EAST GERMAN
MOTOR RIFLES
1985-89
Is the East German
National Volksarmee’s
Motor Rifles Soldat a
skirmishable load-out?
Gadge Harvey puts
the last Prussian army
under the microscope
A
Soldat A: the airsoft perspective
038
January 2012
s the last true Prussian Army,
the East German National
Volksarmee (NVA) carried
on a proud tradition of
German military values and
saw themselves as the vanguard of world
socialism throughout the Cold War.
Indeed, the NVA can truly be said to have
stood on the front line of the Cold War. In
the event of WWIII erupting, Germany would
have become the main battlefield for the
opposing armies as the German Fulda Gap
presented the best route for the Soviet tank
armies to reach the West.
Following WWII Germany was split into
democratic West Germany and communistcontrolled East Germany. The Germans of
the Deutsche Demokratische Republik
(or DDR, as the east was known) were
uneasy and somewhat unwilling allies of the
Russians. Moscow had initially stripped the
DDR of its industry, wealth and treasures
and treated its populace equally harshly,
blaming them for the horrors of WWII. Mass
civil unrest in 1953, however, caused the
Soviets to relax controls over the DDR – and
the Kremlin soon found East Germany to be
a staunch supporter of Socialism. It became
not only the best trained and equipped
Warsaw Pact (WP) army, but also the most
politically reliable.