Black soldiers of World War II. Heroes with a name

GRENADE ON AIRPLANES

During the defense of Sevastopol in 1942, the only case in the entire history of World War II and the Great Patriotic War occurred when the commander of a mortar company, Junior Lieutenant Simonok, shot down a low-flying German plane with a direct hit from an 82-mm mortar! This is as unlikely as bringing down a plane with a thrown stone or brick...

ENGLISH HUMOR PERFORMED BY A TORPEDO

A funny incident at sea. In 1943, a German and a British destroyer met in the North Atlantic. The British, without hesitation, were the first to throw a torpedo at the enemy... but the torpedo’s rudders jammed at an angle, and as a result, the torpedo made a cheerful circular maneuver and returned... The British were no longer joking as they watched their own torpedo rush towards them. As a result, they suffered from their own torpedo, and in such a way that the destroyer, although it remained afloat and waited for help, did not participate in hostilities until the very end of the war due to the damage received. A mystery military history There is only one thing left: why didn’t the Germans finish off the British? Either they were ashamed to finish off such warriors of the “queen of the seas” and the successors of Nelson’s glory, or they laughed so hard that they could no longer shoot...

POLYGLOTS

A curious incident occurred in Hungary. Already at the end of the war, when Soviet troops entered Hungary, as a result of battles and communication, the majority of Hungarians were sure that “fucking your mother” was an accepted greeting, like “hello.” One day when Soviet colonel came to a rally with Hungarian workers and greeted them in Hungarian, they responded in unison with “fucking your mother!”

NOT ALL GENERALS RETURNED

June 22, 1941 in the strip southwestern front Army Group South (commander Field Marshal G. Rundstedt) struck main blow south of Vladimir-Volynsky along the formations of the 5th Army of General M.I. Potapov and the 6th Army of General I.N. Muzychenko. In the center of the 6th Army zone, in the Rava-Russkaya area, the 41st Infantry Division of the oldest commander of the Red Army, General G.N., staunchly defended. Mikusheva. The division's units repelled the first enemy attacks together with the border guards of the 91st border detachment. On June 23, with the arrival of the main forces of the division, they launched a counterattack, pushed the enemy back across the state border and advanced up to 3 km into Polish territory. But, due to the threat of encirclement, they had to retreat...

Unusual intelligence facts. Basically German intelligence“worked” quite successfully in the Soviet rear, except in the Leningrad direction. The Germans sent spies in large numbers to besieged Leningrad, providing everything necessary - clothing, documents, addresses, passwords, appearances. But, when checking documents, any patrol instantly identified “fake” documents of German origin. Works the best specialists forensics and printing were easily detected by soldiers and officers on patrol. The Germans changed the texture of the paper and the composition of the paints - to no avail. Any even semi-literate sergeant of the Central Asian conscription identified the linden at first sight. The Germans never solved the problem. And the secret was simple - the Germans, a quality nation, made the paper clips that were used to fasten documents from stainless steel, and our real Soviet paper clips were slightly rusty, the patrol sergeants had never seen anything else, for them the shiny steel paper clips sparkled like gold...

FROM PLANES WITHOUT PARACHUTES

A pilot on a reconnaissance flight during his return noticed a column of German armored vehicles moving towards Moscow. As it turned out -on a way There are no German tanks, no one. It was decided to drop troops in front of the column. They brought to the airfield only a complete regiment of Siberians in white sheepskin coats. When the German column was walking along the highway, suddenly low-flying planes appeared ahead, as if they were about to land, having slowed down to the limit, 10-20 meters from the snow surface. Clusters of people in white sheepskin coats fell from airplanes onto a snow-covered field next to the road. The soldiers got up alive and immediately threw themselves under the tracks of the tanks with bunches of grenades... They looked like white ghosts, they were not visible in the snow, and the advance of the tanks was stopped. When a new column of tanks and motorized infantry approached the Germans, there were practically no “white pea coats” left. And then a wave of planes flew in again and a new white waterfall of fresh fighters poured from the sky. The German advance was stopped, and only a few tanks hastily retreated. Afterwards it turned out that only 12 percent of the landing force died when they fell into the snow, and the rest entered into an unequal battle. Although it is still a terribly wrong tradition to measure victories by the percentage of living people who died. On the other hand, it is difficult to imagine a German, American, or Englishman voluntarily jumping onto tanks without a parachute. They wouldn't even be able to think about it.

At the beginning of October 1941, the Headquarters of the Supreme High Command learned about the defeat of its three fronts in the Moscow direction from Berlin radio messages. We are talking about the encirclement near Vyazma.

AND ONE WARRIOR IN THE FIELD

On July 17, 1941 (the first month of the war), Wehrmacht Chief Lieutenant Hensfald, who later died at Stalingrad, wrote in his diary: “Sokolnichi, near Krichev. In the evening, a Russian unknown soldier was buried. He alone, standing at the gun, spent a long time shooting at a column of our tanks and infantry. And so he died. Everyone was amazed at his courage.” Yes, this warrior was buried by the enemy! With honors... Later it turned out that it was the commander of the gun of the 137th Infantry Division of the 13th Army, Senior Sergeant Nikolai Sirotinin. He was left alone to cover the withdrawal of his unit. Sirotinin, took up an advantageous firing position from which the highway, a small river and a bridge across it were clearly visible. At dawn on July 17, German tanks and armored personnel carriers appeared. When the lead tank reached the bridge, a gun shot rang out. With the first shot, Nikolai knocked out a German tank. The second shell hit another one that was at the rear of the column. There was a traffic jam on the road. The Nazis tried to turn off the highway, but several tanks immediately got stuck in the swamp. And senior sergeant Sirotinin continued to send shells to the target. The enemy brought down the fire of all tanks and machine guns on the lone gun. A second group of tanks approached from the west and also opened fire. Only after 2.5 hours did the Germans manage to destroy the cannon, which managed to fire almost 60 shells. At the battle site, 10 destroyed German tanks and armored personnel carriers were burning out. The Germans had the impression that the fire on the tanks was carried out by a full battery. And only later did they learn that the column of tanks was held back by one artilleryman. Yes, this warrior was buried by the enemy! With honors...

