What is the Great Patriotic War, everyone knows, because this terrible period left an indelible imprint on world history. Today we will consider the most amazing historical facts about the Great Patriotic War , which are rarely mentioned in the usual sources.
Victory Day
It is difficult to imagine, but in the history of the USSR there was a 17-year period when Victory Day was not celebrated. Since 1948, May 9 was a simple working day, and January 1 (since 1930 this day was a working day) was a day off. In 1965, the holiday was returned to its place and marked it with a wide celebration of the 20th anniversary of the Soviet victory. Since then, May 9 is again a day off. Many historians attribute such a strange decision to the Soviet government that it was afraid of active independent veterans on this significant day off. The official order said that people need to forget about the war and throw all their strength into rebuilding the country.
Women in war
Imagine, 80 thousand officers of the Red Army during the Second World War were women. In general, from different periods of hostilities, from 0.6 to 1 million women were at the front. Of the fairer sexes who voluntarily came to the front, the following were formed: rifle brigade, 3 aviation regiments and a spare rifle regiment. In addition, a women's sniper school was organized, whose pupils more than once entered the history of Soviet military achievements. A separate company of women sailors was also organized.
It is worth noting that women in the war performed combat missions no worse than men, as evidenced by 87 titles of the Hero of the Soviet Union assigned to them during the Second World War. In world history, this was the first case of such a mass struggle of women for their homeland. In the ranks of soldiers of the Great Patriotic War, the representatives of the weaker sex mastered almost all military specialties. Many of them served shoulder to shoulder with their husbands, brothers and fathers.
"Crusade"
Hitler regarded his attack on the Soviet Union as a Crusade, in which you can resort to terrorist methods. Already in May 1941, while fulfilling the Barbarossa plan, Hitler relieved his servicemen of all responsibility for their actions. Thus, his wards could do whatever they wanted with respect to civilians.
Four-legged friends
During the Second World War, more than 60 thousand dogs served on various fronts. Thanks to four-legged saboteurs, dozens of Nazi echelons went downhill. Tank destroyers destroyed more than 300 units of enemy armored vehicles. Signal dogs obtained for the USSR about two hundred reports. On medical carts, dogs were taken from the battlefield at least 700 thousand wounded soldiers and officers of the Red Army. Thanks to sapper dogs, 303 settlements were cleared. In total, four-legged sappers examined more than 15 thousand km 2 of land. They found more than 4 million units of German mines and landmines.
Kremlin Disguise
Considering interesting facts about the Great Patriotic War , we will not once encounter the ingenuity of the Soviet military. During the first month of the war, the Moscow Kremlin literally disappeared from the face of the earth. At least it seemed so from the sky. Flying over Moscow, the Nazi pilots were in complete despair, as their cards did not coincide with reality. The thing is that the Kremlin was carefully masked: the tower stars and cathedral crosses were covered with covers, and the domes were repainted black. In addition, three-dimensional models of residential buildings were built around the perimeter of the Kremlin wall, beyond which even the battlements were not visible. Manezhnaya Square and the Alexander Garden were partially forced by the plywood decorations of the buildings, the Mausoleum received two additional floors, and a sandy road appeared between the Borovitsky and Spassky gates. The facades of the Kremlin buildings changed their color to gray, and the roofs to red-brown. The palace ensemble has never looked so democratic during its existence. By the way, the body of V.I. Lenin was evacuated to Tyumen during the war.
Feat of Dmitry Ovcharenko
Soviet feats in World War II repeatedly illustrated the triumph of courage over armament. July 13, 1941 Dmitry Ovcharenko, returning with ammunition to his company, was surrounded by five dozen enemy soldiers. The rifle was taken from him, but the man did not lose heart. Snatching an ax from his wagon, he chopped off the head of the officer who was interrogating him. Then Dmitry threw three grenades at the enemy soldiers, which killed 21 soldiers. The rest of the Germans fled, with the exception of the officer, whom Ovcharenko caught up and also beheaded. For the courage shown, the soldier was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.
Hitler's main enemy
The history of the Second World War does not always tell about this, but the leader of the Nazis did not consider Stalin, but Yuri Levitan, as his main enemy in the Soviet Union. Hitler offered 250 thousand marks for the announcer’s head. In this regard, the Soviet authorities carefully guarded Levitan, misinforming the press about his appearance.
