U.S, Soviets Join Ranks to Honor WWII Dead : Ceremony: Ft. Rosecrans wreath-laying during historic San Diego port call brings back memories of sacrifices made by both nations.

In a serious, colorful, pageant-filled ceremony Wednesday, the commanders of the U.S. and Soviet Pacific fleets together placed a wreath at the foot of the veterans memorial at Ft. Rosecrans National Cemetery on Point Loma.

Although the rest of the week’s activities have allowed the visiting Soviet officers relaxation and socializing, Wednesday’s ceremony was a display of military formality.

Commemorating those killed in action, especially during World War II, takes on special importance for Soviet citizens, who suffered the greatest losses of that war, which they refer to as the Great Patriotic War.

Adm. Gennadij Khvatov and his U.S. Navy counterpart, Adm. Charles Larson, arrived together at the entrance to the cemetery, staring straight ahead at the monument, while soldiers and sailors from both countries lined the pathway.

Meanwhile, Soviet Seaman Marot Nurakhmedov, a member of the navy band, stood quietly behind his countrymen, waiting for the ceremony to start.

“The memory of World War II is especially important to us,” said Nurakhmedov, a lean-faced native of Tashkent.

“Events such as this are a special part of life,” he said, through an interpreter.

Before the two commanders arrived, sailors from the Soviet navy lined up across from U.S. Marines on the walkway leading from the cemetery entrance to the monument.

The Soviet sailors stood at attention in their white jerseys, resting bayonet-fixed rifles at their feet. Behind them were the Navy bands from both countries, and about 80 veterans of the 1941 attack on Pearl Harbor.

Across the passageway, 30 Marines stood raptly in their dress blue uniforms, while a Marine captain barked orders in preparation for the two admirals.

Khvatov and Larson arrived together and walked to the entrance, where the bands played each national anthem.

As the two admirals marched up the walkway, soldiers and sailors on each side snapped to attention. Together, the admirals grabbed the red and green wreath and placed it against the monument.

While the two marched past, John Romeo of San Diego thought about the day his supply ship, en route to the western Soviet port of Murmansk to deliver goods to the Red Army, was torpedoed.

“You got to take your hat off to these people,” said Romeo, a Merchant Marine veteran. “I’ve always admired them.”

After the wreath-laying, Romeo presented Khvatov with the flag of the Merchant Marines. Khvatov was moved to speak of the great impact the war had on his family, then he exchanged hugs and kisses on the cheek with Romeo.

“There’s no alternative to peace, cooperation, and friendship,” Khvatov said, through an interpreter.

“I think we are headed down that road.”

The history of the two countries came to a painful crossroads during the war, the only time U.S. and Soviet forces have fought on the same side.

Yet the U.S.S.R. suffered a loss that’s not easy for outsiders to comprehend. While both countries had about 12.5 million men and women in uniform during the war, the Soviet Union lost 7.5 million of them, contrasted with 300,000 American deaths.

Overall, 20 million to 27 million Soviet citizens died during the war, stripping the country of almost one-sixth of its population, including a large part of the Soviet youth.

That has had a great impact on the country’s citizens, who take ceremonies commemorating war dead, particularly World War II victims, with great gravity.

In fact, it is customary for Soviet newlyweds, before embarking on their honeymoon, to go to the nearest monument and lay a wreath or flowers.

“The Soviet state almost went under the wheels of the Wehrmacht,” said Benjamin Lambeth, a Soviet expert with the Rand Corp. think tank in Santa Monica.

“They will never let that memory die. They feel a certain kinship with the American fighting men who fought side by side with them,” he said.

During his travels in the Soviet Union, Soviet history professor Woodford McClellan of the University of Virginia said, he has yet to meet a family who did not lose a member during the war.

“It was an unimaginable catastrophe for the nation,” he said in a telephone interview. “They take (memorials to the war) very seriously.”

The bond forged between the two countries during the war was also remembered by the U.S. veterans who attended.

Charlie Serr of La Mesa lost three of his best friends when Japanese planes bombed Pearl Harbor, blowing up his living quarters, which, fortunately, he was not in.

“I have nothing but admiration for the suffering they had to go through,” said Serr, who served on the battleship Pennsylvania. “It was unbelievable.”

Sergey Novikov, a native of the Soviet Pacific Fleet’s home port of Vladivostok, carried the red, white and blue flag of the Soviet Navy.

After the ceremony he lingered, waiting for the rest of his countrymen to board the bus back to their ships.

“The Second World War was a great tragedy for the Russian people,” said the lieutenant. Through an interpreter, he emphasized the importance the ceremony had had for him.

Even after a long day of practicing and performing, the Soviet band director had a moment to reflect on the second day of the visit to the United States, which he said was being carefully watched back home.

“There hardly is a person in the Soviet Union who doesn’t know about this visit,” said Alexander Danilenchenko.

“Everybody in the Soviet Union hopes for better understanding and feelings toward each other to come from this.”

Even members of Greenpeace, who Tuesday had braved the early morning waters of San Diego Bay to accompany the visiting ships to port, seemed a little pacified by the ceremony.

After parking their yellow rental truck, covered with nuclear-free slogans on bedsheets, the six members were invited inside the cemetery, where they watched the ceremony alongside other non-military observers.

They stood back from the procession, taking in the ceremony while running through their political agenda with those who approached them.

Interspersed between explanations of political goals, Brian Hinman, the coordinator of the group’s Nuclear Free Seas campaign, noted, “The Cold War is dead, and the Berlin Wall has come down.”

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