Analysis


Woody Gutherie's song, Miss Palvichenko: Click me!








Propaganda

Her tour: lessons from Lyudmila

During her time in the U.S, Lyudmila Palivenchko visited schools, appeared on radio shows, and, through her translator, answered swathes of journalists. By the end of her tour, she had become an honorary graduate of University of Michigan and the first Soviet woman to visit the White House. Although Lyudmila and Eleanor's tour spoke directly to the alliance between the Soviet Union and the United States in the fight against fascism during World War II, the criticisms the sniper faced on the road prove apt for considering late 20th century concerns. A comparison between the unlikely compatriots can typify the debate between later second wave feminists and their dissenters, while an examination of Palvechenko's interviews reveals early cold war tensions as well as the blatant sexism that pervaded the American military and mainstream. As did the American public at the time, so too must we reconcile mythologic "Lady Death" with the 26-year-old human. However, unlike the contemporary media, this website endeavors to be humanizing, rather than sensational. Where news outlets voiced frustration over her inexplicably ruthless femininity, this website attempts to explore Palvechenko holistically, inserting her into a larger question of what it means to be simultaneously a woman, a political persona, and a militant advocate.

"Journalistic invention is just one element of propaganda. People need a living hero to make this more convincing" - Lyudmilla Pavlichenko

In my research on Lyudmila Pavlichenko, I was struck by the skepticism with which she was regarded. Historian Kirsten Ghodsee acknowledges that "some scholars suggest that Palvichenko was a fraud and her achievements a mere fabrication of soviet authorities." Joe Kassabian, a lay writer and podcast host, goes so far as to allege that Palvichenko may have been, if not unaware of her memoir, only vaguely consulted in its construction, a fact that military historian Martin Pegler vigorously disputes in his forward to the personal account. Of course, some of this skepticism is founded; the Soviets were no stranger to propaganda mills. Neither, it should be noted, were the Americans and the British.

However, Palvichenko's identity as a woman complicates her interaction with the media. Might her sexuality contribute to lingering doubts over her success? At the time of her tour, her femininity, or lack thereof, defined Lyudmilla, from the ways in which journalists choose to depict the young women who "looked just like any other young women" to the questions they decided to ask the female sniper. Instead of inquiring over Palvichenko's military strategy, most reporters focused on her appearance.

They asked "whether women were allowed to wear makeup on the front lines?" The response clarified that there were no rules against it, "but because of the conditions at the front, nobody bothers about it." Another commented that the long skirt in Palvichenko's uniform "made [her] look fat." Lyudmila replied that she was "proud to wear the uniform of the legendary Red Army."

In some instances, Palvichenko employed gendered language to her own ends. In a message she wrote to America before her tour, Palvichenko reminded Americans that they "only feel [war] as an incovenience–doing without gasoline [and they] do not know what it is to have… women and girls ravished by Hilterite beasts," inserting herself into a tradition that contrasts the rapacious enemy with a young girl. In another interview, Palvichenko used the authority that femininity afforded her to question American masculinity. Repeatedly addressing the journalists as "gentlemen," Palvichenko attacks the crowd: "I am 25 years old and I have killed 309 fascist occupants by now. Don't you think, gentlemen, that you have been hiding behind my back for too long?"

Socialist Feminism


"Pavlichenko in a trench," 1942. Wikepedia,accessed July 24 2025.

"Whatever we do, we are honored as individual personalities. As human beings, that is a very big word" - Lyudmila Palvichenko

In her book Red Valkyries, Kirsten Ghodsie suggests that the sniper "may have inspired the former first lady in profound and interesting ways." After touring the Soviet Union and visiting Palvichenko in 1957, Eleanor became the chair of the First Presidential Commission on the Status of Women in 1961. In her 1963 report "The American Women," Eleanor outlined reforms that "helped set the stage… for second-wave feminism." While Ghodsie correctly theorizes that Kennedy's motivation for the Commission stemmed in part from Cold War "national security" priorities, she overstates the impact that Pavlichenko had on Eleanor's activism. While their unlikely friendship surely was evidence of Eleanor's radical inclination, it was by no means an impetus for the first lady's advocacy.

Nonetheless, a comparison between the two women is valuable for examining feminism in the 20th century. According to Ghodsee, Palvichenko's presence anticipates, if tacitly, Judith Butler's notion of gender as performance and characterizes socialist feminism of the time. Socialist feminism, Ghodsee argues, was "less vexed by culturally specific ideals of masculinity and femininity." Instead of rejecting femininity altogether, Palvichenko presents an alternative, a femininity that makes room for both "maternal love and military violence." Under socialist feminism "individual choices about gender performance… mattered less than the collective political goal of killing the Nazis." In this instance, the emphasis on collective that some would posit circumscribed individual freedoms actually promotes them. Whether or not one chooses to wear makeup on the front line has little bearing on their, as Palvichenko puts it, "individual personalities."