In historical (real) pictures as well as Hollywood movies, it seems like the Soviet soldiers rarely wore helmets. In contrast, Germans and Americans are almost always wearing them.
Is this factually true? If so, is this due to materiel shortage or just different rules and customs?
Wikipedia shows that they had helmets, but not much about how prevalently they were used. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Soviet_helmets_during_World_War_II
I've started to type before comment I'm replying was deleted, don't want to waste that work :) So here it goes:
[Are] (http://i.imgur.com/U121rML.jpg) you sure about this statement (every word is clickable). Take a closer look at the last photo. It was taken in 1939 in Mongolia (Mongolian Marshal Choibalsan in the middle). Now take a look at Soviet officers and their officer caps.
SSh-40 were produced by Lysvensky Metallurgical Plant, (Southern Ural region) more than 10 million helmets were produced in 1942-1945.
SSh-39 was produced by two plants - mentioned earlier LMP and Red October plant in Stalingrad. More than 6 million produced in 1939-1941.
More than 1 million SSh-36 produced in 1937-1939, and thousands of these were shipped to Spain during Civil War.
