1947 Stalingrad; American Journalists’ Viewpoint

The early spring lasted. Little by little city was getting better after one of the stiffest battles that the land of the USSR has ever seen. City, which at the present time is called Volgograd (yeah, that’s exactly the place where the Mother Russia monument is located), but back then at times of the USSR it was called Stalingrad and was totally leveled by the German army during Battle for Stalingrad in 1942-1943. In 1947 the Cold War didn’t started yet, so the relations between 2 military allies, the USSR and the USA, allowed such “exchange” trips. In this article you will see lots of different things, most of them are really horrifying, but still, they belong to the history of the USSR and no one can blot them out.

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The Winter War

Today we have one more documental article for you. In this article you will find out some details and information about not so limelighted, but still, about the war that was stuck down into the record of our history quite tight. Russian-Finnish War 1939-1940 or as it called otherwise – the Winter War.

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St. Petersburg: Now and Then 2

Sergei Larenkov, the author of “Petersburg Now and Then” has released the second part of the modern city photos combined with the photo made during the city siege at World War2.

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First Days of Invasion

First days of invasion into Russia seemed to be a piece of cake for Nazi German army. According to the plans of the German chief commanders the whole deal with Russia would take just a few months. They were hoping to take over the Moscow until winter of 1941 (the operation has started early summer, 1941). The invitations were sent to the higher officers of the German army for the celebration of the victory on Russian army in the summer, a few month before the planned victory.

And so there advancement into the Russian territory was really that easy for the first months. They moved fast, often leaving some pockets of resistance inside the conquered Russian land. Soon they got themselves right near two of Russian main cities - Moscow and St. Petersburg.

In Russia there is a popular belief, that Moscow shouldn’t be ever surrender to the enemy, because loosing Moscow can mean loosing of all the country. So the battles were becoming more violent and fierce as the Nazis approached Moscow.

And then winter come, that was the well-known old Russian winter, with horrible frosts and lots of snow. Before German army fought in the relatively warm climate of Western Europe and didn’t know what Russian Winter really is. It got demoralized them very much and possibly the Russian Winter saved the Russian people from being defeated right in the first year of the war.

Then the war lasted for 5 years more, and no holiday took place for which German officers got invitations, and frankly speaking at the end of the war mostly no invitation recipients were left alive.

And those are photos of the first days of the invasion, made by German soldiers.

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Ossetia

There were plenty of professional photos from news agencies from these region lately, now those are amateur shots by Ilia Plehanov, via navoine.ru, from Southern Ossetia or Georgia or name it yourself..

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Russian Jet Fighters in Afghanistan

These are photos from private archives of Russian SU-25 jet fighters in Afghanistan War at 1980s.

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Russia under Nazis during WW2

During World War 2 the Nazi soldiers besides their rifles had also cameras handy and made a lot of photos of the conquered territories. Such pictures were banned in Soviet Russia because they didn’t fit in the official agenda. According to Soviet propaganda Nazis were not much better than wild dangerous animals killing and torturing civilians and burning down every village they enter. Later, after the collapse of USSR some amount of evidence started arriving from abroad to Russia, showing that it was not so bad under the short German rule for the Russian people, some really enjoyed some freedoms they didn’t have under the Soviet rule. Like on the top picture people depicted throwing rocks at the Lenin monument. Also private property was restored and people could compete freely opening some businesses. Still such talks are not welcomed in modern Russia too because practically every Russian family has someone who was killed as a soldier during WW2 and accepting the fact that it was not so bad under the Nazis means to somehow reject the fact that their fathers died for the better future. Still here are some photos from Germans of Russian people and German soldiers during WW2.

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Russian-Japan War Propaganda Posters

In the beginning of 20-th century Russia participated in the war with Japan.

Some our readers asked if there were some propaganda posters from that times.

There are some.

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