However these fortification structures were by no means built to protect the USSR from Germany, because they did not even have the common border in the 1930s (the Belarussian territory of the USSR bordered on Poland and Latvia only). The main task of the fortified regions at the time was just to retain the border area and not to defeat the enemy completely, as many mistakenly think.
In 1939 Poland ceased to exist as a state so the USSR and Germany got a common border 500 km west of the previous one. The old fortification structures turned out in the deep rear of the Red Army, thus a new fortification line began to be constructed on the new border. For that purpose covering troops were moved there as well as armament and special equipment which was partially demounted from the old border.
It would also be appropriate to point put what enemy we had faced. On May 10, 1940 the whole world was amazed how easily only 78 German paratroopers neutralised fort Eben-Emael with the garrison of 900 men, which was reputed to be impregnable at the time. Nobody expected that the Germans would just glide right on the fort territory without making a sound.
The Wehrmacht used its stunning tactics against our army as well. On June, 24 after taking Vilnius, as many as three tank divisions turned to Molodechno and headed to Minsk. When it was reported to Dmitry Pavlov, who was the commander of the Soviet Western Front during the initial stage of the German invasion of the Soviet Union, he did not believe this! Considering such deep land seizure total madness he moved Soviet anti-tank units to Lida where they were bogged down in battles with the Wehrmacht infantry divisions which did not have a single tank, meanwhile the 7th, 12th, 20th Panzer ivisions just … advanced the attack further with the path now clear!
Despite stout resistance of the Soviet troops near Molodechno, the fascist tanks reached the Minsk Fortified Region on the evening of June, 25. In a battle near Radoshkovichi our intelligence service managed to get enemy’s maps where June, 27 was marked as the date of Minsk invasion! But without getting into dragged-out battles, enemy’s units just outflanked Minsk north and set up their own airfield in an empty field near Ostroshitskiy Gorodok. German troops started to arrive instantly. On June, 27 the Germans captured Smolevichi thereby blocking the road to Moscow. Minsk was in a trap. And meanwhile the Red Army’s units far west, which had just left Belostock, could not even imagine that 400 km east in the deep rear, the enemy had already сut off the Moscow escape route.
Our historical and cultural complex is located not far from Zaslavl and occupies only a small part of the Minsk Fortified Region, which front line was 140 km. In April 1941 in this fortified region only one of six machine-gun artillery battalions were left. Captain Arseny Sugakov was assigned as its commander. However there were not enough people even to stand guard, and even though there was some ammunition and equipment left, much of it was damaged or broken. Moreover, there was neither electricity nor communication support in some pillboxes, and in the majority of them the air filtration equipment was out of order what made these pillboxes unsuited to shooting - the soldiers would just die of the explosive gases.
That is how Arseny Sugakov himself describes the situation: “When I took command of the battalion in April 1941 I found out the following problems:
There was drastic decline in discipline, the soldiers were complaining about irregularity of food supply. 10,5 thousand rubles was not enough for food.
All ammunition from the pillboxes was demounted and taken to the Zelyonoe village, artillery barrels were piled in the open air, optics was broken, machine-guns were rusted, the underground communication and water-supply of the pillboxes were severely damaged.
On May, 28 the order from commander Pavlov to repair and camouflage the pillboxes was received.
When I started to examine the pillboxes it turned out that all the documentation was muddled and moved to the battalion headquarter, and the landmarks (some trees) were cut by collective farms for their own needs.
I decided to report these and many other faults to the commander.
On June, 3 commander Pavlov called a meeting where he mocked all my remarks about the condition of the pillboxes.
He even criticised my commander skills which according to him worsened greatly during my staying in reserve. Here are his exact words: “Captain Sugakov does not know that we have another fortification line built on the new border. And these old pillboxes will only be used for storing potatoes”.
On June, 15 1941 I received order to reinstall weapon in the pillboxes. It was impossible to have all this work done in just ten days on the distance from Dzerzhinsk to Pleshenitcy. That is why I asked the first secretary of the district Party committee for help, and 85 horse-drawn carriages were given to us for 3 days. Night and day we were delivering weapon to the pillboxes. We also needed life support equipment technicians. There was not enough ammunition nor engineers. We could equip only 105 pillboxes out of 242, and the military staff had not sent here a single engineer so we had to reconstruct electric power supply and ventilation system by ourselves.”
On May, 30 1941 there were already three more machine-gun battalions in the Minsk Fortified Region except for Sugakov’s batallion. There also were a command post, a signal company, 18 caponier artillery troops armed with the 76-mm guns and 9 anti-tank infantry units with forty-five-caliber anti-tank guns. Sergey Fillipovich Lyalkov was appointed as the commandant of the Minsk Fortified Region, and captain Ivan Kuzmich Juchimetc was assigned as the executive officer. So on the threshold of war the Minsk Fortified Region was coming to life, and there were only two battalions left until its full staffing.
Many may think: “Is it so complicated to install the missing guns in the pillboxes and stop the enemy just with the help of ordinary troops?” But you may think so only if you have never been to a pillbox before. For example, ordinary medium machine-gun is mounted on a special casemate machine-gun carrier.
That way horizontal targeting is performed not by gunner’s hands but with his legs! The gunner sits on a firmly fixed seat and turns the gun left and right by his legs only.
Even despite all the hardships the Minsk Fortified region took up the fight.
The 7th, 12th and 20th Panzer Divisions were racing forward from Vilnius, and they had to be stopped by the 64th Rifle Division only! It’s front line was in reality about 50 km instead of established 12. That is why it was hard for the division artillery to cover its rifle units, and much less the pillboxes.
Meanwhile the 17th and 18th Panzer Drivisions were approaching from Baranovichi. The route to Minsk was protected by the 108th Rifle Division, which front line stretched for 40 km. Both our rifle divisions were covered by the pillboxes of the Minsk Fortified Region. In the Uruchye village east of Minsk the 100th Rifle Division and the 161th Reserve Division were positioned.
The growing resistance of our troops around the Minsk Fortified Region can be proved by daily reports of the German Wehrmacht's combat operations. The summary of the 12th Panzer Division dated June, 26, says:
“The Soviet Resistance has grown much stronger for the last few days. This is especially true for the fortified regions of the old border northeast of Rakov. There is also sharp fire from forest and urban areas. The Russians also got snipers - in one of the infantry platoons 12 soldiers out of 45 were shot through the head!”
Next day this division was bolstered by a motorised rifle battalion and a tank battalion, which were ordered to capture Minsk by the evening of the same day. But they did not manage to enter the city. The 12th Panzer Division spent this and even the following day severely fighting with the defenders of the Soviet pillboxes. A detailed summaries dated June 27 and June, 28 show how fierce the resistance of the Russians was and report the direct experience of fighting against the Soviet pillboxes.
The division had to spend as many as two days to destroy 26 Russian pillboxes west of Zaslavl.
To locate these carefully camouflaged pillboxes a tank regiment drew fire upon itself by outflanking the pillboxes from the north. The unit suffered severe casualties, but the positions of all the firing points were detected and immediately shot from heavy mortars and the 105-mm howitzers. When the garrisons were mostly eliminated we started to fire direct fire. The 37mm antitank guns were blasting armoured shields of the embrasures and the 20mm automatic anti-aircraft guns were finishing the defenders inside.
As soon as the pillboxes were eliminated, the storm troops in Panzer IV tanks were breaking into the positions of the Russians to defeat them completely.
The ways the Russians resisted was different and probably depended on the commander’s personality. Some garrisons were fighting until their last soldiers. Others would close the embrasures after the first direct hit and went on the offensive. Still others would leave the casemates and take up forward defensive positions, putting up extremely stout resistance. There were also pillboxes which showed no signs of life whatsoever until the storm groups approached, and only then the Russians opened surprise close-range fire. Such “resurrected” pillboxes caused significant damage to our division and significantly slowed down the attack. That is why it is highly recommended to destroy each and every pillbox with the help of special combat engineering units.”
As it can be seen from this report the German army, which was in its second year of war, was already experienced in pillbox elimination and followed a proven scheme. First they would launch a tank attack, where tanks drew fire upon themselves. Meanwhile the enemy was locating the positions of the pillboxes, which opened fire, and after that their complete elimination was just a matter of time. It was not a hard task to hit the embrasure of a static pillbox, that is why it was covered with an armoured shield which was lifted only for shooting and then lowered.
Here are the memories of the former deputy political instructor Filipp Ryabov about the defence of caponier №06 close to the Matsky village:
“On June 26, 1941 there were a total of 22 people in the pillbox (20 soldiers and 2 women who were our commanders’ wifes). The pillbox consisted of two firing platoons (a 4-gun battery of the 76-mm guns), which were commanded by second lieutenants Petrochuk and Roschin, who both participated in the Winter War. The day before the first battle there was a call from the staff warning about a possible fascist tank attack. That is why the next morning we were watching the territory since the very dawn. We were keeping guard in turns, Second Lieutenant Roschin, Private Zhenzhero, who was later assigned as a junior sergeant, and me, a deputy political instructor. All the soldiers were on high alert.
- I see the fascist tanks on the old Minsk-Vilnus road, - reported Zhenzhero. - A total of 6 vehicles. The landmark on the right is a bench mark, the landmark on the left is the tree on the forest margin.
- First and second weapon! Armour-piercing shells! Load quickly! - Second Lieutenant Petrochuk ordered the gunners. The pointer quickly shot the tanks at the front.
After two simultaneous discharges the pillbox trembled and filled with powder fume.
-
In less than 10 minutes two more tanks reeled to stop with their caterpillar tracks destroyed. Next discharge destroyed the turret of one of the tanks and set on fire another one. The others turned away and took cover.
That day we turned several German attacks. Not a single enemy tank managed to pass through.
On the morning of June, 27 the Germans attacked us after heavy shelling. As soon as we opened fire they took cover and sent their tanks instead.
As a result of their fierce attack the kitchen, the food warehouse, the commandant’s unit, the Little Red Corner, the gasoline supply and the power-plant unit, which gave electricity to the whole pillbox, were destroyed. It was an extremely hard time for the garrison: there was no water, the air filtration equipment was out of order. The soldiers had to fight in total darkness without water or food (except for a sack of dried bread and a half sack of sugar). The upper casemates were filled with powder fumes so the crew just could not breathe. Second Lieutenant Petrochuk ordered everyone but the gunners to stay in the lower casemates, but these units were choked with dense smoke too. And to top it all we were running out of shells.
When it got dark and the enemy’s attacks almost ceased, Second Lieutenant Petrochuk sent Privates Myshak, Sinitsyn, Dergachyov and me to get some food, kerosene lamps and first-aid material from the farmers of the Matcky village.
We crawled carefully to the end houses of the village, but there was no one inside, as well as in the next ones. In the whole village there was no one at all! So how happy we were to meet an old woman who told us that all the villagers were hiding in the forest. She also helped us to find the brigade leader. We told him that there were neither light nor food in the pillbox, that the ventilation system did not function properly, and there were no first-aid materials for the wounded. The brigade leader listened attentively and promised to help us. In an hour and a half the farmers from the Matcky village brought us a dozen of kerosene lamps, bread, salo (bacon), milk cans and several bedsheets for bandage. Everything was taken to the pillbox. And Nikolay Stasevich, who was one of the villagers, the whole night was helping us to get the shells from the emergency warehouse to the pillbox.
Seeing such сare of the local people our soldiers vowed to fight until the last shell, until the last bullet, but to stop the enemy.
At night we tried to switch the air filtration equipment to battery supplied power but it was extremely weak. Then we tried to operate the ventilation equipment manually to clean the air in the casemates at least a little bit, but it was not very helpful.
In the morning of 28 June the Germans launched another artillery attack against the pillbox, but it remained unharmed. The walls and the ceiling were very thick. When Zhenzhero reported that the German tanks appeared, Myshak and Lutsenko lifted the armoured plates and gunners Vasilyev and Butromenko hit two fascist tanks. Then the Germans opened fire on the embrasures of the pillbox, and damaged the lift mechanism of the armour plate. Second Lieutenant Petrochuk and Private Gafiz Zainutdinov volunteered to fix it, but Gafiz was killed by a projectile explosion, and Petrochuk was shot in the arm.
During next attack a shell penetrated the protective armoured plate of the casemate gun and both the gunner and the loader were killed by blast debris. Four soldiers and Second Leutienant Petrochuk were wounded, and Roschin's and Petrochuk’s wives helped to bind them up.
The Germans tried to destroy the artillery caponier several times, but each attack was blocked by a three-embrasure gun pillbox which protected it from the German infantry. And the gunners were protected by our caponier, which covered them from the tanks.
After heavy shelling the Germans launched another attack from the side of the Krinitsy village.
They could reach the caponier almost unnoticed because the forest was only several meters away from the caponier. But the crew of the machine-gun pillbox noticed them and immediately warned the gunners from the artillery pillbox.
Second Leutnant Roschin ordered Privates Lutsenko and Bobkov to take one gun, and Privates Sinitsyn and Dergachyov were ordered to take the the other. They waited until the Germans came closer and then opened surprise close-range fire. The Germans clearly had not expected that and tried to change their position. But as soon as they moved to another place they were attacked by the machine-gun pillbox again.
