The Red Army, forged by Leo Trotsky from revolutionary guards and members of the Tsarist troops, becomes the sword of Communist Russia. Their soldiers win the civil war, enlarge the realm in battles und campaigns and defend land and regime against Hitler’s annihilatory madness. After 1945 Stalin’s Army becomes synonymous with repression of the Communist satellite states in Eastern Europe. Yet the bloody campaign in Afghanistan in the 1980s adds to the growing instability of the Red Empire.