ENGLISH HUMOR

Famous historical fact. The Germans, demonstrating the supposedly impending landing on the British Isles, placed several dummy airfields on the coast of France, on which they “planed” a large number of wooden copies of aircraft. Work on creating these same dummy airplanes was in full swing when one day in broad daylight a lone British plane appeared in the air and dropped a single bomb on the “airfield”. She was wooden...! After this “bombing,” the Germans abandoned false airfields.

CAUTION, UNFORMAT!

Those who fought on eastern front The Germans completely refute the stereotypes we have based on films about the Second World War. As German WWII veterans recall, “UR-R-RA!” they had never heard and did not even suspect the existence of such an attack cry from Russian soldiers. But they learned the word BL@D perfectly. Because it was with such a cry that the Russians rushed into an especially hand-to-hand attack. And the second word that the Germans often heard from their side of the trenches was “Hey, go ahead, fucking m@t!”, this booming cry meant that now not only infantry but also T-34 tanks would trample on the Germans.

The first memorial in honor of the unknown soldier was built at the very beginning of the 1920s in France. In Paris, near Arc de Triomphe, with all due military honors, the remains of one of the countless French infantrymen left to lie on the fields of the First World War were buried. There, at the monument, it was first lit Eternal flame. Soon after this, similar burials appeared in the UK, near Westminster Abbey, and in the USA, at Arlington Cemetery. On the first of them were the words: “Soldier of the Great War, whose name is known to God.” The second memorial appeared only eleven years later, in 1932. It also read: “Here lies in honorable glory American soldier, whose name is known only to God."

The tradition of erecting a monument to a nameless hero could only have arisen in the era of the world wars of the 20th century. In the previous century, with its cult of Napoleon and ideas about war as an opportunity to demonstrate personal valor, no one could imagine that long-range artillery firing “across the area”, dense machine-gun fire, the use of poisonous gases and other modern means of warfare would deprive the very idea of meaning individual heroism. New military doctrines operate with human masses, and therefore heroism new war can only be massive. Like death, which is inextricably linked with the idea of heroism, it is also massive.

By the way, in the USSR in the interwar decades they did not yet understand this and looked at the Eternal Flame in Paris with bewilderment, as if it were a bourgeois whim. In the Land of Soviets itself, mythology Civil War developed around heroes with big names and biographies of popular favorites, legendary army commanders and “people's marshals”. Those of them who survived the period of repression in the Red Army in the mid-30s never learned to fight in a new way: Semyon Budyonny and Kliment Voroshilov could still personally lead an attack on the enemy (which, by the way, Voroshilov did during the fighting for Leningrad, having been wounded by the Germans and earning a contemptuous reproach from Stalin), but they could not afford to abandon dashing cavalry raids in favor of strategic maneuvering by masses of troops.

With your hands held high

From the first days of the war, the Soviet propaganda machine began talking about the heroism of the Red Army units, valiantly holding back the advancing enemy. The version of why the German invasion achieved such amazing successes in a matter of weeks was formulated personally by Comrade Stalin in his famous address to Soviet citizens on July 3, 1941: “Despite the fact that the enemy’s best divisions and the best units of his aviation have already been defeated and found his grave on the battlefield, the enemy continues to push forward, throwing new forces to the front.” IN Soviet historiography the defeats and retreats of the Red Army of 1941-1942 were explained by anything: the surprise of the strike, the superiority of the enemy in the number and quality of troops, his greater preparedness for war, even the shortcomings of military planning on the part of the USSR - but not by what actually had place, namely the moral unpreparedness of the Red Army soldiers and commanders for a war with Germany, for a new type of war.

We are embarrassed to write about the instability of our troops in initial period war. And the troops... not only retreated, but also fled and fell into panic.
G.K. Zhukov

Meanwhile, reluctance Soviet citizens to fight was explained by a whole complex of reasons, both ideological and psychological. Wehrmacht units that crossed the state border of the USSR fell on Soviet cities and villages, not only thousands of bombs and shells, but also a powerful information charge with the aim of discrediting the existing political system in the country, driving a wedge between state and party authorities and ordinary citizens. The efforts of Hitler’s propagandists were by no means completely useless - a significant part of the inhabitants of our country, especially from among the peasants, representatives of national regions only recently annexed to the USSR, in general, people who in one way or another suffered from the repressions of the 20-30s, did not see the point in to fight to the last “for the power of the Bolsheviks.” It is no secret that the Germans, especially in the western regions of the country, were often indeed looked upon as liberators.

We analyzed losses during the retreat. Most of fell on the missing, a smaller part - on the wounded and killed (mainly commanders, communists and Komsomol members). Based on the analysis of losses, we built party-political work to increase the stability of the division in defense. If in the days of the first week we allocated 6 hours for defense work and 2 hours for study, then in subsequent weeks the ratio was the opposite.
From the memoirs of General A.V. Gorbatov about the events of October-November 1941

Important role Reasons of a military nature also played a role, only related, again, not to weapons, but to psychology. In the pre-war years, the Red Army soldiers were prepared for war in the old, linear manner - to advance in a chain and hold the defense with the entire front line. Such tactics tied the soldier to his place in the general formation, forced him to look up to his neighbors on the right and left, and deprived him of an operational vision of the battlefield and even a hint of initiative. As a result, not just individual Red Army soldiers and junior commanders, but also commanders of divisions and armies found themselves completely helpless in the face of the new tactics of the Germans, who professed maneuver warfare, who knew how to gather mobile mechanized units into a fist in order to cut through, encircle and defeat masses of troops stretched out in a line with relatively small forces. enemy.

Russian offensive tactics: a three-minute fire raid, then a pause, after which an infantry attack shouting “hurray” in deeply echeloned combat formations (up to 12 waves) without support from heavy weapons fire, even in cases where attacks are made from long distances. From here it's incredible big losses Russians.
From the diary German general Franz Halder, July 1941

Therefore, in the first months of the war, units of the Red Army were able to provide serious resistance only where positional - linear - tactics were dictated by the situation itself, primarily in the defense of large populated areas and other strongholds - Brest Fortress, Tallinn, Leningrad, Kyiv, Odessa, Smolensk, Sevastopol. In all other cases, where there was room for maneuver, the Nazis constantly “outplayed” the Soviet commanders. Left behind enemy lines, without contact with headquarters, without support from their neighbors, the Red Army soldiers quickly lost the will to resist, fled or immediately surrendered - individually, in groups and entire military formations, with weapons, banners and commanders... So in the fall of 1941, After three or four months of fighting, the German armies found themselves at the walls of Moscow and Leningrad. A real threat of complete military defeat loomed over the USSR.

