There is no such thing as a war without prisoners. This truth is confirmed by centuries of history. For any warrior, captivity is shame, sorrow and hope. In the 20th century humanity has survived two global wars. During World War II, captivity became the most severe physical, psychological and moral test for millions of Soviet prisoners of war, costing most their lives.

In Russian historiography, the issues of captivity for a long time were not studied and covered in a wide range. Even based on this, the historiography of the problem of Soviet prisoners of war during the Great Patriotic War can be divided into two main stages.

The first - 1941-1945. characterized by relative closedness. During the war, only individual problems of Soviet prisoners of war were covered on the pages of the press. These include the extremely difficult conditions of their detention, the cruel treatment of them by German soldiers, and the Wehrmacht’s failure to comply with international obligations in accordance with the Hague (1907) and Geneva (1929) conventions. The domestic and foreign press published official statements and notes of the Soviet government addressed to all states with which the USSR had diplomatic relations and to the leadership of Nazi Germany. However, in these materials we do not find recommendations or demands for the world community or the governments of the anti-Hitler coalition to protect the rights of Soviet prisoners of war. There is no information about what the Soviet military-political leadership did to alleviate the fate of Soviet citizens languishing in fascist dungeons.

In the post-war period, until 1949, they tried not to talk about Soviet prisoners of war on the pages of the press. Only in the early 1950s were studies conducted by Soviet lawyers A.B. Amelina, A.I. Poltoraka, P.S. Romashkin, who examined the categories of international military law from a legal point of view, in particular such concepts as armed forces, combatants, crimes against the laws and customs of war.

The second stage - 1956-2003. began with the Resolution of the Central Committee of the CPSU and the Council of Ministers of the USSR “On eliminating the consequences of gross violations of the law in relation to former prisoners of war and members of their families” dated June 29, 1956 and the 20th Congress of the CPSU. At this time, scientific research was carried out by N.M. Lemeshchuk, V.D. Petrov, K.M. Petukhov, A.I. Poltorak, V.F. Romanovsky and others, where the issues of captivity are considered in one form or another. The problem of Soviet prisoners of war is significantly reflected in a number of collections of materials from the Nuremberg trials.

Characteristic of the second stage is the appearance of historical, documentary, artistic works, and monographs. These include the works of N.S. Alekseeva, V.I. Bondartsa, E.A. Brodsky, V.P. Galitsky, S.A. Golubkina, M.P. Devyatova, E.A. Dolmatovsky, I.G. Lupala, G.Ya. Puzerenko, P.S. Romashkina, M.I. Semiryaga and others. In the 1990s, many publications were published on the issue of military cooperation between Soviet citizens, including prisoners of war, and the Nazis. A. Kolesnik, N. Ramanichev, L. Reshin, M. Semiryaga, B. Sokolov, F. Titov and others wrote about this. A number of studies have appeared on the repatriation of former Soviet prisoners of war. These include materials prepared by V.N. Zemskov, P.M. Polyak, A.A. Shevyakov, Yu.N. Arzamaskin and others.

It should be noted that much earlier, foreign historians began to study the problem of Soviet prisoners of war. Among them are E. Andreeva, N. Bettle, A. Werth, D. Gerns, A. Dallin, S. Datner, N. Tolstoy, S. Fröhlich, I. Hoffman, W. Shirer and others.

In general, the problem under consideration is very extensive and awaits detailed research. Deepening knowledge on this issue is the task of restoring historical justice in relation to millions of compatriots who suffered a terrible fate.

With the outbreak of hostilities on the Soviet-German front, huge masses of soldiers and commanders of the Red Army were surrounded for various reasons. After fierce battles, many of them died, small groups returned to their own, some became partisans, but many of them, due to wounds, illness, lack of ammunition, fuel and provisions, were captured by the enemy. Not many surrendered voluntarily. In his study, the German historian K. Streit, citing numerous documents from the headquarters of army groups, provides data on the number of Soviet prisoners of war captured by German troops in 1941-1942. in various areas of combat operations: Bialystok-Minsk - 323 thousand, Uman - 103 thousand, Smolensk-Roslavl - 348 thousand, Gomel - 50 thousand, lake. Ilmen -18 thousand, Velikiye Luki - 30 thousand, Estonia -11 thousand, Demyansk - 35 thousand, Kyiv - 665 thousand, Luga-Leningrad - 20 thousand, Melitopol-Berdyansk - 100 thousand, Vyazma-Bryansk - 662 thousand, Kerch - 100 thousand. In total, by November 16, 1941, their number reached 2.5 million people. For six and a half months of the war - from June 22, 1941 to January 10, 1942 - according to a summary of reports from German headquarters, it amounted to 3.9 million, among them 15.2 thousand officers, or 0.4%. At the Nuremberg trial of the main Nazi war criminals, the Soviet side presented a document from the office of A. Rosenberg, which stated this figure - 3.9 million Soviet prisoners of war, of which 1.1 million remained in the camps by the beginning of 1942. Mostly Soviet soldiers were captured in 1941-1942, but it also happened later: according to the Commission under the President of the Russian Federation for the rehabilitation of victims of political repression in 1943 - 487 thousand, in 1944 - 203 thousand, in 1945 - 40.6 thousand people.

Data on the total number of Soviet prisoners of war, their mortality in the front-line zone and camps are contradictory and raise doubts among many researchers about their reliability. For example, on the pages of a number of publications you can find the following information about the number of Red Army soldiers in German captivity: 4.0-4.59 million, 5.2-5.7 million, 6.0-6.2 million. The spread of figures is explained by the lack of a unified approach to the calculation methodology and the use of archival documents.

For the most part, foreign researchers are inclined to the figure of 5.7 million. The basis for them is documents from the headquarters of the German troops. One could agree with them, but there are known facts when the German command classified male civilians (of military age) as prisoners of war.

Official domestic sources give a figure of 4.559 million people, but it does not include partisans, underground fighters, persons belonging to paramilitary formations of the People's Commissariats of Railways, Communications, Sea and River Transport, civil aviation, defense construction departments of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR and the NKVD of the USSR, personnel of the People's Commissariat militia, fighter squads and self-defense battalions of cities and regions, as well as the wounded who were in hospitals and captured by the enemy. In addition, we must not forget the fact that the personnel records in the Red Army in the first years of the war were unsatisfactorily established; information was received by the General Staff extremely irregularly.

Sometimes researchers in their calculations use a certificate from the department for prisoners of war of the Wehrmacht High Command (OKB). This document in itself is interesting, but requires additional clarification and comparison with other sources (see Table 1). In our opinion, information published in the foreign and domestic press on the number of Soviet prisoners of war cannot be fundamentally final and needs further clarification.

The question of the mortality of the soldiers and commanders of the Red Army who were in German captivity remains confusing. Here are just some data: German sources give a figure of 3.3 million dead (58% of all prisoners); The Extraordinary State Commission under the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR gives a different figure - 3.9 million people, but this number does not include those who died in Poland - 808 thousand and Germany - 340 thousand and several tens of thousands in other countries, which in total is over 5 million dead Soviet prisoners of war. There is no complete answer to this question in the review volume of the All-Russian Book of Memory, which presents the results of the efforts of many search teams dealing with this issue. For comparison, we note that out of 232 thousand British and American prisoners of war taken by the Germans in 1941-1942, 8348 people (3.5%) died before the end of the war.

A comparison of various documents allows us to conclude that there were at least 5 million Soviet prisoners of war, of whom over 3 million died.

Unfortunately, there is no consensus not only on the number of Soviet prisoners of war in Germany, but also on the number of foreign prisoners of war in the USSR. Thus, the total number of prisoners taken by the Red Army in 1941-1945, according to the report of the Chief of the General Staff, Army General A.I. Antonov to the government of the USSR, amounted to 3777.85 thousand, and taking into account those taken prisoner by surrender (1284 thousand) - 5061.85 thousand. But in the camps of the Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees of the NKVD, only 3486.85 thousand prisoners of war were taken into account, taken at the Western Theater. The deficit - 1575 thousand people - includes those liberated directly at the fronts, according to various sources, from 615.1 to 680 thousand and from 895 to 960 thousand who did not reach the camps - those who died during the evacuation stages (according to other sources, there were 753 thousand .). The statistical study “Classified as Classified...” provides the number of foreign prisoners of war for various periods of the war, and in total for 1941-1945. it amounted to 3,777,290 people (see Table 2).

According to German data, 3.2 million German soldiers, officers and generals were captured by the Soviets, of which 1,185 thousand (37.5%) died in captivity (according to Soviet sources, of the 2,389,560 people captured, more than 450 thousand died, of these, over 93 thousand are in transit camps and almost 357 thousand in camps of the Main Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees of the NKVD (GUPVI).

The variety of numerical characteristics of both Soviet and German prisoners of war indicates how difficult the problem of captivity is to study.

Numerous archival documents give every reason to believe that the tragedy of Soviet prisoners of war was predetermined long before the invasion of German troops into the territory of the Soviet Union. Their treatment was determined by Nazi ideology, according to which they were “extremely dangerous and treacherous and had completely lost the right to be treated as worthy soldiers,” therefore measures against them must be “ruthless.” As the deputy chief of the operational leadership of the Wehrmacht High Command, General W. Warlimont, noted in his testimony after the war, on March 30, 1941, Hitler stated at a meeting of senior German officials that “he will take special measures against political workers and commissars of the Red Army, as unusual prisoners of war. They will need to be transferred to special SS and SD groups that will follow the German army. Russia was not a signatory to the Geneva Convention (1929), and he had received information regarding Russian intentions to treat German prisoners, especially SS and police officers, in a manner that was far from normal. He does not at all expect his officers to understand his instructions; the only thing required of them is unquestioning obedience.” This requirement was developed in special directives, which recommended that political commissars, when captured, be immediately destroyed using weapons. As for all the other Soviet prisoners of war, each of them, according to the deputy chief of German military intelligence and counterintelligence (Abwehr) E. Lockhausen, “should have been considered a Bolshevik, and therefore he was looked at as a non-human.”

At first, captured soldiers and commanders of the Red Army were supposed to be recruited “only for the immediate needs of troops.” But this was contrary to international law, which prohibited their use in work related to military operations. Their food ration was much lower than required for basic survival. There were no instructions regarding the treatment of wounded and sick Soviet military personnel. True, one of the “commandments” (sixth) for German soldiers stipulated that “the Red Cross is inviolable. Enemy wounded must be treated humanely." At the same time, in some companies, a day or two before the invasion of German troops into the territory of the Soviet Union, the commanders gave orders: “wounded Red Army soldiers should not be bandaged, because the German army has no time to bother with the wounded.”

When starting the war against the USSR, the political and military leadership of the Third Reich viewed Soviet prisoners of war not only as people of an “inferior race”, but also as potential enemies of Germany who did not necessarily need to be treated in accordance with the requirements of international humanitarian law. And this decision was elevated to the rank of state policy.

Unlike Germany, foreign prisoners of war were treated differently in the USSR. The decisions taken by the Soviet military-political leadership largely coincided with the requirements of international humanitarian law. Not a single order, directive or verbal order called upon the soldiers and commanders of the Red Army to treat German prisoners of war mercilessly. At the same time, the ferocity of the fighting often caused a response from Soviet soldiers. However, the command suppressed all attempts to reprisal prisoners of war.

On the eve of the war and in the first days of its outbreak, the regime of military captivity in the Soviet Union was regulated primarily by the “Regulations on Prisoners of War”, instructions “On the work of the NKVD points for receiving prisoners of war” and “On the military protection of prisoner of war camps by units of the NKVD escort troops of the USSR”, adopted in 1939 Despite the heavy defeats of the Red Army and the forced retreat, when German prisoners numbered only in the hundreds, the Soviet military-political leadership still found time to address the problem of prisoners of war. On July 1, 1941, the Council of People's Commissars introduced a new “Regulation on Prisoners of War,” which guaranteed their life and safety, normal food and medical care. They retained the right to wear military uniforms, insignia, awards, personal belongings and valuables. The procedure for using prisoners was established. They were subject to regulations on labor protection, working hours and other legislative acts that applied to Soviet citizens performing the same tasks. Criminal and administrative liability of prisoners of war was provided for.

In development of the “Regulations on Prisoners of War,” the Council of People's Commissars, the State Defense Committee, the leadership of the Red Army, the NKVD and other departments during the war adopted hundreds of documents regulating the regime of military captivity. These primarily include the instruction “On the procedure for keeping and recording prisoners of war in NKVD camps” dated August 7, 1941, “Regulations on NKVD distribution camps for prisoners of war” and the temporary “Regulations on NKVD points for receiving prisoners of war” dated June 5 1942 In connection with the massive influx of prisoners of war, an order was issued by the People's Commissar of Defense “On streamlining the work of evacuating prisoners of war from the front” dated January 2, 1943. In addition, Art. 29 “Regulations on military crimes” and the requirements of the Field Manual of the Red Army. They outlined the responsibilities of officials for working with foreign prisoners of war and the responsibility of Soviet military personnel for their mistreatment (punishment - imprisonment without strict isolation for up to three years).

In a statement dated April 27, 1942, the Soviet government, condemning Germany’s cruel policy towards Soviet prisoners of war, assured the world community that it did not intend “even in these circumstances to take retaliatory measures against German prisoners of war.” It should be noted that the Soviet leadership paid special attention to the issues of their nutrition, medical care and everyday life. Thus, according to the telegram of the General Staff of the Red Army dated June 26, 1941 and the instructions of the Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees of the NKVD dated June 29, 1941, the following nutritional standards were established for them: rye bread - 600 g, various cereals - 90 g, meat - 40 g, fish and herring - 120 g, potatoes and vegetables - 600 g, sugar - 20 g per day per person. True, this ration contained only about 2000 calories, which was clearly not enough, especially for people doing physical work. In this regard, the food standards for prisoners of war were revised several times in the direction of increasing rations (resolutions of the Council of NGOs of the USSR dated June 30 and August 6, 1941, November 24, 1942 and the State Defense Committee dated April 5, 1943 and October 14, 1944 .). Beginning in 1943, nutritional standards were provided for generals, officers, those hospitalized, those suffering from dystrophy, and those engaged in heavy physical labor. However, it cannot be denied that due to economic difficulties in the country and the massive influx of prisoners, they did not always receive the established norms.