Tractor tanks
Considering interesting facts about the Great Patriotic War , one cannot ignore the fact that due to the acute shortage of tanks, in emergency cases, the USSR Armed Forces made them from simple tractors. During the Odessa defensive operation, 20 tractors covered with sheets of armor were thrown into battle. Naturally, the main effect of this decision is psychological. Having attacked the Romanians at night with the sirens and lights turned on, the Russians forced them to flee. As for weapons, many of these "tanks" were equipped with dummies of heavy guns. Soviet soldiers of the Great Patriotic War jokingly called such machines NI-1, which means “To Fright”.
Son of Stalin
In the war, the son of Stalin, Yakov Dzhugashvili, was captured. The Nazis offered Stalin to exchange his son for Field Marshal Paulus, who was held captive by the Soviet troops. The Soviet commander in chief refused, stating that the soldier was not being changed to field marshal. Shortly before the arrival of the Soviet army, Jacob was shot. After the war, his family was exiled as a prisoner of war family. When Stalin was informed about this, he said that he would not make exceptions for relatives and cross the law.
The fate of prisoners of war
There are historical facts that make memories of the war especially unpleasant. Here is one of those. About 5.27 million Soviet soldiers who were held in terrible conditions were captured by the Germans. This fact is confirmed by the fact that less than two million soldiers of the Red Army returned to their homeland. The reason for the cruel treatment of prisoners by the Germans was the refusal of the USSR to sign the Geneva and Hague conventions on prisoners of war. The German authorities decided that if the other side did not sign the documents, then they may not regulate the conditions of detention of prisoners by international standards. In fact, the Geneva Convention regulates the treatment of prisoners, regardless of whether the countries have signed the agreement.
The Soviet Union treated enemy prisoners of war much more humane, as evidenced by at least the fact that 350 thousand German prisoners died in the Great Patriotic War , and the remaining 2 million returned home safely.
Feat of Matvey Kuzmin
During the Great Patriotic War, interesting facts about which we are considering, the 83-year-old peasant Matvey Kuzmin repeated the feat of Ivan Susanin, who in 1613 led the Poles into an impenetrable swamp.
In February 1942, a German mountain rifle battalion lodged in the village of Kurakino, who was instructed to break through to the rear of the Soviet troops planning a counteroffensive in the area of the Malkinsky Heights. Matvey Kuzmin lived in Kurakino. The Germans asked the old man to act as a guide for them, offering in return food and a gun. Kuzmin agreed to the proposal and, having notified the nearest part of the Red Army through an 11-year-old grandson, set off with the Germans on the road. Having led the Nazis by roundabout roads, the old man led them to the village of Malkino, where an ambush awaited them. Soviet soldiers met the enemy with machine gun fire, and Matvey Kuzmin was killed by one of the German commanders.
Air ram
On June 22, 1941, the Soviet pilot I. Ivanov decided on an air ram. This was the first military feat marked with the title Hero of the Soviet Union.
Best tanker
The most qualified tank ace of WWII was rightfully recognized as Dmitry Lavrinenko, who served in the 40th Tank Brigade. For three months of battles (September - November 1941), he participated in 28 tank battles and personally destroyed 52 German tanks. In November 1941, a brave tanker died near Moscow.
Losses during the Battle of Kursk
The losses of the USSR in the war are a difficult topic, which they always try not to touch upon. So, official data on the losses of Soviet troops during the Battle of Kursk were published only in 1993. According to researcher B.V. Sokolov, German casualties in Kursk amounted to approximately 360 thousand killed, wounded and captured soldiers. Soviet losses exceeded the Nazi losses seven times.
Feat of Jacob Studennikov
On July 7, 1943, in the midst of the Battle of Kursk, Yakov Studennikov, machine gunner of the 1019th regiment, independently fought for two days. The remaining fighters from his calculation were killed. Despite being wounded, Studennikov repulsed 10 enemy attacks and killed more than three hundred Nazis. For this feat he was awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.
Feat of the 1378th Regiment of the 87th Division
On December 17, 1942, near the village of Verkhne-Kumskoye, soldiers of a company of senior lieutenant Naumov defended a height of 1372 m with two anti-tank rifle crews. They managed to repel three enemy tank and infantry attacks on the first day and several more attacks on the second. During this time, 24 soldiers neutralized 18 tanks and about a hundred infantrymen. As a result, Soviet brave men died, but went down in history as heroes.
