What distinguishes our national history from all others? The number of heroes and heroic events, almost unattainable for other histories. For the education of future generations, we do not need Supermen and Spidermen, sucked from the finger.
Most people remember since their childhood exploits of individual heroes, small groups, and even entire armies and fronts. In 1965, there appeared a tradition to award the entire cities for unparalleled fortitude and heroism of their defenders during the war. We know them as the cities-heroes and the cities of military glory.
However, even among the cities-heroes, there are some that stand out among the others. For the fact that they fought in the siege or directly on the frontline for a long time.
The first among them is the city-hero of Leningrad. From September 8, 1941 to January 27, 1944, for 872 days, it was the hardest ever blockade that cost the lives of hundreds of thousands of civilians and defenders of the city. Leningrad was besieged by German and Finnish troops. Having failed to enter Leningrad immediately on tanks and suffered serious losses on the way to the city, the Nazis and their allies decided to take the city into submission by hunger, cold, and regular attacks with bombings, which they believed would force its defenders to capitulate. However, the Leningrad residents refused to surrender. In inhuman conditions, on a starvation diet, people did not only manage to survive, but also to work on defense and to clean and tidy up their city.
The turning point came on January 18, 1943. By incredible efforts of the troops of the Leningrad and Volkhov fronts, the Leningrad blockade was broken and the communication with the city by land was restored, although the full lifting of the blockade was still over a year ahead.
The city-hero of Sevastopol. The second defense. From September 12, 1941 to July 10, 1942. It was the feat of Sevastopol defenders that helped Leningrad stand. The Germans brought all their large-caliber assault artillery to Sevastopol. On a small section of the front occupants amassed over 200 210mm field artillery batteries, reinforced with 300 and 350mm heavy howitzers preserved from the time of the First World War.
Seeing that Sevastopol was a tough nut to crack, the Germans used to break it superheavy cannons - a 420mm howitzer Gamma Morser and two 600mm motorized mortars Karl. On Sevastopol, for the first and last time, was used a monstrous, 800mm cannon "Dora", launching 7-ton monstrous shells.
On July 10, 1942, the heroic Sevastopol fell, like a soldier not surrendered to the enemy.
Voronezh, the city of Military Glory. It fought for 212 days, from June 7, 1942 to January 25, 1943, on the front line that cut the city in half. The German and Hungarian troops were unable to completely seize the city, which affected the outcome of the Battle of Stalingrad.
A few years ago, it would have sounded a washed-delusion that in the XXI century, after more than 70 years after the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, there would be another Russian city that would to stand, for a long time, to stand at the turn of the fire. Its name is Donetsk, and just the other day the city had survived the 900th day of the siege.
On a number of factors, the defense of Donetsk is very similar to the defense of Sevastopol, Voronezh and Leningrad. As once the Nazis did to Sevastopol, the Banderites shell the residential areas of Donetsk with conventional and rocket artillery amassed on the outskirts of the city.
The capital of the DPR has seen «Doras», «Carls» and other «Morsers» delivered by the Banderites, only in their present forms. The «Tochka-U» missiles. and «gifts» from the MLRS «Smerch» and «Uragan», and heavy mortars from motorized systems «Tulpans».
For 900 days, the children of Donetsk have learned to distinguish between a mortar and an artillery shell explosion, and, even more, that of MLRS «Grad». Hardly anyone would want their children to learn from their own experience how to distinguish the type of arriving ammunition by the sound of it, and how to hide, according to the rules, in a shelter, if an attack overtakes them during a game of football.
What is it to live on the edge of the sucking swamp, of which demons and every murderous rubbish regularly climb out, collecting toll in human lives?
However, sometimes it is possible to push the swamp back. The operation on the outskirts of Donetsk, which was akin to the assault of the Mamayev Kurgan occupied by Hitler entrenched artillery: the battalions «Sparta» and «Somali» cleansed the airport of the «cyborgs» entrenched in it. The airport ruins and the surrounding area had been turned by the Ukrainian Nazis into a dangerous springboard, from which they shelled Donetsk almost to the center with artillery, where they amassed their troops and threatened the city with another assault.
The Kiev junta would be happy to erase Donetsk, as well as other cities and towns of the People's Republics, from the earth, but for such drastic measures it does not have enough strength and sovereignty. It does not have enough strength because for 20 years, the lion's share of the inherited Soviet arsenal of three military districts had been stolen and put down in the drainage. It does not have enough sovereignty because the curators do not need too obvious genocide and hostilities in Donbass as the result may be too unpredictable. As it happened on August 24, 2014, with the «parade» for those who wanted to march in Donetsk and Lugansk, Sevastopol and Moscow. It was the case when the dreams did come true, but not exactly as expected.
The junta’s nearest dream and task is to regain, by any means, the control over the border with Russia and tuen Donbass into a large concentration camp, cutting off the rebellious territory of any outside help. That is why Kiev responds so sharply and hysterically to every humanitarian convoy coming to the Republics from Russia.
In the first winter of the war, the humanitarian convoys helped Donetsk and other cities of the LDPR survive. At the moment, the acute lack of the basic necessities is removed, but not completely overcome.
A separate line is for a few warm words about the residents of Donetsk, who, like Leningrad residents during the siege, of their own accord, come to restore and care for their city. Looking at flower beds, fountains, neat houses and streets, playgrounds, smooth roads and well-maintained municipal facilities, it is hard to believe that somewhere nearby there is the frontline, that Ukrainian shells regularly hit streets and homes, and, like in besieged Leningrad, on the walls there are stenciled warnings: «During shelling this side of the street is most dangerous». In any case, the comparison is not in favor of «ItsEurope», dully and monotonously painted in two colors, and long ago turned into one big garbage dump with no prospects for cleaning it up.
900 days of Donetsk standing at the turn of fire is not a holiday and not a record. It is a pit into which the European civilization has slipped over the past 25 years. And, worst of all, it is not clear whether there is an upward movement. Or, at least, a desire to get out of the pit. Alas, this means that the life of the big city at the edge of the war will continue indefinitely.
Alexander Rostovtsev
http://www.politnavigator.net/900-dnejj-u-kraya-vojjny.html
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