OGILEV, 5 July (BelTA) – The battles on the Dnieper line in Belarus in many ways contributed to the Soviet victory at Moscow and shaped the trajectory of the Great Patriotic War, Belarusian President Aleksandr Lukashenko said at the inauguration ceremony for the Mogilev Oblast Glory Museum. The museum was built in Mogilev District next to the legendary Buinichi Field that saw the fiercest battles taking place at the initial stage of the Great Patriotic War, BelTA has learned.
“Exactly thirty years have passed since we opened the memorial complex here on the Buinichi Field to commemorate the heroic feat of the Mogilev defenders. It was here that one of the most heroic chapters of the Great Patriotic War was written. Here, on the Dnieper line, the countdown to the collapse of the Third Reich began. These battles largely influenced the outcome of the Battle of Moscow and the wider war, and are comparable to the battles of Kulikovo, Borodino and Prokhorovka,” the head of state said.
Aleksandr Lukashenko emphasized that the fighting on the Buinichi Field lasted about a month. It played a crucial role in delaying the German advance on Moscow that lay through Mogilev and Smolensk. One of the most striking episodes of the fierce Battle of Mogilev was the defense of this territory by the 388th rifle regiment under the command of Colonel Kutepov. This had a huge impact on the outcome of the battle for the Soviet capital. “Our command and the country’s leadership understood: it is necessary to hold off the enemy here as long as possible at all costs in order to buy time to prepare for the defense [of Moscow]. This is why these battles near Mogilev and Smolensk were so consequential,” the Belarusian leader noted.
The details about these battles are known thanks to the writer and war correspondent Konstantin Simonov. Having seen a cemetery of German tanks and other armored vehicles burned in the first battle on the Buinichi Field, he called it ‘a triumph of soldierly courage’.
“The Red Army soldiers – as Simonov wrote in his diary – became winners defying all the laws of logic. He wrote after the war that it was here, near Mogilev, that he saw ‘people who would stop the enemy’. He saw the dawn of the Great Victory,” Aleksandr Lukashenko said quoting the writer.
The Buinichi Field, the field of valor and fortitude of Soviet soldiers, left a deep mark on the war-time writer. He bequeathed that his ashes be scattered here after his death. The will of Konstantin Simonov was fulfilled.
"And today we are fulfilling the will of our veterans and local residents - we are inaugurating the Mogilev Oblast Glory Museum,” the president said.
/More to come/
Follow us on:
