Against the background of the growing political, societal, and military relevance of Eastern Europe, this panel introduces and discusses the emerging research field of Military History of Eastern Europe as a distinct analytical and conceptual framework. In response to current developments, the Bundeswehr Centre for Military History and Social Sciences (ZMSBw) has developed an Additional Research Perspective aimed at strengthening and systematically integrating Eastern Europe into its research agenda. This initiative reflects a broader need to rethink established disciplinary boundaries and to develop new approaches capable of addressing the complexity of war, military structures, and violence in the region. The panel is guided by the idea of analytically, methodologically, and thematically defining the field at the intersection of military history and Eastern European area studies. While military history traditionally focuses on war, armed forces, and organized violence, area studies approach Eastern Europe as a historically and culturally diverse region shaped by imperial legacies, shifting borders, and competing narratives. Bringing these two perspectives together poses conceptual challenges, as they cut across rather than complement each other in conventional academic structures. At the same time, their intersection opens up new and productive research questions. By framing Military History of Eastern Europe as a field in its own right, the panel explores how this intersection can generate innovative approaches to topics such as strategic planning of war, military cultures, experiences of war, memory and remembrance, and the societal impact of armed conflict. Particular attention is paid to methodological issues, including comparative and transnational perspectives, the use of interdisciplinary approaches, and the integration of cultural, social, and spatial analyses into military-historical research. Concretely, the panel will discuss this context by looking at three different areas of study: Cultural Studies (German perceptions of the Tsarist Russian army as potential enemy and a cultural phenomenon), the Study of the Sciences (war between ideology and science in the Soviet Union), and Memory Studies (landscapes of violence in Belarus as spaces of the remembrance of World War II). The panel also addresses the institutional dimension of this research perspective. It discusses how the concept is designed to be applicable across all research areas of the ZMSBw. Overall, the panel aims to contribute to an ongoing debate on how Eastern European area studies can be rethought in light of the war in Ukraine and Eastern Europe’s central role in contemporary conflicts and historical interpretations.

This paper examines landscape as a carrier of memory and its significance within collective remembrance, with a particular focus on the spatialization of memory. It explores how topographical, cultural, politically shaped, and virtual spaces associated with war and violence - or dedicated to their remembrance - influence memory cultures. The analysis concentrates on monuments and memorial sites located at historical places outside urban contexts. As a case study, the paper discusses the work of the renowned Belarusian architect Leonid M. Levin (1936–2014), whose architectural concepts explicitly understand landscape as a bearer of history. The temporal scope ranges from the 1960s and 1970s, when the Great Patriotic War was institutionalized as the second founding myth of the Soviet Union and Levin was commissioned to design and realize memorials and commemorative sites, to the present day. Contemporary reinterpretations and conceptual overwritings illustrate how his work continues to be recontextualized. The handling of this memorial landscape serves as an example of the instrumentalization and militarization of war memory in Belarus. The research context of this contribution brings together two central thematic fields. First, it focuses on the relationship between war and landscape. During the Second World War, space became both a resource and a target. The National Socialist ideology of Lebensraum im Osten (Living Space in the East) formed the ideological foundation for policies of conquest, displacement, and annihilation in Central and Eastern Europe. Measures such as the so-called ARLZ operations (Auflockerung, Räumung, Lähmung, Zerstörung—loosening, clearing, paralyzing, destruction) demonstrate how the systematic reshaping, exploitation, and devastation of landscapes were employed as instruments of occupation policy, linking racial-ideological objectives with military tactics. At the same time, landscape was of existential importance for the Soviet side as well, particularly forests, which functioned as spaces of refuge, survival, and military operation for partisan warfare. Second, the paper draws on memory studies and the research field of space and violence, including spatial concepts developed by Henri Lefebvre, Pierre Nora, and Karl Schlögel. From this perspective, spaces are not understood primarily as geographical or topographical locations, but as symbolic and functional reference points in which collective memory is articulated and which contribute to processes of identity formation. Landscapes, in particular, with their charged significance as historical stages and material testimonies of violence, resistance, and commemoration, can be read in this sense. Accordingly, the paper examines the interplay between military spatial practices and commemorative representations, shedding light on the correlations between landscape and memory.

This paper explores efforts to reconcile Karl Marx’s theoretical framework with established forms of military knowledge in Soviet Russia between 1927 and 1932. It focuses in particular on the military section of the Communist Academy, an institution that was explicitly charged with developing a Marxist approach to war and military science. Conceived as a space for theoretical synthesis, the section brought together professional Red Army officers, military specialists, and party officials who shared an interest in the study of war, but often differed sharply in their intellectual priorities and methodological assumptions. Although the military section existed only for a relatively short period, it was remarkably active during its lifetime. It organized regular weekly seminars that functioned as structured forums for debate, many of which were subsequently published in the form of proceedings. In addition, the section produced several edited volumes, collections of articles, and monographs that sought to establish a specifically Marxist foundation for military theory. Through these activities, it became a key institutional setting in which participants grappled with fundamental questions concerning the nature of war under capitalism, the relationship between class struggle and armed conflict, and the extent to which Marxist historical materialism could be meaningfully applied to military science. The discussions within the military section reveal a striking diversity of positions. Some contributors emphasized the primacy of ideology and class relations in shaping warfare, while others stressed the enduring relevance of operational experience, tactical principles, and technical expertise inherited from pre-revolutionary and foreign military traditions. Rather than producing a coherent or unified doctrine, the section functioned as a contested intellectual space in which competing interpretations of Marxism and military professionalism coexisted uneasily. By examining the section’s debates, publications, and institutional development, this paper highlights the complexity and heterogeneity of Soviet military thought during the late 1920s and early 1930s. In doing so, it challenges the common assumption that “operational theory” represented the universally acknowledged core innovation of Soviet military theory in this period. Instead, the paper argues that Marxist theoretical experimentation constituted an important, though ultimately marginalized, strand of Soviet military discourse. The eventual dissolution of the military section illustrates how shifting political priorities, growing ideological rigidity, and tensions between party orthodoxy and professional military expertise shaped the evolution of Soviet military thinking. Its fate underscores the contingent and contested nature of doctrinal development in the early Soviet state, at a moment when the boundaries between ideology, science, and military practice remained deeply unsettled.

"""For the period before 1914, military-historical research frequently emphasizes that heightened expectations of future war, combined with rapid technological and organizational innovations, encouraged military institutions to look systematically beyond their own borders. The accelerating pace of armaments development, changes in operational doctrine, and the growing complexity of mass armies made it increasingly difficult for any state to assess its own military capabilities in isolation. As a result, military planners and political decision-makers alike came to recognize the strategic value of closely observing foreign armed forces, not only in terms of their material strength, but also with regard to their institutional culture, command structures, and political embedding. Within this context, military officials acknowledged that effective preparation for war required comprehensive knowledge of both the domestic and foreign policy agendas of potential adversaries, as well as an informed assessment of their defense potential. Intelligence gathering thus extended far beyond the collection of quantitative data such as troop numbers or armaments production. It increasingly encompassed qualitative evaluations of leadership styles, training standards, morale, and the interaction between military institutions and broader social and political structures. These assessments were understood as indispensable for anticipating how an enemy army might perform under the stresses of modern warfare. German military attachés, military plenipotentiaries, politicians, and diplomatic envoys stationed at the Russian Tsar’s court played a central role in this process. Positioned at the intersection of diplomacy, military observation, and intelligence work, they served the German political and military leadership as informants and analysts of the Russian armed forces. Their reports were shaped not only by direct observation and personal networks within the imperial elite, but also by the broader strategic assumptions and threat perceptions prevalent within German military culture. Combining representative, consular, and intelligence functions, these actors provided Berlin with comparative and often critical assessments of the Russian military. Their analyses addressed issues such as leadership culture, combat effectiveness, tactical doctrines, and long-term development trends, while also identifying perceived structural weaknesses. These weaknesses were frequently interpreted as the result of both historical experience—particularly memories of earlier conflicts—and enduring social and political hierarchies within imperial Russia. In this sense, the image of the Russian armed forces constructed by German observers reflected not only empirical observation, but also deeply embedded assumptions about tradition, modernization, and power relations within the Tsarist state. """