Often, Soviet soldiers shared this with prisoners; what they had. This is how the former commander of the 21st Army, Colonel General I.M., describes in his book “Serving the Fatherland”. Chistyakov about the attitude of Soviet military personnel towards prisoners of war captured at Stalingrad:

“We had more than twenty thousand prisoners. When we were preparing the operation, we counted on five thousand. We built a camp based on this number and prepared food. And when so many prisoners arrived, in five or six days all the food supplies were eaten. For several days we had to take food from the army reserve. How many times these days have I observed such pictures: our soldier takes out a pouch to light a cigarette and immediately offers it to the prisoner. Or bread. There is half a pound, he will break off half and give it away... The wounded who were captured were immediately provided with medical assistance. Near Gumrak we occupied territory where there were many German hospitals with wounded German soldiers and officers. I, like other commanders, immediately ordered the necessary amount of medicines and food to be allocated for these hospitals, and our medical personnel to be sent.”

Indeed, in the USSR, considerable attention was paid to the medical and sanitary provision of prisoners. For example, in the “Regulations on Prisoners of War” dated July 1, 1941, it was determined that “prisoners of war are treated in medical and sanitary terms on the same basis as military personnel of the Red Army.” The Field Manual of the Red Army stated that “wounded and sick prisoners of war in need of medical care and hospitalization must be immediately sent by the unit command to the nearest hospital.” More details about the medical and sanitary provision of prisoners of war in the rear were discussed in the NKVD orders of January 2, March 6 and 16, October 6, 1943 and March 22, 1944. All these orders are permeated with care for the wounded and sick prisoners of war. There is evidence that during the period from October 1944 to July 1945 alone, 335,698 prisoners passed through front-line hospitals and were provided with qualified medical care.

At the same time, the situation cannot be idealized. The life of foreign prisoners of war in Soviet camps was far from easy: there were unfavorable living conditions, hard work, and many continued to be here for a long time after the war. In general, we can conclude that in the conditions in which the country was located, it was impossible to do more than what was done for foreign prisoners of war in the USSR.

table 2
Number of foreign prisoners of war captured by the Red Army on the Soviet-German front from June 22, 1941 to May 8, 1945.

As for the fate of the soldiers and commanders of the Red Army captured by the enemy, it developed differently. A German soldier, without bearing any legal responsibility, could have shot each of them in a state of anger, for the sake of entertainment, and unwillingness to be escorted to the assembly point. Numerous studies confirm that unjustified killings of unarmed, surrendered soldiers took place not only in the first hours and days of the war, but also later. German generals and officers had ambivalent attitudes towards this. Some initiated atrocities, others remained silent, and only a few called for humanity.

The first days, weeks and months of captivity were difficult and, for many servicemen, fatal. They were initially sent to divisional collection points, from where they were sent to “dulags” (transit camps), where they were filtered based on nationality, profession, and degree of loyalty. Then privates and junior commanders were sent to "stalags", and officers to special camps - "oflags". Prisoners of war could be transferred from Stalags and Oflags to concentration and work camps. During the period of the greatest number of prisoners of war, there were about 2,670 prisoner of war camps in the territory of the Reichskommissariats Ostland, Ukraine, the Polish General Government, Austria, Czechoslovakia, Germany, Norway, Finland and Romania. Later, work teams from prisoners were scattered throughout almost all of occupied Europe.

The evacuation of Soviet prisoners of war was difficult, especially in the first and last years of the war. Since equipment for evacuating prisoners was rarely used, the main form of movement was on foot in columns. March evacuation was organized along special routes, usually far from populated areas, off-road and in open areas. Their length reached from several tens to several hundred kilometers. Transitions lasted up to 4 weeks. The daily march was sometimes up to 40 km, and the columns contained wounded, sick and exhausted prisoners. These marches were often called “death marches.”

From archival documents, periodicals and eyewitness accounts, it is known that during the evacuation there was arbitrariness, mockery, which turned into atrocity. One of the eyewitnesses of the Crimean tragedy (1942) spoke fully and clearly on this matter: “The ground was watered with blood and strewn with the corpses of those who died and were killed along the route of the columns of prisoners of war.”

Transport of prisoners of war to the rear was carried out by rail on open platforms and in closed freight cars. They, like cattle, were herded into a carriage of 80-100 people (with a capacity of 40-50). The carriages were not equipped with bunks, stoves, drinking water tanks, washbasins or latrines. Along the way, as a rule, they were fed very rarely; more often than not, people remained hungry for 3 to 5 days. In the summer, the prisoners suffocated from the heat and lack of oxygen, and in the winter they froze from the cold. The trains that arrived at the destination station contained dozens and hundreds of dead, and at the station. Bridge (Latvia) in one train, which was followed by 1,500 Soviet prisoners of war, it was discovered that not a single one was alive in its carriages. In a number of cases, the German command used trains with prisoners of war as “human shields” to cover especially important cargo.

Changes in improving the transportation of prisoners of war occurred only after the publication of the OKB order of December 8, 1941 and the “Instructions on the evacuation of newly arriving prisoners of war.” These two documents were largely declarative in nature. However, prisoners began to be saved for use at work.

During the final stage of the war, during the evacuation of prisoners of war into the interior of Germany, many of them died due to ill-treatment. According to the Polish historian S. Datner, the total figure of “loss during transportation” is approximately 200-250 thousand Soviet prisoners of war.

Having covered hundreds and sometimes thousands of kilometers, the survivors arrived at permanent prisoner of war camps, where new trials awaited them. Life here largely depended on the actions of the guards. It was mainly carried by Wehrmacht soldiers, although sometimes proven “in practice” volunteers from the peoples of the Soviet Union were involved. In the concentration camps, SS troops were responsible for security. When prisoners of war were used for various jobs outside the camp, as a rule, one guard was allocated for every 10 people. In practice, the guards were guided by regulations, orders, directives (in the form of memos and instructions) of the German command. These documents stated that the Bolshevik soldier had lost the right to be treated as a true soldier; at the slightest sign of disobedience, in case of active and passive resistance, force should be used; when prisoners of war attack guards, crowds gather, if they persist, if they refuse to carry out orders, commands and work to overcome resistance, after the use of a butt and bayonet to no avail, open fire. Often the guards, not understanding what was happening among the prisoners of war, fired from automatic weapons, threw grenades into the crowd of people, and sometimes, for the sake of entertainment, killed them without reason.

The prisoner of war camps created by the Germans did not comply with established international conventions and norms. In the first year of the war, prisoners were most often located in the field and fenced with wire. Sometimes they were placed in stockyards, warehouses, farms, stadiums, broken down barracks and churches. In cold weather, in some camps they spent the night in holes dug in the ground. And only with the increased need in Germany for labor since 1942, the situation of the survivors improved somewhat, they began to be transferred to unheated barracks with bunks, and the food ration was increased to 2540 calories.

Numerous archival documents and testimonies indicate that hundreds of thousands of Soviet prisoners of war were subjected to the most terrible test - hunger. German Colonel Marshall, who inspected the “dulags” of Army Group Center, admitted in his reports that the prisoners’ diet was abnormal - 150 g of bread and 50 g of dry millet per day per person. This diet had a maximum of 200 to 700 calories, which was less than half the vital requirement. The situation was similar in the camps of other army groups. The famine that broke out in late 1941 and early 1942 in German prisoner-of-war camps forced people to eat grass, dry leaves, tree bark, carrion, and resort to humiliation, betrayal, and even cannibalism.

Particularly difficult conditions developed in the camps of Smolensk, Kaunas, as well as those located in close proximity to Biała Podlaska, Bobruisk, Ivan Gorod, Kielce, Ostrow Mazowiecki and other settlements. In only one camp in Ostrow Mazowiecki in the fall of 1941, the mortality rate of prisoners of war reached up to 1000 people per day. Based on these German documents, from the beginning of the war until the summer of 1942, about 6 thousand Soviet prisoners of war died every day. On December 14, 1941, the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories A. Rosenberg reported to Hitler that in the camps in Ukraine “up to 2,500 prisoners die every day as a result of exhaustion.”

There was no organized medical support for wounded soldiers and commanders of the Red Army captured by German troops. As a rule, assistance was received by those who could be used in the future in Germany. For example, the seriously wounded captured commander of the 19th Army, Lieutenant General M.F. Lukin, in the hope of cooperation with the German authorities, had his right leg amputated above the knee. But not everyone did this. Archival documents and memoirs of former prisoners of war provide numerous facts of wounded soldiers being killed, burned, tortured, stars cut out on their bodies, gassed, drowned in the sea, and grenades thrown at the premises where the unfortunates were located.

Over time, the German authorities created infirmary camps. However, the wounded prisoners of war did not receive proper medical care there. Patients with festering wounds lay for days without dressings on bare, ice-crusted ground, concrete, dirty bunks or straw. Soviet doctors brought in by the Germans helped the martyrs in every possible way. But in most hospitals there were no medicines, dressings, or necessary tools. Military doctor 3rd rank A.P. Rosenberg from the medical battalion of the 177th Infantry Division testified that Soviet doctors performed amputations of the limbs of wounded prisoners of war with a chisel, hammer and hacksaw. After such operations, many developed blood poisoning and died. And only in the last years of the war in a number of camps, especially on the territory of the Reich, medical care was provided more efficiently.

An objective assessment of the conditions of detention of Soviet prisoners of war in the first year of the war was given by the Reich Minister for the Occupied Eastern Territories A. Rosenberg in his letter to the Chief of Staff of the OKB, Field Marshal W. Keitel dated February 28, 1942. Here are some fragments of this letter:

“The fate of Soviet prisoners of war in Germany was a tragedy of enormous proportions. Of the 3.6 million prisoners of war, only a few hundred thousand are currently fully functional. Most of them died from hunger or cold. Thousands died from typhus. It goes without saying that supplying such a mass of prisoners of war with food encounters great difficulties. Nevertheless, with a clear understanding of the goals pursued by German policy, the death of people on the described scale could have been avoided... in many cases, when prisoners of war could not march due to hunger and exhaustion, they were shot in front of the horrified civilian population, and their corpses remained abandoned. In numerous camps, no care was taken at all to build premises for prisoners of war. In the rain and snow they were in the open air. One could hear reasoning: “The more prisoners die, the better for us.”

One would not suspect the Imperial Minister of sympathy for Soviet prisoners of war. But he made an interesting admission.

Captivity is the worst thing that could happen in the life of a military man. Captivity is bondage: wire, restrictions and deprivations. In extremely difficult physical and psychological conditions for humans, even very strong characters broke down. Unfortunately, we know very little about how Soviet prisoners of war behaved under these conditions, since for many years only official assessments of historical events and people’s actions were recognized. From the point of view of state ideology, they were assessed either positively or negatively.

Once captured, people found themselves in conditions unusual for everyday life (hunger, bullying, mass executions, mountains of corpses). And their views and behavior could change. Therefore, there can be no adequate assessment of the behavior of prisoners. It depended on the human psyche, surrounding circumstances, as well as the legal framework that determined the position of the prisoners.

From the stories of people who went through fascist camps, from numerous sources it is known that captivity for many soldiers and commanders turned out to be a terrible ordeal. It should be recognized that not every person could calmly endure hunger, cold, bullying and the death of comrades. After what they saw and experienced, people were subjected to psychological stress. Thus, Academician I.N. Burdenko, who saw the released prisoners, described them as follows:

“The pictures that I saw are beyond all imagination. The joy at the sight of the liberated people was darkened by the numbness on their faces. This circumstance made me think - what's the matter? Obviously, the suffering experienced equated life and death. I observed these people for three days, bandaged them, evacuated them - the psychological stupor did not change. Something similar was on the faces of the doctors in the first days.”

And it is not surprising that some of the prisoners, unable to withstand the tests, went to certain death, to suicide. For example, as follows from the testimony of the commandant of the Sachsenhausen concentration camp, SS Colonel Kaindl, and the commander of the SS security battalion Wegner, who had been in captivity since July 1941, the son of I.V. Stalin's senior lieutenant Yakov Dzhugashvili at the end of 1943 could not bear the psychological stress that had developed around him and threw himself at a high-voltage wire fence, as a result of which he died.

The difficult conditions of camp life, strict isolation from the outside world, and active propaganda work among prisoners of war significantly influenced the suppression of the spirit and dignity of people, causing a feeling of hopelessness. Many, as a result of what they saw and experienced, succumbing to enemy propaganda, human emotions, various promises and threats, broke down and took the path of cooperation with the enemy, thereby saving their lives, but at the same time moving into the category of traitors to the Motherland. These include generals I.A. Blagoveshchensky, A.A. Vlasova, D.E. Zakutny, V.F. Malyshkina, M.B. Salikhova, B.S. Richter, F.I. Trukhin, brigade commissar G.N. Zhilenkova. The ranks of traitors included not only some generals of the Red Army, but also a number of officers and privates. A significant number of prisoners of war adapted to camp life and took a wait-and-see attitude.

At the same time, there were also those in the camp who had strong nerves and enormous willpower. It was around them that like-minded people grouped. They escaped, sabotaged production and committed sabotage, provided assistance to those in need, believed in Victory and the opportunity to survive. Among them are generals Kh.N. Alaverdov, A.S. Zotov, D.M. Karbyshev, P.G. Makarov, I.S. Nikitin, S.Ya. Ogurtsov, M.A. Romanov, N.M. Starostin, S.A. Tkachenko, I.M. Shepetov, officers K.A. Kartsev, N.F. Küng, Ivanov, Shamshiev, V. Bukreev, I. Kondakov, A.N. Pirogov and many others.

Thus, heroism and honesty, cowardice and betrayal were sometimes very close, in the same camp, on the same bunks, and sometimes in the same person.

The defeat of German troops near Moscow, huge losses at the front, and Germany's great need for soldiers and labor pushed its military-political leadership to radically change its attitude towards Soviet prisoners of war. After much hesitation, Hitler allowed their use on the territory of the Reich. From that time on, the food of the prisoners was improved, and they were given bonuses in food and money for conscientious work. Carrying out the instructions of the Fuhrer, the General Commissioner for the Four-Year Plan, Reichsmarschall G. Goering, specified the procedure for the treatment of Russians and their employment, and by the end of 1941 various services prepared a number of relevant documents. From this time on, “the fair treatment of prisoners of war and their use as labor” was recognized as a “highest principle.” The process of destroying the “undesirables” was stopped; their lives were extended, but only for a short time. They were sent to work that required great physical strength. After several months of intensive exploitation, many prisoners could not stand it and died from exhaustion. The provision on the elimination of infectious patients and disabled people as unnecessary consumers remained in force.

The use of Soviet prisoners of war in the coal industry, construction, railways, military industry and agriculture became widespread. It is reliably known that in Germany they worked in various sectors of the economy: in 1942 - 487 thousand, 1943 - 500 thousand, 1944 -765 thousand, 1945 - 750 thousand. This does not include the dead and deceased. In total, in 1944, 8 million foreigners worked in the German economy, of which 6 million were civilian workers and 2 million prisoners of war from various states, and together with concentration camp prisoners (500 thousand) and prison prisoners (170 thousand) about 9 million people . In total, during the entire period of World War II, about 14 million foreign workers and prisoners of war were deported to the Reich.

