1944

In 1944...the German army and the Soviet Leningrad Front fought a series of battles for the Narva Isthmus. In July, the Soviet army captured Narva. This ancient city has been the dividing line between Russia and the Western world for nine hundred years. The Tannenberg defense line behind Narva is the last line of defense in Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. A group of young Estonians in their early 20s volunteered to join the 20th Division of the SS Guards and began to attack Soviet armored forces head-on on the Eastern Front to fight against Soviet occupation. This was not the first time that Estonia became a battlefield between East and West, Germans and Slavs. Counting from the ice battle on Lake Chud, this battle has lasted for more than 700 years. The Estonians caught in the middle were inevitably caught up in both sides and became victims of history. … In September, as Finland announced the cessation of military cooperation with Germany and signed the Moscow Armistice Agreement, the German troops, who were attacked from both sides, decided to withdraw from Estonia. The Soviet army followed the German army all the way to Tallinn, the capital of Estonia. The Yeshanian (Russified Estonian) soldiers in the Red Army also witnessed with their own eyes that the blue, black and white tricolor flag, which symbolized the independence of the Estonian nation, was withdrawn by the German army...