Rise of the masses

In this critical situation, three circumstances played a decisive role, closely related friend with a friend. Firstly, German command, who developed the plan for the eastern campaign, underestimated the scale of the task facing him. The Nazis already had experience of conquest behind them. Western European countries in a matter of weeks, but a hundred kilometers on the roads of France and the same hundred kilometers on the Russian off-road are not at all the same thing, and from the then border of the USSR to Moscow, for example, there were 900 kilometers only in a straight line, not to mention the fact that constantly maneuvering armies had to cover significantly greater distances. All this had a deplorable effect on the combat readiness of German tank and motorized units when they eventually reached the distant approaches to Moscow. And if you consider that the Barbarossa plan provided for the delivery of full-scale strikes in three strategic directions at once, then it is not surprising that the Germans simply did not have enough strength in the fall of 1941 for the final decisive push towards Moscow. And these hundreds of kilometers were not covered with fanfare - despite the catastrophic situation Soviet troops, to encirclements, “cauldrons”, the death of entire divisions and even armies, Headquarters each time managed to close the hastily restored front line in front of the Germans and bring more and more people into battle, including the completely incapable people’s militia. Actually, the mass heroism of the Red Army soldiers of this period lay precisely in the fact that they took the battle in stunningly unequal, unfavorable conditions for themselves. And they died in the thousands, tens of thousands, but they helped buy the time the country needed to come to its senses.

It can be said with almost certainty that no cultured Westerner will ever understand the character and soul of the Russians. Knowledge of the Russian character can serve as the key to understanding the fighting qualities of the Russian soldier, his advantages and methods of fighting on the battlefield... You can never say in advance what a Russian will do: as a rule, he veers from one extreme to the other. His nature is as unusual and complex as this huge and incomprehensible country itself. It is difficult to imagine the limits of his patience and endurance; he is unusually brave and brave and yet at times shows cowardice. There were cases when Russian units, having selflessly repelled all German attacks, unexpectedly fled in front of small assault groups. Sometimes Russian infantry battalions were thrown into confusion after the first shots, and the next day the same units fought with fanatical tenacity.

Secondly, the Nazis’ propaganda campaign in the East failed because it came into conflict with their own developed doctrine of the complete destruction of “Slavic statehood.” It did not take much time for the population of Ukraine, Belarus, the western regions of Russia and other republics that were part of the USSR to understand what kind of “new order” the invaders were bringing to them. Although there was cooperation with the Germans in the occupied territory, it did not become truly widespread. And most importantly, with their unjustified cruelty towards prisoners of war and civilians, their barbaric methods of warfare, the fascists provoked a massive response from the Soviet people, in which anger and fierce hatred predominated. What Stalin could not do at first, Hitler did - he made the citizens of the USSR realize what was happening not as a confrontation between two political systems, but as a sacred struggle for the right of their fatherland to live, forced the soldiers of the Red Army to fight not for fear, but for conscience. The mass feeling of fear, mass panic and confusion that helped the Nazis in the first months of the war, by the winter of 1941, turned into a readiness for mass heroism and self-sacrifice.

To some extent, the high fighting qualities of the Russians are reduced by their lack of intelligence and natural laziness. However, during the war, the Russians constantly improved, and their senior commanders and staffs received a lot of useful information from studying the experience of the combat operations of their troops and German army... Junior and often middle-level commanders still suffered from sluggishness and inability to accept independent decisions- due to severe disciplinary sanctions, they were afraid to take responsibility... Herd instinct among soldiers is so great that an individual fighter always strives to merge with the “crowd.” Russian soldiers and junior commanders instinctively knew that if they were left to their own devices, they would die. In this instinct one can see the roots of both panic and the greatest heroism and self-sacrifice.
Friedrich Wilhelm von Mellenthin, "Tank battles 1939-1945."

And thirdly, Soviet military leaders in these incredibly difficult conditions, they found the strength to resist general confusion and panic, constant pressure from Headquarters, and begin to master the basics of military science, buried under a heap of political slogans and party directives. It was necessary to start almost from scratch - from the refusal linear tactics defense, from unprepared counterattacks and offensives, from the tactically incorrect use of infantry and tanks for wide frontal attacks. Even in the most difficult situations there were generals, such as the commander of the 5th Army M.I. Potapov, who led the defensive battles in Ukraine, or the commander of the 19th Army M.F. Lukin, who fought near Smolensk and Vyazma, who managed to gather around themselves everyone who could truly fight, to organize nodes of meaningful opposition to the enemy. Both mentioned generals were captured by the Germans in the same 1941, but there were others - K.K. Rokossovsky, M.E. Katukov, I.S. Konev, finally, G.K. Zhukov, who carried out the first successful offensive operation near Yelnya, and later stopped the Germans first near Leningrad and then near Moscow. It was they who managed to reorganize during the battles, instill in those around them the idea of the need to use new tactics, and give the accumulated mass anger of the Red Army soldiers the form of thoughtful, effective military strikes.

The rest was a matter of time. As soon as the moral factor came into play, as soon as the Red Army felt the taste of its first victories, the fate of Hitler's Germany was sealed. Undoubtedly, the Soviet troops still had to learn many bitter lessons from the enemy, but the advantage in human resources, as well as a meaningful readiness to fight, gave the mass heroism of the Red Army and Red Navy a different character compared to the first stage of the war. Now they were driven not by despair, but by faith in future victory.

Heroes with a name

Against the backdrop of the mass deaths of hundreds of thousands and even millions of people, many of whom remain nameless to this day, several names stand out that have become truly legendary. We are talking about heroes whose exploits became famous throughout the country during the war and whose fame in post-war period was truly national. Monuments and memorial complexes were erected in their honor. Streets and squares, mines and steamships, military units and pioneer squads were named after them. Songs were written about them and films were made. Over the course of fifty years, their images managed to acquire real monumentality, which even the “revelatory” publications in the press, a whole wave of which surged in the early 1990s, could do nothing about.

One can doubt the official Soviet version of the events of the history of the Great Patriotic War. One can consider the level of training of our pilots in 1941 to be so low that supposedly they could not have achieved anything more worthwhile than a ground ramming of a concentration of enemy troops. It can be assumed that the Soviet saboteurs operating in the near German rear in the winter of 1941 were caught not by Wehrmacht soldiers, but by local peasants who collaborated with them. You can argue until you're hoarse what happens to the human body when it falls on top of a firing heavy machine gun. But one thing is obvious - the names of Nikolai Gastello, Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, Alexander Matrosov and others would never have taken root in mass consciousness Soviet people (especially those who themselves went through the war), if they did not embody something very important - perhaps exactly what helped the Red Army withstand the onslaught of the Nazis in 1941 and 1942 and reach Berlin in 1945.

Captain Nikolai Gastello died on the fifth day of the war. His feat became the personification of that critical situation when the enemy had to be fought with any available means, in conditions of his overwhelming technical superiority. Gastello served in bomber aviation, participated in the battles at Khalkhin Gol and in the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940. He made his first flight during the Great Patriotic War on June 22 at 5 am. His regiment suffered very heavy losses in the very first hours, and already on June 24, the remaining aircraft and crews were consolidated into two squadrons. Gastello became the commander of the second of them. On June 26, his plane, consisting of a flight of three aircraft, took off to strike the cluster German troops, advancing on Minsk. After bombing along the highway, the planes turned east. At this moment, Gastello decided to shoot a column of German troops moving along country road. During the attack, his plane was shot down, and the captain decided to ram ground targets. His entire crew died along with him: lieutenants A.A. Burdenyuk, G.N. Skorobogaty, senior sergeant A.A. Kalinin.

A month after his death, Captain Nikolai Frantsevich Gastello, born in 1908, commander of the 2nd aviation squadron of the 42nd long-range bomber aviation division of the 3rd bomber aviation corps of the long-range bomber aviation, was posthumously nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union and awarded the Gold Star and the Order of Lenin . Its crew members were awarded the Order of the Patriotic War, 1st degree. It is believed that during the years of the Great Patriotic feat Gastello was repeated by many Soviet pilots.

About martyrdom of Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya became known in January 1942 from the publication of the war correspondent of the Pravda newspaper Pyotr Lidov entitled “Tanya”. In the article itself, Zoya’s name was not yet mentioned; it was established later. It was also later discovered that in November 1941, Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya, as part of a group, was sent to the Vereisky district of the Moscow region, where German units were stationed. Zoya, contrary to popular belief, was not a partisan, but served in military unit 9903, which organized the dispatch of saboteurs behind enemy lines. In late November, Zoya was captured while attempting to set fire to buildings in the village of Petrishchevo. According to some sources, she was noticed by a sentry, according to others, she was betrayed by a member of her group, Vasily Klubkov, who had also been captured by the Germans shortly before. During interrogation, she identified herself as Tanya and denied to the end that she belonged to the sabotage detachment. The Germans beat her all night, and the next morning they hanged her in front of the villagers.

The feat of Zoya Kosmodemyanskaya became an expression of the highest steadfastness of the Soviet spirit. The eighteen-year-old girl did not die in the heat of battle, not surrounded by her comrades, and her death had no tactical significance for the success of the Soviet troops near Moscow. Zoya found herself in territory captured by the enemy and died at the hands of the executioners. But, having accepted martyrdom, she won a moral victory over them. Zoya Anatolyevna Kosmodemyanskaya, born in 1923, was nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on February 16, 1942. She became the first woman to receive a Gold Star during the Great Patriotic War.

Feat Alexandra Matrosova symbolized something else - the desire to help his comrades at the cost of his life, to bring victory closer, which after the defeat Hitler's troops near Stalingrad seemed inevitable. Sailors fought since November 1942 as part of the Kalinin Front, in the 2nd separate rifle battalion of the 91st separate Siberian volunteer brigade named after Stalin (later the 254th Guards Rifle Regiment of the 56th Guards Rifle Division). On February 27, 1943, Matrosov’s battalion entered battle near the village of Pleten in the Pskov region. The approaches to the village were covered by three German bunkers. The fighters managed to destroy two of them, but the machine gun installed in the third did not allow the fighters to launch an attack. Sailors, approaching the bunker, tried to destroy the machine-gun crew with grenades, and when this failed, he closed the embrasure own body, giving the Red Army soldiers the opportunity to capture the village.

Alexander Matveevich Matrosov, born in 1924, was nominated for the title of Hero of the Soviet Union on June 19, 1943. His name was assigned to the 254th Guards Regiment, and he himself was forever included in the lists of the 1st company of this unit. The feat of Alexander Matrosov for propaganda purposes was timed to coincide with February 23, 1943. It is believed that Matrosov was not the first Red Army soldier to cover a machine gun embrasure with his chest, and after his death the same feat was repeated by about 300 more soldiers, whose names were not so widely known.

In the December days of 1966, in honor of the 25th anniversary of the defeat of German troops near Moscow, the ashes of the Unknown Soldier, brought from the 41st kilometer of the Leningrad Highway, where particularly fierce battles for the capital took place in 1941, were solemnly buried in the Alexander Garden near the Kremlin walls.

On the eve of the celebration of the 22nd anniversary of the Victory, May 8, 1967, a grave was opened at the burial site. architectural ensemble"Tomb of the Unknown Soldier". The authors of the project are architects D.I. Burdin, V.A. Klimov, Yu.A. Rabaev, sculptor - N.V. Tomsky. The center of the ensemble is a bronze star placed in the middle of a mirror-polished black square framed by a red granite platform. The Eternal Flame of Glory bursts out of the star, delivered to Moscow from Leningrad, where it was ignited from the flames blazing on the Champs of Mars.

