Due to the participation of the three Smolensk regiments, Russians saw the battle as a victory of a Polish–Lithuanian–Russian coalition against invading Germans. Chronicler Jan Długosz praised the Smolensk banners, who fought bravely and were the only banners from the Grand Duchy of Lithuania not to retreat. In Soviet historiography, the Battle of Grunwald was styled as an ethnic struggle between Slavs and Germanics.[102] The Teutonic Knights were portrayed as the medieval forerunners of Hitler's armies, while the battle itself was seen as the medieval counterpart to the Battle of Stalingrad.[2][102]