Moscow Strikes Back/Defeat Of The German Forces Near Moscow (1942)

Defeat of the German Forces Near Moscow (also known as Moscow Strikes Back) is a 1942 USSR Documentary Film of the Battle for Moscow, directed by Leonid Varlamov and Ilya Kopalin. Audio in Russian with English subtitles.

Soviet wartime cameramen accompanied the fighting troops of the Red Army on foot, aboard their tanks, and in their aircraft to film this epochal documentary of the Battle of Moscow that halted the vaunted and-until then, unstoppable-German war machine cold in its tracks. It is a stunning record of the Soviet capital’s epic civilian defense, as well as the major battle that included ski troops and airborne paratroop forces, plus the liberation of Russian villages.

In what became the most widely shown Allied film documentary of the war, it was released to great acclaim in the USSR on Feb. 23, 1942, just a month after the actual battle ended! The film had a terrific propaganda effect at home and worldwide. Released in the United States as Moscow Strikes Back, it won an Academy Award for Best Documentary in 1942, having previously won Russia’s own Stalin Prize. Narrated in English by actor Edward G. Robinson, the film became a powerful weapon in the Allied alliance that began the day after the Moscow battle, when the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor.

This version includes the original Russian soundtrack with English subtitles. It is the full, complete, uncut, and uncensored film, including the harsher dialogue focused on German barbarity. Thus, this is the full Soviet version - not the 1942 US-edited release (known as Moscow Strikes Back) which is almost 10 minutes shorter.