We defeated this attack but generally the situation was getting worse. We were running out of ammunition supplies, and we could get to water at night only. The previous time I volunteered to go for water myself. I took a thermos bottle and put it in a сase to prevent it from making any noise, fastened several flasks on to a belt and crawled out of the pillbox. I had to stay motionless for a long time. Finally I reached the river, filled the thermos bottle and the flasks, drank water myself and started to crawl back. It took me two hours to take water to the pillbox.
Selsovet (a rural district) chairmans Matskov A. and Abakunchik I. also left their memories:
“After each German attack we were listening with bated breath to the battle sounds. Is the crew alive? Haven’t they stopped shooting? But they were alive and continued fighting. Only on June, 29 where not a single projectile was left, the defenders put out of action all the equipment and left the pillbox late at night. Several days after Fillip Ivanovich Ryabov, all beaten up and exhausted, returned to the village.
That is how he described the last battle days:
By nightfall of June 29 two caponier guns were destroyed. There were many wounded from our and other pillboxes, as well as from other field units, and there was no doctor, a medical instructor from Minsk had to perform its functions. It was getting harder and harder to hold the position, especially when the 64th Rifle Division ceased its fire on the afternoon of June, 28.
We were also running out of projectiles because there was no supply support from the rear. The 15 trucks which were sent to Minsk for projectiles never returned, and on June, 26 we faced a severe shortage of the 152mm shells and a total lack of the 122mm howitzer projectiles.
Arms fire was heard eastwards, but it ceased a bit later. Private Jurov and me were ordered to find the Smolensk regiment of the 64th Division and tell its commandant to start the shelling of the territory around the pillbox after a red rocket flare and get us the projectiles from the Fortified Region or from the warehouse in the Zelyonaja village.
There were only the captain with several soldiers instead of the whole regiment in the indicated spot, and they were preparing two heavy guns for evacuation. The captain told us that the Germans encircled the Smolensk Regiment and the Staff ordered to change the artillery positions.
We rushed back immediately. On the way we saw a group of Red Army soldiers, which we thought were from the Smolensk Regiment, and headed towards them. But all of a sudden they tied us down because they turned out to be disguised German soldiers.
Ruabov was exhausted and suffered from open ulcer. First Anna Ignatyevna Krivonos and then Zinaida and Vasuliy Kushner sheltered him, and gradually he got better. But a traitor rat out that there was a political instructor hiding in the village and Ryabov was taken to the prison camp again. Once at night the Germans took the detainees to the cemetery to shoot them, but in was extremely dark that night and Fillip Ivanovich managed to escape. The owner of a farm close to the Zhdanovichi village helped him with food and clothes, but Ryabov was captured in a while again. The camps followed the escapes throughout the whole war until he was rescued by English troops in 1945. After the war Fillip Ivanovich returned to Kazakhstan, his home country.
East of the Matsky village there was another road to Minsk. The 20th Panzer Division was moving forward, heading to Minsk.
The map of the pillboxes located close to this road.
Arseniy Sugakov shares his memories about first days of war:
“On the midnight of June, 22 it was announced on the radio that German forces invaded our Motherland without declaring war.
In the morning of June, 24 our infantry opened fire on a plane, which appeared out of nowhere. Alexander Ivanovich Efremov, who was commanding the 30th Rifle Regiment, jumped to the forest margin, where an anti-aircraft gun was installed, and opened fire as well. The plane started to go down and landed somewhere behind the trees. As it turned out later nobody noticed the stars on the plane’s hull during the battle, so the plane was actually hit. There were two people in the cabin, dressed as a soviet major and a second lieutenant. Both of them had documents which were sealed and signed by the Belarussian Military District which entitled them to “check the readiness of any military unit to repel the enemy”. They also had maps of the Minsk region printed in Germany and other documents hidden in the uniform coat. During the interrogation the answer to the question “Which tasks did the German commanders give you?” was “To kill the ones like you!”. I sent them to the Zaslavl NKVD Department (People’s Commissariat for Internal Affairs) and reported about the incident to the aircraft defence headquarter.
On June, 25 1941 the enemy approached the defence line and a battle close to the Kozenkovo village started. That day all enemy’s attacks were repelled. On June, 26 the enemy resumed the attack against artillery caponiers and that day we hit a total of 30 tanks. When I was reporting this to the Staff they asked: “Where did the Germans get so many tanks?”
