hunyadi

Truly they are easy to fake - but there are not many out there for sale either. I have passed on some just simply because it was too improbable, or it was such a blatant attempt to make one up. The ones that I have found and purchased are rather - ho-hum, and so therefore I feel that they are a little more 'believable' in regards to originality. But still - its not a major part of my collection parameters.

here is a back shot of the same bar - so - it is entirely possible to make up your own medal bar and with not much effort

unfortunatly - the medal bars from this period were easily made by hand - its just a bar with a pin back and the trifold ribbons and medals are hung off of that. Sometimes owners would sew the ribbons together, but not always - so even though I have some bars, and I believe them to be period original - there is no way to be 100% sure. This one is suspected to be an original - but the medals are out of order - the last one should be the first one...

Though I dont have any yet - I am interested in getting some of these - mainly for the same reason that Dan would like more - crud quality, but an interesting side-line to history. (Purely hypothetical - and not meant to bring up political affiliation - but just an exercise in 'what if' ONLY!! OK?) What if Donitz had continued to issue his own version of 3rd Reich awards to his friends after the end fo the war (even though this would have been illegal, etc... its Hypothetical! folks!) - wouldnt they be extremely collectible? If anyone has some that they want to unload - PM me...

Dan - as I know the author personaly - I think I can get you the latter two, though I cnat recal how much he wants for them...

Nic ones Dan - SO - where I can 'waste my money' on these "Umalatova" awards.... anyone got any links (Ebay? Etc...)

All of the ones that I have seen are marked with '1951' the last '1' in these can be mistaken for a '4' easily enough. I think the one in the auction is also a '1'. In the Blue Bible - there is no mention of a 'Stalin Vasmu' award - but there is the 'Dunai Vasmu' badge - it may have been more politically correct to 'rename' the awward for a publication in the 1970's. My assumtion that these are both the same award is that the 'Dunai Vasmu' was insitututed on March 10th 1951 (same year as marked on the badge, and no other 'Vasmu' awards - (Iron Works) were created in that year). Unlike the 'legends' that I was told about these - the book states that the first class was awarded for two years of continuious service wehre good work, etc... was displayed. The second class was for one year of continuious work in building the Iron Works Factory. It claims that the award was bestowed up to 1954. But interestingly enough this document was not bestowed until 1957 and yet still with the old pre October 23, 1956 coat of arms. A very interesting award document - besides being mismatched with the award itself.

"Stalinvaros" was a program of oddity as it was a plan to build a city where none had existed historicaly. Placed alongside a section of the Duna River, it was designed to be an indistrial hub of various heavy and light industry. Massive ammounds money were spent on the ambitious project to bring about a modern industrial city to, as some have said, impress Stalin by rapid industrialization. It was nearly antithematical for a nation known for its rich soil and bountiful agriculture yet lacked the raw materials to make steel. As ambitious as the project was, it required engineers, planners, architects, etc... to pull it all off. According to what I have learned these medals were awareded to those who had made vital contributions to the project. The silver grade went to lead-managment types, while to bronze class went to project directors. The silver class (First class) is extremely rare to find, the document even harder to find, and to a foreigner - even more rare (but probably explains its survival.) The bronze class is more commonly found, but not readily always available. In both examples the case is also rare to find. However - the example shown here appears to be a Silver Class document, with a cased bronze grade badge.

OK - so just the Order of the Red Star and other types like that (?)

Also picked up this little goodie an Excelent Engineering Industy Worker badge (1950's era?? not sure on this one)

because its numbered!

Another goodie! A first Type II Excelent Worker badge - but one of the very eraly issue items...

if you didnt see it on the front... serial number 3597186

Been watching this thread for a little while and took the plunge. Had my choice of about 20 today, all from the low one millions up to the six million range (what range is Afghanistan???) But I had to go with the 'thats interesting' for my purchase...

Picked this up recently and just wanted to share

Bringing this back to the top as I was offered a 3rd class recently from the Soivet Mint. For the third class according to the post above - there would have been 22,100 3rd class made in the Soivet Union between 1944 and 1945. I would assume that these had the serial numbers engraved in them and probably in numerical order (?) But if "There were 10,384 3rd Class awarded, but you can find them as high as in the 28,000. So there is a lot of 3rd Class on the market that comes from stocks in former Yugoslavia." Then that would seem that the Soviet stocks would have been enough well into the 1970's. So - my question is do we have any data of those that were awarded during WW2 and then after? Of course if they were not distributed sequentialy, then this makes the matters worse when trying to figure out New Old Stock and awarded items. Also after the fall out with the CCCP in 1948 did the Soivet made awards then fall out of favor as well? Or was there little interest in "forcing themselves away" from the Soviets, that it mattered little where the awards came from?

Now that is interesting - very nice finds!

nice one Gordon - that is the first one of those that I have ever seen!

