There is great debate over wether the legendary WWII German sniper that was sent to Stalingrad
to dispatch of Vasili Zaitzev was Konig, Thorvald, or even wether he existed at all. In fact
in the actual Soviet war records, it originally showed up as a Maj. Erwin Konig, which is
in fact a very basic and plain German Name at the time. In Vasili Zaitsev's war memoirs, he
later refers to him as Heinz Thorvald, which was yet another popular German name in that
time period. Thorvald seems to be the name that is used more now, and its confusing as to
which it was, and if they were the same person, or one was a mistake, or wether the German
Super Sniper was fabricated by the Soviet press to represent the German army, or German
snipers on a "whole", and that the story was just a means of providing morale for the Soviet
troops. The two names are on official Soviet war records, but there is no record of either
name in the German record books (not to say they couldn't have removed the name to save grace).
Any way you look at it, its confusing and debatable. Since both names appear in Soviet propaganda
and war records, Konig in early war records and Thorvald in Zaitsevs memoirs and in later
war records, I have included them both on the list until there is concrete proof that one
or the other, or both, did not exist.
In regards to Vasili Zaitsev, there is no doubt he existed, and was a very accomplished
and successful sniper.
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