Blue Seas, Red Stars
Blue Seas, Red Stars

Author: David A. Schwind

Publisher: Schiffer Military History

Published: 2015

Total Pages: 0

ISBN-13: 9780764348297

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At the end of the Second World War, the Soviet Union decorated 217 men of the U.S. Navy, Coast Guard, and Merchant Marine who had performed "heroic acts" during convoy and anti-submarine duties in the Atlantic. For the last decade, David Schwind has made it his mission to identify and track down every remaining medal and capture the stories of these brave men. This book is the culmination of that quest. Based on extensive archival research and in-person interviews with over 100 recipients or their families, Schwind takes the reader on a photographic and biographical odyssey exploring the lives of each recipient, illuminated by over 600 never before published photographs of exceptionally rare Soviet and American medals, photographs, and related documents still in the possession of the veterans and their families today.

The Stuff of Soldiers
The Stuff of Soldiers

Author: Brandon M. Schechter

Publisher: Cornell University Press

Published: 2019-10-15

Total Pages: 503

ISBN-13: 1501739816

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The Stuff of Soldiers uses everyday objects to tell the story of the Great Patriotic War as never before. Brandon M. Schechter attends to a diverse array of things—from spoons to tanks—to show how a wide array of citizens became soldiers, and how the provisioning of material goods separated soldiers from civilians. Through a fascinating examination of leaflets, proclamations, newspapers, manuals, letters to and from the front, diaries, and interviews, The Stuff of Soldiers reveals how the use of everyday items made it possible to wage war. The dazzling range of documents showcases ethnic diversity, women's particular problems at the front, and vivid descriptions of violence and looting. Each chapter features a series of related objects: weapons, uniforms, rations, and even the knick-knacks in a soldier's rucksack. These objects narrate the experience of people at war, illuminating the changes taking place in Soviet society over the course of the most destructive conflict in recorded history. Schechter argues that spoons, shovels, belts, and watches held as much meaning to the waging of war as guns and tanks. In The Stuff of Soldiers, he describes the transformative potential of material things to create a modern culture, citizen, and soldier during World War II.

Lend-Lease and Soviet Aviation in the Second World War
Lend-Lease and Soviet Aviation in the Second World War

Author: Vladimir Kotelnikov

Publisher: Helion

Published: 2021-12-15

Total Pages: 576

ISBN-13: 9781914059599

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Seventy years have passed since the Second World War yet the books and articles still keep coming in a never-ending stream discussing the question of what role the deliveries of arms and materials by Soviet allies played in the victory of the Red Army. In Russia, the American Bell P-39 Airacobra fighter along with the Studebaker US6 truck and canned stewed meat became the symbols of Allied help to the USSR during the Second World War. Other aircraft which arrived to the country under the Lend-Lease program are less known but also made a valuable contribution to the victory. The author of this book for the first time has assembled a huge volume of information related to the delivery of aviation equipment from the UK and USA. Based on documents from Russian and foreign archives, museums, and veterans' recollections, the author has made a qualitative and quantitative appraisal of the influence of these deliveries upon the Soviet war effort and airpower during the conflict. The book details the routes of the aircraft deliveries to Russia, the modifications which were done in order to suit the demands of the Russian climate and specifics of their front-line use, as well as the process of the new aircraft being mastered by the units of the Red Army Air Force. The first foreign aircraft arrived in the Soviet Union with No. 151 Wing RAF in 1941, and their use expanded rapidly - they took part in the counteroffensive near Moscow, the battles for Stalingrad and the Kursk salient, and operations of the war up to the battle for Berlin and the capitulation of Japanese forces in the North China. The author includes the results of the combat assessments of the aircraft, which were done at the Scientific Testing Institute of the Air Force, as well as reports from front-line regiments, and multiple combat episodes, detailing the views of the Soviet designers and pilots on the British and American aircraft. A separate chapter provides information about the aircraft which were not officially delivered but appeared in the Soviet Union accidentally. For the first time an attempt has been made to assess the influence of the deliveries of material and equipment upon the Soviet aviation industry and war effort. The author's impressive text is supported by nearly 700 color and b/w photographs, 100 color aircraft profiles, plus maps, charts etc.