Shiny tanks
During the fighting near Lake Hassan, Japanese soldiers decided that the Soviet Union, trying to outwit them, was using plywood tanks. As a result, the Japanese fired on Soviet equipment with ordinary bullets in the hope that this would be enough. Returning from the battlefield, the tanks of the Red Army were so densely covered with lead bullets molten from the impact on the armor that they literally shone. Well, their armor remained unscathed.
Help camels
In the history of the Second World War , this is rarely mentioned, but camels used camels as a draft force to transport cannons for the 28-reserve Soviet army formed in Astrakhan during the battles near Stalingrad. The Soviet soldiers had to catch wild camels and tame them because of the acute shortage of vehicles and horses. Most of the 350 tamed animals died in various battles, and the survivors were transferred to household units or zoos. One of the camels, who was given the name Yashka, went with the soldiers to Berlin.
Child removal
Many little-known facts about the Great Patriotic War cause sincere sorrow. During the Second World War, the Nazis took thousands of children of "Nordic appearance" from Poland and the Soviet Union. The Nazis took children from two months to six years of age and drove them to a concentration camp called "Kinder KC", where the "racial value" of the kids was determined. Those children who were selected were subjected to “initial Germanization”. They were called German names and taught the German language. The new citizenship of the child was confirmed by fake documents. Germanized children were sent to local shelters. Thus, many German families did not even realize that the children they adopted were of Slavic origin. At the end of the war, no more than 3% of such children were returned to their homeland. The remaining 97% grew and grew older, considering themselves to be full-fledged Germans. Most likely, their descendants will never know about their true origin.
Minor heroes
Finishing to consider interesting facts about the Great Patriotic War, it should be said about the children-heroes. So, the titles of the Hero were awarded to 14-year-old Lenya Golikov and Sasha Chekalin, as well as 15-year-old Marat Kazei, Valya Kotik and Zina Portnova.
Battle of stalingrad
In August 1942, Adolf Hitler ordered his troops leaving for Stalingrad "not to leave stone unturned." In fact, the Germans succeeded. When the fierce battle was over, the Soviet government concluded that building a city from scratch would be cheaper than restoring what was left. Nevertheless, Stalin unconditionally ordered the restoration of the city literally from the ashes. During the clearing of Stalingrad, so many shells were thrown at Mamaev Kurgan that for the next two years even weeds did not grow there.
For an unknown reason, it was in Stalingrad that the adversaries changed their methods of warfare. From the very beginning of the war, the Soviet command adhered to tactics of flexible defense, retreating in critical situations. Well, the Germans, in turn, tried to avoid massive bloodshed and bypassed large fortified areas. In Stalingrad, both sides seemed to have forgotten their principles and triple the fierce battle.
It all began on August 23, 1942, when the Germans massively attacked the city from the air. The bombing killed 40 thousand people, which is 15 thousand more than during the Soviet raid on Dresden in early 1945. The Soviet side in Stalingrad applied methods of psychological influence on the enemy. Of the loudspeakers installed right on the front line, popular German music sounded, interrupted by reports of the next successes of the Red Army on the fronts. But the most effective means of psychological pressure on the Nazis was the knock of the metronome, which after 7 strikes was interrupted by the message: "Every seven seconds, one Nazi soldier dies at the front." After 10-20 such messages included tango.
Considering interesting facts about the beginning of World War II and, in particular, about the Battle of Stalingrad, one cannot ignore the feat of Sergeant Nuradilov. On September 1, 1942, the machine gunner Khanpasha Nuradilov independently destroyed 920 enemy soldiers.
The memory of the battle of Stalingrad
The battle of Stalingrad is remembered not only in the post-Soviet space. In many European countries (France, Great Britain, Belgium, Italy, and others) streets, squares and squares were named after the Battle of Stalingrad. In Paris, "Stalingrad" named metro station, square and boulevard. And in Italy, one of the central streets of Bologna is named after this battle.
Victory Banner
The genuine Victory Banner is kept in the Central Museum of the Armed Forces as a sacred relic and one of the most vivid memories of the war . Due to the fact that the flag is made of fragile satin, it can only be stored in a horizontal position. The genuine banner is shown only in special cases and in the presence of a guard. In other cases, it is replaced by a duplicate, which is 100% identical to the original and even grows old the same way.