Yes - they were mostly crew and pilot KIA in 'aireal losses' helicopters are bullet magnets (so is the A-10: great for killing tanks, but also a slow flying aircraft) plus the Air Rescue teams have the added problem of dealing with uncertain terrain and weather conditions so they have a higher 'crash' rate. Add in a guy with an assault rifle or shoulder fired missle at the crash site and the results get even worse for you. My bad math was just to make the point that even if they had all ben jet-jockeys - its still a low number. Still - what Yugoslavia was able to bring down is not something to balk at. My hat is off to them.

Not American - here is a site that you can see the M1 helmet in its design and use http://www.m-1helmet.com/

A few things about the US military as I wont speak for NATO - most family members of serivcemen and women dont know where their family member is serving in a war zone - general location, but never specifics. Its a matter of security that we have learned over the years with the dynamic shift of warfare. As for crashes in other parts of the world - accidents happen all the time. Most never get reported beyond local events and when it does make the public news, its because someone in the public reported it. But the other thing to consider is that when in times of conflict, training goes up. Pilots and crews want to do what they are trained for and if there is a chance that they are going to a 'conflict zone' then you step up the training. Pilots and crews from all over the world know they may be called in. Its not like we just have European pool of pilots and when that pool runs out the war ends. Using the assumption that the extra crashes or 'accidents' in other regions is not a good guage. The data would also have to be comaperd to reported 'crashes' OR perhaps its also including 'inicidents'. An incident includes a system failure even if not vital to flight, a blown tire, putting a dent in the hangar door, popping a rivet on the skin, etc...so are we certain that all of these were 'crashes' or 'incidents' if you want to make a statement more juicy for the spring summer of 1999, just throw the inicdents in with the actual crashes and you can make the mountain out of the mole hill easily. Asuming that everyting remained constant in training and flights during the sping / summer of 1999 is a bad guage as things got 'stepped up' so to say - nothing in military training or use remains a constant when the military is deploying to a 'conflict zone'. Here is something that I found on the CNN site when trying to get statistics - is from the legal proceedings against Clinton (a president not widely liked by those in the US armed foces BTW!) for his use of the War Powers Act. The lawsuit contends that between March 24 and April 28, 1999, "United States and allied aircraft flew over 11,500 sorties" over Yugoslavia, "an average of approximately 350 sorties per day." "During the same period, the United States and allied aircraft launched over 4,400 confirmed air strikes on Yugoslavia territory, an average of over 100 per day. United States Armed Forces also launched over 180 cruise missiles against Yugoslavia during this time period. The United States has tens of thousands of military personnel involved in the military operations against Yugoslavia," the lawsuit said. Yugolsavia is not a large nation and having 350 sorties a day is a full sky in my opinion. With most losses being surface to air (and helicopters being a big majority - slow moving bullet magnets...) its (tragicaly) purely acceptible losses from a military stand point. If you take it that all of the purported 218 deaths were jet fighters with one pilot and complare that with sorties flown (218/11500 = 0.018) its a relatively low number for such a massive air campaign against a nation with substantial air defence systems. From my personal recolections of the time I remember how we (my family and friends - mostly military) were deploring the humanitarian crisis casued by the bombing. Targets were being hit over and over (even with confirmation of a destroyed target the first time - example was the radio tower hit 8 times because it was a 'propoganda' machine). Why? The military and to an extent the media all saw that in order to end the crisis quickly we / NATO needed to deploy the ground troops from day one and "restore order" (so that humanitarain supplys could be delivered and the roaming bands of ethnic cleansers could be stopped). But the (then) President Clinton knew that it would not look good for his VP, Al Gore when he wanted to go up for election in 2000 with an 'occupation' force (which had to be implimented regardlessly - and is still going to have to be there till my grandchildren are dead IMHO) after a bloody battle in which US servicemen died. Fro Clinton, it was too much of a situation that could turn into Vietnam and not look good at the voting box for the liberals in 2000. A few dead pilots and crew are nothing (politicaly) as compared to several thousand dad infantrymen. So he just kept telling the JCS to keep the AirForce bombing until they gave up. It was a situtation that the US military did not want to be in - regardless of the media spin - they want to get into these situations and end them in the shortest ammount of time - its those that sit in the oval office who make the final policy call. On another point - you are all right - the West had no real idea what was going on there (and for six-pack Joe in front of the TV they still dont). Shortly after war books sprang up on bookshelves all across the US to tell the history and the reasons. I recall reading 'The Balkans' at night for several months as I tried to get a grasp of the complex history and situation of the region. Still, for most, its an anomoly and is overshadowed by more recent events. It will be years (decades) before any real historical research is done - sadly.

a recent find as well - sports badge in silver grade

detail shot of the upper half

Picked this one up this weekend - Lt. Col to the Hussar units (Panzer). Not highly decorated, but still a rare rank to find and with the awards (minus the long service award )

though I doubt if the box and the Excelent Worker badge belong together - I found the award documents (!!!!) stuffed under the felt lining. Of interest is a 'congratulatory' note from the director informing him of the award. Never seen one of these beofre.