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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

TRANSCRIPT ENGLISH TRANSLATION —Today is March 17, 2009. We are in Los Angeles, meeting a veteran of the Great Patriotic War. Please introduce yourself and tell us about your life before the war. What was your family like, what did your parents do, what sort of school did you attend? How did the war begin for you and what did you do during the war?

My name is Gregory Fein and I was born on April 18, 1921, in Propolsk [Prapoisk], which was later renamed Slavgorod [Slawharad], Mahilyow Region, Belarus. My father was an artisan bootmaker. We lived Propolsk until 1929. That year my family moved to Krasnapolle, a nearby town in the same region. We moved because my father had to work in an artel. In order for his children to have an education, he had to join an artisan cooperative rather than work alone. His skills were in demand in Kransopole [Krasnapolle], so we moved there, because there was a cooperative there. There were five children in the family and I was the youngest. My eldest sister Raya worked as a labor and delivery nurse her entire life. My second sister Tsilya is still with us. She is ninety-five and also lives in Los Angeles. She is a communications engineer and graduated from the Bonch-Bruevich Leningrad State Institute of Telecommunications. My third sister Anya lives in New York. She is ninety-two and worked in medicine.

I had an older brother named Osik. He had just completed his first year of studies at the Gomel [Homel] Pedagogic Institute when the war began in 1941. He was drafted into the army and was killed shortly thereafter in the Mogilev [Mahilyow] Defense Operation. He was a very talented person, an artist and mathematician, but unfortunately his fate was tragic. In 1938 I graduated from the Krasnopole ten-year school, having previously completed seven years of study at the town’s Jewish school. There was a Jewish school in Kransopole. I know Yiddish well and I am well-versed in Jewish literature: Sholem Aleichem, Mendele Mocher Sforim, Itzik Feffer, and others. I had to graduate from a Belarusian ten-year high school because all the Jewish schools were shut down in 1935. Our family always got along well. We were a bit poor, of course, since our family was so big, and things were difficult and we were always lacking in material comforts. I graduated from high school with perfect grades and secured a right to enroll at any institution of higher education in the country without entrance exams. Back then they didn't award school medals, but gave you that right. I enrolled at the Philosophy Department of the Leningrad State University. In 1939, as war was becoming increasingly likely, I was drafted into the Workers’ and Peasants’ Red Army, as it was known then, into the air force.

I completed my training as a weapons repairman at junior aviation specialist school in Krechevitsy, Novgorod District, Leningrad Oblast [now part of the city of Novgorod]. As you know, in 1939 the Soviet- Finnish War began and our 10th Rapid Bombing Regiment was deployed to fight in that war. The gunner

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN of the airplane crew I worked with was killed in action and I was offered a chance to take his place since I was the only person who was a weapon specialist there. I began flying on missions as a gunner and continued to do so until the end of the war with Finland. At some point, I was wounded and sent to a hospital. I was notified of the end of the war on March 13, 1940. I was then released from the hospital and continued to serve.

I was sent to train at the Moscow Military Aviation Technical School. I became an oxygenating-equipment specialist. I was in charge of maintaining and operating equipment that collected oxygen from air for military flights at high altitude. I did this work first at an auto oxygen station, then worked at a rail one. After that I served in the 24th Red Banner Airfield Engineering Battalion as a political worker. I finished the war with this battalion that constructed combat airfields for our air force. After the war I was offered an opportunity to stay in the military. I served in the Odessa [Odesa] Military District and was then sent to train as a propagandist in Smolensk. I completed my training with perfect scores and then served as a propagandist in several aviation units. I then decided to enroll in the military political academy in order to advance my career. Unfortunately I was only allowed to take correspondence courses, most likely because of my ethnicity. But I was able to graduate in 1952. I managed to take all my exams and complete my studies there within one and a half years. By the way, this badge that commemorates my graduation was given to me by none other than Semyon Mikhailovich Budyonny.

I continued to serve until 1960. At that point I was a major and senior political propaganda instructor in the 5th Guards Aviation Bomber Division. I realized that I could not advance any further due to my ethnicity, so I decided to resign. Just then there was an order to downsize the military by 1.2 million and I retired after serving twenty years, nine months, and a number of days. I moved my family to Odessa after that. My wife is from there. I got married in 1946 to Ninel Mikhaylovna Kharitonskaya. She was a wonderful person and a very capable woman. She worked in officers’ clubs as a military-political instructor for a long time. She was a natural actress, a remarkable and accomplished person, kind, attentive, caring, and helpful. In Odessa I first worked for a few years as the secretary of the Society for the Distribution of Political and Scientific Information. I then found work at the Odessa Communications Electrical Engineering Institute and worked there for twenty-five years. I worked as an instructor and simultaneously prepared my dissertation. I defended my dissertation in philosophy and officially became a PhD. I chaired the Philosophy Department at the Odessa Communications Institute for several years. I retired in 1986, but continued to be active. I was an auxiliary lecturer at the All-Union society “Knowledge.” I traveled around all the republics of the former USSR, and have earned recognition for that. I also started a grassroots effort to open an oratory university in Odessa. I was the dean of this university for thirteen years. I invited the best lecturers and orators to visit Odessa and give talks there.