On June, 27 the Germans launched the offensive on the whole battalion defence area. Enemy’s tanks were destroying a pillbox after a pillbox. Our units were asking for help - and I was not able to help them. I tried to call the Staff and it turned out that the communication was cut off. When we managed to reach Zaslavl we knew that the Germans took over the town. Our battalion was defeated by outnumbered German forces despite the stout resistance we showed the enemy. Five other soldiers and me stayed alone in the pillbox. We decided not to give ourselves up and try to get to Minsk. At the Degtyaryovka village we joined a group of Soviet soldiers and had a fight with the Germans. The Germans encircled the village, almost everyone was killed in that fight. One of the villagers gave us his civilian clothes, and I dug my uniform, a party membership card and other documents into the ground. Minsk was almost near but on the way there we were captured.”
And now let’s turn to the German sources.
That is how V. Shtraub, which served in the 20th Panzer Division at the time, describes these battles.
“On June 27 , when we passed Rodoshkovichi, the tank battalion faced a stout resistance close to the Pilnitsa village. We sustained staff casualties, and four Panzer tanks came under heavy shelling. Despite all this we advanced the attack. The commander’s tank was hit by the Russians as well and he and his crew were seriously wounded and sent to the field hospital. Lieutenant Vinnenknecht took command over the platoon, and four anti-tank guns and one tank were destroyed under his command.
After shelling, which lasted for an hour and a half, we took over the village but we were running out of gasoline and ammunition and were not able to advance the attack.
The Russians showed high level of excellence at choosing and defending their positions. They usually chose forested or elevated areas and used anti-tank guns, mortar launchers, artillery and armoured vehicles.
There was rough terrain on the left and swamp area on the right, which made it impossible to outflank the enemy. Before the artillery units reached us our squadron was firing on already detected targets to save projectiles. Then after heavy shelling the Russian fire ceased and our tank battalion advanced the attack. There were bodies of dead Soviet soldiers lying everywhere, but the Russians managed to move away artillery and armoured vehicles.
Close to Putniki our battalion was attacked by Russian planes, and in the evening we faced another offensive and were not able to move further. Within a very short time four members of the crew were killed, other four were wounded and as many as three tanks were destroyed! We took up the defence, but nothing happened at night and we had the possibility to get some rest. Next day our transport units were attacked by the Russians one more time and we had to fight it back from them again. Despite our movement forward we still have to defend our rear.
At 4:30 on June, 28 our tank battalion launched another attack, but we faced stout resistance again. Even with the help of our infantry we did not manage to defeat the Russians completely and tat day we suffered severe casualties. Some tanks were in so bad condition that we had to leave them in swamp area close to Ostrishitskiy Gorodok. To minimise the possibility of future losses we slowed down the attack. The commander of the infantry battalion conducted reconnaissance by himself and was able to convince the brigade commander Colonel von Bismarck to open artillery fire on Russian positions.
On June 29 we advanced rapidly towards Minsk. After reaching the airfield half a platoon came under fire so we had to outflank the enemy both on the left and on the right. After passing the stream sector close to the Loshitsa village we established a bridgehead there. Around 9:30 we reached Minsk. The tanks were moving through the streets without any resistance. The streets were almost burned out with tram wires hanging from above. On the city outskirts close to the airfield we had another battle with the Russians. During the battle we seized several Soviet anti-tank guns, and shot their artillery squad with the 7,5 mm gun. Russian units which were defending the city were later destroyed by our infantry. In the evening we posted guards to protect the Division headquarter but there were no more attacks. Meanwhile east of Minsk our 20th Panzer division had a battle with the 7th Tank Division. In the city we also saw fist knocked-out T-34. We were really surprised to see this armoured vehicle which we never even knew existed. And unfortunately, it was nowhere near the last time we would encounter it.
Report from the operations record book of the 20th Panzer division:
June, 27: There are stubborn battles both north and east of Minsk, but the enemy can not prevent its encircling. Under the cover of the screening forces the Russians try to move east as many troops as possible.
June, 28: after a fast breakthrough towards Smolevichi of the 7th Panzer Division, Russian pillboxes north of Minsk were occupied by German troops only partially. This led to the irregularity of food and ammunition supply and made further advance impossible. The commandant of the tank regiment Colonel Rotenburg was killed during the attempt to take him to the field hospital, so the commandants of the 20th and the 12th Panzer Divisions took decision to continue further attacks only after total destruction of Russian pillboxes and their crew.
