LEGO Military MOCs: the Most Original Creations

LEGO has never ventured to produce sets depicting war scenes from the various conflicts of the 20th century, apart from the LEGO Star Wars or The Lord of the Rings sets.

One of the very few times we have been able to buy or see LEGO minifigures depicting soldiers from a real nation was in LEGO Indiana Jones set #7626, with minifigures representing Russian soldiers; more recently, the Indiana Jones set 77012 Fighter Plane Chase (2023) included a German fighter pilot.

I LEGO Military Diorama

While it's more common to see LEGO models of clean, tidy city centers, like the modular buildings of the LEGO Creator Expert line (now LEGO Icons), it takes at least as much skill to depict a city in the aftermath of war.

Builder Paul Rizzi created this diorama depicting the invasion of Berlin by Stalin's army in 1945. Made from around 12,000 pieces, the 1:42 scale diorama is centered on a pair of large buildings that you can tell were once richly decorated and colorful, before being bombed, most likely during intensive air raids.

Paul took care not to simply build a standard LEGO building and then partially take it apart, but rather to include some of the framing that is usually missing from a LEGO building, such as rafters and floor joists.

The large number of bricks and rubble scattered through the buildings and the street during the bombing, along with several large craters, add realistic touches that are sometimes missing from the "too clean" versions that many builders new to dioramas make.

The Soviet armored / all-terrain vehicle, a T-34/85, takes up the right half of the diorama, along with a handful of (Red Army) troops facing a small number of Wehrmacht fighters. The minifigures pass under Berlin's famous Stadtbahn railway line.

The tank recreated here in building bricks was the backbone of the USSR's armored and offensive vehicles during the 1940 / 1945 period.

I LEGO WW1 MOC

The Great War saw the arrival of combat equipment that was highly advanced for its time, such as armored vehicles and fighter planes. Many of these designs left a lasting impression, on soldiers and the public alike.

These various aircraft and armored vehicles have been recreated by fans of LEGO bricks and history, so let us show you a few of these ingenious builds!

1 LEGO WW1 Tank

Adam Grabrowski built two gorgeous little WW1 tanks, bronze and olive green Renault FT-17 tanks. This tank was first used in 1918 and revolutionized tank design at the time.

World of Tanks fans will recognize it as the first tank in the French tech tree.

Adam's design is very faithful to the original and is an excellent recreation that would deserve an official set from the Danish toy giant!

2 LEGO WW1 Plane

World War I (1914-1918) marked a turning point in military technology. Although aircraft were still a brand-new technology, military strategists were quick to recognize their advantage on the main battlefields.

The era produced legendary pilots such as the Red Baron and Eddie Rickenbacker. 100 years later, we can add Wesley and his creations, not to the ranks of the best pilots, but at least to the list of MOC builders worthy of "collector" status, with his brilliant fighter planes from the Great War.

On their own, Wesley's models give a realistic image of scale models made exclusively of bricks, but his excellent eye for photography takes things up a notch. He does a great job of staging, with believable landscapes and cloud-filled skies.

The muted colors used to present the pictures are reminiscent of the hand-tinted color photographs of the early 20th century. Wesley has built a number of planes we can admire:

• A French Army Nieuport 17 (left) and a German Army Fokker Dr.1 (right).

• A British Army Sopwith Camel.

II LEGO WW2 Plane

Didier Burtin, a MOC builder, most certainly a LEGO collector and a talented builder, designed a magnificent Supermarine Spitfire Mk. II along with a field hangar to house it. This famous fighter plane was one of the most powerful weapons in the Battle of Britain during the conflict that ravaged the country from 1940 to 1945.

There are actually two Spitfires here, one in traditional "desert brown" style camouflage, while the other wears the less common gray winter camouflage.

The concrete slabs that make up the speckled runway are actually tiles set on their sides, carefully spaced with just enough room to insert a variety of foliage and tiny green pieces, along with LEGO plants, to form the overgrown grass.

And of course, the hangar itself is beautiful, made of two gray baseplates slightly curved to form the hangar's arched roof. It's an extremely simple technique, but a very effective one visually.

