Inferno: The World at War, 1939-1945

by Max Hastings

The advancing Soviet legions resembled no other army the world had ever seen: a mingling of old and new, Europe and Asia, high intelligence and brutish ignorance, ideology and patriotism, technological sophistication and the most primitive transport and equipment. T-34s, artillery and katyusha rocket launchers were followed by jeeps and Studebaker and Dodge trucks supplied under Lend-Lease, then by shaggy ponies and columns of horsemen, farm carts and trudging peasants from the remote republics of Central Asia, clad in foot cloths and rags of uniform. Drunkenness was endemic. German harmonicas provided musical accompaniment for many units, because they could be played in rattling trucks. The only discipline rigorously enforced was that which required men—and women—to attack, to fight, and to die. Stalin and his marshals cared nothing for the preservation of civilian life or property. When one of Vasilievsky’s officers asked for guidance about the proper response to wholesale vandalism being committed by his men, the commander sat silent for several seconds, then said, “I don’t give a fuck. It is now time for our soldiers to issue their own justice.”