Rusting relics of the Cold War:
Polish Military Museum, Warsaw, Poland
CNN Interactive assigned staff from across the world to document sites and images important to the history of the Cold War. Associate Editor Aleksander Wierzejski returned home to Poland -- where, among other important landmarks, he photographed the Polish Military Museum and its collection of Soviet bloc weaponry.
Every year, an estimated 250,000 people visit this museum in downtown Warsaw. Exhibits display 400 years of military hardware. But on the museum's grounds, away from the 17th century cannons, are examples of war machines that, for the past five decades, were used to defend and uphold Polish socialism -- sometimes at the expense of Poles themselves.
The newest displays, retired from Poland's Cold War arsenal just years ago, are casualties of the collapse of the Soviet bloc -- and Warsaw's preparations to join its former military rival, NATO. Admission to the museum's grounds, and its rusting parade of Cold War weaponry, is free.
