For completeness' sake, when Bose was through with the Germans and Japanese, he attempted to enlist help from the Soviets for his anti-British fight (but died after a plane crash before he could get to Manchuria). He remains valued for his dedication to independence, but controversial for his choice of allies in India.

The latter closely mirrors the way of the Jewish Lehi group which fought against the British mandate in Palestine. They twice tried to form an alliance with the Nazis and Italian fascists during WW II while other militant Zionist groups observed a truce with the British, then approached the Soviets and made their ideology National Bolshevism, a crossover between radical left- and right-wing politics. They engaged in terrorist acts against British forces up to Israeli independence in 1948, then were disbanded and members convicted for them, but quickly pardoned. Their leader Yitzhak Shamir (who authorized the assassination of Swedish UN mediator Folke Bernadotte - a guy that negotiated the release of more than 30,000 KZ inmates during WW II - in 1948 even after the group had ceased operating nationally) of course became Israeli prime minister in 1983. And yes, you can buy t-shirts with the Lehi logo today.

quote:

Originally posted by JD83:


Above photo probably of an ex-Soviet soldier from Mongolia(looks like he could fit right into a Japanese Samurai flick though. Maybe the OP's friend's grandfather saw one of these in Normandy).

Re: Andrey Vlasov. When I was a kid I knew a man who was in Vlasov's Army-a friend of my father. I've written about him in my blog and other places: here

As a subset of the Wehrmacht's Osttruppen noted earlier, there were the Ostlegionen specifically made up of various non-Russian nationalities within the USSR - Armenians, Azeris, Georgians, Kalmyks, Tatars and Turkistanis. The latter also have pretty Asian looks, of course.

Cossacks, notionally Russian, were first to be recruited for security/anti-partisan duties, a task they had long performed under the Tsars. Hitler put a stop on their rapid expansion in 1942, preferring to enlist non-Russian minorities, but as the situation became ever more dire two complete Cossack cavalry divisions were established in 1943/44, forming the XV. Cossack Cavalry Corps which was transfered to the Waffen-SS shortly before war's end.

Generally, the Osttruppen were considered of little combat value. As can be expected of units mainly recruited from POWs under more or less duress, many surrendered at first chance, others mutinied. Of 30th SS Waffen-Grenadier Division (Russian No. 2, but really manned mostly by Ukrainians), two battalions shot their German leadership cadre in 1944 and went over to the French Interior Forces (part of the Resistance), later forming their own Foreign Legion demi-brigade under French 1st Division. Two other battalions deserted and crossed into neutral Switzerland. In 1945, a Georgian Legion battalion based on the Dutch island of Texel also killed their German officers in their sleep and took over almost all of the island, but the mutiny was beaten down by German reinforcements in fights that actually lasted beyond Germany's official capitulation.