Closer, but too simplistic - USSR had its own industry [0]. But it was in heavy need of aviation, heavy trucks, locomotives, fuel, ammunition and food for army. A lot of supplies were captured in Operation Barbarossa. Wikipedia has better description [1]:

> In total, the U.S. deliveries to the USSR through Lend-Lease amounted to $11 billion in materials: over 400,000 jeeps and trucks; 12,000 armored vehicles (including 7,000 tanks, about 1,386 of which were M3 Lees and 4,102 M4 Shermans); 11,400 aircraft (4,719 of which were Bell P-39 Airacobras) and 1.75 million tons of food.

Compare with totals [2], check out USSR tanks production (119,583) [3]. And Lend Lease resources were not free - they had to be payed back.

The brilliance of USA move was helping others to fight their enemy. You can always replace goods but no way to replace a man. Without USSR they would loose a lot. Quite possibly there would be no USA today.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_industry_in_World_War_I...

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lend-Lease

[2] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Military_production_during_Wor...

[3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_combat_vehicle_producti...

Well, there is a reason hiring mercenaries is usually regarded as a shady proposition. But you're right, Russia and America made a good match in WW2. It's just an angle that's not often illuminated (thanks for your far better post btw) and as always in this story, it's so sad that ordinary Russians ultimately paid the price. I wish that part also was shown differently (in Russia). Russia was not a casualty, Russians were. And Russians certainly did not win this war.

"And Russians certainly did not win this war."

We most certainly did, we still exist as a nation.

If there ever was a people divorced from its nationstate, its Russia. I know the propaganda department does not allow for critical thinking on this matter, but Russians did not win, and have never really won.

That I hope will change someday.

You remind me of people in the Soviet Union brainwashed by the propaganda and confident that it is all true.

We have shook off that and got quite a cynical attitude.

I see you haven't done the same.

I don't have a hope that it will change someday.

Not sure what you mean. What I hope is a human Russian history, not dictated by what passes for government there. An honest confrontation with the past, and not a Hollywood interpretation meant to match the US and to cover up the horrors that have occurred.

What you offer ("It would be more precise to say the Russians were an American mercenary army.") by far beats the craziest Hollywood interpretations.

You ignore USSR and Bolsheviks crimes, you know better than USSR marshal about "combined efforts", you look quite brainwashed.

No, I don't.

Well, define winning. Here the looser side(s) still exists not only as a nation, but also as flourishing economy, human rights, democracy, welfare etc. Russia has only the yearly parades.

The USSR lost the Cold War.

I believe he is about wining like German population did. There was no Nuremberg trials on Soviet leaders. Millions killed but nothing.

Is this what they teach in American schools?

The idea that the US bought millions of Soviet lives is as ridiculous as it is insulting.

The Soviet people fought in an existential war, the defeat meant death in concentration camps for some, and life as slaves for others.

All the stuff the USSR got in the lend-lease, while much appreciated, is a small fraction of the resources the USSR commited to the war.

"delivered for free"

You understand that it was called "lend-lease" for a reason?

I wouldnt know what they teach Americans in school. See sibling comment for why youre wrong.

Nothing is less disrespectful than not telling the story of ordinary people, in favor of national or foreign narratives.

I know the story of the ordinary people. They are my grandparents.

I don't know in what kind of warped reality you live if you write things like 'the Russians were an American mercenary army'.