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On the 76th anniversary of the defeat of Japan. First parade on the liberated land

76 years ago, on August 12, 1945, the first parade of the Red Army took place in the city liberated from the Japanese invaders.
It was the Chinese Dongning in the Heilongjiang province, liberated by the soldiers of the 25th Army of the 1st Far Eastern Front on August 10. And although in Dunnin itself, according to Army Commander Ivan Chistyakov, “we have never seen such terrible poverty - dusty narrow streets, mud houses made of cardboard, people are extremely emaciated, behind the women’s backs children are tied with a cloth”, but the Dunnin fortress was considered one of the strongest Japanese fortifications in China. It is no coincidence that, as it turned out, many Japanese officers in disguise remained in Dongning. “The saboteurs were sitting in attics, in basements,” General Chistyakov recalled. - There was even such a case. Our soldier was wounded in the street. It turned out that the shooting was carried out by a woman dressed in the uniform of a Soviet officer. "
On August 12, the commander of the First Far Eastern Front, Marshal Meretskov, arrived in the city. “He gave me a number of instructions and was about to leave, when the commander of the 40th rifle division, Colonel S. G. Tsyplenkov entered the headquarters and reported that his division would now pass through Dunnin,” said Ivan Mikhailovich Chistyakov. "Would you like, comrade Marshal, to look at the soldiers who stormed the Dunnin fortified area, among whom there are many of Hasan's heroes"? Meretskov readily agreed. A few minutes later we saw a clear line of machine gunners, artillerymen, mortarmen. Orders and medals received for
skill and courage displayed on the battlefield during the storming of the Dunnin fortified area glittered on many on their chests in the rays of the bright sun. In the head of the column the banner of the 231st regiment fluttered in the wind. We all knew that under this banner the regiment was crushing the Japanese samurai on Lake Hasan. Marshal K. A. Meretskov, standing in his car, greeted the heroes of past and new battles.
Colonel S.G. Tsyplenkov explained to us that the banner of the 231st Infantry Regiment is carried by submachine gunner Sergeant Zherebtsov, who with his squad destroyed a samurai platoon and captured the bridge over the Manchugai River, ensuring the unhindered advance of our troops and equipment. At the head of the first column was Captain Bobrov's company of machine gunners. It was she who, at the height Bezymyannaya, defeated the Japanese mortar battery, the headquarters of the Japanese battalion, blew up the ammunition depot and destroyed more than a dozen enemy soldiers and officers.
Thousands of residents of the city came out to watch this kind of parade in a combat situation. I saw how their faces shone. The mass of red flags that they raised and lowered in time with the steps of our soldiers seemed to me a glow, a symbol of the new life of the working people of China, to whom we brought liberation, hope, faith in a happy future. "