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Old 08-13-2002, 05:50 AM   #1
Bravo2Zero
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Russian "VC"?

Art.With 100 members I'm sure somebody can help this Aussie plebe with this question...which Soviet award is closest to the Victoria Cross or the Medal of Honor?Would members agree that a Cavalier of the Order of Glory is the closest?Or am I right in thinking that the Russian system with its very specific conditions means no exact match is possible.My maths always were terrible but with around 10 million troops in the field the percentage that were honoured as Cavaliers is pretty tiny ...

Mike
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Old 08-13-2002, 07:33 AM   #2
Bryan
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Mike,

I would think that the Hero of the Soviet Union would be the closest match,

Bryan
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Old 08-13-2002, 08:25 AM   #3
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A VC of M of Honor is for conspicuous bravery in a single act. Thus, I agree that an act worthy of a HSU in the USSR is the closest the Soviets had to these western awards. A cavalier of Glory has 3 classes, thus the orders were given for 3 seperate acts as one "climbed up" the order chain from 3rd - 1st. You couldn't jump over the 2nd and 3rd class orders and earn a first. It is also important to note that HSU was a classification higher than one awarded an Order of Lenin. HSU was a title earned in combat, Orders of Lenin were awarded for everything and to everyone (combat, labor, science, arts), including to organizations!
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Old 08-13-2002, 04:06 PM   #4
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I couldn't have said it better myself..seriously, I couldn't!
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Old 08-13-2002, 04:25 PM   #5
Ed_Haynes
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For those more intimate with the dissection of comparative Soviet citations than myself:

How different were HSU citations from Order of Glory citations? I realize there is a fairly mechanical formula at work (in theory): kill five tanks, get "X", kill seven and get "Y".

I ask because at times I get the feeling with Glory citations: "Why wasn't that a HSU?" And does a Glory 1 = HSU x 3? How much of the who got what for what acts is accident and how much is politics?

My specific interest lies in the conscious copying of the Russian Cross of St. George (which was also the model for the Order of Glory also, in several dimensions) for the Order of Merit (renamed in 1902 as the Indian Order of Merit) which was established in India in 1837. Do one brave deed, get 3rd class; do another, get 2nd class; do a third and get 1st class; and in one unique case do a 4th deed and get a bar to your 1st class badge. When the VC was extended to Indian troops in 1911, there was a debate as to why an IOM1 did not equate to three VC awards.

Do the two divergent theories of recognising bravery (HSU vs. Glory) clash in the USSR?

Sorry to drag you far afield....

Ed Haynes
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Old 08-13-2002, 04:36 PM   #6
tinmoldova
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I'm not sure there is an easy answer to this. Obviously, politics, rank (officer vs. enlisted), ethnic background, party affiliation, commanding officer loyalty/friendship, informal connections (patron/client), and so forth could play a part in these decisions as they did and do in the armed forces of all countries the world over.

I don't think Cavaliers and HSU were not mutually exclusive. I see no reason why a buck sergeant in the mud in Stalingrad couldn't have gone from a fresh faced newbie to a HSU without ever receiving a Order of Glory.

I would strongly disagree that there is a way that so many other orders or multiple awards of a lower medal in some way equate with the HSU, VC, or MoH. I know that when it comes time for promotion, citations and awards are numerically calculated using rank/numbers assigned by the military. I think this is the only case that this is true---those that earn them do not weigh them in the same way promotion boards do.
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Old 08-13-2002, 04:41 PM   #7
Ed Maier
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Quote:
Originally posted by tinmoldova

I don't think Cavaliers and HSU were not mutually exclusive. I see no reason why a buck sergeant in the mud in Stalingrad couldn't have gone from a fresh faced newbie to a HSU without ever receiving a Order of Glory.
There are plenty of cases where an enlisted man received the HSU and not the Order of Glory. The HSU group in my collection is to an Uzbek Sgt in the Cavalry. The only awards he received were the HSU and Order of Lenin in 1945.


The writing in citations differs a great deal from author to author. Some could bearly write a complete sentence and some wrote like Pushkin.

As for deeds done and comparing Orders and Medals, the two closest types of deeds related to awards is not between the HSU and Order of Glory, but the Order of Glory and the Medal "For Valor." In both cases the deed done is almost identical. It seems that it was a personal preference of the officer in charge as to which award was recommended. I always felt bad for guys who had 2 Orders of Glory and a Valor medal as the citations read the same, but they would have received so much more from the State if they had been awarded the third Glory.

Hero citations are a mixture of things. Citations to pilots are usually a compilation of a career, while citations to enlisted men tend to be for a specific event. Its also interesting to not that almost 25% of the W.W.II HSU awards came from the Dneiper River crossing.

Just my observation,
Ed

Last edited by CtahhR; 01-27-2014 at 07:48 PM.
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