The inscription “To those who fell for the Motherland” is carved on the granite wall. 1941-1945". On the right, along the Kremlin wall, blocks of dark red porphyry are placed in a row; under them, in urns, soil is stored, delivered from the hero cities - Leningrad, Kiev, Minsk, Volgograd, Sevastopol, Odessa, Kerch, Novorossiysk, Murmansk, Tula, Smolensk, and also from the Brest Fortress. Each block bears the name of the city and an embossed image of the Gold Star medal. The tombstone of the monument is topped with a voluminous bronze emblem depicting a soldier’s helmet, battle banner and a laurel branch.

Words are engraved on the granite slab of the tombstone.

Second World War for our country it still remains the most tragic and great event in our history. The memory of those who died during these years is immortalized in many monuments that are located in all cities of Russia. A lot of unidentified soldiers were buried during the war. To honor their feat, a monument to the Unknown Soldier is erected on such graves. There is such a memorial in Moscow - in the Alexander Garden near

The significance of such monuments

All over the world, monuments to those killed in war are erected so that people remember why soldiers gave their lives. Soldiers' graves are often unmarked, and people have not previously visited them to honor their memory. But after one of the most bloody wars- The First World War - a tradition was formed to perpetuate the memory of such warriors in monuments. They are usually installed at the burial site. This is how descendants express their gratitude and respect to the soldiers who died in battle. The first monument to the Unknown Soldier was erected in Paris in November 1920. Something similar was created in Russia at the same time, however, this memorial symbolized the memory of the heroes who died for the revolution.

History of the monument to the unknown soldier

In the Soviet Union, large-scale celebrations of victory in the Great Patriotic War began only in 1965. At this time, our capital, like many other cities, was awarded the status of a hero city, and May 9 became a national holiday. On the eve of the anniversary great battle For Moscow, the government of the country thought about how to create a monument that could perpetuate the feat of the city’s defenders. It was supposed to be a memorial of national importance. Therefore, we settled on erecting a monument to the unknown soldier.

Moscow was an ideal place for this, because thousands of soldiers died in the battles for the city, and many of them were not identified. A competition was announced to create the monument. The project of the architect V. A. Klimov was recognized as the best. He believed that such a monument must be located in a park so that a person could sit next to it and think. Best place for him it was chosen near the Kremlin wall - a symbol of Russia's invincibility. And in 1966, work began on the monument. It was created by architects V.A. Klimov, D. I. Burdin and Yu. R. Rabaev. The most famous writers and poets were invited to create the inscription on the monument. The words of S. Mikhalkov were recognized as the best: “Your name is unknown, your feat is immortal.” The grand opening of the monument took place on the eve of Victory Day in 1967. In subsequent years, it was repeatedly supplemented with new elements and restored. To this day, the Monument to the Unknown Soldier remains in the Great Patriotic War.

How the warrior's ashes were buried

Before creating the memorial, we thought for a long time about who to bury in the grave under the monument. After all, it must be an unidentified warrior who died in the battles for Moscow. And in 1966, forty kilometers from the city, in Zelenograd, a mass grave was discovered. They chose a soldier who was wearing a well-preserved uniform. Experts guaranteed that he was not a deserter, otherwise he would not have been wearing a belt. This warrior could not have been captured, since there was no fascist occupation in this place. On December 2, the soldier was transferred to a coffin covered with St. George's ribbon. A soldier's time stamp was placed on the lid. Until the morning, young soldiers and war veterans stood next to him in a guard of honor. On the morning of December 3, the coffin was taken to Moscow along the Leningradskoye Highway as part of a funeral procession. In front of the Alexander Garden, the coffin was placed on an artillery carriage. The entire procession was accompanied by a guard of honor; alongside, to the sounds of a funeral march, war veterans walked and carried unfurled military banners.

How the monument was created

After the burial of the ashes of the unknown soldier - a month later - they began to create the memorial itself. At that time it looked different than it does now, and then the composition was supplemented several times. At first, the memorial consisted of the words of S. Mikhalkov, a tombstone over the grave and a bronze star with the Eternal Flame. A granite wall was made next to the monument, on which the names of all the hero cities are immortalized. The opening of the monument took place in a solemn atmosphere: National anthem and the fireworks went off. The Eternal Flame, which was brought from Leningrad, was also lit. The memorial was supplemented in 1975 with a bronze composition - a soldier's helmet on an unfurled banner.

What is the monument like now?

Modern youth may not even be able to answer what kind of monument this is and what its significance is. But this war still remains the Great Patriotic War for most people, and to this day the monument to the unknown soldier is the place where wreaths are laid in holidays, it is visited by foreign delegations. There are always people around him who came to honor the memory of the dead. Since 1997, Post No. 1 has been located next to the monument. Soldiers of the Presidential Regiment replace each other every hour. In 2009, reconstruction of the complex began. At this time, the Eternal Flame was moved to Poklonnaya Hill, and after the opening of the updated monument in 2010, it was returned back. During the restoration, a ten-meter stele was added to the memorial, perpetuating the memory of

Description of the monument to the unknown soldier

The memorial is located in the Alexander Garden under the Kremlin wall. Every person who comes to Moscow considers it his duty to visit the monument to the unknown soldier. Photos of him can be found in all books dedicated to the Great Patriotic War, in newspapers and on the Internet. But it's still better to see it in reality. The composition is made of shiny red granite and black labradorite. On the tombstone there is a bronze soldier's helmet lying on an unfurled banner. In the center of a square of mirror-polished black stone is a bronze star. The Eternal Flame bursts out of it. On the right lies a low stele 10 meters long, on which the names of cities are carved military glory. And the memory of the city heroes is immortalized on a granite alley from

This memorial is known all over the world and is now one of the landmarks of Moscow. People come here not only on Victory Day, but simply to honor the memory of the fallen and pay tribute to the feat of the defenders of the Motherland.

Today we celebrate the “Day of the Unknown Soldier” for the first time. Although it would be more correct to call it “Day of Remembrance of the Unknown Soldier”.
By and large, there should be no unknown soldiers. The war is not considered over until the last soldier is buried. Remains dead soldiers They are still being found. And not only in the places of past battles, but also in the places of current battles in Ukraine.
My grandfather died as an “unknown soldier” during the defense of Stalingrad.
During the Great Patriotic War, 4.4 million military personnel went missing. During the war in Afghanistan from 1979 to 1989, 417 of our soldiers were captured (130 were released before the withdrawal of Soviet troops from Afghanistan).
Recently, a monument to Afghan soldiers was unveiled in the military glory park near our house. Many of those present said: “if only there was no war”!

