The monument they describe is near my home. I’m going to pay it a visit.
I'm embarrassed a little that I knew nothing about this. That cemetery is miles from my childhood home, and I've driven past it more times than I could count. I was chatting with my brother about this and he shared the following he learned while doing a research paper in college on the matter:I believe in one of the Kruschev/Nixon exchanges, the comment was made, “at least we didn’t send troops to fight in the American Revolution “ and Nixon had no idea what he was talking about
That was a very interesting read. Thanks for sharing.In 1929, some former soldiers of the 339th regiment returned to North Russia to recover the remains of 86 comrades. Forty-five of them are now buried in White Chapel Cemetery near Detroit, surrounding a white statue of a fierce polar bear.
The Russian Civil War - and American participation in it - are an essential part of Ken Follett's Fall of Giants, the first historical novel in the Century trilogy. American participation in the Russian Civil War was related to Wilson's ambivalence about the Bolsheviks in the first place: we knew the White Russians were shit, but we weren't quite sure if the Bolsheviks were shit, and if one side or the other could be cajoled into being friendly to US interests it would help to stabilize the stalemate in Europe while also potentially providing a buffer against a newly-expansionist Japan. Unfortunately there were no good options in Russia (and the rest of the imperial powers were busy grinding each other to dust one trench at a time) so a lot of American involvement was "stand here and figure out who to shoot at." British involvement was similar but they ran out of the manpower to do it earlier.