1:32 Russian Assault Troops (WWII)

The assault engineer brigades

In the spring of 1943 the Red Army began to raise special formations intended to break through fortified positions. They were designated assault engineer-sapper brigades and there were fifteen of them. This was not infantry in the usual sense: the training was built on throwing grenades on the run, on working with explosives, on cutting wire entanglements and on close combat in rubble. The composition of the armament matched that; the long rifle was almost absent from it. They were filled with men selected for physical fitness, and the losses of these brigades were proportionate to all that.

The steel breastplate and its purpose

The most conspicuous feature is the plate chest protector of two pieces of pressed steel, which these soldiers pulled on over the uniform. It weighed around three kilograms and protected against fragments and pistol rounds, not against rifle caliber. In open terrain it was more of a burden, but in built-up areas, where the shooting was done from a few meters, it saved enough lives to be worn until the end of the war. The deployment culminated at Königsberg and in Berlin in 1945.

What to make of it

The breastplate offers something an ordinary figure does not have: a large smooth surface. It pays to approach it with a different technique from cloth, that is with a polished metallic sheen, scuffs on the edges and scratches pulled out dry. Rubble, a bent fence, an overturned manhole cover and a broken brick wall of fired blocks then work well around the figures. Carry the layer of dust on the footwear only up to ankle height; any higher already looks implausible.