The Battle of Berlin was fought between Soviet troops and the last outposts of the Nazi army.
It lasted from mid-April 1945 until 2nd May 1945, when Berlin, exhausted by losses and reduced to a carpet of rubble, fell to the Soviets.
However, Germany would only capitulate between 8th – 9th May 1945, with its unconditional surrender and the end of World War II in Europe.
In just under three weeks, over 78,000 Soviet soldiers fell.
To ensure that the memory of the war would not be forgotten, the Soviet Union ordered, as early as 1945, the construction of three memorial cemeteries for fallen Soviet soldiers.
A few steps from the Brandenburg Gate, in the heart of the Tiergarten, stands the first Soviet memorial erected in the city after the end of World War II.
This memorial was also built with some of the marble and stone from the demolition of the Führer’s Chancellery, the headquarters of the Third Reich. The memorial was inaugurated on 11th November 1945, the anniversary of the October Revolution.
The memorial is accessed via a wide flight of steps containing some of the original weapons used by the Soviets to conquer the city, including the two Soviet T-34 tanks.
Colonnade symbolizes the various branches of the Red Army, and the large bronze statue rising above it depicts a Soviet soldier bidding farewell to his fallen comrades on the battlefield, with his left hand outstretched.
From its inauguration until the memorial’s transfer to the Federal Republic of Germany in 1990, Soviet soldiers maintained an honor guard here.
The Tiergarten Memorial was also a protagonist of the Cold War because it was the only Soviet memorial located on West Berlin territory, and more precisely in the British sector.
