Women in War and Resistance: Selected Biographies of Soviet Women Soldiers

Cameron Pulsifer is a historian at the Canadian War Museum in Ottawa.

Historian Kazimiera Cottam has published a number of previous works
about Soviet women in the “Great Patriotic War” (1941–45) against
Nazi Germany. This book describes the military careers of 100 Soviet
women soldiers, 92 of whom received the Hero of the Soviet Union, the
Soviet federation’s highest military award. The biographies
graphically illustrate how Soviet women were able to move beyond their
traditional roles as nurturers and caregivers to become tireless
fighters and dedicated killers in the battle against the Nazi regime.

The book has its problems, however. It would have benefited from the
attentions of a rigorous editor; as it is, there are numerous
repetitions, excessive extraneous details, and all-too-frequent
instances of awkward or unclear writing. In addition, in researching the
book the author did not conduct formal interviews, her justification
being that they are of “limited value” and that there is no
“substitute for a judicious reading of written sources that are
chronologically relatively close to the events described.” The problem
here is that most of the written sources she relies on are either
recommendations for the granting of military awards or descriptions of
military heroism. All too often in such writing (both Soviet and
Western), military heroism is seen as evidence of a saintly private
disposition.

The women profiled in this book are characterized as fresh-faced,
likable, guileless, and largely from good proletarian backgrounds. The
description of machine-gunner Neonila Onilova is typical. As a young
student in Odessa, she studied at night while working as a machine
operator at a knitted-goods factory. Cottam describes her as a
“frail-looking and short, simple, merry and sociable young woman, with
a round sunburnt face, laughing eyes and a charming shy smile”; though
“frail-looking,” she proves herself “a bold and brave machine
gunner.” The author seems unable to transcend her mostly Soviet-era
printed sources; her book contains no fresh revelations from recently
opened Soviet archival collections.

Cottam’s publishing company is called New Military Publishing; there
is very little in this book that is either new or military history in
the best sense.