Yes i know its fantasy sci-fi but i was just wondering if this anime mentions the fact that Russia (government/army) and Germany were on the same side at the start of WW2 (When Germany invaded Poland Russia was invading it on the other side). Russia became *ahem* 'neutral' just after the time war was declared on Germany. Just wondering if a Japanese animation dealt with this (often swept under the carpet) point?
thanks.
This fact is not mentioned in any part. Besides, the whole story is hilarious stupid even though I am a big anime and scifi/fantasy fan.
Maybe if this plot had been put into a series I would have liked it. One hour is too short to straighten the most important things out. Certain parts of the story simply make no sense to me.
"Omae wa mou shinde iru!" - Kenshiro, Hokuto No-Ken (Fist of the North Star)
The Soviets and the Germans were never on the same side, they both wanted to gain polish territory (in the Soviet case eastern Belarus and Ukraine) so they made an agreement in the partition of Poland, that's not an alliance and if you bother to do some research you'll find out that Hitler always wanted to destroy the Soviet Union and Stalin with that move wanted to gain territory and time to prepare for the war (that according to him would have started in 1942 after the invasion of Englane).
However this movie deals with the military situation in 1942 when the Germans were almost in Leningrad and Stalingrad so there was no point in discussing the partition of Poland happened in 1939.
Juliet Parrish: You can't win a war if you're extinct!
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If USSR's signing an agreement with the Nazis is your idea of being "on the same side at the start of WW2" - does Chamberlains famous agreement with the Nazis mean that Britain was "on the same side at the start of WW2"?
How about all those American businesses like IBM, Ford, GM, GE, Kodak, DuPont, Chase Bank, Random House, Coca-Cola, Nestle, etc. whom gladly took Nazi contracts, Nazi employment, Nazi leases, and Nazi money, from the beginning right through the war, even as many of the polititians knew very well all about these dealings but kept quiet - does that mean the USA was "on the same side at the start of WW2"?
Thanks.
I shall do my best to answer this question. Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union did indeed sign the Molotov-Ribbentrop Pact in 1939 (that is, a non-aggression pact). This is not an alliance, per se, it is more of a "you don't shoot me, I don't shoot you" agreement without the formal military alliance that did exist between Nazi Germany, Italy, and Japan. No mention of the Pact is made during the film (to the best of my knowledge). Russia was definitely not "neutral" by any means due to them invading Poland and Scandinavia before Germany initiated Operation Barbarossa.
The problem with the film is that, besides the "1942" heading on the DVD's back cover summary, there is little to no actual historic chronological reference to establish a setting. Even the Wikipedia page gives a 1941/1942 "timeframe" for the plot summary. I think the key to figuring out a rough estimate is looking at what's happening as opposed to what is said.
1. Snow. Snow didn't begin to fall until earlier December 1941.
2. Lack of German presence in the immediate area around Moscow. The Nazi's had all but breached the walls of Moscow and didn't start withdrawing from Moscow until mid December 1941.
3. German Trenches. Hitler ordered the digging of trenches around 20 December.
4. Presence of the Luftwaffe. The German air force was grounded by 22 December once the snow arrived and temperatures fell well below freezing. They did not return to the battle until early January 1942.
So...based on the visual clues, we can estimate that the film takes place either between 20-22 December 1941 or between 4-7 January 1942...or both!