The working conditions of Soviet prisoners of war were extremely difficult. Their working hours lasted from 12 to 14 hours a day, often in two shifts and without a lunch break. Many worked in mines and other enterprises located underground, where there was a lack of light, clean air, and high humidity prevailed. Security measures were not followed. Medical support, if there was any, was at a primitive level. All this led to high morbidity and mortality. In the coal industry alone, the losses of Soviet prisoners of war amounted to 5 thousand people per month, or 3.3% of the total number of workers; in the Upper Silesian industrial region, more than 25% of them died in 6 months. A similar picture was observed in other sectors of the economy.

By exploiting prisoners of war, German entrepreneurs sought to achieve maximum productivity from them at minimal cost. At first, the prisoners did not receive any payment for their work, but at the end of 1942 they began to receive meager money: for the Soviets - from 0.10 to 0.60, and for foreign ones - from 0.20 to 1.20 German marks and 40 pieces cigarettes per month. In general, it can be noted that without the use of foreign labor and imported raw materials on a large scale, Germany would not have been able to wage war for such a long time.

It is known that from the first months of the war, the German military leadership practiced the use of Soviet prisoners of war not only as labor, but also as part of the military formations of the Wehrmacht, SS and police. According to foreign researchers, there were 1-1.7 million citizens of the USSR, according to domestic estimates - from 0.2 to 1.5 million. However, the method for identifying these figures is not scientifically justified and they are not documented, which raises doubts about their reliability.

Various sources allow us to identify two main forms of Germany’s use of prisoners of war in the Wehrmacht. These included the “hiwis” (“those who want to help”), who, as a rule, were not armed, and the “volunteers” - combat units of the eastern troops. The creation of this kind of military formations from among Soviet prisoners of war was a direct violation of international law. Moreover, it should be noted that if in the first years of the war this was done because of the large losses of the Germans, then later it was carried out for political reasons.

The largest group were the “Khiwis,” whose presence in German units has been noted since the end of July 1941. They were recruited primarily from prisoners of war and defectors of exclusively Slavic origin. Often they included civilians from the occupied territory. Depending on where the troops were located, unarmed prisoners were used on the front line or in the rear as drivers, sleds, orderlies, kitchen help, carriers of weapons and ammunition, in mine clearance, and in the construction of defense lines, roads, bridges and airfields. Another way to say it is that they did any work that German soldiers had to do. The Khiwi also included women who performed medical and economic functions.

The position of the “Khiwis” changed from illegal, when they were hidden from high authorities, to official inclusion in the division or regiment. The head of the second section of the administrative department of the OKH General Staff, Count K. von Staufenberg, played a significant role in resolving the situation of the Hiwis. He was the first to issue an order on the OKH (August 1942), which established uniform standards for food, maintenance and other aspects of the Hiwi service. Colonel Freitag-Loringhofen prepared the “Charter 5000”, according to which all “Hiwis”, after taking the oath, were enrolled in the unit and equated to German soldiers. Subsequently, this charter was extended to volunteer formations.

Huge human losses at the front pushed the German command to use the Hivi on a significant scale. By April 1942, there were about 200 thousand of them in the Wehrmacht ground forces, in February 1943 - up to 400 thousand. They made up a significant percentage of the regular strength of units, units and formations. Thus, the 134th Infantry Division at the end of 1942 consisted of 50% Hiwis, and in the Reich Panzer Division in the summer of 1943, some companies of 180 people had up to 80% Hiwis. According to the new states, October 1943 in a German infantry division of 12,713 people it was planned to have 2005 Hiwis, i.e. about 16% In the 6th Army of F. Paulus, surrounded in Stalingrad, there were 51,780 Russian auxiliary personnel. In addition to infantry and tank units, Hiwis were used in the navy - 15 thousand and in the Air Force - from 50 to 60 thousand ( as of July 1944), a total of about 700 thousand people

The second large group of volunteers were combat units. Their formation was sanctioned by Hitler, and it began in the winter of 1941/42. Preference was first given to representatives of national minorities of the Soviet Union - Central Asian, Caucasian nationalities, as well as the peoples of the Volga region, the Urals and Crimea who professed Islam. At the beginning of 1942, units of Armenians and Georgians began to form. The center of their formation was Poland and Ukraine, where the largest number of prisoner of war camps were located. The basis was made up of infantry battalions numbering 800-1000 people, including 40 German officers and junior commanders. Battalions were united into legions based on nationality. By relying on prisoners of war of non-Russian nationality, the fascist German leadership thereby sought to incite discord among the peoples of the Soviet Union.

During the entire period of the war, according to the German historian I. Hoffmann, the German army had 90 battalions, of which 26 Turkestan (20.5 thousand people), 15 Azerbaijani (36.6 thousand), 13 Georgian (19 thousand) , 12 Armenian (7 thousand), 9 North Caucasian (15 thousand), 8 battalions of Crimean Tatars (10 thousand), 7 battalions of Volga Tatars and other peoples of the Volga region and the Urals (12.5 thousand people). In 1942, the Kalmyk cavalry corps (5 thousand people) was formed in the zone of operation of Army Group A.

Along with combat units, the Wehrmacht had 11 personnel battalions, which served as the basis for the formation of marching reinforcements, as well as 15 reserve, construction and transport battalions and 202 separate companies (111 Turkestan, 30 Georgian, 22 Armenian, 21 Azerbaijani, 15 Tatar and 3 North Caucasian ) The 162nd (Turkic) Infantry Division was partially staffed by these units. Thus, the total number of military formations from the Turkic and Caucasian nationalities reached about 150 thousand. Most of them were Soviet prisoners of war.

From prisoners and representatives of the local population of Slavic origin, the command of the German troops at the fronts formed Russian national units and formations. Officially, their creation began in the fall of 1941. At first these were Cossack hundreds. Along with the Cossacks, they included prisoners of war - Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians. By the end of 1941, each of the nine security divisions located in the east had one Cossack hundred. In 1942, Cossack regiments appeared - from the local population of the Kuban, Don, Terek, and by April 1943, about 20 Cossack regiments (battalions) numbering from 400 to 1000 people, as well as many Cossack hundreds and squadrons, were already operating on the Eastern Front.

In May 1943, 90 Russian battalions operated on the side of the German armed forces. By mid-1944, the Wehrmacht command had at its disposal 200 infantry battalions formed from Russians, Ukrainians, Belarusians and representatives of other nationalities.

Along with the "Khiwi" and armed volunteers, Soviet prisoners of war, after recruitment in the camps, were enlisted in the Russian People's Liberation Army (RNLA), the Russian National People's Army (RNNA), the 15th Cossack Cavalry Corps of General G. von Pannwitz, the Cossack camp of General T .N. Dumanov, 1st Cossack Corps of General A.V. Skorodumov, Cossack group (brigade) of General A.V. Turkul and from the end of 1944 - into the Russian Liberation Army (ROA) of General A.A. Vlasova.

Since January 1943, K. Staufenberg’s department in the OKH created independent control of the “eastern” troops, led by Lieutenant General G. Helmich. He was in charge of volunteer formations of various national compositions, “hiwis”, national battalions, eastern legions, and police units.

Battalions and regiments were formed from local residents of the Baltic states, Belarus, and Ukraine, which were subsequently united into formations. To raise their prestige, they were given SS titles. They included soldiers and commanders of the Red Army who had been in German captivity and were released from it, as well as deserters who remained in the occupied part of the territory of the USSR. By mid-1943, the SS troops included: 14th (1st Ukrainian), 15th (1st Latvian), 19th (2nd Latvian) and 20th (Estonian) divisions. In 1944, the 29th and 30th (1st and 2nd Russian) and 30th Belarusian cavalry divisions were created. In addition to the listed formations, prisoners of war were replenished with special teams, SS detachments, Sonderkommando "Shamil", Sonderstab "Caucasus", brigade "North Caucasus", special unit "Bergman", Sonderdetachment 203 and others.

Soviet prisoners of war were trained in German reconnaissance, sabotage, and propaganda schools, after which they were sent behind the front line.

On the territory of the Reichskommissariats Ostland (Baltic republics and Belarus) and Ukraine, the German occupation authorities created an extensive network of police forces. According to German sources, by May 1943, in the occupied part of the USSR, there were about 70 thousand Soviet citizens serving in the auxiliary police of the military administration, and about 300 thousand in police teams (gemma, odi, noise). A significant part of the police were former soldiers of the Red Army. It should be noted that police formations were included in border regiments (in the Baltic states), in the Belarusian Self-Defense Corps (BCS), in the Ukrainian Insurgent Army (UPA), in military units of the Wehrmacht and SS.

The military and police formations created by the German authorities from Soviet prisoners and civilians were constantly changing. The same people served at different times in the police, national formations of the Wehrmacht and the SS. In this regard, the spread of figures for the total number of citizens who collaborated with the German authorities requires a more in-depth study. A number of statements that Soviet citizens, who collaborated with the Germans in one form or another, did so consciously, out of political convictions, are far from historical realities. The main motives that influenced the decision of prisoners of war to serve in German formations were salvation from hunger and atrocities committed by the Germans in the camps, the fear of being shot, and some cherished the hope of escaping to the partisans or crossing the front line at the first opportunity, which often happened. Thus, in the summer of 1943, most of the military personnel of the SS “Druzhina” brigade, led by the commander, former chief of staff of the 229th Infantry Division, Lieutenant Colonel of the Red Army V.V., went over to the side of the partisans. Gil-Rodionov. It is impossible to deny the fact that some prisoners of war, especially defectors, served the Germans out of conviction. Various kinds of volunteers were sent to fight against the Red Army, against the armies of the allies in the anti-Hitler coalition, as well as against partisans and detachments of the European Resistance.

Soviet prisoners of war were widely recruited by the Nazi government not only to perform various works and military service as part of the Wehrmacht, SS troops and police, but also as material for medical experiments. The decision to conduct them on a mass scale, mainly for the needs of the war, was approved at a meeting at the Research Institute of Hygiene of the SS Troops in the second half of 1941. The place for this was special laboratories, located mainly in concentration camps. Thus, at the end of 1941 in Dachau, German doctors used prisoners of war as “guinea pigs” in the interests of the navy and air force. They were subjected to freezing, hypothermia and testing the effect of high altitudes on the human body. In Auschwitz, 500 Soviet prisoners of war were exposed to the Zyklon B gas. New drugs were tested on prisoners of war, the possible life expectancy of a person without water and food was determined, surgical experiments were carried out on bones, nerves and muscle tissues, an ointment was tested for the treatment of phosphorus burns, the effect of phenol injections, bullets poisoned with acotine, mustard gas and phosgene was studied. Skin and internal organ transplants were practiced. Other experiments were also carried out. All prisoners who were subjected to various kinds of medical experiments, as a rule, died or were destroyed as unnecessary witnesses.

Despite the cruelty and violence on the part of the German authorities, most of the prisoners did not want to accept their fate. They united in groups, organizations, and sometimes fought the enemy alone. This did not happen right away. At first, even very brave people could not imagine how you could fight when the enemy was armed, and you had not only weapons, but also strength. “What the hell is the fight here, Mikhail Ivanovich! - said Eremeev, the hero of one of the works dedicated to the struggle of prisoners of war. - These are all beautiful words, nothing more. Everyone here is fighting for themselves, for their lives, that’s all... they hit each other in the face over a potato. We are dying gradually, from day to day, and you say to fight!.. It would be better to immediately perish from a German bullet.” Over time, the prisoners began to understand that saving their lives was in the fight, and only together could they survive.

In the first year of the war, underground groups of prisoners of war operated in camps located on the territory of Ukraine in Vladimir-Volynsk, Bogun, Adabazh, Slavuta, Shepetovka, near Chernigov, Dnepropetrovsk and Kiev. Over time, similar groups formed in camps located in parts of the occupied territory of the Russian Federation, Belarus, the Polish General Government, in the Reich and some European states occupied by Germany.

Resistance reached its greatest scale in concentration camps, where prisoners inevitably faced death; the only question was time. Various sources testify to the heroic resistance of Soviet people in the fascist concentration camps of Buchenwald, Dachau, Sachsenhausen, Mauthausen, Flessenburg, Auschwitz, Mittelbau, Dora, Neuengamme, Ravensbrück and others, since the most active and politically dangerous prisoners for the Nazis were ultimately concentrated in them.

There are cases when Soviet underground organizations, with assistance from international anti-fascist committees, covered a significant part of the prisoners with their influence. For example, the Fraternal Cooperation of Prisoners of War (BCW) organization, created in 1942, had its people in all prisoner of war camps and in 20 eastern labor camps located in Bavaria. It consisted of several thousand united and partially armed people. This allowed them to wage an organized fight. However, not all of the plans were achieved. The reason for this was the mass arrests and executions carried out by the Gestapo in the fall of 1944.

The “Central Committee of Soviet Prisoners of War”, formed in France at the end of 1943, had a huge influence on the activation of the resistance of Soviet prisoners of war. In a short time, members of the Central Committee were able to create underground organizations in more than 20 camps (in the area of ​​Rouen, Nancy, Nord and Pas de departments -Kale). The Committee ceased its activities only at the end of 1944, when France became free from the Nazis.

It is impossible not to note the activities of the underground organization in the international officer camp “Oflag XIII-D” (near Hammelburg). The general management of the underground work was carried out by the committee. Soviet prisoners of war generals I.S. were active there at various times. Nikitin, Kh.N. Averdov, D.M. Karbyshev, S.A. Tkachenko, G.I. Thor, N.F. Mikhailov, I.I. Melnikov. While in captivity, Soviet generals and officers urged prisoners to remain loyal to their homeland. Thus, speaking at a rally, prisoner of war, commander of the 1st Cavalry Corps, Major General I.S. Nikitin stated: “I, a Soviet general, a communist, a citizen of the Soviet Union, will not betray my Motherland under any circumstances. I am firmly convinced that everyone will follow this example.”

Captured Lieutenant General D.M. The German authorities persuaded Karbyshev to cooperate for quite a long time, but he refused. On the frosty day of February 18, 1945, he was taken to the parade ground of the Mauthausen concentration camp, tied to a post and poured with cold water until he turned into a block of ice. People like D.M. Karbyshev, I.S. Nikitin, died like heroes, remaining faithful to the military oath. Thousands of Soviet prisoners of war followed them. The price of their action is life.

