There was a lot of action on the Eastern Front in the autumn of 1944. In late September, the Red Army and its new allies enter Yugoslavia and connect with communist Partisans led by a man called Tito. The results will echo across the decades.

The Lockheed P-38 Lightning and the Focke-Wulf fw189

The Yakovlev Yak-9 in flight

The Yakovlev Yak-9 in the Russian military museum

Josip Broz, a.k.a. Tito, far right, with his staff.

Antony Beevor, The Second World War. New York, NY, USA: Little, Brown and Company, 2012.

Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.

Giles Milton, The Stalin Affair: The impossible alliance that won the war. New York, NY, USA: Henry Holt and Company, 2022.

Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin’s War, 1941–1945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press, 2017.

Morse code by Thane Brown

Music composed and recorded by Nicolas Bury

In October 1944, the Red Army entered East Prussia, the heart of German militarism. Horrific war crimes ensued.

Konigsberg Castle before World War 1

German officers find evidence of massacre at Nemmersdorf, East Prussia

Civilians killed at Nemmersdorf, 1944

Antony Beevor, The Second World War. New York, NY, USA: Little, Brown and Company, 2012.

Evan Mawdsley, Thunder in the East: The Nazi-Soviet War, 1941–1945. London: Bloomsbury Academic, 2016.

Pat McTaggart, "Goldap Operation: Soviets in the Prussian Heartland,” in WWII History, vol. 14, No. 2, February 2015. Cited in Warfare History Network, February 2015, https://warfarehistorynetwork.com/article/goldap-operation-soviets-in-the-prussian-heartland/

Anthony Tucker-Jones, Slaughter on the Eastern Front: Hitler and Stalin’s War, 1941–1945. Stroud, Gloucestershire, UK: The History Press, 2017.

Morse code by Thane Brown

Music composed and recorded by Nicolas Bury

In the autumn of 1944, nation after nation abandons the cruel, insane Axis to join the Western Allies or USSR: Romania, Bulgaria, Slovkia … as Finland signs an armistice with the USSR. With the Red Army on the border of Germany itself, Hungary faces the choice: to fight on with, or against, the nazis.

Map 1: The Red Army invades Slovakia

The Dukla Pass is to the right.

Map 2: The Battle of Debrecen

General (later Marshal) Rodion Malinovsky, 1944

General (later Marshal) Fyodor Tolbukhin, 1944

Marshal Ivan Konev, 1945

Milos Horthy, Regent of Hungary, 1944

Ferenc Szalisi, Leader of the Hungarian Nation, 1944

General Heinz Guderian, Inspector-General of the Army, 1944