Victory on the Volga
The anniversary of Stalingrad has inspired major celebrations in Russia, but a strange silence here

Sixty years ago the greatest battle of the second world war reached its climax. The site of that decisive battle was not the windswept sands of north Africa beloved of British war mythology, nor the broad expanses of the Pacific favoured in the American version, but the debris of a devastated city on the Volga.

The German surrender at Stalingrad in February 1943 was the strategic turning point of the second world war. After Stalingrad, Hitler had no hope of winning on the eastern front and that meant inevitable defeat in the wider conflict.

In Russia, the 60th anniversary of the battle has been marked by great celebrations. President Putin led the commemoration in Volgograd (as the city was later renamed) and was joined by the British and American ambassadors. But in Britain and the US the silence about the battle has been deafening.
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