Ref.: DRAG-6705
German Winter Combatants 1943-45 Germany expected an early conquest of Russia at the time of its attack on 22 June 1941, but when the expected victory did not come as easily as anticipated, the Wehrmacht soon found itself embroiled in Russia’s brutal and bitterly cold winter. A quarter of a million German soldiers suffered frostbite in that first Russian winter simply because they were ill equipped and poorly supplied with appropriate cold-weather gear. Soldiers who survived that first grueling winter actually received a medal (called the Medaille Winterschlacht im Osten 1941/42, and which the soldiers often called “Frozen Meat Order”)! Every winter on the Eastern Front in the following few years was also a test of endurance.