkarbayev.
Dudes, good posts!!!
Heck, I didn’t even look at the pics yet because I know we have some good people here!
Did Russia Win D-Day? Eric Margolis
http://www.feldgrau.net/forum/viewtopic.php?f=50&t=29698
GETTING TO THE TRUTH ABOUT WORLD WAR II
http://www.ericmargolis.com/political_commentaries/getting-to-the-truth-about-world-war-ii.aspx
what, no photos of rapes?
welcome to the human race!
One other picture of Berlin in those days: http://www.ipernity.com/doc/57114/8518324/in/keyword/665877/self
If all should be told, these great Russian heroes also took the occasion to rape and murder German women and girls. Don’t for a second think the battle of Berlin was all liberation, freedom and glory.
I don’t really want to argue with anyone, but I do take issue with the idea that Japan was just a side show. If Japan had succeeded in catching the U.S. carriers at Pearl Harbor, The whole Pacific and the countries and territories therein would’ve been screwed. But they didn’t and the U.S. was able to regain her footing and eventually prevail. I believe that some of the island fighting was just as brutal as the Eastern front. As for the Atomic bombs: in the end they saved millions of Japanese and U.S. lives.Sure they were terrible but I don’t hear anyone crying about the hundreds of thousands of civillians killed in the fire bombing of German cities like Dresden. Let’s not forget our worker comrades, when it comes down to it the industrial might and the productivity of the U.S. and USSR were the deciding factors in the war, that does not detract from the fighting abilities of any of the nations involved. I will say that the USSR suffered huge casualties because the Germans out generaled them on the whole.
We’ll never know if the estimates on invasion losses were accurate. What we do know is that the US had the ability to end a war that killed hundreds of thousands of US troops and had gone on for years. Truman made the decision to not risk the lives of his own troops and take the lives of an enemy people. WW2 was a total war. Civilian populations were considered legitimate targets. As a leader it is your duty to what is best for your people first. Not the enemy. Hiroshima and Nagasaki ended the wars early. Wrong or right, most reasonable people believe that less people dies as a result of the atomic attacks.
…and after that 50 years of soviet occupation started
So why not educate us hillbillies with your knowledge?
Are you on mind altering drugs?
Lots of claims, perhaps you could substantiate them or are you full sh1t as you claim the rest of us are?
If not Stalin, Hitler would be still saying his speeches in bars. Nazis had only 20 % of votes in elections, but Stalin ordered German communist parties to vote for you know who.
russians are like goblins.
And now, who are you?
Israelit?
To everyone complaining about the rapes in Berlin, to bad for them they allowed someone like Hitler to come to power and then when he attacked the soviet union they killed, pillaged, raped all the way to Stalingrad. So you know what THEY GOT WHAT THEY DESERVED.
No, the germans did not get what they deserve as they deserve much more suffering as was inflicted on them. Not to get into any vulgar discussion of what was needed to be done to them, i make my point with an analogy of smearing a pile of dung over a large surface causing irreversible infestation instead of surgically wiping it off.
Really? Do women and children deserve to be raped and murdered? Wow! I wonder if you would say that if it was your family. Perhaps you’d join in. Where do your morals lie? Are you pro-rape and murder? You hatred for human kind is astounding.
thank you stalin, thank you soviets!
for bringing over 50 years of occupation, oppression, suffering, poverty and destruction to half of europe!
thank you brave russian soldiers for killing civilians, raping women, stealing whatever could be stolen and destroying the rest!
thank you for bringing the worst political system ever – communism – to outside of russia!
thank you for invading poland on Sep 17 and plotting with germans (ribbentrop-molotov pact) to divide europe!
thank you for lenin and stalin – 2 great leaders who did not kill millions and imprison dozens of millions of their own people and ppl from neighboring countries!
thank you for always telling the truth about history and never trying to falsify it!
russia, you are the only greatest nation in the world, you only did good things and the whole world loves you and wants to be your slaves!
Any time, and don’t hesitate to ask, we are very prominent to respond.
Yeah, go wash my boots, slave.