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

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ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

They performed in Odessa. This was a very interesting and productive time in my professional life. In 1996 we decided to leave what had been our homeland until then. We had two options, Israel and the United States. I had no family in Israel, but I had two sisters living in the US, so we decided to go there. I am active in our local veterans’ association here. I continue to give talks at events here. My son lives in Long Beach, not far from Los Angeles, while my daughter lives in Paris. She has a very interesting job facilitating Russo- Frankish relations. She has received numerous awards for her work. She visits me and was just here a short while ago.

—I would like to return to your prewar life. Did your large family observe any Jewish customs or traditions?

Yes. My father was of course a religious man and had all the appropriate items to attend synagogue. He took his sons with him to the synagogue in Krasnapolle. We celebrated every Jewish holiday. I regret that so much culture, a knowledge of Judaism and religion in general… We were deprived of that in school and in universities, where the subject was neglected. However, I still remember a few things from conversations with my father. It was very dangerous to attend synagogue back then. I do not attend services now, but I keep all the traditions.

—For example?

I celebrate all the holidays in accordance with our norms and traditions. Recently we celebrated Purim, which is important to Jews both religiously and historically.

—So your family was culturally Jewish. Then the Jewish school was shut down. How quickly did Jewish traditions begin to disappear after that.

They began do disappear because of external pressure and persecution. People even began celebrating Jewish holidays in secret. They were afraid. The political situation in our country was terrible. People had no civil liberties, everything was forbidden. There was strict censorship and control. Books in Yiddish began to disappear and became difficult to obtain. There were no newspapers in Yiddish anymore. The Jewish theater was shut down. They got rid of Mikhoels. These were very difficult times. I experienced many anti-Semitic incidents, as did my family. This was especially true in the armed forces.

—During the war?

During the war not as much, mostly after the war.

—What about during the war?

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

There were various conversations during the war, including between my fellow servicemen . . . about Jews hiding somewhere in Tashkent instead of fighting.

—So even during the war?

Yes. Of course we challenged them, so there were any open attacks, but there was such talk. The army did have a culture of anti-Semitism, but it was less perceptible during the war because Jews fought, and fought well.

—You served as a gunner-radio operator during the Finnish campaign. Were there any other Jews in your unit?

I was the only Jew in my regiment, but I do not know about other units.

—After the Great Patriotic War began, did you continue flying for a long time?

No, just for one year and then began doing the work I had mentioned.

—So you flew on bombers for a year?

No, on Il-2 fighters.

—They have a crew of two?

Yes, and I often served as a navigator because we suffered losses. Planes were often shot down, people were killed, and they would send anyone who had any connection to aviation.

—Is the pilot protected by any armor on an Il-2?

Yes, of course. The navigator is too, but to a lesser extent.

—You had your back turned to the pilot?

Yes. I was in a turret with a rotating machine gun.

—Since gunners were less protected . . .

They were killed more frequently. A fighter, let’s say a Messerschmitt, would appear behind us. He would then kill the gunner. Sometimes people managed to save themselves.

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

—Were there other Jews in your unit during the war?

Of course. Many were in service units: engineers overseeing specialized equipment, weapons repairmen, engine specialists, and other similar specialties. There were also some Jews in the flight crews. There were some Jewish pilots as well, but not many.

—Did you know any of them personally?

I was more familiar with technical specialists.

—How did you . . . determine whether someone was Jewish.

Well, naturally by the way people looked, but . . . often we were just open about it with one another. It was obvious . . . We would say a few words in Yiddish to one another and then a conversation began.

—Was there any sense of camaraderie?

Of course. And after the war, when I served in the 5th Guards Division, we were family friends with some of the Jewish specialists. The Jewish families were friends with one another.

—So even when religion was no longer a factor, regardless of the reason, there was a sense of closeness . . .

It was preserved. I am deeply convinced that Jews are not necessarily those who go to the synagogue. Jewishness is a spiritual concept. If someone feels in their heart that they are Jewish, that they come from our historically great people . . . This sense of national spirituality and cultural national identity has always been there.

—But the foundation of this feeling may be religious.

Naturally, that is where the roots are.

—Do you remember any particular incidents from the war?

