The Eastern Front
The largest land war ever fought — four years, two thousand kilometres of front, and machines built in their tens of thousands to survive it.
On 22 June 1941 Germany launched Operation Barbarossa, the largest invasion in military history, across a front that stretched from the Baltic to the Black Sea. The panzers that had conquered Western Europe in weeks met something new within days: the T-34 and the KV, tanks their guns struggled to kill — and a country that would trade space, blood and machines on a scale no planner had imagined.
What followed was the war that decided the war: Moscow in the snow, Stalingrad street by street, the great armoured confrontation at Kursk in July 1943, and the two-year drive that ended in Berlin. It was fought by tanks, assault guns, rocket artillery and aircraft built in their tens of thousands — and most of them are in this archive.
From Barbarossa to Berlin
22 June 1941Operation Barbarossa opens across the Soviet frontier
5 December 1941The Soviet counteroffensive begins before Moscow
19 November 1942Operation Uranus begins the encirclement of Axis forces at Stalingrad
5 July 1943Operation Citadel opens the Battle of Kursk
22 June 1944Operation Bagration opens against German Army Group Centre
2 May 1945The Berlin garrison surrenders to the Red Army
The Red Army’s armour · 8
T-26
The tank the Red Army actually had on 22 June 1941: 10,268 of them, gone in weeks
BT-7
The fast tank on Christie suspension — and the machine the T-34 grew out of
T-34
The shock of 1941 — the tank that rewrote the rules
T-34-85
The 1944 answer: an 85 mm from an anti-aircraft gun, and a commander free to command
Kliment Voroshilov KV-1
Immune to almost every German gun of 1941
Kliment Voroshilov KV-2
The 152 mm bunker-buster that stunned Barbarossa’s spearheads
SU-100
The deadliest Soviet tank destroyer of the late war
Iosif Stalin IS-2
The Stalin tank — built to break into Berlin
Soviet artillery and assault support · 4
BM-13 Katyusha
Sixteen rockets in ten seconds — the massed artillery salvo from Moscow to Berlin
SU-152
The original “Zveroboy” — the KV-based 152 mm assault gun that debuted at Kursk
ISU-152
The “Zveroboy” — a 152 mm heavy assault gun for fortified positions and German armour
SU-76
The ubiquitous “Suka” — the mobile gun that walked with the infantry to Berlin
The Panzerwaffe · 15
Panzerkampfwagen II
Still in the spearheads in June 1941 — and hopeless the day it met a T-34
Panzerkampfwagen 38(t)
The Czech-built tank in the spearheads of Barbarossa
Panzerkampfwagen III
Led the drive on Moscow — then fell behind the T-34
Panzerkampfwagen IV
The Wehrmacht’s workhorse from Barbarossa to Berlin
Sturmgeschütz III
The most-produced German AFV — assault gun turned tank-killer
Panzerkampfwagen VI Tiger
Feared from Leningrad to Kursk
Panzerkampfwagen V Panther
Built to answer the T-34 — blooded at Kursk
Panzerjäger Tiger (P) Elefant
Thrown into Kursk on its combat debut
Panzerkampfwagen VI Tiger II
The last German heavyweight, 1944–45
Jagdpanzer 38(t) Hetzer
The cheap ambush killer of the final years
Jagdpanther
The 8.8 cm tank-hunter fought in the East as well as the West
Sd.Kfz. 234/2 Puma
Reconnaissance for the panzer divisions, from 1944 to the end
Marder III
The gun that got wheels — the Panzerjäger companies’ mobile anti-tank defence from 1942
Marder II
The same idea on the Panzer II hull — lower, better proportioned, and gone when the chassis ran out
Sd.Kfz. 251
The half-track that carried the Panzergrenadiers alongside the tanks
Lend-Lease to the Red Army · 6
Infantry Tank Mk III Valentine
