Aliya Nurmukhambetovna Moldagulova (Russian: Алия Нурмухамбетовна Молдагулова; Kazakh: Әлия Нұрмұхамедқызы Молдағұлова, romanized: Äliia Nūrmūhamedqyzy Moldağūlova; 25 October 1925 – 14 January 1944) was a Soviet sniper in the Red Army during World War II who killed over 30 Nazi soldiers.

After dying of wounds sustained in battle on 14 January 1944, she was posthumously awarded the title Hero of the Soviet Union.

Moldagulova was born on 25 October 1925 in Bulak village (now in the Khobdinsky district of the Aktobe region, Kazakh ASSR) to Nurmukhamet Sarkulov and his wife Marzhan.

[1][2] He hastily buried his wife somewhere in the lower reaches of the Kuraili River, where his family lived at that time.

[3][4] After the death of her mother, she wandered around the village for a whole year until her uncle, Aubakir Moldagulov, took her to Alma-Ata to be raised by her grandmother.

There were eight members of the family in one room: Moldagulov, his wife, their three children, an aunt, two grandmothers and the young Moldagulova.

[5][6][3] Immediately after the attack on the USSR, the military registration and enlistment offices of the republics of Central Asia and Kazakhstan received a flood of applications from volunteers wishing to go to the front where both women and men were equally willing to defend their homelands.

[7] During the Great Patriotic War, women of the Soviet Union took a massive and active part in the armed defense of their homeland.

Many names of the women, seen as heroes of Central Asia and Kazakhstan, are captured in historical and fictional literature.

During the war, more than 1,200,000 Kazakh soldiers were drafted into the ranks of the Soviet army, and more than 20 rifle divisions and other formations were formed.

Despite the persuasions of family members, she stayed and explained this by the fact that she would defend the Motherland to the end, says Sapar Mogdagulov.

As it turned out later, Leah gave half of her meager bread ration to a small girl, with poor health, Katya.

"[5][8] In March 1942, together with the orphanage, Moldagulova left the besieged Leningrad for the village of Vyatskoye, Yaroslavl Region.

[8] On 20 March 1942, by order of the People's Commissariat of Defense of the Soviet Union, a school of sniper instructors was created under the Main Directorate of Vsevobuch.

Classes were held in this building, and the barracks where the cadets lived were set up on the territory of the former estate of the Sheremetevs in Kuskovo.

From the memoirs of N. A. Matveeva, then a student of a sniper school: "On 17 December 1942, I first met Aliya at the Rybinsk City Executive Committee.

In the sniper school, Moldagulova was awarded a personalized rifle with the inscription "From the Central Committee of the Komsomol for excellent shooting".

The battalion, along with which the snipers were walking, was supposed to cut the Novosokolniki-Dno railway in the area of the Nasva station and capture the village of Kazachikha.

At this critical moment, Aliya Moldagulova stood up to her full height and shouted: "Brothers soldiers, follow me!"

And at the call of the girl, the fighters rose ... Moldagulova three more times that day participated in repelling the enemy's counterattacks.

[9] During one of the attacks, Moldagulova, being wounded in the arm by a mine fragment, nevertheless participated in hand-to-hand combat, which began in a German trench.

At the age of 18, Moldagulova died in hand-to-hand combat on January 14, 1944, near the village of Kazachikha, Novosokolniki district.

Varshavsky, political instructor of the 4th battalion, where the sniper Aliya Moldagulov served, parts of the brigade reached the railway at the Nasva station, where they were met with strong enemy fire.

The battalion, whose actions were covered by snipers, was tasked with cutting the Novosokolniki-Dno railway in the area of Nasva station and seizing the village of Kazachikha.

According to the recollections of Moldagulova's front-line friends, frosts reached - 47 degrees (°C)[dubious – discuss] and everyone lay in the trenches.

Moldagulova was not at a loss and took everyone to the village of Kazachikha, near the town of Novosokolniki in the Kalinin (Tver) region where Soviet soldiers fought the Nazis already in hand-to-hand combat.

[11] Moldagulova died from a gunshot wound later that day after writing a letter to her sister and was buried in a mass grave in Monakovo, Pskov.

[11] The commander, Lieutenant Colonel Andrei Efimov, wrote a letter to the sniper school, from which Moldagulova graduated with honors.

At the beginning of the attack, the enemy fired artillery, mortars, and machine guns and tried to stop our soldiers.

When they formed a line and attacked the crowd, Leah took a submachine gun and opened fire, killing 28 German soldiers and officers.