Guelton, Frédéric/Bourlet, Michael Le Front de l'est

De l'Opération Barbarossa à la chute de Berlin - La Seconde Guerre mondiale en couleur

The war between the Soviet Union and Germany from 22 June 1941 to 8 May 1945 was a war of superlatives. First of all, it took place on the largest theatre of the Second World War and probably in the entire history of mankind. This mobile front, where German and Soviet offensives alternated, ran across the western Soviet Union and then through Central Europe, from the Baltic Sea to the Mediterranean. From east to west, this front combined all forms of warfare: trench warfare, mobile warfare, siege warfare, urban warfare, guerrilla warfare, tank warfare, etc. The bitter struggle between the two totalitarian regimes led to an extraordinary mobilisation of economies and societies. It resulted in destruction and human losses on an unprecedented scale, caused by fighting, deportations, massacres, war crimes, but also by disease and hunger. The Eastern Front is also a front of death, where ideology reigns supreme. For the Soviet regime, the Eastern Front is first and foremost a question of survival. The Soviet Union responds to the war of life and death imposed by Germany with the brutality of a totalitarian state. How would the Second World War have ended without the Soviet Union? The mobilisation of the population in the Soviet Union and the sacrifice of millions of men and women an industry running at full speed, and the immense material aid provided by the USA enabled the USSR to resist, wear down its opponent and ultimately extend its influence to the West. The war in the East shaped the face of Europe for more than half a century. The consequences are still felt today.