The idea to create the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier memorial appeared in France after the end of the First World War. After World War II, the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier monument was created in Poland. And in the USSR - the victorious country! - there was nothing like that.

In December 1966, they were preparing to celebrate the 25th anniversary of the battle under the walls of Moscow. During construction in Zelenograd, near Moscow, workers came across mass grave soldier. One of the fighters is wearing a well-preserved uniform with the insignia of a private. He had no documents - he fell like an unknown hero.
The remains of this soldier were placed in a coffin, which was installed on a gun carriage on December 3, and the solemn procession headed to Moscow. The Unknown Soldier was buried in the Alexander Garden near the Kremlin wall.
On May 8, 1967, the architectural ensemble “Tomb of the Unknown Soldier” was opened at the burial site and the “eternal flame” was lit.
“Your name is unknown, your feat is immortal!” – everyone knows these words now.

During my childhood, I regularly watched the then popular television program of the writer S.S. Smirnov about the unknown soldiers of the Great Patriotic War.
Often, at the request of my parents and friends, I sang the song “In the field, along the steep bank, past the huts. A soldier walked in a gray overcoat of a private. The soldier walked, not knowing any barriers, the soldier walked, losing friends. It often happened that the soldier walked forward without stopping.”
Another popular song was: “Standing over the mountain Alyosha, Alyosha, Alyosha. A Russian soldier stands over Mount Alyosha in Bulgaria.”
And who is the “16th Republic” of the Soviet Union with now?

I recently watched the American film "Fury". Those who are not familiar with the history of World War II can conclude that Europe was liberated exclusively by American soldiers. In the film, Brad Pitt's character demands that a recruit shoot a German prisoner of war begging for mercy, and as a result kills himself. American soldiers buy German girls “for a chocolate bar”, and at the same time cannot understand “why the Germans do not surrender.”

In the new American film"Interstellar" teachers in schools convince students that the Apollo flight to the Moon was staged in order to provoke the USSR into spending money on the lunar race and thereby ruin it.

The world is ruled by Her Majesty LIES!
When diplomats say they don't want a new Cold War, it means a "second cold war"is already untied.
The lies of politicians and journalists are simply sickening. Hopes that common sense wins, there are none left. Nobody cares about the truth anymore; all that matters is what is consistent with the policy being pursued. If it doesn’t correspond, then they will try to ignore the truth.

The situation with Malaysian Boeing is an example of boundless hypocrisy!
Well, politicians don’t want to tell the truth. Give them at least some facts, politicians will not recognize the truth if it is not profitable for them now. They each have their own truth. Everyone is fighting for a place in the sun in all unacceptable ways.

France doesn’t want to fulfill the terms of the contract and transfer the Mistral to Russia, and that’s all. You see, “the conditions are not ripe.”
And this is Western civilized constitutional state, where there seems to be a cult of compliance with contractual relations. But the agreement on the construction of the Mistrals was, if I’m not mistaken, part of the general agreement regarding Libya. We were deceived both in Libya and in the Mistrals!
Let's see what the “independent” European court will say when Russia applies for payment of the penalty.

Is politics really more important than law even in a country like France?!
What kind of rule of law is this if politics is stronger than the rule of law?!

What is this – this same politician? Opportunistic adherence to one's pragmatic interests?

Humanistic values of European civilization - yes. But if in this life there is nothing to die for, if the main value is your own life, then in order to preserve this life you can commit any meanness, any crime, even killing another. Hence death - “it’s not with me, it’s with someone else.”

The world is again divided into friends and strangers. The “Axis of Evil” is being built again: Russia, North Korea, Iran, Vietnam...
Now Russia is actually in a state of undeclared war. Only completely foolish man does not see an international oil conspiracy, including against Russia. It’s no longer a secret that manipulation of oil prices is part of a “conspiracy theory” with the goal of undermining the Russian economy and destroying it, just as the USSR was destroyed in its time.

I recently read that our “partners” are ready to fight until the last Ukrainian soldier. Some unknown armies without identification marks are fighting. Either these are private armies, belonging to no one knows, or volunteers, or terrorists. All have approximately the same shape. How they distinguish their own from strangers, one can only guess.

They want to make not only the Unknown Soldier, but the entire Great Patriotic War in Ukraine unknown. They propose to delete even the phrase “Great Great Patriotic War” from history textbooks. Patriotic War" But whoever forgets the lessons of history is doomed to repeat them.

As a child, I vacationed in a Ukrainian village near the town of Bila Tserkva. In his youth he served in the navy together with Ukrainians, including in Sevastopol. I like Ukrainians. But I hate politicians who build their careers on the bones of ordinary people.

I can’t watch or listen to how children are dying from shelling in Donetsk. The Nazis did not fire at besieged Leningrad the way the Ukrainian brothers fire at their native Donetsk!

Information and economic war in full swing. Cyberwar has already begun. However, judging by the revelations of Edward Snowden, it never ended. Recently it was reported that the Americans had developed a new computer virus, also directed against Russia, allowing one to view Internet correspondence and eavesdrop on telephone conversations leading operators.
Who is he, the “unknown soldier” leading the cyber war?

Many felt uneasy when Minister of Revolution Shoigu spoke about measures in case of mobilization. NATO's power is 30 times greater armed forces Russia. Will Russia use nuclear weapons to defend itself? Hardly. Since application nuclear weapons suicidal. In such a war there can be neither winners nor losers.
But then why do we need so many expensive nuclear missiles, which will never be applied?
Does a loaded gun really have to fire?

Our people will survive in any war, unless they are betrayed by politicians, as Khrushchev betrayed in 1954, transferring Crimea to Ukraine, as the leaders betrayed in 1991, collapsing the USSR.

Recently, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov admitted that economic sanctions against Russia are aimed at changing political regime in the country.
Do our “partners” want to make life better for ordinary Russians as a result of regime change? Not sure. For them, we are more like “white natives” who need to be civilized by forcing us to work for ourselves.

