The end of the war in Russia

The Germans were only able to launch one more serious offensive against the Russians. This was at Kursk in July 1943. It was the biggest tank battle in history: 2700 German tanks faced 3600 Russian tanks and 2.2 million men were involved. The attack failed. The German armies, starved of reserves, were now forced to retreat rapidly and within twelve months of Kursk they had been driven from Russian territory altogether. From then on, the Russians drove into eastern Europe and headed for Berlin - the capital of Nazi Germany. At the same time, the British and Americans and their allies were attacking from the west and the south to link up with the Russians.

The price of victory

The Soviet Union paid a terrible price for their victory: 20 million soldiers and civilians perished in what the Russians call 'the Great Patriotic War'. By comparison, the military and civilian casualties of Britain and the United States together came to around 800,000. In the Soviet Union 25 million homes, 84,000 schools and 31,000 factories had been destroyed. The Communist government which ruled the Soviet Union until 1991 always claimed that the West never gave the Soviet forces proper recognition for their crucial role in defeating Nazi Germany. In fact 75 per cent of Germany's military might had been sent to the Eastern Front to fight the Soviet Union.

Neil Demarco: The era of the Second World War; Oxford University Press, 1993/2000, page 41