In total, together with their subordinates, the burden of enemy captivity was shared by 83 Soviet generals, among them 7 army commanders, 2 members of the military council, 4 army chiefs of staff, 5 army artillery chiefs, the chief of army logistics, the commander of the army air force, the head of the army military communications department, 19 commanders corps, 2 deputy corps commanders, 3 corps artillery chiefs, 31 division commanders, deputy division commanders, brigade commanders, head of a school, head of the department of the Military Academy of the General Staff, head of the front operational department, head of the Main Intelligence Directorate of the General Staff, deputy head of the sanitary front department.

Despite the meager food, hard work, mockery and mockery, despite the promises of the German authorities of all sorts of benefits, only about a dozen generals agreed to cooperate with the enemy. Six generals managed to escape from captivity. For preparing escapes and Soviet propaganda among prisoners of war in the camps, 15 people were executed, including Lieutenant General D.M. Karbyshev, Major General I.S. Nikitin, G.I. Thor, Hero of the Soviet Union I.M. Shepetov, 10 died from hunger, disease, beatings and hard physical labor. For the courage and heroism shown at the fronts and in captivity, generals D.M. were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Karbyshev (1946), G.I. Thor (1991) and Hero of the Russian Federation - M.F. Lukin (1999). Everything is posthumous.

The main forms of intra-camp resistance were: escape, sabotage, violation of the regime, struggle for moral survival, unwillingness to cooperate with the enemy, and even rebellion. The resistance activity of prisoners of war was influenced by the successes of the Red Army at the front, the opening of a second front by the Allies in June 1944, the partisan movement and the activities of local underground fighters.

The cherished dream of every prisoner of war was a successful escape. He brought freedom from captivity and a chance to stay alive. According to German data, more than 70 thousand Soviet prisoners of war escaped from the camps located on the territory controlled by the OKB until 1944. Escapes occurred during pedestrian crossings, transportation by rail, from camps and work sites. So, on September 15, 1941, 340 people escaped at the Sherpitets railway station near Torun. In July 1942, 110 people fled from a camp located near the Krupki station in the Minsk region. In June 1943, 15 prisoners escaped captivity from Stalag 352 (Belarus) in two armored cars, of which 13 reached the partisans.

The escape from captivity of senior lieutenant M.P. became widely known. Devyatayeva and 9 people with him. On February 8, 1945, brave souls captured a German Henkel-111 bomber at the airfield and took off on it. They managed to “reach out” to their own and land the plane at the location of the advancing 331st Infantry Division. For this feat MP. Devyatayev was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union (1957).

In case of unsuccessful escape, prisoners of war, especially officers, were sent to concentration camps or shot. Thus, for attempting to escape, the Heroes of the Soviet Union division commanders, Major General I.M., were shot. Shepetov and Colonel I.D. Zinoviev. And there are thousands of such examples.

Some researchers question the issue of intra-camp resistance of Soviet prisoners of war. Thus, in one certificate prepared by one of the members of the section of former prisoners of war of the Soviet Committee of War Veterans (in the 1950s), the involvement of a number of colleagues in public activities in leading the resistance movement in the Mauthausen concentration camp was disputed. They were accused of “inflating, and sometimes even inventing, facts in order to create the image of a prisoner of war hero and classify themselves as mythical heroes.” However, many facts indicate the fallacy of this statement, although the lack of documents and the death of resistance heroes do not yet allow it to be completely refuted . Only one thing can be said with confidence: the problem of intra-camp resistance is very complex and requires further in-depth study. Just one fact. At E.A. Brodsky, just researching the activities of the organization “Brotherly Cooperation of Prisoners of War” and identifying the heroes of the resistance took about 50 years of painstaking work in domestic and foreign archives.

It is known that several tens of thousands of Soviet soldiers who escaped from enemy captivity crossed the front line, joined partisan detachments, underground organizations, and became fighters of the European Resistance movement (they constituted its most trained and persistent part). With their courage, courage, and discipline, his patriots earned respect not only among their compatriots, but also among the peoples of Europe. In his work, the Italian M. Galleni noted: “The Italian Resistance is undoubtedly proud that in its ranks were these warriors (Soviet - N.D.), who gave everything to the fight, without demanding anything in return.”

In general, it should be noted that the problem of resistance of Soviet prisoners of war has not yet been sufficiently studied, although several dozen books have been devoted to it

Numerous documents and testimony indicate that captured soldiers and commanders of the Red Army suffered not only in conditions of captivity. In their homeland they were unfairly viewed as cowards and traitors. This compounded their tragedy.

It should be noted that according to existing Soviet legislation, only surrender, not caused by a combat situation, was considered a serious military crime and, according to Art. 22 “Additions on military crimes” (Article 193-22 of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR), was punishable by capital punishment - execution with confiscation of property. The legislation also provided for criminal liability of adult family members of a serviceman only for direct defection to the side of the enemy, flight abroad (Article 51-1 “b”, 58-1 “c” of the Criminal Code of the RSFSR). Thus, military personnel who were captured due to circumstances beyond their control, in conditions caused by the combat situation, were not subject to prosecution by law. With regard to material support, the issuance of benefits and the provision of benefits to family members of military personnel who were captured, the legislation also did not provide for any restrictions.

However, with the beginning of the war, in accordance with ideological principles, the Soviet political leadership considered the capture of a Red Army soldier as a deliberately committed crime, regardless of the circumstances as a result of which it happened. Thus, in the decree of the State Defense Committee of July 16, 1941 and in the subsequent order of the Supreme Command Headquarters No. 270 of August 16, 1941, it was stated: “Commanders and political workers who tear off their insignia during battle... or part Red Army soldiers [who] instead of organizing a rebuff to the enemy would prefer to surrender - to destroy them by all means... and deprive the families of the Red Army soldiers who surrendered of state benefits and assistance” (the order was signed by Stalin and six other persons). The orders and instructions of the NKVD - NKGB adopted in their development strengthened these requirements to the extreme, especially in relation to family members of military personnel who, for one reason or another, were captured.

During the war, every soldier who emerged from encirclement, escaped from captivity, or was released by the Red Army and allies in the anti-Hitler coalition was indiscriminately subjected to scrutiny, bordering on political distrust. Measures were applied to him that humiliated his personal dignity and prevented further use in the army. Thus, in accordance with the GKO decree of December 27, 1941, the above-mentioned persons were sent through collection points of the People's Commissariat of Defense under escort to special NKVD camps for inspection. The conditions for keeping former prisoners of war in them were the same as for criminals held in forced labor camps. In everyday life and documents they were called “former military personnel” or “special contingent”, although no judicial or administrative decisions were made against these persons. “Former military personnel” were deprived of the rights and benefits due to military ranks, length of service, as well as monetary and clothing allowances. They were forbidden to correspond with family and friends.

While inspections were being carried out, the “special contingent” was involved in heavy forced labor in mines, logging, construction, mines and the metallurgical industry. They were set extremely high production standards and were formally accrued a small salary. For failure to complete the task and for the slightest offenses, they were punished as prisoners of the Gulag.

Along with the exposure of a significant number of people who actually committed crimes, as a result of the use of illegal, provocative investigative methods, many military personnel who honestly performed their duty and did not stain themselves in captivity were unreasonably repressed. Persons who worked in German camps as doctors, orderlies, barracks leaders, cooks, translators, storekeepers, and household services were often condemned as traitors to the Motherland. The families of military personnel, subjectively classified as voluntarily surrendered Germans, were illegally deprived of state benefits and benefits for the entire period of the war, without taking into account the reasons for their captivity.

According to available data, during the period from October 1941 to March 1944, 317,954 former prisoners of war and encirclement passed through special camps. The results of the filtering of these individuals can be judged from the report of Deputy People's Commissar of Internal Affairs V.V. Chernyshev, addressed to L.P. Beria (information as of October 1, 1944):

“In total, 354,592 people, including officers - 50,441 people, passed through the special camps for former Red Army soldiers who escaped encirclement and were freed from captivity. Of this number, 248,416 people were checked and transferred to the Red Army, including: to military units through military registration and enlistment offices - 231,034 people, of which 27,042 were officers; for the formation of assault battalions - 18,382 people, of which 16,163 were officers; in industry - 30,749 people, including officers - 29 people; for the formation of convoy troops - 5924 people; 11,556 people were arrested, of which 2,083 were enemy intelligence and counterintelligence agents, of which 1,284 were officers (for various crimes); went to hospitals, infirmaries and died - 5347 people; are in special camps of the NKVD of the USSR under inspection - 51,601 people. From among the officers remaining in the camps of the NKVD of the USSR, 4 assault battalions of 920 people each were formed in October. every"

Figures show that of the military personnel admitted to the special camps, the overwhelming majority were sent to the Red Army, the NKVD and the defense industry, about 4% were arrested.

As for the individual assault rifle battalions, they were created by order of the People's Commissar of Defense on August 1, 1943. The first five battalions were formed on August 25, 1943, in January 1944 - the 6th, 7th, 8th and 9th, by March Three more were in the process of being organized. By December 31, 1944, the 26th separate assault battalion was completed.

Battalion commanders, political deputies, chiefs of staff, and company commanders were appointed from officers in the active army. The rank and file and junior commanding officers were replenished with middle and senior commanders of the so-called special contingents. The length of stay in the battalions was set as follows: either two months of participation in battles, or until being awarded an order for valor in battle, or until the first wound. After this, with good certification, the “stormtroopers” were sent to the Red Army to the appropriate positions. According to the Commission for the Rehabilitation of Victims of Political Repression under the President of the Russian Federation, about 25 thousand Red Army soldiers who emerged from encirclement and were freed from captivity were sent to assault battalions, which was in itself a serious violation of their rights.

However, when prisoner of war camps were liberated by Red Army troops, prisoners were not always sent for inspection. Commander of the 21st Army M.I. Chistyakov in his book “The Earth Smelled of Gunpowder” writes:

“Near Gumrak (near Stalingrad - N.D.) there was a camp for our prisoners of war. I was ordered to dress all our soldiers, former prisoners of war, well, put on shoes, treat them, feed them, give them rest for 10-15 days, and then send them to the rear. I talked with these soldiers and became convinced that the mood of these people was such that they were ready at any moment to fight the Nazis to the death in order to avenge their humiliation and torment, for the death of their comrades... I selected 8 thousand from the former prisoners of war. man, formed eight battalions from them, armed them and sent them to divisions"

And the former prisoners of war honorably fulfilled their duty as defenders of their Fatherland.

In the second half of 1944, fighting took place in the countries of Eastern Europe. During the offensive operations, the Red Army suffered significant casualties. In accordance with the GKO resolution adopted on November 4, 1944, Soviet military personnel and civilians of military age released from German captivity were sent to reserve units, bypassing special camps. In reserve front-line and army regiments, new reinforcements, after undergoing combat training and partial testing, were sent (almost exclusively - N.D.) to active rifle units. For example, during the fighting on German territory, formations and units of the 1st Ukrainian Front made up for combat losses in people at the expense of Soviet citizens of military age released from German captivity. On March 20, 1945, 40 thousand people were sent to military units. Among the new recruits were Soviet prisoners of war, including junior officers up to and including the captain. And in the formation where the head of the political department was General N.F. Voronov, out of 3,870 recruits, 870 turned out to be former prisoners of war who had previously served in the army. In total, during the war years, more than 1 million people were conscripted for the second time from among those previously missing and in captivity. Having experienced all the horrors of fascist captivity, the reinforcement fighters mercilessly crushed the enemy. Until the end of the war, many of them were awarded orders and medals for the courage and heroism shown in battle.

From the end of 1944 to the mid-1950s, Soviet citizens released from captivity were returned to their homeland. Here are just some data concerning the issues of repatriation of former Soviet prisoners of war and their treatment in their homeland. According to the Office of the Commissioner of the Council of People's Commissars of the USSR for Repatriation Affairs, as of October 1945, 2016 480 released Soviet prisoners of war were taken into account, of which: 1,730,181 - in Germany and other countries and 286,299 - on the territory of the Union republics that were under occupation There is information that by mid-1947, 1,836 thousand of them returned to their homeland, including those who entered military and police service with the enemy, the rest remained abroad. Their fates turned out differently. Some were arrested and convicted, others were sent to a 6-year special settlement, and others were enlisted in the working battalions of NGOs. About 300 thousand prisoners of war (data as of August 1, 1946) were released home

After the end of the war, 57 Soviet generals returned to their homeland from captivity. Their fates turned out differently. All of them passed a special check by the NKVD, then some of them were released and sent to the troops or to teach, the majority received government awards and continued to serve in the armed forces. For example, the former commander of the 5th Army, General M.I. Potapov, after being captured at the end of 1945, was reinstated in the Soviet Army, rose to the rank of deputy commander of the Odessa Military District, and in 1961 he was awarded the rank of colonel general. Some generals were under investigation for a long time, after which a number of them were executed in 1950 (including the commander of the 12th Army, Major General P.G. Ponedelin, the commander of the 15th Rifle Corps of the 5th Army, Major General P.F. Privalov and others), several people died in prison before trial (see Table 3).

For a long time, Soviet people returning from German captivity faced infringement of their rights. Locally they were treated as traitors. They were withdrawn from participation in political life, when entering higher educational institutions they were looked at with caution, they were not considered participants in the war. Even after Stalin's death, little changed in the situation of former prisoners of war. And only in 1956 was an attempt made to change the attitude towards those of them who had not committed any crimes. On April 19, 1956, the Presidium of the CPSU Central Committee decided to create a commission chaired by Marshal of the Soviet Union G.K. Zhukov with the task of understanding the situation of the Red Army servicemen who returned from captivity, as well as those who were in the army, and making their proposals to the CPSU Central Committee. On June 4 of the same year, a memo by G.K. Zhukova, E.A. Furtseva, K.P. Gorshenin and others “On the situation of former prisoners of war” was presented to the Central Committee. On June 29, 1956, the Central Committee of the Party and the Council of Ministers of the USSR adopted a resolution “On eliminating the consequences of gross violations of the law in relation to former prisoners of war and their families,” which condemned the practice of indiscriminate political mistrust, the use of repressive measures, as well as deprivation of benefits and allowances in regarding former Soviet prisoners of war and members of their families. It was proposed to extend the Decree of the Presidium of the Supreme Soviet of the USSR on amnesty dated September 17, 1955 to former Soviet prisoners of war convicted of surrender. Since 1957, the cases of former Soviet prisoners of war have been largely reconsidered. Most were rehabilitated. Their military ranks and pensions were restored, and awards were returned. Those who were wounded and escaped from captivity were awarded orders and medals. However, in this resolution many issues were not given an appropriate assessment, and the planned measures largely remained on paper. And only 50 years after the Great Patriotic War, in January 1995, the President of the Russian Federation

B.N. Yeltsin signed the Decree “On the restoration of the legal rights of Russian citizens - former Soviet prisoners of war and civilians repatriated during the Great Patriotic War and the post-war period,” according to which former prisoners of war received the status of participants in the Great Patriotic War. They are fully covered by the federal law “On veterans”, adopted by the State Duma on December 16, 1994.

