The Dawns Here Are Quiet

In a remote outpost, a Soviet sergeant commands a small detachment of young women anti-aircraft gunners when they discover German saboteurs moving through the forest. With minimal support, the women volunteer to track and stop the infiltrators, at great personal cost. The film contrasts their youthful humanity with the brutality of war.

Soviet women served extensively in the Red Army, including in anti-aircraft units, and rear-area skirmishes with German reconnaissance and sabotage units occurred throughout the occupied and frontline Soviet territories during the war.

Based on Boris Vasilyev's novel; the specific unit and skirmish are fictional but reflect genuine roles of Soviet servicewomen.

The Luftwaffe attempted to win air superiority over southern England as a precondition for invasion. RAF Fighter Command, supported by the Dowding radar and control system, denied it.

Attacks moved from convoys and coastal radar to airfields, then in September switched to London — relieving pressure on Fighter Command at a critical moment. Invasion plans were postponed indefinitely in mid-September.

Directed by Stanislav Rostotsky

Cast: Andrei Martynov, Irina Shevchuk, Olga Ostroumova

Positioned at Spring 1942 within the World War II phase of the war, as part of the Eastern Front rear-guard actions. This is entry 65 of 150 in the chronological archive.

• Soviet servicewomen
• Eastern Front
• anti-aircraft unit
• partisan skirmish
• Vasilyev novel

• 

  Stalingrad

  September 1942 – February 1943

• 

  Stalingrad

  August 1942 – February 1943

• 

  Enemy at the Gates

  September 1942 – February 1943

• 

  The Ascent

  Winter 1942

• 

  Ivan's Childhood

  1943–1944

• 

  White Tiger

  1943–1945