The tank Moscow asked Britain to keep building — the most valued of all
M4 Sherman
The “Emcha” — Shermans that fought with the Red Army to Berlin
Infantry Tank Mk IV Churchill
Heavy British infantry tanks in Soviet hands at Kursk
M3 Lee
Grim under fire — the Soviets called it “a grave for seven brothers”
M3/M5 Stuart
Light Lend-Lease armour for the desperate battles of 1942
M3 Half-track
Thousands went to the Red Army, which built almost no personnel carriers of its own
The air war · 24
Polikarpov I-16
Met Barbarossa head-on — obsolete, but everywhere
Ilyushin Il-2 Shturmovik
The Shturmovik — more built than any combat aircraft in history
Yakovlev Yak-3
So dangerous low down that Luftwaffe pilots were warned off it
Yakovlev Yak-9
The VVS workhorse — 16,769 built, and the 37 mm Yak-9T against tanks and barges
Petlyakov Pe-2
The Peshka — the Red Army’s tactical bomber, and the mount of the 587th women’s regiment
Lavochkin La-5
The LaGG-3 saved by a radial engine — and Kozhedub’s mount, 62 victories
Ilyushin Il-4
Long-range bombing and the naval torpedo regiments — the first Soviet bombs on Berlin, August 1941
Yakovlev Yak-7
The trainer armed and sent to the front in 1941, and the airframe the Yak-9 grew out of
Lavochkin-Gorbunov-Gudkov LaGG-3
The wooden fighter its own pilots called a coffin — and the airframe the La-5 was built on
Hawker Hurricane
Lend-Lease to the VVS — the first Allied fighters to fight for the Soviets, from Murmansk in 1941
Supermarine Spitfire
Some 1,300 Spitfires flew for the Red Air Force from 1943
Curtiss P-40 Warhawk
Lend-Lease in quantity: ~2,425 P-40s reached the VVS from 1941
North American B-25 Mitchell
Lend-Lease bombers — 861 delivered, a tenth of Soviet Long-Range Aviation
Dornier Do 17
The Flying Pencil in the opening phase of Barbarossa
Fieseler Fi 156 Storch
The Storch: liaison, artillery spotting and casualty evacuation across the whole front
Junkers Ju 52/3m
The Stalingrad airlift: 117 tonnes a day against the 500 promised
Junkers Ju 87 Stuka
From Barbarossa’s first hours to 37 mm tank-busting
Junkers Ju 88
Bomber of the eastern skies from day one
Heinkel He 111
Bomber turned desperate transport of the Stalingrad airlift
Messerschmitt Bf 109
The mount of the highest-scoring aces in history
Messerschmitt Bf 110
Zerstörer and ground-attacker from the first day of Barbarossa
Focke-Wulf Fw 190
Fighter and ground-attacker across the eastern sky
Savoia-Marchetti S.M.79 Sparviero
Romania’s twin-engined S.M.79B and JRS-79B derivatives served against the Soviet Union
Reggiane Re.2000 Falco
Hungary’s licence-built Héja — the 1/1 Fighter Squadron’s mount over the Don, 1942
The Italian expeditionary corps · 8
Macchi C.200 Saetta
The Saetta of the 22° Gruppo — the CSIR’s fighter over the southern steppe, 1941–42
Macchi C.202 Folgore
The Folgore of the 21° Gruppo — the contingent’s frontline fighter in Russia, 1942
Autoblinda AB 41
The Autoblinda scout car of the corps’s reconnaissance groups on the Don, 1941–43
Carro Veloce L3/35
Tankettes sent to Russia, against Soviet armour of the classes that had already outclassed them in Spain
Carro Armato L6/40
The light tank that replaced them — a 20 mm gun on the Don, and the retreat of 1943
Semovente L40 da 47/32
The same hull as a tank destroyer: 31 sent to the Don in August 1942, all 31 lost
Fiat BR.20 Cicogna
The Cicogna — lone incendiary sorties over the Don, August 1941 to spring 1943
Camionetta Desertica AS.42
Not the CSIR: the Gruppo Italiano Arditi Camionettisti, 46 men attached to the German 2. Fallschirmjäger-Division, 1943–44