The valor of the Russian defenders of the Fatherland in the memories of the German invaders

Today the whole country congratulates veterans - heroes and heirs of the immortal glory of Russian soldiers and officers, who at all times were known as valiant and fearless warriors. "Never fight the Russians," Bismarck wrote and never did. However, his followers, the rulers of Germany, were not so far-sighted. Learning the heroism of Russian weapons during the World Wars, the Germans paid tribute to him in diaries, monographs and memoirs.

The First World War

After the end of the Mazurian Battle of 1915, in which the soldiers of the 20th corps of the Russian army, having shot all the ammunition, went into a bayonet attack on German machine guns, war correspondent Brandt wrote:

German military historian General von Posek in his work "German cavalry in Lithuania and Courland" praised Russian cavalrymen:

The diary of an officer of the Austro-Hungarian army, Dietrich von Chodkiewicz, contains even enthusiastic reviews about the enemy:

World War II

German Field Marshal Ludwig von Kleist believed that the initial successes of the German army were due solely to better preparation for war:

General Gunther Blumentritt, Chief of Staff of the 4th Army:

And this is an excerpt from Blumentritt's memoirs, written a few years after the German surrender:

Memoirs of an infantryman from Robert Kershaw's book "1941 through the eyes of the Germans":

And one more quote, not about bravery, but about the character of our grandfathers and great-grandfathers. A soldier who was captured tried to comprehend the mysterious Russian soul: