The Red Army advanced more swiftly than Eisenhower’s forces in 1944–45, partly because its soldiers lived off the land and required much lower scales of supply; they were the least cosseted of the war. Among the long list of comforts and facilities routinely provided to Western Allied troops but denied their Russian counterparts were razors, delousing chambers, pencils, ink, paper, knives, torches, candles, games. Vodka was the only Red Army–issue stimulant to morale, and some sections pooled their rations, so that men could take turns to drink themselves into stupefaction.
