Soviet airmen's membership in the Communist Party?

[Laurent Rizzotti]

I don't know about the Soviet airforce in particular, but most of the Soviet accounts of WWII insist on the fact that Soviet heroes were members of the communist Party or of the Konsomol (youth organization of the Party). Then the question is: did they only tell about communist heroes and ignore the others, did the communits behave more heroically than the others, or did hero be allowed to join the Party ? I believe that the 3 are at least partly true.

I remember reading somewhere that it was possible for soldiers to join the Party on the frontline, and that it was frequently done. My understanding is that being a Party member certainly made the life easier in USSR, and during the war this "front joining" allowed people to join that would have never had this opportunity in civilian life.

There certainly was no interdiction to join the Party for military, as in the German military forces.