Next, on american artifacts, we visit an exhibit about world war ii soviet soldiers. My name is craig hall. I basically consider myself an amateur military historian. I do various impressions. This impression here today is to represent the contribution of the soviet union as an ally of the americans and the british, to helping them win world war ii. We have to give equal credit to our allies. Some would say, we couldnt have done it by ourselves, but the point is and people asked me why do i do this impression. I think because the reason is that we need to tell the story about the eastern front. If you dont understand what happened on the eastern front, you dont understand world war ii. The soviets made a significant contribution to winning that w ar. Now, for example, what i normally do is, on my display on the table over here, i have a National Geographic magazine dated may, 1944. The first article in it has to do with the liberation of the ukraine. The point being, the significance of that is that, of course, one month later, we had dday. And the point the relationship of the soviet contribution is that, as of that date, when we push when you liberate the ukraine, you effectively push the germans out of your country. By that point in time, one month before dday, we had been occupying 65 maybe of the best german troops fighting us. If we hadnt done that, if they hadnt failed if we have failed in moscow or stalingrad or cursed, all of those trips could have well been on normandy beaches and it couldve have been a different outcome. Thats a significant contribution to winning the war that needs to be, if you will, explained to us as americans. We all contributed. Theres nothing wrong with supporting, as we all do my father fought in world war ii. Our contribution, but we have to understand the war as a total picture. And the eastern front, thats where we need to do it. As well as that strategic advantage, just the numbers, the sacrifice is a story that needs to be told. There was something in the area of 20 to 22 Million People who died on the eastern front. Half of whom, they allege, may be military. Even if you dont like those numbers. If you are to cut them in half, thats a lot of people. If when it comes to the soviets, for example, as Many Red Army soldiers died in one, battling grad, as all the americans who died in action in the entire war. You can see thats a significant contribution and an important part of the story that must be told. When it comes to the soviet contribution, the interesting thing that i find and try to communicate to people is the differences, if you will, in the soviet contribution as opposed to the british and the americans. I find there are three significant differences. One of them has to do with the partisan movement. The partisan movement in the soviet union as a resistance type function is totally different than all of the other resistance in france or belgium. All of those were underground. They did good things, no doubt about it. For example, the french got a lot of american airman back to london. In the soviet union, the partisan movement was big, it was well organized, it was organized in a military fashion. There were not only numbers but because of the geography of that place, they could hide from the germans. For action behind the german lines, a new army was formed. An army without uniforms whose home was the forest and whose front was the enemies rear. A guerrilla army. A minimum of glory and a maximum of determination. Their achievements were seldom recorded. Look at all of these faces. You will never see them again and the ranks of war prisoners or read their names over heroes graves. Ahead of them lay nothing but the road and the horror, but they stayed fighting. Their only goal was merciless destruction. Now, the partisan Movement Began in 1941, basically, in terms of its composition. When stalin made his first speech to the people, he reminded them and urged them to become partisans. To rise up like the russians did when napoleon invaded russia, referencing back to the history of russia. This war is not an ordinary war. It is the war of the entire russian people. Not only to eliminate the danger hanging over our heads, but to aid all people groaning under the yoke of fascism. When he said that, he probably didnt really mean it, because for the first year, the only party since that were allowed in the partisan movement were either Red Army Soldiers who are caught behind the lines or communist party members. In many cases, that wasnt a bad deal, because you werent getting a lot of other volunteers, especially in places like the ukraine, which were behind alliance. Because the ukrainians were, initially, when the germans first invaded the ukraine, the ukrainians welcomed them. Thinking, of course, like an world war i, when the germans came into ukraine and made them in independent nation, that they would again be an independent nation. I think that after about a year, they began to realize they had to devils. Stalin on the one hand, because they dont like the soviet system and they dont like the fact that collectivized a shun cost them tens of thousands of people who died of starvation because of that system. By the way, we also see that today. That juxtaposition in terms between the ukraine and the russians and the not animosity that they have. What happens is that they now realize there is another double. Thats hitler in the nazis. They are killing people just because they are slabs. Because there are lower on the totem pole of the racial identities that the nazis project. They send their young back to germany as slave laborers. At that point, we are able to get people to join the partisan movement. In moscow, the leader of the partisan bureaucracy finally convinced stalin that he should actually issue in order that would now open the partisan movement to all people of the soviet union. Whether they were red army or communist party members. They began to increase in numbers through that period of time. And most everything they did as an organized group was designed to support the regular army, the red army. So, for example, they did basically four Different Things as a partisan movement. Again, three of them in adjunct to or in support of the red army. One was to provide intelligence. Now, again, on my table over here, we have a picture, okay . This picture depicts one of those elements. A red army scout dressed in camouflage uniform, is consulting with partisan members. Moving back over here to this display, we then see parts of the uniform and equipment that he would have worn. In this case, he wears the camouflage outfit. In this case, its a leaf pattern, as opposed to what they call the amoeba pattern in that picture. He is dressed with that. He doesnt have a helmet, he has a soft cap. He has a bag with a few items in it. Thats his map case. He has binoculars. He has a canteen. He has a belt and his compass. Is his weapon is the pps41. Again, lightly dressed. This is what he does, he provides intelligence. Also, theres another element he would be carrying. This is the scout ninth. Very few Red Army Soldiers were provided with knives of any sort, unlike the americans who had things like the quay bar or whatever. The scout knife was provided to scouts by the soviet army. The unique thing about it, of course, is it is used in a particular way. As you can see, the knife has a blade edge and a non blade edge. A scout is actually trained to use it in one particular way. If you see the hilt, the way it fits my fingers, it is designed for two motions. One motion is across the neck from behind and the other is from the bottom and up. Its designed to be lethal, quick and silent which is the role of the scout. Not to be discovered, to take his intelligence back to the main red army, an observed. The other thing that partisans did, for example, were raids, sabotage, the things we normally think of guerrilla fighters being involved in. Sabotage. One of the more significant ones was, what they call, the railroad war as part of the battle of kursk. Again, the partisan movement is being directed from moscow. They knew about the battle of cursed and knew they were going to be attacked. They were defending against and. So, orders went out to all the various units of the partisans, that they should begin attacking the german communications, their supplies and whatever. Thats what they did. Those would be small unit operations in which you would have, lets say, a half dozen or a dozen men with the nations to go out and blow things up, attack convoys and whatever. The other things they did is raids which were different in the sense of their size and purpose. Where example, Ukrainian Partisans were actually directed by stalin, the boss, that they should conduct a rate down to the carpet ian mountains. This would be a unit involving Something Like 700 participants. Thats a substantial number of arms, mortars, light machine guns, in order to draw out the germans away and to chase them. That was the idea of the raid as opposed to the sabotage. So, those are the three things, for example, that the partisans did in support of the army itself. The other thing the partisans did is they represented the government of the soviet union to the people behind the lines. For example, one of the directives, by the way, as an aside over again to my display. You will note a number of weapons on this other display. Most of them are german, one of them is italian. An axis ally, an ally of the germans. Even the belt buckle is german. The point is that the directive was that they were supposed to be sufficient. Self sufficient. One way to do that was to capture arms from the germans. They used the german supply chain to supply the partisans. That includes, as i said, even belt buckles. They would cover the swastikas with the soviet star. So, that doesnt mean we werent provided supplies by the soviet union. We were. But we simply mentored them to try to be a self sufficient is possible. When he came to food, then you had to go to the collective farms. You went to the collective farms and the theory would be that you would bring along your political officer and he would talk to the people. He would say, you must give food to the partisans because they are fighting to support the motherland. By the way, a speech giving support, if you will, and motivation and confidence to the people about the fact that the war will be one and comrade stalin is still in moscow. Were going to win. But, theres also a directive, a warning, do not give aid to the germans. France as they were called. If you collaborate and give aid, you might be given permanent discipline. Permanent discipline would involve a firing squad. Sometimes, the partisans did have to exercise that kind of discipline in terms of representing the government. The partisans continued on until 1944 the. The last operation we was when our ukraine was liberated. They were pushed out of the soviet union. Now theres no need for partisans anymore because there are no lines to fight behind. Most of the units were disbanded and were amalgamated into the regular Red Army Units. One of those units that i portray one of the other things that i find interesting about the soviet contribution law, one of them was the partisans as i mentioned, but the other was cavalry. So, i represent a cavalry sergeant in my case. My uniform is a fairly standard late war uniform we will call it. I have my red stripe on my pants to represent the cavalry movement. My hat also, of course, has various combinations of colors. The idea again being the blue on my epilepsy and i also have a symbol with the crossed sabers. Im also carrying a saber. Who it harks back to the cost facts. But cavalry men were heavily armored. Lightly armored. The soviets had large amounts of mounted cavalry groups. I might represent, for example, the fourth cavalry corpse. Hard as the war progressed, things change in the military. Part of the changes to adopt a prewar set of medals and uniforms. In the times of the czars, there were elite guard units. When you were a unit they did something very good, notable, probably heroic, you would then be distinguished as a guard unit and you would be given better pay and better supplies. Lets say im the fourth guard. The point being though is that we would take the large mounted force, again, all they are armored with is pistols, a sword, maybe a sub machine gun as we saw earlier. Maybe more orders, maybe light some machine guns. They would then take that core