I remember one episode from the Finnish War. Three SBs took off to bomb the Mannerheim Line.

—SB . . .

Rapid bomber.

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

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—How many are in its crew?

There are three: a pilot, a navigator, and a gunner. I went as the gunner. One of our planes was hit by enemy fire and landed in the no man’s land between Soviet and Finnish lines. Our pilot, Lieutenant Sokolov, decided to rescue the crew of the downed plane. He landed his plane next to the downed one and everyone climbed in, but there was no place to sit. People found a spot wherever they could, basically hanging from the landing gear. We did not have to fly far because we were near Leningrad, but it was very cold. We took off and brought the entire crew back. Of course the pilot received the Order of Lenin for his heroism and I received the medal "For Battle Merit."

—You were awarded two Orders of the Red Star during the war.

No, I only received one of them during the war. The second was given to me for fifteen years of military service.

—I see that you are only wearing one.

Unfortunately my beloved wife Ninel died here in Los Angeles in 2001 . . . She was a wonderful person. She did not have any medals . . . as a sign of my deep respect for her . . . I took my Order of the Red Star off my chest and placed it into her coffin. She was buried with my medal.

—In the early stages of the war the Germans were advancing rapidly. Did you always manage to evacuate your airfields in time?

Yes. At the start of the war our airfield was in Singureni, near Baltsy [Bălți], Moldova. Our regiment was stationed there along with an air base that serviced that regiment. This was the 155th Fighter Aviation Regiment. On the eve of the war the regiment received new MiG-3s, but had not even had time to train on them. Our airfield was bombed. A week before that the air force commander in the Odessa Military District relocated our unit to a backup airfield in the Bălți District. The bulk of our pilots and aircraft were moved there. The part of our regiment that did not take off in time and remained in Singureni was destroyed.

The fate of our regiment is quite interesting. It was later renamed the 16th Fighter Regiment. The future three-time Hero of the Soviet Union Aleksandr Ivanovich Pokryshkin served there. I remember him as a junior lieutenant. He started out as a pilot in my regiment.

—How long did the Germans maintain air superiority?

Until 1943 when we won it back in the skies over Kuban.

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

—Your regiment participated . . .

Yes, our 5th Air Army was involved.

—Did you visit your native town after it was liberated?

Yes. This is an interesting question that I will happily answer. I left Krasnopole in 1938 and returned forty years later. When I was on a lecture tour I asked to be sent to Belarus so that I could visit my hometown. I was sent to Minsk and informed the officials there that I wanted to give a lecture in Krasnopole. They asked me why on earth I wanted to go there. They said that it is a small and rundown town, that it would be better for me to lecture in larger cities. I insisted, saying that it was the place where I was born. When I arrived I began searching for my former classmates and found some. I decided to visit my old school, which was now in a different building. I walked into the teachers’ lounge and asked if there was anybody around who had studied at the school before the war. A math teacher got up, looked at me, and asked “Grisha?” He rushed to embrace me . . . we had studied together, he was one year older than me. I asked him who else was left. He said that some of our former teachers were still around. Fruza Fyodorovna, who taught us Belarusian language and literature, and Adam Pavlovich, who taught chemistry, were still there. He asked if I wanted to visit them and we did. They lived in poverty, of course. The town had barely changed. The hotel was rundown, everything was . . . This was in 1978.

However, I went there to lecture. I asked the organizer of my talks to invite my former teachers and he sat them in the front row. They listened to their former pupil’s talk, which was of course very touching.

—Were there mass executions there?

Yes. I have not told you the most important thing that I learned during my visit there. My classmate . . . we shared a desk . . . his name was Isaak Vaksman had apparently organized and led a partisan detachment during the war. Of course he was killed. I was told about this when I noticed that the main street of the town was named in his honor. We have a portrait of him in our veterans’ association here. He was my classmate.

—When did you find out about the Holocaust, during or after the war?

Unfortunately, I found out after the war. I lost eighteen relatives in the Holocaust, some at Babyn Yar. My father’s three brothers, one sister, and their families all lived in Kiev [Kyiv]. All of them were killed because they did not manage to evacuate in time. My parents managed to evacuate from Belarus.

—You were not a simple soldier, but a political worker. Why did you not know about the Holocaust during

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Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN the war?

We were not told anything and there was an effort to conceal the truth from us. Nothing about it was published after all. They even tried to keep it quiet after the war. There is still a tendency to either gloss over or outright deny the Holocaust. What could we . . . we listened to the Sovinformburo bulletins, read pamphlets, and received frontline newspapers. There was no mention of the Holocaust in those sources. I understand that the main reason for this was state-sanctioned anti-Semitism and Stalin’s personal anti- Semitism. I think that it still exists to a great degree in Russia. It is no longer state-sanctioned, but it exists in everyday life.