But how many years it took to restore justice! Many died without receiving rehabilitation. Here's just one example. In the fall of 1941, In Dubosekovo, 28 Panfilov heroes performed a heroic feat in the battle of Moscow. On July 21, 1942, all of them were awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union posthumously. But, as often happens, it later became known that not all of them died. Three fighters - I. Dobrobabin, D. Timofeev and I. Shchadrin - were captured in an unconscious state, and four seriously wounded - I. Vasilyev, D. Kozhubergenov, I. Natarov and G. Shemyakin - were picked up by our scouts.

I. Shchadrin and D. Timofeev returned from captivity. The most dramatic was the fate of I. Dobrobabin. Having woken up after a shell shock, he tried to get to his own people, but was captured by the Germans and sent to a prisoner of war camp. On the way, he broke out the window of the carriage and jumped out of the train while it was moving. I reached my native village. Perekop in the Kharkov region. With the arrival of the Red Army, he again found himself on the front line. For his courage he was awarded the Order of Glory, III degree, and several medals. In 1947, he was arrested and put on trial “for aiding the enemy,” who sentenced him to 15 years in prison to be served in camps. This was followed by a decree depriving Dobrobabin of the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. And only on March 26, 1993, the Plenum of the Supreme Court of Ukraine overturned court decisions against I.E. Dobrobabina. The case was dismissed for lack of evidence of a crime. He was rehabilitated, but the title of Hero of the Soviet Union was never restored. This is the fate of only one person.

Numerous facts convince us of how difficult and tragic the fate of millions of Soviet prisoners of war during the Great Patriotic War turned out to be. But there could have been fewer victims and suffering if the attitude towards human life had been more humane and fair.

In our country, the problem of prisoners of war remains relevant to this day, since the status of a prisoner of war is not fully determined, many documents are missing regarding the rehabilitation of former prisoners of war, especially those necessary while some of them are still alive.

Scanning and processing: Vadim Plotnikov

Read also on this topic:

In Soviet literature it was often stated that the enemy allegedly overestimated the number of prisoners, but a detailed study of German statistics does not confirm this. On the contrary, there were facts of deliberate underestimation of their numbers in order to downplay the scale of the genocide. In December 1941, the OKB and OKH made adjustments to their statistics, reducing the number of Soviet prisoners of war from 3.8 million to 3.35 million. From the total number of Soviet military personnel captured by German troops, commissars and political instructors who were killed shortly after capture were excluded , Jews and many others who were not brought alive to the camps were shot along the way. 3.35 million is that part of the Soviet prisoners of war who were brought alive to the camps during the first six months of the war and registered there, but it was to this figure that German statisticians added those taken prisoner in 1942-1945. and received a total of 5.75 million people. Most researchers use the latter figure as the final figure, but in reality it is overestimated by at least 450 thousand.

Homeland. 1991. No. 6-7. P. 100. (In the works of foreign researchers A. Dallin, K. Streit and others, the same information is given as of May 1, 1944, with the caveat that this information is incomplete.)

To these should be added 100,185 people held in air force prisoner of war camps, making a total of 5,231,057 Soviet prisoners of war.

Freedom was given to those who agreed to be “voluntary assistants” of the Verkhmat, the SS troops, and the police. These were mainly Germans from the Volga region, Ukrainians, Belarusians, Tatars, Armenians, Georgians, and Azerbaijanis.

The countdown began from the moment of registration in the camps. The hundreds of thousands of prisoners of war who died between the time of capture and the time of registration in the camps are not included in these statistics.

Without taking into account captured militias, partisans, fighters of special forces of various civil departments, city self-defense, extermination squads, etc.

The Geneva Convention stipulated that a country that signed it, while at war with a country that did not sign it, is still obliged to comply with this convention.

The secrecy has been removed... P. 391.

Among them are 2,389,560 Germans, 156,682 Austrians, 513,767 Hungarians, 201,800 Romanians, 48,957 Italians, 2,377 Finns; the remaining 464,147 are French, Slovaks, Czechs, Belgians, Spaniards and others who previously served in the Wehrmacht or worked in service and logistics institutions.

August 16, 1943 V.V. Gil (real name) with 2,200 “combatants” joined the partisan brigade named after. Zheleznyak (operating during the war in the Polotsk-Lepel region - Belarus), while they had 10 guns, 23 mortars, 77 machine guns. In one of the battles against the punitive forces, Gil died.

Karbyshev Dmitry Mikhailovich (1880-1945) - military engineer, lieutenant general, author of over 100 scientific works, professor (1938), doctor of military sciences (1941), Hero of the Soviet Union.

The figure of 1836 thousand was made up of 1549.7 thousand prisoners of war repatriated from Germany and other countries, and 286.3 thousand prisoners of war captured from the enemy during the offensive operations of the Red Army on the territory of the USSR in 1944 - early 1945 (including those who were until May 9, 1945 in captivity in the Courland Pocket on the territory of Latvia). These statistics do not include those released and those who escaped from captivity in occupied territory in 1941-1943.

For details about the results of checking and filtering repatriates, as well as about the fate of their individual categories, including prisoners of war, see the essay by V.N. Zemsky “Repatriation of displaced Soviet citizens”, published in this book.

With the exception of former prisoners of war who served in enemy armies, renegade formations, police, etc.

1. Streit K. They are not our comrades: the Wehrmacht and Soviet prisoners of war, 1941-1945. / Per. with him. M., 1991. S. 147-148.

2. Schustereit H. Vabanque: Hitlers Angriff und die Sowietunion 1941. Herford; Bonn, 1988. S. 69.

3.. For more details, see: All-Russian Book of Memory, 1941-1945. Review volume. M., 1995. S. 410-411; The classification has been removed: Losses of the Armed Forces of the USSR in wars, hostilities and military conflicts: Stat. study. M., 1993. P. 4. Shtrash K. Decree. Op. S. 3; A book of historical sensations. M., 1993. P. 53; Sokolov B. Russian collaborators // Nezavisimaya Gazeta. 1991. Oct 29; Homeland. 1991. No. 6-7. P. 100; Half a century ago: The Great Patriotic War: Figures and facts. M., 1995. P. 99; Polyan P.M. Soviet citizens in the Reich: How many were there? // Socis. 2002. No. 5. P. 95-100.

4.. See: Shtrash K. Decree. Op. S. 3; Rudenko N.A. Not subject to oblivion // Pravda. 1969. March 24; Nazarevich R. Soviet prisoners of war in Poland during the Second World War and assistance to them from the Polish population // Questions of history. 1989. No. 3. P. 35; Grishin E. Pages of the Book of Memory // Izvestia. 1989. May 9.

5.. Bohme K.W. Die deutchen Kriegsgefangenen in Sowjetischen Hand. Munchen, 1966 S 151

6.. Central archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation. F. 13. Op. 3028. D. 10. L. 3-6.

7.. Galitsky V.P. Maintenance of prisoners of war of the enemy army in the USSR. M., 1990. P. 6; It's him. Prisoners of war of the German army in the Soviet Union. M., 1992. P. 13.

8.. Galitsky V.P. Maintenance of prisoners of war... P. 96.

9. Striet C. Die Behanlung und Ermurdung 1941-1945. Frankfurt a/M., 1992. S.9

10. Galitsky V.P. Hitlerites against Hitler // Military History. magazine 1995. No. 1. P. 20.

11. State Archive of the Russian Federation. F. 7445. Op. 2. D. 125. L. 30 (Hereinafter: GA RF).

12. See: The criminal goals of Nazi Germany in the war against the Soviet Union: Documents and materials. M., 1987. pp. 105-107.

13. GA RF. F. 7445. Op. 2. D. 189. L. 267.

14. Gerns D. Hitler - Wehrmacht in der Sowijetunion: Legenden – Wahrheit -Traditionen - Dokumente. Frankfurt a/M., 1985. S. 37.

15. Datner S. Crimes of the Nazi Wehrmacht against prisoners of war / Transl. from Polish M., 1963. P. 412.

16. Nuremberg trials. M., 1958. T. 3. P. 413.

17. Chistyakov IM. We serve the Fatherland. M., 1985. P. 99-100.

18. Golubkov S.A. In a fascist death camp. Smolensk, 1963. S. 241-242; Kudryashov S. Civilized monsters // Motherland. 2002. No. 6. P. 71-73. See also: GA RF. F. 7445. Op. 1. D. 1668. L. 101; Op. 2. D. 139. L. 97-98; Nuremberg trials. T. 3. P. 68; T. 4. pp. 123-131, 145.

19. GA RF. F. 7445. Op. 115. D. 6. L. 27; F. 7021. Op. 148. D. 43. L. 66.

20. Ibid. F. 7445. Op. 2. D. 103. L. 141-143; F. 7021. Op. 148. D. 43. L. 66; Russell E. The Curse of the Swastika / Trans. from English M., 1954. P. 78.

21. See: Datner Sh. Decree. Op. P. 351.

22. GA RF. F. 7021. Op. 115. D. 7. L. 10; F. 7445. Op. 2. D. 128. L. 278; Russian State Military Archive. F. 1/v. Op. 12. D. 7. L. 79-81.

23. GA RF. F. 7021. Op. 150. D. 42. L. 11.

24. Streit K. Decree. Op. P. 259.

25. GA RF. F. 7021. Op. 148. D. 48. L. 16-17.

26. Ibid. F. 7445. Op. 2. D. 139. L. 97-98.

27. Ibid. F. 7445. Op. 1. D. 1668. L. 73.

28. Joseph Stalin in the embrace of his family. Berlin; Chicago; Tokyo; M., 1943. P. 96-100; Dranbyan T.S. Who provoked the death of I.V.’s eldest son? Stalin? // Military History magazine 2000. No. 3. P. 78-87.

29. See: International Committee of Historical Sciences: Reports of the Congress. M., 1974. T. 1. P. 229-244; German industry during the war of 1939-1945. /Per with him. M., 1956. P. 65; Müller-Hillebrand B. German Land Army, 1933-1945: In 3 books. / Per. with him. M., 1976. Book. 3. P. 327; Kuchinsky Yu. History of working conditions in Germany / Transl. with him. M., 1949. P. 508.

30. See: The criminal goals of Hitler's Germany in the war against the Soviet Union. P. 231.

31. GA RF. F. 7021. Op. 148. D. 251. L. 32; D. 214. L. 75-76.

32. Dallin A. Deutshe Herrschaft in Rusland, 1941-1945: Eine Studie liber Besatzungpolitik. Diisseldorf, 1981. S. 550-559, 660; Frolich S. General Wlassov: Russen und Deutschen zwischen Hitler und Stalin. Koln, 1978. S. 59, 63; Hoffmann J. Die Geschichte der Wlassow-Armee. Freiburg, 1986. S. 14, 358; Idem. Kaukasien. 1942/43: Das Deutsche Heer und die Orientvolker der Sowjetunion. Freiburg, 1991. S. 46-47; Muller-Hillebrand B. Das Heer. 1933-1945. Frankfurt a/M., 1966. Bd. 3. S. 70, 114, 141; Ready J. The forgotten axis. Germany's partners and foreign volunteers in Word War II. Jefferson; London, 1987. P. 510.

33. The secrecy has been removed... P. 385, 392; Gareev M.A. About the figures old and new // Military History. magazine 1991. No. 4. P. 49; Ramanichev N.M. Whoever is not with us is... // Russian news. 1995. April 11; Vodopyanova Z., Domracheva T., Meshcheryakova G. An opinion was formed that the losses amounted to 20 million people // Source. 1994. No. 5. P. 90.

34.See: Germany's war against the Soviet Union, 1941-1945: Documentary exhibition. Catalog. Berlin, 1992. P. 145.

35. See: Information reports of the VII department of GlavPURKKA for September - December 1943. M., 1944. p. 12

36. See: Muller-Hillebrand B. Or. cit. Bd.3 S.135, 141, 225.

37. Overmans R. Another face of war: The life and death of the 6th Army // Stalingrad: Event. Impact. Symbol. M., 1995. S. 463-465.

38. See: Semiryaga M.I. The fate of Soviet prisoners of war // Questions of history. 1995. No. 4. P. 22.

39. cm.: Hoffmann J. Kaukasien. 1942/43. S. 46, 56.

40. HoffmanJ. Die Ostlegionen, 1941-1943. Freiburg, 1976. S. 171-172.

41. cm.: Germany's war against the Soviet Union, 1941-1945. pp. 142, 145; Hoffmann J. Kaukasien. 1942/43. S. 46, 47; Ready J. Op. cit. P. 216.

42.See: GA RF. F. 7445. Op. 2. D. 318. L. 28-29; The Nuremberg trials of the main German war criminals. M., 1959. T. 4. P. 448-449.

43. See: Auschwitz concentration camp - Brzezinka / Transl. from Polish Warsaw, 1961. S. 89-96, 118; BorkinD. Crime and Punishment “I.G. Farben-industry" / Trans. from English M., 1982. P. 179.

44. See: Archive of Foreign Policy of the Russian Federation. F. 082. Op. 32. P. 180. D. 14. L. 58-62; Nuremberg trials of the main German criminals. M., 1966. T. 2. P. 410-442; Delarue J. History of the Gestapo / Trans. from fr. Smolensk 1993. P. 372.

45. Lyubovtsev V.M. Fighters don't kneel. M., 1964. P. 26.

46. ​​GA RF. f. 9541. Op. 1. D. 18.

47. Galleni M. Partigiani nella Resistenza italiano. Roma, 1967. P. 9, 234.

48. 1mgosNe S. Op 1ez pottaN yez ё1гаn§егз. R., 1965; The Second World War: In 3 books. M., 1966. Book. 3; Bushueva T.S. Participation of Soviet people in the people's liberation war in Yugoslavia. dis. ...cand. ist. Sci. M., 1974; Semiryaga M.I. Soviet people in the European Resistance. M., 1970; Heroes of the Resistance. M., 1990; Rossy M. Soviet soldiers in the Garibaldian partisan battalions // Military History. magazine 2001. No. 6. P. 57-63.

49. Mezhenko A.V. Prisoners of war returned to duty... // Military History. magazine 1997. No. 5. P. 32.

51. Chistyakov M.I. The ground smelled of gunpowder. M., 1979. pp. 52-53.

52. All-Russian Book of Memory, 1941-1945. Review volume. P. 452.

53. Russian archive: Great Patriotic War: Battle of Berlin (Red Army in defeated Germany). M., 1995. T. 15 (4-5). P. 148.

