People's Democracy

Some Glaring Facts about Anti-Fascist War

• Over 20 million Soviet soldiers and people lost their lives. In 1418 days of war the Soviet Union lost nine lives every minute, 857 every hour and 14,000 lives a day.

• The Guardian, published on January 1, 1970, when the secret foreign office archives were made public after the statutory period of 30 years said, "the cabinet papers for 1939, published this morning show that the second world war would not have started that year, had the Chamberlain government accepted or understood Russian advice that an alliance between Britain, France and the Soviet Union would prevent war because Hitler would not risk a conflict against the powers on two fronts."

• US senator Harry Truman later became both the Vice-President and the President of the USA. The day after Hitler attacked Soviet Union he said "If we see that Germany is winning we should help the Russians and if Russia is winning we should help the Germans and that way let them kill as many as possible" (The New York Times, June 24, 1941).

• "The greatest military march in world history" as Hitler declared, advanced 600 km into the Soviet Union within a fortnight. Winston Churchill wrote in his memoirs "almost all responsible military opinion held that the Russian army will be soon defeated and largely destroyed." Soon the world was amazed when Moscow admitted its losses after nine weeks of war as including 7,500 guns, 4,500 planes and 5000 tanks. A British war journalist observed, "an army that could still fight must have had the biggest or the second biggest supply".

• Retreating German soldiers, in Istra near Moscow, wrote on the walls "Farewell Moscow we are off to Berlin," the Soviet soldiers wrote below, "We will get to Berlin too." This they did. The red flag unfurled atop the German Reichstag on April 30, 1945. It was not the USA or Britain or France but the Soviet Union that lowered the fascist flag.