The units of the 20th Panzer Division are engaged in heavy fighting in the defensive line and continue suffer significant casualties. The commandant of the regiment and eight more officers were killed. It was reported that Minsk was taken by the 12th Panzer Division.
June, 29: only after complete destruction of Russian pillboxes, units of the 20th Panzer division got on Minsk- Smolevichi Road, while some units of the 12th Panzer Division were engaged in combat operations with groups of Russian soldiers.
June, 30: during the fights which were aimed to break the defensive line northwest of Minsk, three tank divisions suffered such severe tank casualties that we were continuing the offensive with 70% of tanks only.
In German divisions there was a total of 784 tanks, and this 30% of tanks destroyed during the battles of Minsk amounted to 210 vehicles (a whole division!), while in Soviet reports more than 300 destroyed tanks are mentioned.
In this regard the commander of the 64th Rifle Division Sergey Ivanovich Iovlev wrote:
“When it comes to those 300 tanks which were supposedly destroyed near Minsk by our soldiers, I personally think we should be totally honest here. Because what does it mean to set up a tank on fire with just a bottle of gasoline or a cluster of grenades? First and foremost it means the greatest personal valour of the soldier, his incredible will power when he needed to pluck up all his courage and fight the armoured beast. It is a huge fight with yourself when you need to face your worst fears, and then stand up against them and fight.
Our soldiers destroyed near Minsk a total of 100 German vehicles. And there could be around 200 knocked-out tanks as well. But we need to understand here that when you destroy its catepillar tracks, the tank stops instantly, and our soldiers had every right to consider such tank as being knocked out. But we also need to understand that after a quick repair this tank continued fighting and could be hit again, and again, and again. But if the tank was set up on fire it could be a total loss. And generally, all the fights near Minsk were mostly that of hit-and-run battles but they were always severe.
Even a quick look at German tank casualties can prove this - only three tank divisions during those three-days battles of Minsk lost as many as 210 armoured vehicles, when a total amount of tanks destroyed during the 40-days Battles of France was 640!
The famous “Maginot Line”, the engineering miracle of the 20th century which was built by the French to protect themselves against the German army, did not manage to stop it not for a single day. The French army, fully equipped and armoured, which declared war on Germany as early as September 1939 , did not manage to maintain resistance in May 1940 and lost the war.
Up until June 22, 1941 the USSR and Germany were in a state of peace, that is why many Soviet units were set as peacetime compliments. Collective farms used military motor vehicles for their needs, and the ammunition was stored on the warehouses of military districts. That is why at the beginning of WWII, when the Smolensk 64th Rifle Division started to take up its positions in the Minsk Fortified Region, its artillery had only those projectiles they had on limbers. The echelon with ammunition supply which followed the division was stopped at Kolodischi by air attack. And huge ammunition warehouse close to Dzerzhinsk was already out of reach for the defenders of Minsk. The 100th Rifle Division east of Minsk was not fully equipped even according to peacetime standards, and did not possess any artillery at all. But nevertheless the Minsk Fortified Region, which was build to stop the Polish army and was extremely short-staffed, managed to detain the Germans for as many as three days! The Polotsk Fortified Region slowed down the nazis for two weeks, and in the Kiev Fortified Region they were held back for as many as two months! Due to the stout resistance of Red Army’s units and such long impediments in Polotsk and especially in Kiev, the Germans had to stop their advance on Moscow and turn to Ukraine. As a result the time table of Operation Barbarossa was disrupted and the Germans were totally defeated at the Battles of Moscow, which in its turn led to their defeat at Stalingrad, Kursk, Ukraine, Belarus, the Baltic States and finally in Berlin.
So our opinion whether it was necessary or not to build this defensive line should be based on the real historical outcome only, and not on the opinion of common people. The Finns built “The Mannerheim Line” and lost the war. The French had “The Maginot Line” and gave up as well. And our army did not only faced the most powerful enemy in the world but managed to utterly defeat it and raise the standard of Victory over the Reichstag!
And that is why our Historical and Cultural complex “Stalin Line” is devoted to the deed of all Soviet soldiers who fought and gave their lives for Victory.
The Battles of the Minsk Fortified Region were so severe that you can not only see blast debris on the walls of the pillboxes but still even find the pieces of the projectiles! Learn more about the pillboxes of the Minsk Fortified Region, which are located near the complex, from our photo report.