Soldiers of Memory
Soldiers of Memory

Author: Ene Kõresaar

Publisher: Brill Rodopi

Published: 2011

Total Pages: 441

ISBN-13: 9789042032439

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Soldiers of Memory explores the complexities and ambiguities of World War II experience from the Estonian veterans' point of view. Since the end of World War II, contesting veteran cultures have developed on the basis of different war experiences and search for recognition in the public arena of history. The book reflects on this process by combining witness accounts with their critical analysis from the aspect of post-Soviet remembrance culture and politics. The first part of the book examines the persistent remembrance of World War II. Eight life stories of Estonian men are presented, revealing different war trajectories: mobilised between 1941 and 1944, the narrators served in the Red Army and its work battalions, fought against the Soviet Union in the Finnish Army, Waffen-SS, Luftwaffe, the German political police force and Wehrmacht, deserted from the Red Army, were held in German and Soviet prison and repatriation camps. The second part of the book offers a critical analysis of the stories from a multidisciplinary point of view: what were the possible life trajectories for an Estonian soldier under Soviet and German occupations in the 1940s? How did the soldiers cope with the extreme conditions of the Soviet rear? How are the veterans' memories situated in terms of different memory regimes and what is their position in the post-Soviet Estonian society? What role does ethnic and generational identity play in the formation of veterans' war remembrance? How do individuals cope with war trauma and guilt in life stories? Offering a wide range of empirical material and its critical analysis, Soldiers of Memory will be important for military, oral and cultural historians, sociologists, cultural psychologists, and anybody with an interest in the history of World War II, post/communism, and cultural construction of memory in contemporary Eastern European societies.

Finland in World War II
Finland in World War II

Author: Tiina Kinnunen

Publisher: BRILL

Published: 2011-11-25

Total Pages: 597

ISBN-13: 9004208941

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Drawing on innovative scholarship on Finland in World War II, this volume offers a comprehensive narrative of politics and combat, well-argued analyses of the ideological, social and cultural aspects of a society at war, and novel interpretations of the memory of war.

The Memory of the Second World War in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia
The Memory of the Second World War in Soviet and Post-Soviet Russia

Author: David L. Hoffmann

Publisher: Routledge

Published: 2021-08-26

Total Pages: 330

ISBN-13: 1000430294

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This volume showcases important new research on World War II memory, both in the Soviet Union and in Russia today. Through an examination of war remembrance in its various forms—official histories, school textbooks, museums, monuments, literature, films, and Victory Day parades—chapters illustrate how the heroic narrative of the war was established in Soviet times and how it continues to shape war memorialization under Putin. This war narrative resonates with the Russian population due to decades of Soviet commemoration, which continued virtually uninterrupted into the post-Soviet period. Major themes of the volume include the use of World War II memory for political legitimation and patriotic mobilization; the striking continuities between Soviet and post-Soviet commemorative practices; the place of Holocaust memorialization in contemporary Russia; Putin’s invocation of the war to bolster national pride and international prestige; and the relationship between individual memory and collective remembrance. Authored by an international group of distinguished specialists, this collection is ideal for scholars of Russia across a range of disciplines, including history, political science, sociology, and cultural studies.

Operation Don's Main Attack
Operation Don's Main Attack

Author: David M. Glantz

Publisher: University Press of Kansas

Published: 2018-03-08

Total Pages: 952

ISBN-13: 0700625267

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With the defeat and destruction of German Sixth Army at Stalingrad all but certain at the end of 1942, the war on the Eastern Front took a definitive turn as the Germans struggled to erect a new defensive front to halt the Soviet juggernaut driving west. Operation Don’s Main Attack is the first detailed study of the dramatic clash of armies that followed, unfolding inexorably over the course of two months across an expanse of more than 1,600 kilometers. Using recently released Russian archival material never before available to researchers, David M. Glantz provides a close-up account, from both sides, of the planning and conduct of Operation Don—the Soviet offensive by the Red Army's Southern front that aimed to capture Rostov in January–February 1943. His book includes a full array of plans, candid daily reports, situation maps, and strength and casualty reports prepared for the forces that participated in the offensive at every level. Drawing on an unprecedented and comprehensive range of documents, the book delves into many hitherto forbidden topics, such as unit strengths and losses and the foibles and attitudes of command cadre. Glantz’s work also presents rare insights into the military strategy, combat tactics, and operational art of such figures as Generals Eremenko and Malinovsky and Field Marshal Erich von Manstein. A uniquely informed study of a critical but virtually forgotten Soviet military operation, Operation Don’s Main Attack offers a fresh perspective on the nature of the twentieth century’s most terrible of wars.

The Second World War
The Second World War

Author: Antony Beevor

Publisher: Back Bay Books

Published: 2012-06-05

Total Pages: 848

ISBN-13: 0316084077

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A masterful and comprehensive chronicle of World War II, by internationally bestselling historian Antony Beevor. Over the past two decades, Antony Beevor has established himself as one of the world's premier historians of WWII. His multi-award winning books have included Stalingrad and The Fall of Berlin 1945. Now, in his newest and most ambitious book, he turns his focus to one of the bloodiest and most tragic events of the twentieth century, the Second World War. In this searing narrative that takes us from Hitler's invasion of Poland on September 1st, 1939 to V-J day on August 14, 1945 and the war's aftermath, Beevor describes the conflict and its global reach -- one that included every major power. The result is a dramatic and breathtaking single-volume history that provides a remarkably intimate account of the war that, more than any other, still commands attention and an audience. Thrillingly written and brilliantly researched, Beevor's grand and provocative account is destined to become the definitive work on this complex, tragic, and endlessly fascinating period in world history, and confirms once more that he is a military historian of the first rank.