Most people heard of the sniper duel between Russias Vassili Zaitsev and the head of the sniper school in Berlin Major Koning.Vassili says in his memoirs that the sniper he killed under the sheet of metal was Koning and that he was a German sniper from Berlin,Marshall of the Soviet Union Vassili Chuikov even told of Vassili and the duel in his memoirs...Well Zaitsev says in his memoirs that him and his partner Nikolai Kulikov went over to Konings body and picked up Konings papers and rifle and turned them into higher ranks-no mention of taking Konings scope as a souvenier..... Heres what confuses me,right here is suposebly Konings scope,Its located in the Moscow Armed Forces Museum The text reads that this scope is Konings and that Zaitsev took it.
Could be or not. We"ll probably never know for certain, but it certainly adds to the legend to believe it is his scope. Thanks for posting.
Legend indeed. Whether it was Konig's scope would depend on if one believed he (or Thorwald) existed in the first place. Which I'm not sure I do really. Safe to say (if he existed at all) he wasn't the head of any Sniper School. Soviet Propaganda can linger as long as nazi. Cheers, Adam.
How they got word of This Koning was that a captured German soldier told them that a Major Koning has been flown in from Berlin to kill Vassili,Zaitsev and his team tracked this German sniper for about 2 weeks and eventually killed him.Was this snipers name Koning,that I believe is unknown but Zaitsev and his men always said that his name was Koning.Im guessing though that a few German snipers were flown in,I was watching a documentary on Stalingrad the other day-This is what a German vet said,A sniper was flown in to eliminate the Soviet snipers,He arived with a rifle with teloscopic sights,A General said to this sniper be careful their snipers are over there you must find a good spot to the left to kill them-He never had a chance he was killed imediatley said the German vet. The duel was nothing nearly as big as in Enemy at the gates-The duel as Zaitsev wrote it in the book was only a chapter BTW anyone know what kind of scope that is in the Photo? Cheers -sm