By Vestnik Kavkaza
The historic meeting of the allies took place at the Elbe 70 years ago: on April 25th 1945, near the German town of Torgau, units and subdivisions of the 69th infantry division of the 1st American Army and the 58th artillery division of the 1st Ukrainian Front met. As a result of the meeting between troops of the allies, the remains of the German Armed Forces were divided into two parts – the northern and the southern ones. On April 25th 2015 a wide-scale reconstruction of the meeting of the allies will be held in German Torgau and Russian Noginsk.
"Victory Day is not only the 9th of May. Victory Day is both the previous and subsequent days,” Viktor Yermakov, chairman of the Board of the Russian public organization Veterans of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, says. “In Torgau we must prove once again the following things: who won, the price of the Victory. With a goodwill mission we must restore once again those kind and friendly relations among the soldiers of the Red Army and US troops. They met on the 25th of April at the Elbe River.
“Our delegation arrives in Berlin on the 22nd of April. The 23rd of April will be dedicated to a wreath-laying ceremony at the graves of Soviet soldiers in Tiergarten, Treptow and other remarkable places where our heroes are buried. We will also meet with the authorities of Berlin,” Yermakov stated.
On the 24th of April arrangements for the meeting of the US army and soldiers of the Red Army will take place. “We will lay flowers at the graves of the killed soldiers in Torgau. We will see the museum of Russian military equipment. It's an amateur museum. We will be received by the mayor of Torgau. It will be a so-called Russian day,” the social activist says.
At the same time, celebrations will take place in Noginsk in the Moscow Region. “Noginsk is the birthplace of the 209th Bogorodsky Infantry Regiment, the centenary of which has been celebrated here recently in the Kaliningrad region. It is, indeed, the Bogorodsky district. And the soldiers of the 209th Bogorodsky regiment, carrying out the tasks of the Command in World War I, died in the Kaliningrad region, in those times this area belonged to Prussia,” Yermakov explained. He also said: “We have a good mission, we want to see a world without wars, we want all people to remember this, remember who won, remember the price of the Victory. All these facts confirm the President's words that the celebration of the 70th anniversary must be on both the previous and subsequent days. We must never forget this date.”
