Book Review, Red Road from Stalingrad
By Mansur Abdulin
The plot of a feel-good book usually
revolves around a thirty something woman who works for an advertising agency in
the city, who one day meets an artsy man with curly hair. They move in together
in a cottage situated in front of a meadow and starts a bed and breakfast
together with a Labrador Retriever and lives happily ever after. If you really
want to put things in perspective and feel better about your life then, trust
me, you don´t want any of that. What you need to do is read Red Road from Stalingrad. Do that and I
can guarantee you that you will never complain about anything ever again.
A Muslim Tartar born in Siberia at the time
of the Communist revolution, Mansur Abdulin fought for the Red Army during the
Second World War. In Red Road from
Stalingrad, he tells openly and candidly what it was like to serve in an
army infamous for its harshness and brutality, during what was quite possibly
the most destructive conflict that man has ever fought. As a miner, Abdulin was
exempt from being drafted when the war broke out, but his sense of duty and
patriotism compelled him to volunteer. The recruiting sergeant even tried
talking him out of joining the army, but Abdulin demanded to be allowed to
serve. After training at an infantry school in Tashkent, Abdulin was offered a
cushy staff job by a kindly general, but declined and asked to be sent to the
front.
He arrived at the outskirts of Stalingrad
and was blooded during the savage fighting to dislodge the German troops
stationed in the outskirts of the city. On November 6th 1942 Abdulin
killed a German soldier with an SVT rifle. As the first soldier of the 1034th
regiment to inflict a casualty on the enemy, he is awarded a medal for bravery.
During the time he spends at the front, from November 1942 until November 1943,
when he is wounded by a mortar blast and sent home, Abdulin is subjected to
constant hardship and heavy fighting. Periods of rest are few and far between.
As a mortar man, Abdulin has to carry a
piece of the disassembled mortar weighing between 20-30 kilograms as well as
his regular kit when his regiment is on the march, which is to say nearly all
the time. He notes that he is used to back-breaking manual labor and is
certainly among the toughest men in his unit, having worked in the Siberian
mines since he was a child. Yet the constant strain nearly brakes his body
while the horrors he witnesses nearly brakes his spirit. He recalls one time
when he falls down and starts to cry, unable to carry the mortar another step,
but somehow forces himself to carry on. If someone like him is nearly done in,
he notes soberly, his comrades must really be going through hell. These days many
bankers from the city spend their weekend climbing mountains, engaged in
supposedly tough military style marches. I wonder if they would have impressed
the young Abdulin and his fellow soldiers.
Besides carrying the heavy mortar and being
constantly under fire from the Germans, there was also an unending supply of
vicious fleas to contend with. While the Germans had to take a nap before they
resumed shooting at them in the morning, the fleas where a plague that never
let up. While passing the burning wrecks of destroyed tanks, Abdulin recalls
how he often fantasized about throwing himself onto their hulls, desperate for
any relief from the itching flea bites. The Germans and the fleas and the heavy
mortar notwithstanding, there was also constant famine and cold. Hot meals were
served from field kitchens or “Kashas”, but these didn´t always reach the front
and the soldiers often had to make do with what they could forage on their own.
Having captured several German flare guns, they often managed to fool the
German transport planes to drop their supplies over their positions instead.
One time they hit the jackpot, and managed to get their hands on several crates
of Christmas presents sent to the front from families in Germany. This treasure
trove included, tobacco, chocolate, dried fruits, schnapps and pornography. Due
to the fact that it was strictly banned in the Soviet Union, Abdulin and his
comrades were shocked when saw the indecent pictures. Naturally, they couldn’t
always rely on stealing supplies from the Germans and a state of near
starvation was the norm. When they were served oatmeal porridge with sunflower
oil after a particular harsh fight, Abdulin tells of how ecstatic he were,
since he hadn´t eaten for several days. As someone who can´t swallow even a
spoonful of porridge without a generous helping of milk and marmalade, this
alone was quite enough to convince me of the war´s hardships.
After his regiment had distinguished
themselves in the fighting around Stalingrad, Abdulin´s 193rd Division
later became the 66th Guards Rifle Division. This was a great honor,
since the Guards regiments were the experienced elite of the red army, a
privilege that came with better pay and conditions. Some of this was merely
theoretical, since the frighteningly high casualty rate meant that combat units
were quickly depleted and had to rely on a constant stream of reinforcements,
meanwhile the supply situation was never dependable. Nevertheless, Abdulin and
his comrades felt deeply honored and they could now wear a red star emblem on
their uniforms and vehicles.
During the long marsh to the Dnieper,
Abdulin´s regiment fought against several of Nazi Germany´s elite SS Divisions.
The fighting was often so brutal and intense that you realize it´s a wonder
anyone survived at all. Abdulin was one of a lucky few, and if you have seen
the opening sequence of Enemy At the
Gates, starring Jude Law, you know some of what it was like. And yes, the
Soviets did have special squads led by Commissars assigned to the rear of the
advance tasked with killing any who tried to flee. To charge into carefully
prepared German positions was extremely dangerous, which Abdulin and his
comrades did time and time again, but to refuse was to face a certain death.
Once, when dragging an injured comrade towards the nearest first aid post, a
cold hearted Commissar mistook Abdulin for a deserter and raised his pistol to
shoot him. Luckily, from our perspective at least, the man is killed by a stray
German artillery shell before he can carry out his grim work.
I myself had only read the classical German
accounts of the eastern front, Guderian, von Mellenthin etc., and I must say it
was both interesting and enlightening to see the other side´s perspective. The
heroic men who climbed the steep cliffs of Normandy have rightly been praised
time and time again, but those who fought in the east have not received the
same praise, at least not outside Russia. This year marked the seventieth
anniversary of the allied Victory in Europe, a victory that wouldn´t have been
possible without men like Mansur Abdulin. He personally writes that the book
came about because he felt that the story needed to be told, and since no one
else in his regiment had decided to take up the pen, he did so reluctantly. It
proved to be a story well worth telling, as well as a reminder that if you
think that you have it too tough, you need to think again.
