Today is Memorial Day, so here's a picture of the Soviet War Memorial in Vienna, lovingly maintained to this day by the Austrian government. Which is all very fine, but why? And why not a picture of the American War Memorial?
Well, the Soviet Union was one of the occupying powers in Vienna after the end of World War II, and in 1945 they built this memorial to themselves. Then, in 1955, when Austria gained independence, the treaty they signed required them to keep up all Soviet monuments in perpetuity. They've kept to that agreement to the present day. The US never built any memorials in Vienna and therefore never required them to be maintained, which is why Vienna boasts a pristine Soviet War Memorial but nothing for the Americans (or the British or the French).
It seems like Russia starting a new war in Ukraine would be a good time for Austria to say "Enough!" and tear down those monuments.
Can't. See treaty agreement in Kevin's post. What Kevin didn't mention is that discretely defacing the Russian war memorial with all kinds of "Fuck Russia" graffiti is a Viennese pastime along with pastries and coffee at 4:00pm.
The Bulgarians have brought it to a high art.
https://earthlymission.com/russia-wants-bulgarians-to-stop-painting-soviet-monuments-to-look-like-american-superheroes/
So, that tells us why there is a Soviet Great Patriotic War memorial in Vienna, but not why Kevin went with that here. Memorial Day being to remember/honor those who died while serving in the United States military…. Victory Day was back on May 9th.
for better or for worse, we were once allies, after all. the number of american war dead we are remembering today would be much greater if we had had to go into berlin. instead, the soviets had that honor and the casualties that went with it, so there's that. it's also an interesting piece of historical trivia and a reminder of the complexities of the post-war era.
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There's a charming 1955 movie, basically Die Fledermaus, set in Vienna during the post World War II occupation. That war memorial may have shown up in there. The bulk of the movie was wonderful fluff, but it ended with a plea to end the occupation.
An estimated 8 and half to 10 million Soviet troops died* destroying the Nazi war machine. That's not to take away any credit or diminish any other's sacrifice, it's to understand something about the Soviet Union/Russia.
*Civilian casualties are estimated at 20 million depending on source...
And how much of those 8 and a half to ten million were the result of Soviet tactics? Searching around suggests anywhere from 3.5 to 5.5 million German soldiers died on the Eastern Front.
Cursory web search for the Western Front suggests the Western Allies inflicted anywhere between 263,000 to 650,000 German soldiers killed to losses of 165,000 to 195,000 killed.
Given the ratios, it looks like the Soviets were willing to treat their soldiers like cannon fodder.
The answer that, yes, the Soviets treated their soldiers like cannon fodder. The complication is that they didn't have much choice, at least if we start the decision tree in 1941.
There are two aspects to this. The first is that the purges during the 1930s killed off most of a generation of the Red Army's officer corps. The nature of the purges meant that those officers who displayed high levels of initiative were the most likely to be killed. The officer corps that survived to June, 1941 was made up of those less skilled men who didn't stick out their necks.
Aside from the general degradation of the officer corps, the purges also meant that the Red Army took a giant step backwards in terms of doctrine. By the mid-1930s, the Soviets had possibly the most forward looking, well developed theories of modern warfare in Europe. This approach was closely tied to Mikhail Tuchahevsky. When he was arrested and killed, any idea closely associated with him became taboo. When war arrived, the Red Army pretty much had to start from scratch doctrinally. This was especially notable with mechanized forces. They proved incapable of organizing and using armored forces larger than a brigade well into 1942, especially daunting since their units were almost a step smaller than those with the same designation in other armies. A brigade was the size of a reinforced battalion; a division was a reinforced brigade, and so on.
The second problem is that the Red Army was built upon a mass of conscripted, poorly educated peasants. They couldn't turn them into the sort of highly trained and disciplined soldiers that the Germans, US and British had. That they were constantly in need of huge numbers of troops right now through the first two years of the war made it even harder.
That said, looking at numbers for the entire war is misleading. 30-40% of that total of 8-10 million casualties came in the first six months of the German invasion. The very poor officer corps led their men to complete disaster. As the Red Army gained knowledge and skill, the ratio of Soviet to German casualties came down significantly, though never got very close to parity. (Figures for German casualties over the entire war are similarly misleading. The Wehrmacht suffered about 25% of all of its casualties in 1945, as units surrendered en masse.
The west had better technology than the Germans, The Russians had worse. The west had better resources than the Germans, the Russians had worse.
There is a scene at the beginning of the movie "Enemy at the Gates" where the Soviet Troops are split into groups of three. Each group of three is given one rifle. The soldier with the rifle is told to charge the Germans, the second soldier is told to pick up the rifle and continue the charge after the first soldier is shot, the third soldier is told to pick up the rifle and continue the charge after the second soldier is shot. The attack fails but when the Soviet troops attempt to retreat to their own lines they are fired on by their own machine guns.
Stalin also liked to let the non-Russian minorities lead the Soviet charges.
I'll just add this: the rape of Austrian women was so pervasive after the Soviet "liberation" in 1945 that the Catholic church suspended, albeit discretely, penances for abortion for about a decade following. To have to look at a gigantic monument to that in the middle of their city every day was, well... Most of them will spit on the ground if they have to pass in view of it in daytime.
Germany is bound by the rule based order to host US military bases in perpetuity, as are Japan, South Korea, and Philippines.
Which is why the people of the Philippines were able to insist the US military leave in the early 90s?
https://www.usni.org/magazines/proceedings/2024/may/there-and-back-and-there-again-us-military-bases-philippines
Yah, I remember that story about Clark Air Force Base. The Filipinos wanted us out, we wanted to stay. Just as things were getting really testy, Mt. Pinatubo erupted and buried the base in millions of tons of volcanic ash. And then we said, "OK, we'll leave."
In the early 1950s, the Soviets built the Palace of Culture and Science in Warsaw. Poles joke that the best view of the city is from its roof, because you can't see it.
Doesn't the lack of a Soviet Union make that promise moot?
As a kid in the sixties my sister and I climbed to the top of the Soviet War Memorial in East Berlin. At the top was a small hot stuffy unairconditioned room full of flies. Very disappointing.
It's just outside the Ring so you don't have to go out of your way to see it. It's got fountains, water, craggy rocks, a semicircle of columns, and a statue up on top of one tall column. What's not to like?
I'm just wondering if Kevin has found the best Döner there.