Penalty Strike: The Memoirs of a Red Army Penal Company

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Penalty Strike: The Memoirs of a Red Army Penal Company Commander, 1943-45 (Stackpole Military History Series)
Extremely rare (possibly the only) book-length account of a Soviet penal unit in World War II
Gritty, intense style conveys the brutality of war on the Eastern Front
Composed of convicts--soldiers who conducted "unauthorized retreats," former Soviet POWs deemed untrustworthy, and Gulag prisoners--the Red Army's penal units received the most difficult, dangerous assignments, such as breaking through the enemy's defenses. So punishing was life in these units that officers in regular formations threatened to send recalcitrant troops to penal battalions. Alexander Pyl'cyn led his penal unit through the Soviets' massive offensive in the summer of 1944, the Vistula-Oder operation into eastern Germany, and the bitter assault on Berlin in 1945. He survived the war, but 80 percent of his men did not.
Country USA
Brand Stackpole Books
Manufacturer Stackpole Books
Binding Paperback
ItemPartNumber 9780811735995
ReleaseDate 2009-04-28
UnitCount 1
Format Illustrated
UPCs 011557035995
EANs 9780811735995

Penalty Strike: The Memoirs of a Red Army Penal Company Commander, 1943-45 (Stackpole Military History Series)