What will happen to Russia when the West declares an embargo on the sale of Russian oil as economic sanctions?

How can you fight for the market with those who have a printing press (the Fed) behind them, and they will print as much money as they want?!

No, they don’t want to see Russians as part of the “golden billion”!

If something similar to what is happening now in Ferguson and other US cities happened in Russia, it would be called a violation of human rights, a crime of the ruling regime, and even a revolution. And if this happens in the USA, then it is called democracy.
“The powerful are always to blame for the powerless.”

Indeed, a “new Middle Ages” is coming.
Previously, the media wrote: “the opinion of the editors may not coincide with the opinion of the author of the publication.” Now, if your position does not coincide with the editorial policy, no one will publish your opinion. It is advised not to even touch on certain topics. If you decide to publish something that does not meet the “editorial policy,” your blog will simply be deleted.

Because of the lies of politicians, political scientists and journalists, television has turned into a zombie box!
These people without honor, without conscience, without morals and their so-called “double standards” led to the loss moral guidelines, to the loss of distinction between good and evil. What is possible for some is not allowed for others; whoever is stronger is right.

Politicians swear like market women. All civilized rules and diplomatic decency have been forgotten. Ideas about honor, conscience, and decency have been lost. The hypocrisy is off the charts!

Politicians understandable feeling superiority over others. But is a leader always smarter than his people? The experience of George W. Bush suggests that this is not always the case.

The job of politicians is to negotiate. And if they cannot agree, then they are not doing their job and they need to hire other politicians. But no one admits to being unsuitable for their position. They themselves cannot live normally, and they do not allow others to live.

Gentlemen of politics! Well, let us live in peace!!
If you want to fight, please put sovereignty in your hands and go to the front line. Fight with yourself. A simple people they don’t want to fight, neither for you nor for your policies.
Do not deceive either people or yourself - no one wants to die for your personal interests and geopolitical games.

Gentlemen of politics, do not be deceived - you do not express the interests of the people. Ordinary people do not want to die either for the property of the oligarchs or for your geopolitics.

How long can you torture people?!

I personally support the proposal of the leader of the Lugansk Republic, Igor Plotnitsky, to challenge the President of Ukraine Petro Poroshenko to a duel. Let them measure their strength as in the good old days, and not throw human lives into the millstones of war. Why should people die for oligarchs who are getting rich?!

Politicians build their careers on the suffering of ordinary citizens.
Elites fight, and children die.
It will all end in revolution again!

It is sad to think that global politics is a struggle between two (or several) ambitions, a struggle on which, perhaps, the fate of humanity depends.
If presidents want to fight, let them choose weapons and fight each other. But ordinary people want to live in peace.

Presidents are not the whole country!
Politicians come and go, but the people remain.

According to Plotnitsky, the duel between him and the President of Ukraine should “put an end to the war.”
“If you still want to shed the blood of your and our soldiers, their wives, mothers, old people and children, then prove that you are ready to shed your blood too - accept my challenge,” concluded Plotnitsky.

“Let’s follow the example of the ancient Slavic leaders and glorious Cossack chieftains and fight in a duel. Whoever wins dictates opposite side your terms. Why incite mutual hatred and destroy people, economies, cities? Both you and we will have to heal these wounds for decades! Isn’t it better to put an end to all differences in a fair fight?” - Plotnitsky addressed Poroshenko.

“Personally, what outrages me most is when those who call themselves guardians of the rule of law call for the shooting of innocent people.
- The innocent always suffer.
- Bastards, bastards! After all, it is obvious to everyone that with these bombings they are only trying to strengthen their power.
- They have always killed and will continue to kill unwanted people. And above all, those who claim power, be it power over the minds or souls of people.
- But I am outraged that at the same time they have the audacity to declare that they defend democracy and freedom, cynically speculating on these concepts. They shout that they care about the interests of the people, and at the same time they shoot these very people.
- Is it possible to restore order at such a cost?
- What to do if there is nothing left and you have to solve the problem this way?
- There is no problem whose solution would justify killing a person.
- And the war?
- War is a sign of intellectual impotence or deceit of rulers. In this way, they solve the problem of increasing their own rating at the expense of other people's lives. The rulers who start a war do not love their people, if they love anyone at all. After all, a politician, like any person, is ultimately ruled by either hatred or love.
In war, people are sent to kill, justifying it in the interests of the state. At the same time, the soldiers are assured that “God is with us” and that, they say, they are under the protection of the law. In this way, the rulers want to save the killers from remorse. After all, they are not the ones who kill! And it’s not them who have to die.”
(from my novel “Stranger Strange Incomprehensible Extraordinary Stranger” on the New Russian Literature website

In your opinion, how to avoid the WAR OF THE UNKNOWN SOLDIER?

P.S. I dedicate this post to the memory of my grandfather!

World War II ended several decades ago. However, time holds a lot of secrets. Perhaps some of them will never be solved, while others will be answered years and decades later. Here are just a few truly amazing stories Second World War

Amazing stories of World War II. Who's in the picture

Six days after Germany's surrender in Life magazine A series of photographs by one of the famous Hungarian photojournalists, Robert Capa, was published. One of the photos shows an American soldier killed by a German sniper's bullet. This photograph has become an imperishable classic of documentary photography.

The body of a killed soldier lies on the balcony of one of the apartments in Leipzig. It was April 18, 1945. The man in the photo, of course, was not the latest victim war and at that time no one cared that the publication did not include the name of the deceased. He remained an unknown soldier for 67 long years.
In 2011, the city of Leipzig gave permission to raze the building in which the above photograph was taken in one of the apartments.
However, a group of conscientious activists decided to prevent the demolition of the historical building. To do this, they decided to find out the name of the soldier who was immortalized by the photographer, and thereby attract the attention of the media and the public to the upcoming demolition of the building. The search began on November 27, 2011. Enthusiasts soon found out that dead soldier name was Raymond Bowman.

Result. The building will not be demolished. An investor has been found who is ready to completely restore it...

