Progress - Toy Soldiers

I recently ran into this Soviet set at a Toy Soldier Show. Initially, the manufacturer was a mystery to me. I bought them from the Marx Man and even he did not know who made them. Luckily, one of our readers was able to point out their origin and even a site that still sells them today (check out the comments section). Apparently, these figures were made by a company in Moscow called Progress or 'Прогресс' to be more precise. It seems like they started making them close to 20 years ago. Some of the sets were made with painted faces and boots, and have been released in different types of packaging -boxed or bagged-. The set is called  "The Brest Fortress" or "Soldiers of the Great Patriotic War". In addition to these figures, it looks like Progress also produced set of knights and medieval figures as well as cowboys and indians.

Progress Soviet Infantry - Part I

These figures are closer to 60mm in size. The detail is actually rather shallow, as if they were clones of clones. I don't think that's the case though because the proportions are still fine, which is something that gets lost when figures are cloned as much as it would be required to lose as much detail. So I think they were simply sculpted this way. As far as the rest of the sculpting goes, the figures are well posed and in decent action stances, like the firing guy who is leaning forward as if firing on the move.

Progress Soviet Infantry - Part II

The flag bearer is a rather unique figure. He could be getting ready to climb the Reichstag building in Berlin. We'll just need to add the Soviet scythe and hammer to it. That might be an interesting painting challenge. I am assuming the man on the right is wounded, otherwise his pose would be a bit lame. The other two are average poses.

Progress Soviet Infantry - Part III

This is the last pose in the set. I shot him separately because I wanted to compare him to a guy from this set which I bought a couple of years back without knowing the set that it belonged to. Take a look below.

Progress Soviet Infantry - Part IV

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Ideal - Toy Soldiers

Ideal was an American Toy soldier manufacturer which was in activley in business during the 50s through the 70s. They manufactured figures in the larger scales of 60mm - 70mm and complemented well those produced by other manufacturers such as Marx and TimMee. They produced a nice range of figures, addressing many historic periods, including the US Civil War, knights, US Colonials and British, Alamo,  Pirates, Cowboys and Indians, modern frogmen, navy, firemen, race track figures, and of course, WWII GIs. They also made a a nice range of accessories, including vehicles such as, wagons and stage coaches, farm vehicles, a pirate ship, a PT boat, Tanks, jeeps, trucks, and a very cool modern cargo plane, that fits other vehicles inside. And they also produced a complementary set of 'forts' to place the figures in, like a mdieval castle, the Alamo, Frontier forts, and so on, which made for very attractive and engaging playsets. As you can see below, one peculiar aspect of their figures is that some of their sets were made without bases. I only happen to have the WWII GIs to show in this post, but if you happen to be interested in seeing more of their figures, Toy Soldier HQ does a much better job at showcasing the range that they produced.

Ideal US Infantry - Part I

These guys are actually reissued Ideal figures. The originals are harder to come by and pricier, but for me, these guys are just fine. The sculpting on these figures is quite nice for the time when they were released. As you can tell, some of them are very similar to the TimMee series 1 figures, like the prone guy on the left. I am not sure who inspired who, but I suspect, the Ideal figures came later. One distinct feature of the Ideal men is that they come without a base. They simply balance themselves on their two feet, and they do it surprisingly well.

Ideal US Infantry - Part II

Here again we see a couple of figures very similar to the TimMee guys: the ones on the far right and left. These guys BTW are closer to 60mm than they are to 54mm. In contrast with the TimMee set, they included a few figures with a bit more action and movement in them, as illustrated by the second man from the right. Even the guy with the flamethrower is leaning forward in a good action pose. 

Ideal US Infantry - Part III

Here one can recognize the kneeling rifleman and the bazooka, although the rifleman lost his sniper scope in the Ideal set. One guy who fooled me for a bit is the one sitting with his legs apart. At first glance I thought he was a recast of the Marx figure, but later on a noticed that he does have a few significant differences, one of them being that his shirt is open down to his belly button. A rather unique touch. The man on the left, appears to be manning a machine gun. Unfortunately the set did not include it. Luckily I do have one or two spare ones that I can issue to him from other sets.

