Women on the Battlefront

By the end of the first year of the war alone, eleven to twelve million Soviet citizens had been mobilized, nearly one million of whom were women. Unlike the draft on able-bodied men between the ages of 18 and 51, women entered the Soviet military on an entirely voluntary basis. These women were overwhelmingly motivated by the same factor as their male counterparts: namely, a sense of patriotic duty. Additionally, many women entering the armed forces were motivated by a desire to support and remain with loved ones: many women enlisted alongside male family members.

“Not only I, but all the girls wanted to go to the front. My father was already there” (Lance Corporal Maria Ivanovna Morozova (Ivanushkina), sniper, “I am loathe to recall” p. 79)

Another important aspect in the experience of military life for women was their sense of camaraderie among one another. Lance Corporal Maria Ivanovna Morozova discussed the bonds formed among her group of female snipers, from the solidarity in training and in battle, to their conversations late at night about their families and loved ones, and hopes for the future. Nonetheless, many women who served, especially in active military positions such as snipers and pilots, recounted instances of deep misogyny: they were often dismissed by their superiors, their abilities were assumed to be inferior to those of men, and their commitment was questioned.

“We felt offended—what was he taking us for? We’d come to fight…and he was receiving us not as soldiers but as girls. We could have been his daughters, as far as age was concerned. ‘What am I to do with you, my darlings?'—that was how he treated us—whereas we already say ourselves as real warriors” (p. 80) 

There was, of course, romance on the front as well. Conversation inevitably included discussion of romance and marriage after war, and Morozova herself met the man she would marry in her regiment, and she recalled: “We also tried to picture what we’d be like when the war was over and how we would marry and whether our husbands would love us” (p. 83). It is this narrative that takes center stage in Ivan’s Childhood.