Post #29613

#WeRemember 🌟 On April 30, 1945, amid fierce battle for the Reichstag, — the legendary Heroic Feat was performed by a Red Army soldier, which entered history as the worldwide known and recognised symbol of the noble, great mission of the Soviet soldiers-liberators,who, selflesslyandfearlessly, at the cost of their lives, crushed Hitler's Germany and freed the peoples of Europe of the the Nazi scourge. #OTD in 1945, Sergeant of the 79th Guards Rifle Division, Red Army soldier NikolayMasalov, despite the enormous danger and under enemy heavy fire, saved the life of a German girl, carrying her out of the shelling zone. This honourable deed is immortalised in the figure of the Liberator Soldier memorial in Berlin — the iconic monument in #TreptowerPark, where over 7'000 Red Army soldiers, who fell during the fighting for the Third Reich’s capital, now rest in peace. The central statue of this world-renowned memorial complex — a Soviet soldier carefully holding in hands a German girl — has become a symbol of the Great Victory of the Soviet people over the Nazi Germany. 💬 Maria Zakharova: This memorial features the statue of a Soviet soldier holding a German girl — not a Russian, Belarusian, Ukrainian, Tajik, Armenian, Azerbaijani, or Jewish girl, but a German girl. This, I believe, represents the most accurate manifestation of humanism: a Soviet soldier is portrayed as a liberator, first and foremost of the German people from Nazism, even though his own family had been killed, his home destroyed, and his home towns and villages burned down. Yet he protects a German girl. <...> And now they [the official authorities of Germany] are questioning if it is appropriate to commemorate and celebrate Victory Day at Treptower Park beside the statue of the Soldier holding a German girl. They claim this contradicts the “quiet mourning” approach adopted by “civilised Europe.” (Excerpt from the briefing by Russian MFA Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova, April 24, 2026) *** The History of the Feat On the morning of April 30, 1945, during the artillery preparation preceding the advance of Soviet units towards a key German defence point in central Berlin — Tempelhof Airport — NikolayMasalov heard a child crying. As Marshal Vasily Chuikov later recalled in his memoirs: A child’s voice sounded as if from somewhere beneath the ground, muffled and imploring. Crying, the child repeated just one word, understood by all — 'mutter', 'mutter'. #Masalov resolutely rushed to help the child. Risking his life, the he crawled across a bridge over the Landwehr Canal and rescued a three-year-old girl who was sitting beside the body of her mother, killed by the Nazis. Taking the girl into his arms, #Masalov began fighting his way back — the Germans were already pouring machine-gun fire onto the Soviet positions. 💬MarshalChuikov later recalled Masalov’s heroic deed as follows: Thousands of guns and mortars were firing upon the enemy. Thousands of shells and mines covered the Soviet soldier’s breakthrough from the death zone with a three-year-old German girl in his arms. Nikolay Masalov himself never regarded his heroic feat as anything out of the ordinary; whenever he spoke of it, he was a man of few words: 💬 “I am a Russian soldier. Anyone would’ve done the same in my place.” #OurHeroes#Victory81