Battle of Stalingrad the regular ferries were quickly destroyed by the Luftwaffe, which then targeted troop barges being towed slowly across the river by tugs. It has been said that Stalin prevented civilians from leaving the city in the belief that their presence would encourage greater resistance from the city's defenders. Civilians, including women and children, were put to work building trenchworks and protective fortifications. A massive German air raid on 23 August caused a firestorm, killing hundreds and turning Stalingrad into a vast landscape of rubble and burnt ruins. Ninety percent of the living space in the Voroshilovskiy area was destroyed. Between
The Motherland Monument in February 2018 that the state emblem of the Soviet Union on the shield of the monument should be removed according to the decommunization laws. It is not removed, however, still by today. A scene in the 2006 novel "World War Z" depicts a Ukrainian tank commander and his surviving men fleeing in their vehicles from an abandoned and burning Kiev under the watchful gaze of the "Rodina-Mat". The monument is prominently featured in the music video for the song "Get Out" by the band Frightened Rabbit. The Motherland Monument The Motherland Monument (, ) is a monumental statue in