Ideal US Infantry - Part IV

This picture shows three more that might have been inspired by the TimMee set. The fourth man, firing from the standing position might have been inspired by the Marx guy. In any case, Ideal set was a nice, well sculpted and detailed set, and with 16 poses, a nice contribution to the hobby. I am glad I was able to finally lay my hands on them.

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part I

I just found this set while looking for some diver figures. It represents a boat carried a manned torpedo and a diving team. It was supposedly manufactured by Ideal, although I have yet to verify the claim. Still it is a nice little set to give the other divers figures in my army a bit of support. In terms of the nationality that is represented, it is not clear to me, although we could probably designate them as Italians as they were the most active in WWII in this type of operations. 

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part II

This is the skipper. Note tha the figures have a hole in the base which allows them to be attached to the boat. This is a nice feature if you actually deploy your boat in real water, which will keep the figures from falling over. 

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part III

One of the divers about to jump in. 

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part IV

The other diver taking in the view.

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part V

This is the only figure which is actually diving. I made him 'hold on' to the side of the boat to get a better angle for the shot. 

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part VI

The manned torpedo deployed in the water, with its diver riding it into action. The lever on the front of the torpedo is actually a crank which turns and twists a rubberband which makes the propeller turn when it is released. Nice mechanism, which again shows that this set was really meant to be deployed in water. 

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part VII

Manned-torpedo rider from the back.

Ideal Manned-Torpedo Launcher with Divers - Part VIII

This shot shows the ramp from which the manned-torpedo can be launched. 

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Introducing the Danish Navy

The Danish Navy goes a long way back in time, arguably back to the Viking times, or to the times when Denmark and Norway were a single country with a powerful navy. That navy saw plenty of action during the 300+ years that the union lasted. I think however that the real founding of the Danish Navy was when Denmark and Norway went their separate ways in 1814 and Denmark became the country it is today. This caused a substantial reduction in the size of its Navy, which took multiple decades to overcome. However, by the time WWI took place, Denmark had quite a modern fleet, with armored ships powered by steam engines, although it did not see any action during this conflict as Denmark remained a neutral country. During WWII, Denmark was quickly occupied and the Navy was used by the Germans for securing its own ports and shipping lanes. The most significant moment of action during WWII took place in August of 1943, when the Danish Navy decided to 'defect'. The ships were instructed to make an escape attempt to neutral or allied ports, but few actually reached their destination. Most were were scuttled or captured. Out of the dozen or so ships that reached friendly ports, the Danish naval flotilla in exile was formed, as well as a Brigade of approximately 5000 ground troops. In terms of plastic toy soldiers representing the Danish Navy, there is only one Danish manufacturer that I am aware of and it has only produced a few poses as seen below.

Reisler Danish Navy

As you can see, Reisler was quite conservative with this set. Not just in terms of the number of poses, but the actual poses themselves. It's not just that the poses are lacking movement and action -except for the man firing on the left, although he seems to be firing a salvo- but also, why would they have made two poses that are almost the same. OK, one is marching and the other one is standing guard. The only explanation that I can think of is that they wanted to avoid fighting poses as Denmark did not get into combat in WWII, but still, there could have been more exciting non-combat poses. As far as the rest of the sculpting, the figures are reasonably well detailed and will probably look fairly decent when painted.

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Introducing the Italian Alpine Troops

The Italian Alpine Troops, or Alpini as they are actually known in Italian, are an elite infantry unit trained in mountain warfare. They were established in the late 1800s, after the unification of Italy, to defend its northern borders. The Aplini played a very important role during WWI, fighting gebirgsjaeger troops from Austria-Hungary and Germany. This was a very dangerous business. Death could come not only from bullets, grenades or shells, but also from extreme temperatures, avalanches, climbing accidents, and in some cases, from the tops of mountains being blown off. The latter was a technique to dislodge the opponent once they were well entrenched on a mountain peak. Tunnels were dug into the mountain and huge loads of explosives were used to blow off the top along with its defenders. WWII saw the Alpini fight on different theaters. Initially as mountain troops in the French Alps during the invasion of France and in the Balkans against Albania, Greece and Yugoslavia. One Alpini battalion also fought in the East Africa campaign. Later on, three Alpini divisions also fought as plain foot infantry on the Russian plains, particularly on the perimeter around Stalingrad, where out of approximately 50,000 men, only about 5,000 managed to escape the Soviet encirclement. This was in great part due to the fact that they were fighting against overwhelming numbers of mechanized infantry against which their mountain warfare skills were of little use, at the same time that they were being outflanked by the Soviets as the fronts next to the Alpini divisions collapsed. In terms of plastic toy soldiers there are a couple of Italian manufacturers who have provided us with a few representative figures. Let's take a look.

