The Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union, 1941-45 PDF Download

Author: Alexander Hill
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135765251
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 525

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Book Description
This book consists of extracts from key documents, along with commentary and further reading, on the ‘Great Patriotic War’ of the Soviet Union against Nazi Germany, 1941-45. Despite the historical significance of the war, few Soviet documents have been published in English. This work provides translations of a range of extracts from Soviet documents relating to the titanic struggle on the Eastern Front during World War II, with commentary. This is the only single-volume work in English to use documentary evidence to look at the Soviet war effort from military, political, economic and diplomatic perspectives. The book should not only facilitate a deeper study of the Soviet war effort, but also allow more balanced study of what is widely known in the West as the ‘Eastern Front’. This book will be of much interest to students and scholars of military history, Soviet history, and World War II history.

Author: Simon M. Dixon
Publisher:
ISBN: 9780199236701
Category : Russia
Languages : en
Pages :

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Author: Gregory Carleton
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 067497848X
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 240

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Book Description
No nation is a stranger to war, but for Russians war is a central part of who they are. Their “motherland” has been the battlefield where some of the largest armies have clashed, the most savage battles have been fought, the highest death tolls paid. Having prevailed over Mongol hordes and vanquished Napoleon and Hitler, many Russians believe no other nation has sacrificed so much for the world. In Russia: The Story of War Gregory Carleton explores how this belief has produced a myth of exceptionalism that pervades Russian culture and politics and has helped forge a national identity rooted in war. While outsiders view Russia as an aggressor, Russians themselves see a country surrounded by enemies, poised in a permanent defensive crouch as it fights one invader after another. Time and again, history has called upon Russia to play the savior—of Europe, of Christianity, of civilization itself—and its victories, especially over the Nazis in World War II, have come at immense cost. In this telling, even defeats lose their sting. Isolation becomes a virtuous destiny and the whole of its bloody history a point of pride. War is the unifying thread of Russia’s national epic, one that transcends its wrenching ideological transformations from the archconservative empire to the radical-totalitarian Soviet Union to the resurgent nationalism of the country today. As Putin’s Russia asserts itself in ever bolder ways, knowing how the story of its war-torn past shapes the present is essential to understanding its self-image and worldview.

Author: David R. Stone
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 272

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Book Description
"Chapters explore key aspects of the Soviet organization of the war, and shed fresh light on the transformation achieved by Stalin and his generals, who faced the prospect of utter defeat in 1941. The structure, tactics and operation of the Red Army through the war years are examined in close detail. The real impact of partisans and resistance fighters is reconsidered as is the role of women and the influence of propaganda. And the authors explore the economic and industrial policies -- and achievements -- that made victory on the battlefields possible"--Jacket.

Author: Henry Sakaida
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1780966512
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 155

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Book Description
When the Great Patriotic War began many women volunteered for the armed forces, but most of them were rejected. They were steered towards nursing or other supportive roles. Many determined women managed to enter combat by first volunteering as field medics and nurses, then simply picking up a gun during the battle, and charging boldly into the line of fire. In the area of aviation, women also contributed greatly to the war effort. In rickety biplanes, they flew bombing missions at night, without parachutes; their only protection was the darkness. This book tells the stories of the brave women that were awarded the Soviet Union's most prestigious title Hero of the Soviet Union for their bravery in protecting their homeland.

Author: Henry Sakaida
Publisher: Bloomsbury Publishing
ISBN: 1780966938
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 66

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Book Description
The Great Patriotic War began on 22 June 1941, when the Germans invaded the Soviet Union. Over 10 million Soviet soldiers took part in the war and of those about 12,600 earned the Soviet Union's highest military award the Hero of the Soviet Union for deeds of great daring and self sacrifice. This book covers the male recipients of the Hero of the Soviet Union award during the Great Patriotic War. Snipers, fighter pilots, partisans and spies are all included, together with the famous aces Pokryshkin and Kozhedub, who both gained the award an amazing three times.

Author: Lev Lopukhovsky
Publisher: Casemate Publishers
ISBN: 1473899664
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 259

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Book Description
“A stark picture of war between the Germans and the Soviets, including some very interesting illustration . . . fascinating, if chilling, reading.”—Firetrench The Red Army’s casualties during the Second World War and the casualties sustained by the German army they fought are a key element in any assessment of the conflict on the Eastern Front. Since the war ended over seventy years ago, the statistics have been a source of bitter controversy, of claim and counterclaim, as each generation of historians has struggled to uncover the truth. This contentious issue is the subject of this absorbing book. The figures reveal much about the way the war was fought, and they demonstrate the enormous human price the Soviet Union paid for its victory. That is why the statistics have been so strongly contested. Distortion and falsification by official historians have obscured the facts because the issue has been so heavily politicized. Using recently declassified information from the Russian archives, the authors focus in forensic detail on the way the figures were recorded and compiled and seek to explain why, so many years after the war, the full truth about the subject is still far from our reach.

Author: Alexander Hill
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
ISBN: 1316720519
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 757

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Book Description
In a definitive new account of the Soviet Union at war, Alexander Hill charts the development, successes and failures of the Red Army from the industrialisation of the Soviet Union in the late 1920s through to the end of the Great Patriotic War in May 1945. Setting military strategy and operations within a broader context that includes national mobilisation on a staggering scale, the book presents a comprehensive account of the origins and course of the war from the perspective of this key Allied power. Drawing on the latest archival research and a wealth of eyewitness testimony, Hill portrays the Red Army at war from the perspective of senior leaders and men and women at the front line to reveal how the Red Army triumphed over the forces of Nazi Germany and her allies on the Eastern Front, and why it did so at such great cost.

Author: Boris Sokolov
Publisher: Pen and Sword
ISBN: 1526742276
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 565

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Book Description
“This English translation of the original Russian work is thought provoking, challenging the ‘official’ version of what happened” during World War II (Firetrench). The memory of the Second World War on the Eastern Front—still referred to in modern Russia as the Great Patriotic War—is an essential element of Russian identity and history, as alive today as it was in Stalin’s time. It is represented as a defining episode, a positive historical myth that sustains the Russian national idea and unites the majority of Russian citizens. As a result, as Boris Sokolov shows in this powerful and thought-provoking study, the heroic and tragic side of the war is highlighted while the dark side—the incompetent, negligent and even criminal way the war was run—is overlooked. Although almost eighty years have passed since the defeat of Nazi Germany, he demonstrates that many of the fabrications put forward during the war and immediately afterwards persist into the present day. In a sequence of incisive chapters he uncovers the truth about famous wartime episodes that have been consistently misrepresented. His bold reinterpretation should go some way towards dispelling the enduring myths about the Great Patriotic War. It is necessary reading for anyone who is keen to understand how it continues to be distorted in Russia today.

Author: David M. Glantz
Publisher:
ISBN:
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 400

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Book Description
Drawing on evidence never before seen in the West, including combat records of early engagements, David Glantz claims that in 1941 the Red Army was poorly trained, inadequately equipped, ineptly organized, and consequently incapable of engaging in large-scale military campaigns - and both Hitler and Stalin knew it. He provides a complete and convincing study of why the Soviets almost lost the war that summer, dispelling many of the myths about the Red Army that have persisted since the war and soundly refuting Viktor Suvorov's controversial thesis that Stalin was planning a preemptive strike against Germany.