The monument was created by sculptor Andrey Korobtsov and architect Konstantin Fomin and is based on a stele with a figure of a mother and children on top.
For those who may never have seen it may I suggest that you watch the film Come and See - it's available for free on YouTube. It follows the life of a young, happy-go-lucky teenager as he experiences the horrors of the Nazi occupation in Belarus. You get to see how his humanity slowly unwinds until the end, when finally he refuses to become like the fascist occupiers. It's very tense and moving. 2 hr 22 mins.
Some facts:
* 628 villages burned in Belarus, with all their inhabitants;
* 5,295 Byelorussian settlements were destroyed by the Nazis and some or all their inhabitants killed (out of 9,200 settlements);
* For comparison: In Lithuania there were 21 scorched villages, and in the Ukraine, 250;
* >700,000 Belarusian soldiers were killed fighting the Nazis;
* The death toll in Leningrad was >1,000,000 - more than the total COMBINED deaths of the UK and US for WW2;
* Leningrad was under siege from September 8th, 1941 through January 18th 1944.
I don't think any Europeans can ever comprehend the immensity of the Soviet struggle. 28 million dead, of which >50% were civilians. And thus I understand totally why modern Russia and its allies will fight tooth and nail never, ever to fall under the yoke of totalitarian fascism again.
It was existential then, and remains an inviolable focus of the national memory now.
Yes, I second your suggestion about the film and thank you for the statistical listing. The facts you list are reasons why I denounce the Holocaust as being "owned" by Jewish people as they weren't the #1 victims of the Nazis by any measure. Plan Ost tells the tale, the plan, and is what so few people in the world know about thanks to its suppression by the West.
Funny you mention that, as I thought when I was writing that comment about how modern Jews actually ignore that overwhelming evidence that German plans for the Soviet Union was eradication of 75% of the population (irrespective of religious affiliation or ethnicity - they were all untermensch in Nazi eyes), the remainder being exiled to the east or used as slaves. And this is all documented, so it's all available as discoverable material. But as you say, the west has suppressed the history it doesn't like and is busy rewriting the remainder.
For those who may never have seen it may I suggest that you watch the film Come and See - it's available for free on YouTube. It follows the life of a young, happy-go-lucky teenager as he experiences the horrors of the Nazi occupation in Belarus. You get to see how his humanity slowly unwinds until the end, when finally he refuses to become like the fascist occupiers. It's very tense and moving. 2 hr 22 mins.
Some facts:
* 628 villages burned in Belarus, with all their inhabitants;
* 5,295 Byelorussian settlements were destroyed by the Nazis and some or all their inhabitants killed (out of 9,200 settlements);
* For comparison: In Lithuania there were 21 scorched villages, and in the Ukraine, 250;
* >700,000 Belarusian soldiers were killed fighting the Nazis;
* The death toll in Leningrad was >1,000,000 - more than the total COMBINED deaths of the UK and US for WW2;
* Leningrad was under siege from September 8th, 1941 through January 18th 1944.
I don't think any Europeans can ever comprehend the immensity of the Soviet struggle. 28 million dead, of which >50% were civilians. And thus I understand totally why modern Russia and its allies will fight tooth and nail never, ever to fall under the yoke of totalitarian fascism again.
It was existential then, and remains an inviolable focus of the national memory now.
Yes, I second your suggestion about the film and thank you for the statistical listing. The facts you list are reasons why I denounce the Holocaust as being "owned" by Jewish people as they weren't the #1 victims of the Nazis by any measure. Plan Ost tells the tale, the plan, and is what so few people in the world know about thanks to its suppression by the West.
Funny you mention that, as I thought when I was writing that comment about how modern Jews actually ignore that overwhelming evidence that German plans for the Soviet Union was eradication of 75% of the population (irrespective of religious affiliation or ethnicity - they were all untermensch in Nazi eyes), the remainder being exiled to the east or used as slaves. And this is all documented, so it's all available as discoverable material. But as you say, the west has suppressed the history it doesn't like and is busy rewriting the remainder.
My argument has swayed a few people, changed their tune and has created a slowly growing snowball. Just need to keep with the mantra.