LeftSR, you hit the nail on the head about Stalins pathology and I couldn’t agree with you more on the use of nukes or the fact that the U.S. and the U.S.S.R. would’ve defeated the Japanese. I believe that the fighting on Okinawa opened the eyes of the U.S. military Leaders and President Truman, as to what to expect for casualties. I recently saw an article in “WORLD WAR 2″ magazine that gave the U.S. and Japanese casualty estimates of a U.S. invasion. Both were based on Okinawa. Unfortunately I don’t have the magazine now, but if I remember correctly the U.S. expected 1-4 million and the Japanese expected 4-7 million dead and wounded. Somebody can correct me on that. I believe that was either the April or May issue.
Great post. Thanks for showing the need for Hiroshima and Nagasaki.
By the way,thanks E/R for another great and thought provoking post. I enjoy this sight immensely and the comment section is always entertaining and enlightening.
Davay uri!
You people like to remember how russians raped german women.
Why don’t you remember how german soldiers raped russian women, huh?
Are you trying to justify bad behavior with other examples of bad behavior. When is rape ever acceptable?
You do not know this Russian. Most of the Russian died in that war. Russian people have always treated well by the defeated (not because the Americans). These Russian – good, patriotic, hardworking people!
And another thing. Yes, we tried to take over Finland and Poland. But for what? To protect yourself and them. Russian multi-ethnic country and we have always treated other people as their own. If they surrendered without a fight – possibly losing the war against the Nazis would have been lower. The same is now making Americans, placing its military bases throughout Europe.
You do not know that war! People fought for life. They simply had no time to rob, kill, rape. Then no food. Do you think that the army – it’s just a bunch of looters and killers. And the Russian and the Germans did not want to do this. Russian fought for freedom. The Germans obeyed Hitler bluntly, they are also common soldiers. Do not they killed millions of people and a bunch of loonies who run them.
germans are evil
The photo of three T-34 tanks rushing through the destroyed place (4th from above) was taken in Poznan, Poland, on the Old Market Square. One of the tanks was destroyed shortly after this photo was taken. Battle for Poznan was very important experience for the Soviet troops, because its character (savage urban warfare) was similar to this of battle of Berlin. In Poznan they’ve learned how to survive in such conditions. Aside from that, Poznan was the last big city on the Soviets route to Berlin.
To FührerBunker.AT
They may be but they sure make nice cars.
Rape is fairly common in warfare. Men, who have not seen any women in months or even years, who have been turned into hardened killers don’t usually restrain themselves, and so whenever a city falls to an enemy, you can expect a good dealing of rapes to happen.There is no doubt that soviet soldiers committed many rapes in Germany , but the bulk of them weren’t done by ethnic Russians, who were relatively well behaved, but by less civilized Mongolian soldiers (which the soviets recruited to compensate for high initial casualties). It’s not at all surprising that the bulk of reported assailants were described as asiatic. The Russian soldiers are credited with feeding the German population, rescuing children, and helping to restore normal life in the country. They do not say anything about what was happening in Germany during the stay of allied troops there.But in general, the Soviet soldiers treated peaceful Germans with humanity. For example, the stay of the French foreign legion in Stuttgart was marked with mass rapes of German women. Police records of Stuttgart show thatduring the French occupation, 1,198 women were raped and eight men violated by French troops, mostly Moroccans.” Little is known about the forced prostitution of German women by American soldiers in the years between 1945 until the currency reform of 1948 In order to accommodate their children, they sought proximity to American soldiers, who gave the hard dollars not without any return. In order to offer them, the women often drove for hours and days on freight trains to the barracks, where they waited in line. From this ate whole family.Between 1942 and 1945, US GIs were legally “charged with” committing 11,040 rapes in Germany (a far lesser number were prosecuted……..They want to belittle the role of the USSR in the defeat of Nazism and even justify Nazism at some point. Why Stalin is still “popular” in Russia and becoming increasingly so today, despite the billions of dollars in mass media lies about Stalin that have inundated the former Soviet peoples as well as the peoples all over the world? This also helps explain why the Soviet people fought with unprecedented courage for Stalin and the Soviet Union and played the overwhelming role in the defeat of German fascism culminating in the surrender of Nazi Germany on May 8, 1945.