Amazing stories of World War II. There are only two of us left

In 1958, Ivan Smirnov, a carpenter at the Nekrasovo state farm in the Uvarovsky district of the Moscow region, when he was trimming a birch trunk, found a cartridge case in it containing a note.

A letter from a Soviet soldier who fought in the Minsk Highway area was written in ink pencil in uneven letters on both sides of the piece of paper. Here is his text:
“12 of us were sent to the Minsk highway to block the enemy’s path, especially the tanks. And we persevered. And now there are three of us left: Kolya, Volodya and me - Alexander. But the enemies attack without mercy. And here’s another one – Volodya from Moscow. But the tanks keep coming. There are already 19 cars burning on the road. There are already two of us. We will stand as long as we have the courage, but we will not let our own people approach.
And so I was left alone, wounded in the head and arm. And the tanks added to the count. Already 23 cars. Perhaps I will die, but maybe someone will someday find my note and remember the heroes. I'm from Frunze, Russian. There are no parents. Goodbye, dear friends. Yours, Alexander Vinogradov. 22/21942"

As a result of the research, it was possible to restore the picture of the battles on the Minsk Highway in February 1942.

To contain the advance of Soviet troops near Moscow, the Nazi command transferred to Soviet-German front additionally several divisions from Germany. For the Soviet troops fighting in the Vyazma area, a difficult situation was created and the commander Western Front ordered the front armies to become more active.

On February 20, 1942, the military commissar of the 612th regiment gave the order to go out to the Minskoye Highway in the area of 152 kilometers west of Moscow and block the path of enemy tanks. The fighters positioned themselves along the highway. A group of fighters, which included Alexander Vinogradov, was on the flank. A column of fascist tanks suddenly appeared. The warriors fought for three days, the ranks of the defenders thinned before our eyes, but they did not retreat...

A. Vinogradov’s note is kept in the Central Museum of the Soviet Army.

Amazing stories of World War II. Mystery Revealed"Perseus"

In November 1941, at the height of World War II, the British submarine Perseus left its naval base in Malta and set off on its next mission. She was supposed to patrol the waters of the Mediterranean Sea near Greece.

On December 6, 1941, not far from the Greek island of Kefalonia, the submarine ran into an Italian mine and sank to the bottom, burying the entire crew with it...

And now, a year and a half later, the UK was shocked by the news: one person managed to escape during the sinking of the boat. It turned out to be John Capes. He was not on the crew list, but during the voyage he performed the duties of a driver.

According to Capes, on the night of the disaster, he was, as usual, in the engine room and lying in his bunk, made from the body of a torpedo. When the explosion occurred, he was thrown to the other end of the room. Quickly realizing that the Perseus had apparently hit a mine, John made his way through the bodies of the dead and wounded and tried to get out of the compartment. This turned out to be impossible, since the entire space behind the door was already filled with water. Putting on the Davis rescue apparatus, Capes opened the escape hatch, took a sip from a bottle of rum lying nearby and climbed out of the boat.

Capes, unconscious, was discovered the next morning by two Greek fishermen. For the next year and a half, he lived in the house of a local Greek, who agreed to shelter him from the Italian occupiers. It was only in May 1943 that Capes managed to get off the island and get to Alexandria, where the British military base was located.
For this rescue, John Capes was awarded a medal. British Empire, but soon mistrust arose in relation to him: was John Capes on lost boat or is it just his imagination?

The fact is that our hero was not listed on the crew lists. There were no living witnesses to his rescue either.

In Britain they began to say that John Capes was a kind of Baron Munchausen, chasing dubious fame. He died in 1985, having failed to convince skeptics of the veracity of his stories.
This story was continued only in 1997, when the Greek submariner Kostas Toktaridis descended to the bottom of the Mediterranean Sea and examined the sunken Perseus.

He found a torpedo-shaped bunk there and a bottle of rum in front of the escape hatch. All other details of Capes' stories also coincided.

In the eyes of many, John was vindicated.

Amazing stories of World War II. I'm leaving with love
October 1941. A tank with a crew consisting of commander junior lieutenant Ivan Sidorovich Kolosov, Vasily Orlov and Pavel Rudov was damaged on the approaches to Vyazma. The commander was shell-shocked, the driver was killed. Kolosov and Orlov drained the fuel and removed ammunition from other damaged tanks, repaired their vehicle and took it into the forest.
Having determined that they were surrounded, the tankers decided to make their way to their own. On October 12, a lone tank destroyed a German column. However, on October 24, when the tank attacked another column, the Germans managed to deploy their guns...

A quarter of a century after the war, in a deep forest near Vyazma, a BT tank with a clearly visible number 12 was found buried in the ground. The hatches were battened down, and there was a hole in the side. When the car was opened, the remains of a junior lieutenant tankman were found in place of the driver. He had a revolver with one cartridge and a tablet, and in the tablet there was a map, a photograph of his beloved girl and an unsent letter dated October 25, 1941:
“Hello, my Varya!
No, you and I will not meet.
Yesterday at noon we smashed another Nazi column. The fascist shell pierced the side armor and exploded inside. While I was driving the car into the forest, Vasily died. My wound is cruel.
I buried Vasily Orlov in a birch grove. It was light inside. Vasily died without having time to say a single word to me, without conveying anything to his beautiful Zoya and white-haired Mashenka, who looked like a dandelion covered in fluff.
So out of three tankers I was the only one left. At dusk I entered the forest. The night passed in agony, a lot of blood was lost. Now, for some reason, the pain burning through my entire chest has subsided and my soul is quiet.

It's a shame that we didn't do everything. But we did everything we could. Our comrades will chase the enemy, who should not walk through our fields and forests. I would never have lived my life like this if it weren’t for you, Varya. You always helped me: at Khalkhin Gol and here. Probably, after all, those who love are kinder to people. Thank you, dear! A person gets old, but the sky is forever young, like your eyes, which you can only look into and admire. They will never grow old or fade.
Time will pass, people will heal their wounds, people will build new cities, grow new gardens. Another life will come, other songs will be sung. But never forget about us, about three tankers.
You will have beautiful children, you will still love. And I am happy that I am leaving you with great love for you. Yours, Ivan Kolosov."
Varvara Petrovna Zhuravleva received letters addressed to her almost 30 years later.