When Germany invaded the Soviet Union in 1941 it coerced a number of its allies and vassals along for the ride; Hungarians, Romanians, Italian and even a handful of Spaniards turned up.
How far did the allies of the Soviets aid them, on the other side? The most famous examples I can think of are the Arctic Convoys, gun running from Britain to Murmansk and Arkhangelsk. Likewise supplies were run across Persia into southern Russia; the United States in particular supplying important materiel in the form of trucks and rations.
Were there any proposals for combat units to be sent to fight alongside the Red Army? Military advisers? What other aid was provided?
To be clear, I’m talking about aid directly into the USSR for use on the Eastern Front, what the Russians call the Great Patriotic War, not efforts aimed at defeating the Nazis in general.
There were some French air units based in Russia, IIRC. I don’t recall if they flew under a French flag (such as the Free French) or if they were a wholy-owned Russian unit (in the pattern of No. 303 Squadron and No. 71 Squadron in the RAF).
I also recall reading that later in the war, they had “Shuttle” missions, where planes would fly from Britain, bomb Germany, continue to land at bases in Russia, and then do the same on the return trip. These didn’t serve much practical purpose as nothing was keeping the planes from just flying back to England, and the Russian bases were much more poorly defended from attack.
I remember reading that Ho Chi Minh was the OSS/CIA’s best friend during and after the war, until the French decided that they wanted their old colonies back. The USA had to decide between the people who helped them defeat the Japanese and wanted independence, and their European ally.
The Chinese had all sorts of interesting gear. Lots of German stuff (the Nationalist China standard-issue rifle was a copy of the Mauser K98, in the same calibre) as a legacy from the 1930s, lots of lend-lease stuff provided by the Americans, and post-WWII, lots of Soviet stuff for obvious reasons.
Did the US and USSR cooperate in any battles in Germany at the end? Any joint missions?
The narrative seems to be only “You come from the east, we’ll come from the west”. Anything more specific? Like conferences between Ike and Zhukov? An American tank battalion joining a Soviet battle?
If memory serves, by the stage in the war at which direction ground-war cooperation was possible, relations between the USSR and the other allies had broken down so much that they could do little more than agree on places the Allies could help with airstrikes, and parcel up Europe between occupiers.
Poland directly contributed on the Eastern Front in rather large numbers; there was a Soviet controlled Polish government and army in exile as well as the one in the West, from wiki:
The armed forces, or some parts thereof, of most of Germany’s allies on the Eastern Front also fought against Germany in the end; Romania surrendered and switched sides, Bulgaria, which had not been at war with the USSR until September 1944 when the USSR declared war on it quickly capitulated and switched sides, and Finland was required to evict German forces as part of its armistice with the USSR in 1944 leading to the Lapland War.
Fitzroy Maclean was Churchill’s commando seconded to Tito’s staff during the war. The Soviets were even less involved in that front until the very end when they steamrollered in. In fact, more Yugoslavs killed each other than killed or were killed by the Germans. But when the Soviets did invade, Maclean had to hand over his car and anything else they wanted, and was lucky not to be dragged away into the Gulag.
One operation where the Western Allies and the Soviets did coordinate closer than anywhere else was when they simultaneously invaded Iran. Another was right after the war, when the British delivered the Cossacks into the Soviet’s hands.