54. See: Arzamaskin Yu.N. Repatriation of Soviet and foreign citizens in 1944-1953: Military-political aspect. M., 1999. P. 113-180; Shevyakov A.A. Secrets of post-war repatriation // Sociological studies. 1993. No. 8. P. 9.

55. The secrecy has been removed... P. 131.

56. Nevzorov B.I. Justice must prevail // Veteran. 1999. No. 23.

August 22nd, 2014

The story of the Red Army soldier V. Cherkasov

It was August 7th. The day before, our unit captured a large settlement on the western bank of the Don. I, a telephone operator, was at the command post of the battalion commander, Senior Lieutenant Kazak. We settled down in the cellar. On this day there was a hot battle. The Hungarians launched counterattacks every now and then. The soldiers of our battalion did not have enough ammunition. Delivery of cartridges from the rear was difficult. All of us, signalmen and messengers who were at the command post, gave our supplies to the front line fighters. We were waiting for the cartridges to be delivered to us.

The battle took place on the streets of the village. Enemy tanks appeared. Communication with the regiment was interrupted. It was necessary to change the command post. The senior lieutenant and one signalman went to choose a new room. There were nine of us left in the basement. Two hours passed and we saw that the Hungarians had entered our street.

What to do? We don't have grenades, we don't have cartridges either. We decided to wait, hoping that they would recapture us. But soon Hungarians armed with machine guns ran into the basement with wild screams. Our line probably brought them here. They took us out into the yard, shouting: “Rus, Rus!” They didn’t touch us or interrogate us right away. They took away the rifles from those who had them. My rifle remained in the basement under the mattress, where I managed to hide it. The Hungarians led us to the house, posted two sentries, and began to dig in nearby.

Soon the Hungarians ordered us to get up from the ground and with gestures, and more with rifle butts, forced us to turn to face the wall of the house. We realized that the last minute had come. A single shot rang out, and the last Red Army soldier fell, then a second shot rang out. I stood fifth in line and waited for my bullet. When the shot rang out behind me, something hit me in the temple and I immediately fell. Then four more shots were fired. I heard them and realized that I was alive, but I pretended to be dead. The groans of wounded comrades were heard. Later I realized that the Hungarians deliberately did not kill us right away so that we would...

I tried to lie in the same position as I fell, and even opened my mouth. The Hungarians go far away, their conversations can be heard. I don’t know how long this lasted, but one of the wounded moved, and the Hungarians rushed to him. A shot rang out and he was finished off. After that they decided to check everyone. They began to move us, and whoever showed signs of life was shot at a second time. Three people were killed this way. Finally, the Hungarians, deciding that we were all dead, left the yard.

I was the most easily wounded. There were scratches on my temple and blood came out. This probably deceived the Hungarians, who decided that the bullet had hit me in the temple. The other wounded began to moan little by little. They were tormented by thirst, heat, and flies. I hear one soldier whisper: “Signalman, are you alive?” I answer: “Alive.” - “Signalman, I’m wounded right through the neck, turn me around, it’s uncomfortable to lie down.” I looked around through narrowed eyes - there was no one - and turned it around. Then another soldier said that one wounded man, named Grushko, crawled to the side. Another wounded man crawled away.

What to do? I see there are no Hungarians nearby. Then I decided to sneak into the house near which we were lying and see if there was water anywhere. He crawled onto the steps of the house, and there he stood up and looked for water in the tub. Then he found two bottles, filled them and, carefully getting out, crawled along the ground again. He began to give water to the wounded. There wasn't enough water for everyone, so we had to crawl again.

As soon as I got into the room, I heard voices and shots. The Hungarian bastards finished shooting the wounded. When it got dark, I went out into the yard. Six comrades - I don’t know their names, because they are infantrymen, I know only one of them, Frolov, who was a messenger for the battalion commander - lie motionless. The Hungarians finished them off. I crawled into the basement of this house and hid. I hear a gun shot. Break. Well, I think ours are close. I spent night and day in the basement. There was a firefight all the time and, finally, on the second night I heard my native Russian voice.

My heart almost jumped out of my chest with joy. I looked out the window - ours. He ran out. It turned out that these were soldiers from another regiment. I ran there. On the way, I went into the basement where the Hungarians took us from, took out my rifle and two telephone coils. I came with them to the battalion. There were still machine gunners shooting here and there on the streets. I took up a familiar task again. Now I’m just waiting for the chance to chop up the Hungarians... // VORONEZH DISTRICT.
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These photographs were found on a murdered German officer. The executioners are in a hurry to hang Soviet people. They introduced the "motorized scaffold". They transport the doomed in batches on trucks, put on nooses, the car starts moving, and the victim hangs on the gallows crossbar. These “improved” executions were to the taste of the German soldiers, and the executioners, amateur photographers, carefully captured all the details of their bloody work. We will not forget this gallows! !

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The cynical frankness of fascist bandits

The truck was carrying mail from a punitive detachment sent by the Germans against the partisans of the Smolensk region. For a long time now, fascist punitive forces have been rampant in a number of areas of the Smolensk region, causing death and destruction in villages and cities, where, like a plague, they destroy all living things. In letters that fell into the hands of the partisans, German monsters talk about with cynical frankness and bragging.

Soldier Herbert boasts to his parents: “Day and night, tongues of fire rise to the sky in the villages set on fire by our soldiers. Crowds of people seeking shelter often pass by us. Then you can hear the crying and lamentations of women who were unable to save even their child.”

“On the second day of our forest hike we arrived at the village. Pigs and cows roamed the street. Even chickens and geese. Each squad immediately slaughtered a pig, chickens and geese for themselves. Unfortunately, we stayed in such villages for one day and could not take much with us. But on this day we lived to the fullest. I immediately devoured at least two pounds of roast pork, a whole chicken, a frying pan of potatoes, and another quart and a half of milk. How delicious it was! But now we usually find ourselves in villages that have already been captured by soldiers, and everything in them has already been eaten. Even in chests and basements.”

In letters to other soldiers, the punishers are even more frank. Corporal Felix Kandels sends his friend lines that cannot be read without shuddering: “Having rummaged through the chests and organized a good dinner, we began to have fun. The girl turned out to be angry, but we organized her too. It doesn’t matter that the whole department... Don’t worry. I remember the lieutenant's advice, and the girl..."

Punisher bandits travel from village to village and, under the guise of fighting partisans, hang and rob local residents. Corporal Michel Stadler informs the parents in Irlaggol: “Although we have to hang, here at least there is something to eat... We live here like gypsies. Many people lead a cow, which they milk when they are thirsty.”

The topic of food occupies a central place in these letters. It talks casually about arson, robbery, violence and murder. The fascist punitive forces are trying to please their relatives by the fact that they have eaten to their fullest.

Corporal Georg Pfahler without hesitation writes to his mother in Sappenfeld: “We spent three days in a small town. Goats and kids were running around the streets. Without thinking for a long time, we slaughtered two goats. We found 20 pounds of fat... You can imagine how much we ate in three days. And how many chests and closets we ransacked, how many little “young ladies” we spoiled... Our life is now fun, not like in the trenches... "

German punitive forces are robbing the population of the Smolensk region to the bone. A letter from Munich from Marianne Ferbinger was found on the murdered postal worker Heinrich Arenius: “I received,” writes the German woman, “a parcel with linen and cloth. You brought me great joy with this. The material is very good. You won't see one like this here. Can you still buy it, or did you get it somehow? The pillowcases you sent earlier will come in handy. If you can, get more...”

This is how robbers write to robbers, and bandits to bandits. // .
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(Izvestia, USSR)
(Izvestia, USSR)
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FAILED "LANDING"

A barely noticeable dot appeared in the night sky. It grew with rapid speed, and after a few minutes the parachute lowered the man to the ground. The parachutist looked around closely. He ended up on an island in the middle of a wide river. The only way to get to the shore is by swimming. Splash of water. Silence again.

In the morning, a lieutenant, a Red Army pilot, appeared at the village council. Everyone looked at his wet clothes in bewilderment. It seemed that he himself was embarrassed by this circumstance.

Having presented his documents to the secretary of the village council, the pilot asked to arrange an apartment for him where he could dry out and rest.

To complete the task, I made a 25-kilometer trek. Tired, wet. I would like to get myself in order...

The pilot willingly talked about his transition. During the conversation, the secretary of the village council noticed that he was confusing the villages that he supposedly had to visit. Trying to show that he knew the area, the pilot became even more confused.

Just wait, Comrade Lieutenant, I’ll find an apartment for you now,” said the secretary.

Suspecting something was wrong, he went to the head of the air monitoring post and told him about his suspicions.

The head of the post, taking a group of fighters, arrested the “lieutenant”. The latter turned out to be a fascist intelligence officer, dropped at night from a German plane. (TASS).
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From the Soviet Information Bureau

Captured corporal of the reconnaissance detachment of the German Air Force Herbert Ritter said: “Our detachment arrived in Russia from Antwerp (Belgium) in June of this year. Following us, other air units arrived from Belgium, as well as from France. While on a reconnaissance flight, I encountered a Soviet fighter and wanted to avoid the fight. However, a Russian pilot pursued me and shot down my car. We have a general opinion that Russian pilots are skilled masters of their craft. Many German pilots are afraid of the Russian winter. In their opinion, the second Russian winter. They say that if the war is not ended soon, Germany will be defeated."

In the village of Basino, Leningrad region, the Nazi scoundrels grabbed the collective farmer Naumova and demanded that she indicate the location of the partisans. Naumova replied that she did not know where the partisans were. Then the fascist executioners tortured her. Without getting a single word from Naumova,...

On the Karelian front, five enemy aircraft tried to destroy our river crossings. Five Soviet fighters attacked the enemy. In the ensuing air battle, pilots TT. Bubnov, Knyazev and Klimenko each shot down one enemy aircraft. In addition, pilots vol. Klimenko and Kuznetsov jointly shot down another enemy plane. Our fighters had no losses.

A detachment of Leningrad partisans under the command of Comrade. Over the past three months, B. killed 315 German soldiers and officers, destroyed 150 meters of the railway track and derailed a steam locomotive, 16 wagons with ammunition and 2 tanks with fuel.

A captured soldier of the 7th company of the 282nd regiment of the 98th German infantry division, Bernhardt Vons, said: “In June, I arrived at the front as part of the 98th marching battalion. Division commander Kareys came to us and gave a speech. He said that the 98th Division suffered heavy losses, many companies were completely drained of blood, with only 15-20 people left in them. Now reinforcements are arriving, and the division will go into action again. The soldiers were sullenly silent, they understood in their hearts that...

Only the devil knows who will manage to get out of here? I am one of the lucky ones: a month later I was captured and now I will only wait for the end of the war.” // .

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Publication of V. Grossman’s story “The People are Immortal”

Vasily Grossman’s story “The People is Immortal,” published in “Red Star,” is published as a separate book in Goslitizdat and in the Military Publishing House of the People’s Commissariat of Defense. In addition, the story will be published in the 8th issue of the Znamya magazine.

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("The New York Times", USA)
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("The New York Times", USA)
("The New York Times", USA)

10:00 08.02.2015

“The camp orderlies carried the dead out of a stone barn without windows or doors, the floor of which was filled with frozen excrement. In order to pack the dead more tightly, one of the orderlies climbed onto the cart and broke the arms and legs of the dead with a crowbar. The dead were dumped naked into the anti-tank ditch. “Boys, where are you going mene vezete?” a weak voice came from the cart. The hair of the “lads” stood on end under their hats. And there was a reason. On the cart, on the dead, sat a naked, living dead man in the cold. I then asked the orderly: “Where did you put him?” “Where, where...,” he answered, “they dumped him in a ditch along with other dead people,” this is how Evgeny Mikhailovich Platonov recalls his first days in a prisoner of war camp.