Atlantic Italian Alpine Troops - Part I

This is another set that is a bit hard to come by. What makes it special is that it has quite a few unique items in it. For instance, on the left you can see that it has what looks like a snowmobile. I don't really know if these were around at the time of WWII, so perhaps these guys represent post WWII figures. As you can see, it also comes with a small howitzer, but there don't seem to be any figures to operate it. And then there is the skier. This is perhaps my favorite pose in the set.

Atlantic Italian Alpine Troops - Part II

Here is a view from behind of the same three items. As you can see, there is a second man sitting on the snowmobile firing on the move. The tricky thing though is that he does not like to stay on his seat and there is nothing to keep him there, so if you move the snowmobile, you constantly need to reposition him.

Atlantic Italian Alpine Troops - Part III

These are the rest of the figures. The man on the right is the only 'traditional' pose. The other two are again, quite specific to the Alpine genre. There is the man sitting on the sled, which is a bit too relaxed, if you ask me, and then there is the man leading the pack mule. So all in all a nice set, but I feel that you need to combine them with some other figures to have a real fighting unit. Even combining them with more Atlantic Alpine Troop sets would not be good enough, as you need to have a few more of the traditional poses.

Dulcop WWI Italian Alpine Troops

Dulcop really gave us a sampler of troops here. We are looking at two Bersaglieri (second and the sixth from the left), two Arditi, a specialty of Italian Army which assaulted the trenches with hand grenades and long knives (first and fifth) and two Alpini (the two in the middle). While these guys are technically WWI troops, considering that Italy did not modernize their military that much during the interwar period, I think that their uniforms and weaponry could pass as WWII equipment. A nice, dynamic set by Dulcop, even if some of the poses seem a bit off balance. The officer's heard is also a bit too small. However the head gear and the facial hair in some of the figures are quite unique. A good addition to the collection.

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Introducing the French Alpine Troops

The French Alpine troops, whose actual name is Chasseurs Alpins, is an elite unit within the French Army. They were formed in the late 1800s in response to the Italian unification and the perceived threat that the Italian Alpine units represented. They were spun off from the original Chasseurs (Chasers/Hunters) units and trained in mountain and winter warfare. Their head dress is a distinctive beret, referred to as a Tarte, because of its resemblance with the baked good of that name. The beret is decorated with a yellow bulge horn -played by one of the figures in pictures below- as music seems to be an important element in their unit culture. During WWII, the Chasseurs Alpins saw some action at the beginning of the war, specifically, they were part of the Allied forces who pushed back the Germans at Narvik, until they were withdrawn once the German offensive against France began in continental Europe. They also fought defensively that summer against the Italian attacks from the southeast, on the Alpine extensions of the Maginot line, where they managed to hold their position until the armistice was signed. In terms of WWII figures, I am only aware of the ones made by Starlux. Let's take a look.

Starlux French Alpine Troops - Part I

I find this set quite nice, primarily due to its uniqueness. The figures are very well proportioned and with a decent level of detail. The only thing that I would have preferred is to have a few more action poses and fewer guys just standing around. But still it is a very nice set.

Starlux French Alpine Troops - Part II

Again, these are perhaps not the most exciting poses, however they do have a certain elegance to them which makes them feel special. The paint job could have been a bit better, although it could also be that it has deteriorated over the years.

Starlux French Alpine Troops - Part III

A couple of musicians. One of them is playing the distinctive bulge horn which is the emblem of the unit and is work on the right side of the beret.

Starlux French Alpine Troops - Part IV

These three are my favorite poses. I just wish I had more of them to build a real patrol unit.

Starlux French Alpine Troops - Part V

The same three guys from another angle.

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