The "greebling" (the technique of adding details and small LEGO elements) is effective, and the crates, barrels and equipment decorate and enhance the diorama

And as if one scene with Spitfires weren't enough, Didier also presented a diorama of a less fortunate fighter, abandoned in a snowy landscape, where it carved out an impressive trail before breaking apart.

History and the various warring nations produced plenty of odd-looking aircraft during the second major conflict of the 20th century, such as the famous P-38 Lightning.

But MOC builder Jon Hall has long been known for putting his skills to work on the odd aircraft that history never produced, designing instead his own batch of more or less strange but appealing fighter planes.

Looking like a cross between the Grumman F6F Hellcat and the Vought V-173 "Flying Pancake" (see the picture above 👆), Jon designed this wacky plane with stubby wings and a flat nose, which he named the P-65 Tomahawk.

The lines of Jon's build are crisp and elegant, this time in a two-tone navy color scheme. We can assume the short wings help with storing it.

Two of the best details have to do with airflow: first, the air intake, which features a 5×5 LEGO Technic disc behind the propeller, a piece that comes from the short-lived LEGO theme Robo Riders.

The second detail you can appreciate is the exhaust on the sides of the fuselage, a series of vents made from the shoulders of a Nexo robot.

III LEGO Military: Building Sets That Spark Creativity!

We interrupt this blog post for a short commercial break. If you love building sets and history in general, the sets in our LEGO Military collection are made for you!

Whether you want to put together dioramas showcasing the vehicles and soldiers of World War II or the armored vehicles and soldiers of the modern era, you can be sure of one thing: you'll find what you're looking for in these building sets!

IV LEGO Military Submarine

The sinking of American and British ships by German submarines was a spectacular and tragic feature of the two wars that shook the world during the first half of the 20th century.

Luis Peña recreated, at 1:50 scale, the submarine menace so dreaded by Allied sailors with the Type VIIC U-boat, the most common and most fearsome class of submarine of the Third Reich.

The vessel's lines are especially well done; it looks like a long, sleek, finless whale. It has everything you would expect from a submarine, plus a few extras made of small LEGO pieces and bricks 🧱.

Small details like the life jacket and the fire extinguisher really help bring this predator of the seas to life.

Details such as the vessel's different compartments add a playable dimension to the model, while the detailed exterior keeps that collector's feel.

IV LEGO Vietnam War

Judging by the way pop culture has portrayed the Vietnam War, you might think it consisted only of guerrilla warfare, lots of helicopters, close combat in the jungle or in rice paddies, and rock 'n' roll music, as depicted in iconic movies 🎥 such as Apocalypse Now, Platoon, Good Morning Vietnam or Full Metal Jacket.

However, the United States was simultaneously waging a high-tech war, with combat aircraft bombing targets in the North and dueling with increasingly sophisticated air defenses.

LEGO Vietnam War MOC

Peter Dorbach expertly and realistically recreated some of the main tools the North had to fight the "Yankee Air Pirates": the "Fan Song" guidance radar and a missile with its launcher. These missile systems were part of the Soviet-made S-75 "Dvina" / SA-2 "Guideline" surface-to-air system.

The comparison with the minifigures shows the size of these two builds. The missiles had two stages and could fly at 3.5 times the speed of sound (Mach 3.5). They were not especially agile and could be outmaneuvered, but that took precise timing.

Starting the evasive maneuver too early gave the missile time to compensate. Maneuver too late, and its massive warhead, with a 75 m (about 250 ft) radius, would do its job.

S-75 missiles shot down dozens of aircraft during the conflict; still, this brick recreation is faithful to the original and packed with detail.

However, we are unlikely to ever see a building kit / LEGO set like this in the LEGO Store / LEGO Shop. A surface-to-air missile may be a somewhat unusual subject for a LEGO build, but it is certainly important from a historical point of view.

The introduction of these systems completely changed the way air combat was approached.

The S-75 is famous for shooting down Francis Gary Powers's U-2 spy plane during a secret mission over Russia in 1960, and another plane was also shot down over Cuba during the Cuban Missile Crisis in 1962.

The S-75 is a typical Cold War weapon and, amazingly, it has remained in service in several countries for more than 60 years.

On that surprising note, we'll leave you, brick fans 🧱!