“The camp orderlies carried the dead out of a stone barn without windows or doors, the floor of which was filled with frozen excrement. In order to pack the dead more tightly, one of the orderlies climbed onto the cart and broke the arms and legs of the dead with a crowbar. The dead were dumped naked into the anti-tank ditch. “Boys, where are you going mene vezete,” a weak voice came from the cart. The hair of the “lads” stood on end under their hats. And there was a reason. On the cart, on the dead, sat a naked, living dead man in the cold. I then asked the orderly: “Where did you put him?” “Where, where...,” he answered, “they dumped him in a ditch along with other dead people,” this is how Evgeny Mikhailovich Platonov recalls his first days in a prisoner of war camp. Evgeny Platonov ended up in the Krivoy Rog camp (Ukraine) in November 1941. At the beginning of the war, the Nazis did not bother to divide the camps into camps for prisoners of war and civilians. Therefore, there were about 12 thousand people in the Krivoy Rog camp, both prisoners and civilians. “The diet was designed so that the strongest person would die within 1-1.5 months. 120-150 people died per day,” says former prisoner of war Platonov. The first year was the most difficult for Soviet prisoners of war. Hitler was confident that the conquest of the USSR was a done deal, so a decree was issued regulating the barbaric attitude towards the Red Army soldiers. Berlin, July 10, 1941. Office of Rosenberg. Resolution of July 14, 1941 No. 170"Orders for the treatment of Soviet prisoners of war in all prisoner of war camps": - The Bolshevik soldier lost all right to claim to be treated as an honest soldier in accordance with the Geneva Agreement. Disobedience, active or passive resistance must be immediately and completely eliminated with the help of weapons (bayonet, stock and firearms). - The use of weapons in relation to Soviet prisoners of war is, as a rule, considered lawful. - Anyone who, in order to force him to carry out his does not use the order or does not use the weapon energetically enough. - Prisoners of war escaping should be shot immediately, without a warning hail. Such simple rules... The photographs of Soviet Red Army soldiers who were captured in 1941 clearly show that German soldiers carried out the orders of the command impeccably. “Politics” The Third Reich in relation to the Soviet Union was interpreted by Hitler very simply - three quarters of the population should be destroyed - period! One third, as free labor, should be brought to the state of primitive man. What prisoners of war? What laws? What is the universal morality? This was out of the question,” says military historian, candidate of historical sciences Dmitry Surzhik, commenting on the situation with Soviet prisoners of war. In 1941, hundreds of Soviet soldiers and officers were captured by the Germans. The Red Army “could boast” at this time of only 10,000 German soldiers who raised their hands in the air. Volga waters, pickles and a Jewish doctor During Soviet captivity, German soldier Klaus Mayer served his sentence in a labor camp at the Bolshevik cement plant. “Working at the factory was unusually difficult for me, an untrained eighteen-year-old high school student. The Volga, along which we marched every day from the camp to the factory... The impressions of this huge river, the mother of Russian rivers, are difficult to describe. One summer, when after the spring flood the river was rolling wide, our Russian guards allowed us to jump into the river to wash off the cement dust. Of course, the “supervisors” acted against the rules; but they were also humane,” the former Wehrmacht soldier recalls decades later. The second strong memory in his memory was ordinary Russian pickled cucumbers. “An elderly woman who, during the lunch break, at the train station in Volsk, shyly served us pickles from her bucket. It was a real feast for us. Later, before leaving, she came and crossed herself in front of each of us. Mother Rus', which I met on the Volga...,” says World War II veteran Mayer. Klaus Meyer now remembers with great gratitude the Jewish doctor who treated him and his fellow sufferers in Soviet captivity. Such different memories, such different dietary standards legalized in the Soviet Union and Nazi Germany. “Hitler and Stalin refused to comply with the Geneva Agreements on the treatment of prisoners of war - that’s a fact! But our state ideology viewed captured Germans as deceived workers and peasants, not as enemies. Therefore, from the very beginning they were treated as potential supporters of the war against fascism. Political workers worked with them, in subsequent years the attitude towards prisoners changed, but in general, it was always humane,” says military historian Dmitry Surzhik.
"Naked numbers" Soviet nutritional standards for German military personnel captured in 1941 compared favorably with the nutritional rules and maintenance of Soviet soldiers in German prisoner-of-war camps. It is impossible today to claim that they were impeccably observed, but the fact remains that Hitler’s prisoner was supposed to receive no more than 2,200 kilocalories per day, and Stalin’s prisoner – 3,117. “German prisoners were given 5 packs of shag and five boxes of matches for a month. And 200 grams of soap. You understand what tobacco meant to a soldier. Although it has no calories and does not promote physical health, it does help keep your mental health in balance. And soap is generally the most important element of hygiene, and therefore survival,” says Candidate of Historical Sciences Surzhik. The situation with German prisoners of war changed dramatically in 1943, after the Battle of Stalingrad. The USSR and the NKVD service were clearly unprepared for such a sharp increase in the number of prisoners - in February-March of 1943 alone, they increased by 300,000 people. Miraculous transformation into a “one” Already in 1943, there were more than 500 camps for German prisoners of war on the territory of the USSR. This year saw the highest mortality rate among soldiers captured by us. In an exclusive interview with the Zvezda TV channel, candidate of historical sciences Elena Tsunaeva spoke about why life in Soviet captivity was so different from German captivity. “Starting in 1943, captured Germans became an “economic unit.” A similar attitude towards free labor appeared in Germany at the same time, but Stalin, unlike Hitler, saw in those who agreed to cooperate not spies and saboteurs, but future supporters of socialist ideology. Enormous efforts and enormous funds were directed towards this in difficult wartimes. But then history showed that all these sacrifices were not made in vain,” says Elena Tsunaeva. “In July 1943, I became a Wehrmacht soldier, but due to long training, I got to the German-Soviet front only in January 1945, which by that time it was passing through the territory of East Prussia. Then the German troops no longer had any chance in confronting the Soviet army. On March 26, 1945, I was captured by the Soviets. I was in camps in Kohla-Jarve in Estonia, in Vinogradovo near Moscow, and worked in a coal mine in Stalinogorsk (today Novomoskovsk). We were always treated like people. We had the opportunity to spend free time and were provided with medical care. On November 2, 1949, after 4.5 years of captivity, I was released and was released as a physically and spiritually healthy person. I know that, in contrast to my experience in Soviet captivity, Soviet prisoners of war in Germany lived completely differently. Hitler treated most Soviet prisoners of war extremely cruelly. For a cultured nation, as the Germans are always imagined, with so many famous poets, composers and scientists, such treatment was a disgrace and an inhumane act,” former German prisoner of war Hans Moeser now recalls. “To be fair, it should be said that nutritional standards and rules are not always the maintenance of prisoners was carried out in full. Norms are norms, but the actual availability of products in the country did not always fit into these norms,” says military historian Tsunaeva. Soviet captivity was not a paradise for the Germans. For example, it was recorded that out of three trains with prisoners sent from the Vorobyovka, Shirinkino, Serebryakovo stations of the South-Eastern Railway in January 1943, 1953 people did not reach the camps (25% of the total number of prisoners sent). Some of them also died of hunger, since for 34 days the prisoners did not receive hot food, but only dry rations. On February 3, 1943, the guard of the 236th NKVD convoy regiment accepted 1,980 prisoners to escort them to the train, the cars of which did not have bunks, stoves, or buckets , dishes. Of the products on the first day of the journey, only crackers were obtained, on the second, flour. On the third and fourth days the prisoners received nothing. From March 20 to March 31, 1943, the guard of the same regiment escorted a train of 720 prisoners along the route Khrenovaya station - Penza-Kozlovka station. Along the way, 328 people died for various reasons. The guard of the 240th NKVD convoy regiment, which received 152 wounded prisoners on January 24, 1943, did not bring 49 people to the camp. “The Kremlin closely monitored everything that was happening. The facts of the mass death of German prisoners of war did not go unnoticed. But Stalin did not personally interfere in what was happening. But the necessary order appeared in the NKVD troops immediately. It was signed by A. Khrulev, Deputy People's Commissar of Defense, Colonel General of the Quartermaster Service on January 2, 1943. The document is issued top secret, Order of the USSR NGO No. 001,” says Candidate of Historical Sciences Tsunaeva. This document formulated simple requirements for the transfer of prisoners of war to their places of detention, which saved the lives of tens of thousands of German prisoners of war. 200-300 kilometer marches to their destination were cancelled. German prisoners of war who fell ill on the way were given the opportunity. By 1943, Nazi Germany also understood that the war would be protracted, labor resources were sharply reduced, there were fewer and fewer “fresh” Soviet prisoners of war, but there was no fundamental change in the conditions of detention of Red Army soldiers in captivity . "Front-Stalag 352"“Here prisoners of war were housed in wooden barracks; food consisted of a piece of bread, sometimes with sawdust, about 200 grams, and a ladle of pearl barley twice a day. This barley of water was brought to the barracks in barrels; the ladle was the lid of a soldier's kettle, and the barley from the barrel was transferred into a bathtub installed outside, right on the ground. I ended up in one of the barracks. There was no furniture in it, half-dead Red Army soldiers were lying on the floor, they could not get up, and they kept the dead nearby, raising their hand to get another ration of bread,” recalls former Soviet prisoner of war Vladimir Grigorievich Karavaev. Bodies were taken out of this camp every day died in an ordinary gig. It held 5 corpses. Vladimir decided to calculate how many people die in the Front-Stalag 352 camp per day. “There were 20 gigs a day. I think that I’m a little mistaken, since in total the German fascist invaders in this 352nd camp alone tortured, killed by hunger and cold 74 thousand people in three years,” states Karavaev. From Churchill - a suit, from Roosevelt - a cut for a suit Captured at the age of 19, Vladimir Karavav escaped from different camps 4 times, eventually he ended up in a partisan detachment, and fought until the Victory.
“After the war, along with being sent to work in Minsk, I received a salary at headquarters for service in the Red Army and in the partisan detachment and for the time I was in captivity - 13 thousand rubles. And also a personal gift from W. Churchill - a suit, and from F. Roosevelt a cut for a suit,” recalls the war veteran. Political information, books, orchestras and tours The life of German prisoners of war in Soviet captivity changed for the better every year. After 1945, the attitude of Soviet people towards prisoners began to change. In almost all cities of the vast Soviet Union, the Germans built entire microdistricts of two-story residential buildings. In Moscow, in memory of them, 7 high-rise buildings remained, which became the “calling card” of the capital - the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the University, the Ukraine Hotel and others. “Created on the initiative of the NKVD and the Main Political Directorate of the Soviet Army, the “Union of German Prisoners of War” was engaged in active propaganda activities. Its activists traveled to all camps giving lectures and amateur concerts. Schools appeared in prisoner-of-war camps, which were attended by illiterate prisoners of war, but this, of course, concerned Romanian soldiers to a greater extent. But 1947 was a very difficult year for the prisoners. The lean year affected not only the prosperity of Soviet citizens, but also the reduction of rations in German prisoner of war camps. But the position of the officers of the defeated Wehrmacht remained the same - officers, starting with the lieutenant, could not go to work, they, unlike captured Red Army soldiers in Germany, could write and receive letters, receive parcels,” says military historian Elena Tsunaeva. In September In 1947, by joint order of the Chairman of the Presidium of the Central Union and the Ministry of Internal Affairs No. 2191с/170, trade in food products (meat, fish, fats, vegetables, pickles, mushrooms, dairy products, eggs, honey) was organized in prisoner camps. In addition, buffets are opening with hot dishes, snacks, tea and coffee. “Where do the prisoners get their money? Well, firstly, they received a salary for their work (although the cost of maintaining prisoners was withheld from it), secondly, as prisoners they received small sums, thirdly, after the end of the war, normal postal communications with their homeland and prisoners were established could receive parcels and money transfers,” says Tsunaeva. This long Russian captivity In 1949, the mass return of German prisoners of war to their homeland began. For those who surrendered back in 1941, it turned out to be very long - 8 years.
The NKVD is developing a number of measures to ensure that former Wehrmacht soldiers returning to Germany look “decent.” From the order of the Deputy People’s Commissar of Internal Affairs of the USSR, Colonel General Chernyshov:
- Prisoners of war to be handed over to the repatriation authorities should be dressed in new captured uniforms.
- All prisoners of war must undergo thorough comprehensive sanitation before departure.
- Provide released prisoners of war with food in full quantity and assortment for the entire route, based on the train moving 200 kilometers per day, plus a five-day supply. Ban the issuance of flour instead of bread, the issuance of only bread and crackers...
- Oblige the head of the train to provide hot meals to prisoners of war along the route and an uninterrupted supply of drinking water.... Hundreds of thousands of German prisoners of war left the USSR in 1949. Minister of the Ministry of Internal Affairs Kruglov in his final report in May 1950. gives the figure of repatriated military personnel as of May 50 - 3 million 344 thousand 696 people. If we take the number of captured people as a starting point - 3 million 777 thousand 290 people, then the number of prisoners of war who did not return home is approximately 500 thousand people. The number of Soviet prisoners of war is still a subject of debate. The German command in official data indicates the figure of 5 million 270 thousand people. According to the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Russian Federation, the losses in prisoners amounted to 4 million 559 thousand Soviet soldiers and officers.

In the USSR, the topic of captivity of German soldiers and officers was actually prohibited for research. While Soviet historians were full of condemnation of the Nazis for their treatment of Soviet prisoners of war, they did not even mention that during the war there were crimes against humanity on both sides of the front.

To be fair, it should be noted that it is only little known in our country (by “us” the author means not only Ukraine, but the entire “post-Soviet space”). In Germany itself, the study of this issue was approached with purely German thoroughness and pedantry. Back in 1957, a scientific commission was created in Germany to study the history of German prisoners of war, which, starting in 1959, published 15 (!) plump volumes in the series “On the history of German prisoners of war in the Second World War,” seven of which were devoted to stories of German prisoners of war in Soviet camps.

But the topic of captivity of German soldiers and officers was actually prohibited from research. While Soviet historians were full of condemnation of the Nazis for their treatment of Soviet prisoners of war, they did not even mention that during the war there were crimes against humanity on both sides of the front.

Moreover, the only Soviet study on this topic (albeit published in Germany) was the work of Alexander Blank - a former translator of Field Marshal Friedrich Paulus during the latter's time in Soviet captivity - Die Deutschen Kriegsgefangenen in der UdSSR (published in Cologne in 1979. ). Her theses were later included in the book “The Second Life of Field Marshal Paulus,” published in Moscow in 1990.

Some statistics: how many were there?

To try to understand the history of German prisoners of war, one should first of all answer the question about their number in . According to German sources, approximately 3.15 million Germans were captured in the Soviet Union, of which approximately 1.1-1.3 million did not survive captivity. Soviet sources cite a significantly lower figure. According to official statistics of the Office of Prisoners of War and Internees (on September 19, 1939, it was organized as the Office of Prisoners of War and Internees (UPVI); from January 11

1945 - Main Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees (GUPVI) of the USSR; from March 18, 1946 - Ministry of Internal Affairs of the USSR; from June 20, 1951 - again UPVI; On March 14, 1953, the UPVI was disbanded, and its functions were transferred to the Prison Directorate of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs) Soviet troops from June 22, 1941 to May 17, 1945 captured a total of 2,389,560 military personnel of German nationality, of which 376 generals and admirals, 69,469 officers and 2,319,715 non-commissioned officers and soldiers. To this number should be added another 14.1 thousand people immediately placed (as war criminals) in special camps of the NKVD, not included in the UPVI/GUPVI system, from 57 to 93.9 thousand (there are different figures) German prisoners of war who died even before they got into the UPVI/GUPVI system, and 600 thousand were released right at the front, without being transferred to camps - an important caveat, since they are usually not included in the general statistics of the number of prisoners of war in the USSR.

The problem, however, is that these figures do not indicate the number of Wehrmacht and SS soldiers captured by the Soviet side. UPVI/GUPVI kept records of prisoners of war not by their nationality or membership in the armed forces of any country, but by their nationality, in some cases, and ethnicity in others (see table). As a first approximation, the number of Wehrmacht and SS troops captured by the Soviets is 2,638,679 people, and together with 14.1 thousand war criminals, 93.9 thousand who did not live to be placed in the camp, and 600 thousand. liberated who left the camp, gives the figure 3,346,679 people. - which is even slightly higher than the assessment of German historians.

It should also be noted that German prisoners of war actively tried to “disguise” among other nationalities - as of May 1950, such “camouflaged captured Germans,” according to official Soviet data, were identified among prisoners of war of other nationalities, 58,103 people.

At the same time, it should be noted that summing up “national lines” does not give an accurate picture. The reason is simple: the statistics (even those intended purely for internal needs) of the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs are lame. Some certificates from this department contradict others: for example, in a certificate from the Ministry of Internal Affairs dated 1956, the number of prisoners of German nationality registered was 1,117 people. less than was recorded “on fresh tracks” in 1945. It is unclear where these people disappeared.

But this is a minor discrepancy. The archives also contain other documents showing both the manipulation of data on the number of prisoners of war that took place at the government level, and much larger discrepancies in reporting.