or division and they would combine it with a Mechanized Group or division. The two of them were a group that worked in tandem. They were armored with the soviet tea 34 and, i also, some american tanks that were provided under lease. The way it would work is the cavalry would perform a function, which the cavalry has been providing since the American Revolutionary war. Thats intelligence and reconnaissance. Calgary sent out and they gain information and bring it back to the commander to use. When they are going to mountain operation, the theory of their working is this. The cavalry will first come into the flanks and get into the rear. They will attack supply, headquarters, and cause turmoil in the rear. As they are doing that, again trying to extricate themselves, because there are many times outnumbered and outgunned. Then the mechanized part of the team hits the front. That causes the germans to respond to that and gives time to the cavalry to escape. That accomplishes their purpose of causing surprise and turmoil in the rear. Thats the theory, it didnt always work. There were certain battles where, unfortunately, the Mechanized Group didnt get that quickly enough and the Cavalry Units were pretty badly mauled. That is a very unique part. Outside of the polish cavalry and the german cavalry in world war ii, a country that used large groups of mounted cavalry in a somewhat very effective manner. The other big thing or important thing about the soviet contribution is the use of women in combat. With that, i will turn it over to you want to introduce yourself . Yes. My name is charles williams. Im representing the female contribution to the soviet effort in world war ii. Just to let you know, the soviets were actually unique at that time in their desire and ability to include women in combat. The women served as medics, they served as tank drivers, they served as pilots, they were actually called the night which is by the germans. The men would bomb the germans during the day and the ladies would come in and bond them during the night. That is why they were called the night which is. Most flamboyantly and famously were the female soviet snipers. They were quite lethal and effective. One of them went on to our with Eleanor Roosevelt to raise money for the war bonds effort. That is the female contribution, soviet contribution, to world war ii. Why do you do this portrayal . It isnt really done a lot. Its not a story that has really been told. Craig and i typically enjoy doing things that are a little bit different. People seem to respond very well to it. These events are always well attended. To me, its an interesting story and something that does not get told a lot. What are some of the questions you get from the public . We get a lot of, oh, i didnt know that. I mean quite honestly. Ill tell you something, conversely, i learn something every time i do this. I learned from the people who come. I learned from my partner here. I learned something every time i come to do one of these events. We get a lot of questions about the span, actually. The span, by the way, represents on our table the fact that we, of course, were an ally of the United States and britain. It represents lend lease. We were provided supplies, both military and non military, to find the germans. Everything from spam to tanks to locomotives. The interesting thing about the spam, of course, is we like to add a little bit of humor to our representation. So, i will tell you a bad joke. Some mornings, the cook will come to the troops and he say i have good news and bad news. He will say what is the good news . We have potato soup all week. And we will say, what is the bad news . He will say no potatoes. So, thank you america for spam to help a substitute for the potato soup during the week. And again, this is part of our display the interesting thing i kind of touched on it a little bit. Because as i said our goal here is not to describe the red army in detail. There are many reenactors and living historians like myself who give a lot of information about the red army. This book, for example, down here on my display, emphasizes obviously, a picture of the Red Army Soldier. Over here we have the life magazine 1944. Thats a Red Army Soldier in the life magazine. Again, we were allies, even to the point of being in the mov ies. Youve probably heard of this fellow, gregory peck. This is his first movie, and its about red army partisans. And of course, he dies a noble death fighting for the soviet union. And then over here is another one called the northstar, which again depicts partisans to some degree, containing many of the famous actors and actresses of the 1940s. 1945, we have to say, after 1945, things change. The soviets became our enemies. We saw them very suddenly in the movies. Until the soviet union fell. Then, all of a sudden, we began to see. Movies again. F. We began then, all of a sudden, we began to see movies agani. Again. When the red army was first organized in the 1920s by trotsky, one thing he wanted to do was eliminate the uniform of the past, of the czarist regime. Under the czars, uniform of a regular soldier in many cases looked very much like the one im wearing. Under the czars, the uniform of a regular soldier looked very much like the one im wearing in many cases. The difference being they would have the raised color and they would have epilepsy. So trotsky to the red army and said i want to make it a working mans army. So when you go to work, you dont wear a suit that has a raised collar and epileptics. You have a suit that has a laid down color. As we saw on the front of that book, that is what we called the early war uniform. It was just a simple smock like this with a lay down collar. The rank and insignia were on the color. But, as the war progressed, there was more and more reference to the past. To the heroics of the military achievements under the czars. A lot of the changes were made to kind of encourage that. In order to reinforce that. So, later on during the war, the uniform was not changed back to the czars type looking uniform with the boards and raised color. Again, the medals came back. Medals were prolific. The guard metal. The idea that there were fame missed zionist guard units. Well now, we are go