—But there were people that knew that their families had been killed.

Probably. I got in touch with my family in 1942. I wrote letters to Buguruslan. They had been evacuated beyond the Urals. My sister worked as a communications engineer in Chelyabinsk Oblast. I wrote to her, but she had been transferred to Zlatoust. Somebody knew her new whereabouts and forwarded my letter. I received a letter from her about my parents, but I did not know anything about our other relatives, and they also didn't know.

—Were many pilots killed?

Yes, especially during the first two years of the war. We suffered tremendous losses. Of course we received reinforcements. They were trained for just a year or two instead of the usual four before getting sent to the front.

—Did you ever get depressed after hearing over and over again about the losses?

Yes, but we quickly recovered because we had a job to do. Here's something that happened one day. Before the war we conducted parachute drills. The gunners and the flight crew would jump.

—Did you also jump?

Yes. The man right before me, his name was Koval, fell to his death right before I was supposed to jump. His parachute did not open and he fell like a stone. Naturally, all further jumps that day were cancelled. These things happened from time to time.

—Were there any spare part shortages when the planes needed repair?

Not for the planes, but we did have spare part shortages in the engineering battalion. We had ZiS and GAZ

Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN prewar vehicles. They got bogged down in the mud and would not budge. The Americans came to our rescue with their Studebakers and other more powerful cars. The massive American aid effort made a difference. They also sent aircraft, especially long-distance planes. We also received English Airacobras [sic. this is an American plane—Trans.].

—So you flew on American and English planes?

No.

—Did you ever host American pilots who flew from England, bombed their targets, and then landed . . .

No, I did not encounter them.

—Did your children want to hear your stories about the war, as you saw it?

Of course. I have great children and I am very proud of them. My son graduated from a military school in Simferopol and also served for seventeen years in the Soviet army. He knows my story and was always very interested in where my medals came from. My daughter also knows. Unfortunately God has not given me any grandchildren.

—When you meet children at home or at school, what do you tell them about the war? After all, you can say different things. You can tell them about Pokryshkin, about how people knowingly sacrificed their lives in order to destroy enemy tanks. However, you can also tell them about the other side of war: hunger, cold, lice, and sleepless nights. What is your approach?

I told them everything that happened to me without glossing over dangers and hardships. I also did not embellish anything; war is a terrible thing. God forbid that something like that should happen again. It is my sincere belief that the war never ended and now continues as the fight against international terrorism. It is a completely different war, but a war nonetheless, with blood being spilled and people dying. When I tell my children my stories and talk to them about anti-Semitism, I tell them that we are blessed that the nation of Israel exists now. Had it existed before World War II, there would not have been a Holocaust, at least not on that scale.

—Did you ever visit Germany after the war?

Yes, my daughter and I went East Germany as tourists. A German philosophy teacher was sent to the communications institute where I worked on an internship. We became friends and he invited us to visit

Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

ID LA008.interview PERMALINK http://n2t.net/ark:/86084/b41h6r

ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN him in the GDR. We spent two weeks traveling around Halle, Dresden, and Berlin. We visited many museums. The atmosphere was . . . pretty normal, we were treated fairly well. I did not sense the fascism of the previous period.

—When did you first visit Germany?

I think this was in 1980.

—By then you knew very well what had been done to the Jews during the war.

Of course.

—When you were in Germany, did you have a feeling . . .

Of course. I was cautious . . . even suspicious. However, I never felt any hostility from the Germans that I spoke with. Of course some inner voices of mine could not be silenced. I told them that my relatives had been killed in the Holocaust and that the war was terrible. I could not just forget about that, but this was a different Germany. This was the German Democratic Republic. And regardless of one's attitude toward it now, there were many positive aspects to life there.

—Many of the Germans who live on the territory of the former GDR . . .

They regret everything, of course.

—What was your dissertation about?

It was titled “The Problem of Turning Moral Responsibility into a Spiritual Need.” I am still working on this subject. The question of freedom and responsibility is always topical.

—Freedom is the recognition of necessity.

That was Engels’s definition and it is correct. I approach the problem thusly: the level of moral responsibility is dependent on the level of the individual's freedom. The more freedom a person has, the more responsibility he bears. So in order for a person to feel that they have a responsibility to society, they must enjoy some amount of freedom. Artistic freedom, free thought, freedom of speech, and everything else that we were deprived of under Stalin.

—Thank you for meeting us and thank you for your service as a gunner-radio operator.

Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

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ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

Thank you.

Gregory Fein. Full, unedited interview, 2009

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ITEM TYPE VIDEO ORIGINAL LANGUAGE RUSSIAN

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