Quote:
Originally Posted by kermitology
I'm sure you've read the books by Antony Beevor. He's hugely criticized by Russian historians because of his description of the raping and pillaging of the Red Army on their path to Berlin. But I find it hard to deny honestly. Look at who made up the 1st Ukrainian and 1st Belorussian fronts.. hordes of men from the Eastern reaches of the Soviet Union.. hardly civilized.
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I've read his stuff, and found it to be quite good. I also don't disagree that the Russian Red Army committed some pretty heinous acts against German Civillians, especially with thier rear guard occupational formations which were little more then savages with guns. There was raping, and there was rampant slaughter, and a lot of it was because of the institutional rage that the Red Army felt after witnessing the destruction that the German's laid down in thier country. However if you look at the reputations of the two militaries, its often emphasized that the German Army was fairly professional in its conduct, while the specialized SS formations did the majority of the atrocities. In fact the German regular army did as many or more hideous things to the Russian Civillians that stayed behind then the Red Army did in Germany. But the Russian's have been fairly demonized by thier behaviour in victory. Its a prime example of the victors not writing history from thier perspective.
At the end of the day, with the fact that the world is getting smaller and more diverse, you won't see the axion that the "Victor's write the history"