The image, which captured a pivotal moment in the war, has become firmly cemented in the history of World War II, but there is just one problem – the photo was both staged and edited. Here is the truth behind the memorable photograph of the Soviet flag being raised over the Reichstag. 

The Battle of Berlin was the last major fight of World War II, at least in Europe. The Soviet Army advanced on the German capital beginning on April 16, 1945. By April 20, the Battle of Berlin was in full swing. Although it was clear that they were already beat, the Germans put up a fierce resistance to the Soviets, who had hoped for a speedy end to the battle. In fact, this final battle of the war was also one of the bloodiest. By the end of the month, the Soviet soldiers were under even more pressure to deliver a swift victory. May 1 is International Workers’ Day, a perfect time to celebrate the defeat of the Nazis. 

The biggest target in Berlin for the Soviet Army was the Reichstag. The government building in Berlin was a large, imposing, and easily recognizable building. To the Germans, it was a symbol of their nation, much like the White House and U.S. Capitol building symbolize the American government. Such a powerful symbol was an obvious target for the Russians, even though the Reichstag had been closed for a dozen years. Built in 1894, the building was an architectural marvel of its day. But the structure was heavily damaged by a fire in 1933 and sat vacant thereafter, awaiting the repairs that were delayed by the war. Despite this, the building was the target for Soviet bombs which inflicted even more damage to the structure. 

According to reports from the time, on April 30, two Soviet bombers flew over Berlin and dropped numerous giant red banners on the city. One of the banners snagged on the dome of the Reichstag, billowing out in the wind. Since the Soviet military was known as the Red Army, it was a particularly poignant scene. There were additional reports from that day that Soviet soldiers had scaled the top of the burned-out dome to erect a flag. 

Marshall Georgy Konstantinovich Zhukov, the Minister of Defense and Marshall of the Soviet Union, heard these reports and understood that a picture is worth a thousand words. He released a statement declaring that Soviet troops were triumphant in Berlin and noted that the Soviet soldiers had hoisted a flag above the Reichstag. He sent war correspondents to capture the scene. 

When the war correspondents, with cameras in hand, made their way into Berlin on May 1, they were not greeted by the sight of a Soviet flag unfurled on the roof of the Reichstag. Instead, they were met with enemy fire. The battle was still raging. The journalists were held off by a hail of German gunfire. When the fighting stopped, a Russian soldier did, indeed, climb to the top of the Reichstag to mount a Soviet flag, but it was much too dark at this point for the reporters to get a good photograph. When dawn broke, the flag was gone. The battle had not quite ended, and some loyal Germans had removed the flag. 

Photographer Yevgeny Khaldei was determined to capture the image that Marshall Zhukov was expecting. On May 2, when things had quieted down in Berlin, Khaldei tucked a Soviet flag under his arm. Khaldei’s uncle stitched together the flag overnight using three large, red tablecloths from a bombed-out restaurant. The photographer stopped a group of passing Soviet soldiers and enlisted their help. They climbed to the Reichstag’s roof and staged the iconic photograph. As the soldiers, Aleksei Kovalev, Meliton Kantaria, Mikhail Yegorov, and Abdulkhakim Ismailov, attached the flag to the building, Khaldei snapped photos with his Leica III Rangefinder camera. Khaldei’s photograph appeared in the May 13, 1945 edition of Ogonvok magazine, and, from that point, it was spread around the globe. 

The original photograph was later doctored by Yevgeny Khaldei himself. Although Photoshop was still decades away, there were a few darkroom tricks to be done. Khaldei manipulated the image by superimposing black smoke from another image into the background of his famous picture, to give it a much more dramatic feel, as you can see in this black and white version of the colorized image at the start of this article. He later did another edit to his image after his editor at Ogonvok magazine noticed that one of the soldiers, Abdulkhakim Ismailov, looked like he was wearing two watches on one wrist. People viewing the image could assume that the soldier has looted one of the watches. This was a strict no-no for Soviet soldiers. In fact, it was a crime punishable by death. To keep Ismailov from being accused of this crime, Khaldei edited the image to remove one of the watches. Later, it was suggested that Ismailov’s second watch wasn’t a watch at all. It was a type of wearable compass called an Adrianov compass. 

The photo at the top of this story was colorized by Olga Shirnina, aka Klimbim; you can see more of her work at her Flickr page.