Example: USSR Foreign Minister Vyacheslav Molotov, in a letter to Stalin dated March 12, 1947, wrote that “in total there are 988,500 German prisoners of war soldiers, officers and generals in the Soviet Union, 785,975 people have been released from captivity to date. (that is, at that time there were 1,774,475 living prisoners of war of German nationality, including those already released - out of 2,389,560 people; how does this correlate with the fact that of the number of German prisoners of war in the UPVI/GUPVI system, only 356 seemed to have died 768 people, - again, it’s unclear - S.G.). We consider it possible to announce the number of German prisoners of war in the Soviet Union, with a reduction of approximately 10%, taking into account their increased mortality."

But... a TASS statement dated March 15, 1947 said that “there are currently 890,532 German prisoners of war remaining on the territory of the Soviet Union; since the surrender of Germany, 1,003,974 German prisoners of war have been released from captivity and returned from the USSR to Germany” (that is, the release of 218 thousand more prisoners of war was announced than they were released according to Molotov’s note; where did this figure come from and what was intended to hide - also unclear - S.G.). And in November 1948, the leadership of the GUPVI proposed to the First Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs of the USSR, Colonel-General Ivan Serov, “to write off 100,025 released German prisoners of war” from the general operational-statistical record, allegedly... registered twice.

In general, historians believe that the repatriation of at least 200 thousand Germans “was not properly documented by the Soviet side.” That is, this may mean that these prisoners did not exist, or (this is more likely) that they died in captivity, and (this is even more likely) that there is a combination of these options. And this brief review, apparently, only indicates that the statistical aspects of the history of German prisoners of war in the USSR are not only still not closed, but will probably never be completely closed.

"The Hague-Geneva Question"

A little about the international legal status of prisoners of war. One of the controversial issues in the history of Soviet prisoners in Germany and German prisoners in the USSR is the question of whether the Hague Convention “On the Laws and Customs of War on Land” of October 18, 1907 and the Geneva Convention “On the Maintenance of Prisoners of War” dated June 27, 1929

It comes to the point that, intentionally or out of ignorance, they confuse the already mentioned Geneva Convention “On the Maintenance of Prisoners of War” of 06/27/1929 with the Geneva Convention - also of 06/27/1929 - “On the improvement of the lot of the wounded, sick and injured persons shipwreck, from the armed forces at sea." Moreover, if the USSR did not sign the first of the mentioned Geneva Conventions, it joined the second back in 1931. Therefore, the author will try to clarify this issue.

The prerequisites for the mandatory implementation of the Hague Convention “On the Laws and Customs of War on Land” are:

1) signing and ratification of this convention by the contracting parties;

2) participation in a land war only of parties that are contracting parties (“clausula si omnes” - “on universal participation”).

The prerequisites for the mandatory implementation of the Geneva Convention “On the Maintenance of Prisoners of War” of 1929 were only the signing and ratification of the contracting parties to this convention. Her Art. 82 stated: “The provisions of this convention shall be observed by the high contracting parties in all circumstances. If, in the event of war, one of the belligerents turns out not to be a party to the convention, nevertheless, its provisions remain binding between all belligerents who have signed the convention.”

Thus, the articles of this Convention not only do not contain a clausula si omnes, but also specifically stipulates the situation when the belligerent powers C1 and C2 are parties to the Convention, and then power C3, which is not a party to the Convention, enters the war. In such a situation, there is no longer a formal possibility of non-compliance with this Convention on the part of the C1 and C2 powers between them. Should powers C1 and C2 comply with the Convention in relation to power C3 - directly from Art. 82 should not be.

The results of this “legal vacuum” were immediate. The conditions established first by Germany for Soviet prisoners, and then by the USSR in relation to prisoners of war from among the Wehrmacht and SS troops, as well as the armed forces of Germany's allied states, could not be called human even to a first approximation.

Thus, the Germans initially considered it sufficient for prisoners to live in dugouts and eat mainly “Russian bread,” made according to a recipe invented by the Germans: half from sugar beet peelings, half from cellulose flour, flour from leaves or straw. It is not surprising that in the winter of 1941-42. these conditions led to mass mortality of Soviet prisoners of war, exacerbated by a typhus epidemic.

According to the Directorate for Prisoners of War Affairs of the High Command of the German Armed Forces (OKW), by May 1, 1944, the total number of exterminated Soviet prisoners of war reached 3.291 million people, of which: 1.981 million people died in camps, were shot and killed during the attempt to flee - 1.03 million people, died on the way - 280 thousand people. (most of the victims occurred in June 1941 - January 1942 - then more than 2.4 million prisoners died). For comparison: just for 1941-1945. The Germans captured (there are different data, but here is the figure considered by the author to be the most reliable) 6.206 million Soviet prisoners of war.

The conditions of detention of German prisoners of war in the USSR were initially just as difficult. Although, of course, there were fewer casualties among them. But only for one reason - there were fewer of them. For example, as of May 1, 1943, only 292,630 military personnel of the German and allied armies were taken into Soviet captivity. Of these, 196,944 people had died by the same time.

In conclusion of this chapter, I note that back on July 1, 1941, the USSR government approved the “Regulations on Prisoners of War.” Prisoners of war were guaranteed treatment appropriate to their status, provision of medical care on an equal basis with Soviet military personnel, the opportunity to correspond with relatives and receive parcels.

Even money transfers were formally allowed. However, Moscow, widely using the “Regulation on Prisoners of War” for propaganda aimed at the Wehrmacht, was in no hurry to implement it. In particular, the USSR refused to exchange lists of prisoners of war through the International Red Cross, which was a fundamental condition for them to receive help from their homeland. And in December 1943, the Soviet Union completely broke off all contacts with this organization.

Long Russian captivity: stages of liberation

German prisoners of war returning home, April 1, 1949. Ethat photo was provided to Wikimedia Commons German Federal Archives (Deutsches Bundesarchiv)

On August 13, 1945, the State Defense Committee (GKO) of the USSR issued a decree “On the release and return to their homeland of 708 thousand prisoners of war of ordinary and non-commissioned officers.” The number of prisoners of war to be sent home included only disabled and other non-able-to-work prisoners.

The Romanians were the first to be sent home. On September 11, 1945, in pursuance of the resolution of the State Defense Committee, it was ordered to release 40 thousand Romanian prisoners of war of ordinary and non-commissioned officers from the camps of the GUPVI NKVD of the USSR “according to the attached allocation for regions and camps”, “to begin sending released Romanian prisoners of war from September 15, 1945 . and finish no later than October 10, 1945." But two days later, a second document appears, according to which soldiers and non-commissioned officers of a number of nationalities are to be sent home:

a) all prisoners of war, regardless of physical condition, of the following nationalities: Poles, French, Czechoslovaks, Yugoslavs, Italians, Swedes, Norwegians, Swiss, Luxembourgers, Americans, British, Belgians, Dutch, Danes, Bulgarians and Greeks;

b) sick prisoners of war, regardless of nationality, except for highly infectious patients, except for Spaniards and Turks, as well as participants in atrocities and persons who served in the SS, SD, SA and Gestapo troops;

c) prisoners of war Germans, Austrians, Hungarians and Romanians - only the disabled and weakened.

At the same time, “participants in atrocities and persons who served in the SS, SD, SA and Gestapo troops, regardless of their physical condition, are not subject to release.”

The directive was not fully implemented. In any case, this conclusion can be drawn from the fact that prisoners of war of many nationalities mentioned in it were ordered to be released by order of the NKVD of January 8, 1946. According to it, Czechoslovaks, Yugoslavs, Italians, Dutch, Belgians, Danes, Swiss, Luxembourgers, Bulgarians, Turks, Norwegians, Swedes, Greeks, French, Americans and British.

At the same time, “persons who served in the SS, SA, SD, Gestapo, officers and members of other punitive bodies are not subject to deportation,” but with one exception - “French prisoners of war are subject to deportation without exception, including officers.”

Finally, on October 18, 1946, an order appeared for the repatriation to their homeland of officers and military personnel of the nationalities listed in the order of January 8, who served in the SS, SD and SA, as well as all Finns, Brazilians, Canadians, Portuguese, Abyssinians, Albanians, Argentines and Syrians. In addition, on November 28, 1946, it was ordered to release 5 thousand captured Austrians.

But let's return from foreign prisoners from among the Wehrmacht and Waffen SS military personnel to the Germans themselves. As of October 1946, 1,354,759 German prisoners of war remained in the GUPVI camps, special hospitals of the Ministry of Internal Affairs and working battalions of the Ministry of the Armed Forces of the USSR, including: generals - 352, officers - 74,506 people, non-commissioned officers and privates - 1,279 901 people

This number has been declining rather slowly. For example, in pursuance of the resolution of the Council of Ministers of the USSR of May 16, 1947 “On the sending to Germany of disabled prisoners of war of the former German army and interned Germans”, it was ordered (May 20): “to be released in 1947 from the camps of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, special hospitals, working battalions of the Ministry Armed Forces and internment battalions and send to Germany 100 thousand disabled prisoners of war of the former German army (Germans) and 13 thousand disabled interned Germans.” At the same time, some officers were also subject to release - up to and including the rank of captain. The following were not subject to exemption:

a) prisoners of war - participants in atrocities who served in units of the SS, SA, SD and Gestapo, and others who have relevant incriminating materials, regardless of their physical condition;

b) interned and arrested groups “B” (this group included Germans arrested by the Soviet authorities on German territory during and after the war, in relation to whom there was reason to believe that they were involved in crimes against the USSR or Soviet citizens in the occupied territories);

c) non-transportable patients.

A little earlier, captured Germans were required to remove their shoulder straps, cockades, awards and emblems, and captured junior officers were equated with soldiers (although they retained officer rations), forcing them to work on an equal basis with the latter.

Nine days later, a directive from the Ministry of Internal Affairs was issued, ordering in May-September 1947 to send home a thousand anti-fascist Germans who had proven themselves to be excellent production workers. This dispatch was of a propaganda nature: it was ordered to widely inform the prisoners of all camps about it, especially emphasizing the labor achievements of those being released. In June 1947, a new directive from the Ministry of Internal Affairs followed to send 500 captured Germans with anti-fascist sentiments to Germany according to personal lists. And by order from

On August 11, 1947, an order was given to release all Austrian prisoners from August to December, with the exception of generals, senior officers and SS men, members of the SA, SD and Gestapo employees, as well as persons under criminal investigation. Patients who were not transportable could not be sent. By order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of October 15, another 100 thousand captured Germans are repatriated - mostly transportable sick and disabled military personnel from privates to captains inclusive.

By the end of 1947, it was possible to determine with sufficient clarity the policy of the USSR in the matter of liberating prisoners - to return to their homeland prisoners gradually and precisely categories that could least influence the development of political life in Germany and other countries that fought against the USSR in a direction undesirable for the Soviet Union.

Patients will be more concerned with their health than with politics; and soldiers, non-commissioned officers and junior officers can influence events at home much less than generals and senior officers. As the pro-Soviet government became established and strengthened in the eastern part of Germany, the flow of returned prisoners increased.

The order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of February 27, 1948 determined the procedure and deadline for sending the next 300 thousand captured Germans to their homeland. First of all, all weakened soldiers, non-commissioned officers and junior officers, sick and disabled senior officers were subject to release. Captured soldiers, non-commissioned officers and junior officers over 50 years of age and senior officers over 60 years of age were also released.

Next, healthy (fit for heavy and moderate physical labor) soldiers, non-commissioned officers and junior officers under 50 years of age, healthy senior officers under 60 years of age, generals and admirals are held captive. In addition, military members of the SS, members of the SA, Gestapo employees, as well as German prisoners of war sentenced to punishment for military or ordinary crimes for which criminal cases were being conducted, and non-transportable patients remained in captivity.

In total, by the end of 1949, there were still 430,670 German military personnel in Soviet captivity (but German prisoners of war brought from the USSR to Eastern European countries for restoration work were detained). This was a clear violation of the USSR’s obligations: in 1947, the fourth session of the Conference of the Foreign Ministers of Great Britain, France, the USSR and the USA decided to complete the repatriation of prisoners of war located on the territory of the Allied powers and other countries by the end of 1948.

Meanwhile, the German generals began to be released. By order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of June 22, 1948, five Wehrmacht generals, Austrians by nationality, were released from captivity. The next order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs (dated September 3 of the same year) - six “correct” German generals (members of the National Committee of Free Germany and the Union of German Officers). On February 23, 1949, the USSR Ministry of Internal Affairs issued order No. 00176, which determined the timing and procedure for sending home all German prisoners during 1949. Military and criminal criminals, persons under investigation, generals and admirals, and non-transportable patients were excluded from this list.

In the summer of 1949, armed guards were removed from prisoner-of-war camps and self-guarding of prisoners was organized (without weapons, only whistles and flags). A very interesting document appears on November 28, 1949. This is the order of the Ministry of Internal Affairs No. 744, in which the Minister of Internal Affairs, Colonel General Sergei Kruglov, demands that order be put in place in the registration of prisoners of war, since it has been revealed that there is no proper registration and search for those who escaped, many prisoners of war are being treated alone in civilian hospitals, independently find employment and work in various enterprises and institutions, including sensitive ones, state and collective farms, marry Soviet citizens, and evade registration as prisoners of war in various ways.

On May 5, 1950, TASS transmitted a message about the completion of the repatriation of German prisoners of war: according to official data, 13,546 people remained in the USSR. — 9,717 convicts, 3,815 persons under investigation and 14 sick prisoners of war.

The resolution of the issue with them dragged on for more than five years. Only on September 10, 1955, negotiations began in Moscow between the delegation of the German government, headed by Federal Chancellor Konrad Adenauer, and representatives of the USSR government. The West German side asked for the release of 9,626 German citizens. The Soviet side called convicted prisoners of war “war criminals.”

Then the German delegation reported that without resolving this issue it was impossible to establish diplomatic relations between the USSR and Germany. When discussing the issue of prisoners of war, Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the USSR Nikolai Bulganin made claims regarding the repatriation of Soviet citizens located in West Germany. Adenauer recalled that these people settled in West Germany with the permission of the occupation authorities - former allies of the USSR, and German representatives did not yet have power. However, the federal government is ready to review their cases if the relevant documents are provided to it. On September 12, 1955, negotiations on the issue of prisoners of war ended with a positive decision.

However, the concession of the USSR at these negotiations was not spontaneous. Anticipating the possibility of Adenauer raising the issue of prisoners of war, the Soviet government in the summer of 1955 created a commission to review the cases of convicted foreign citizens. On July 4, 1955, the commission decided to agree with the Central Committee of the Socialist Unity Party of Germany on the advisability of repatriating to the GDR and the Federal Republic of Germany (in accordance with the place of residence before captivity) of all convicted German citizens in the USSR, and it was proposed to release most of them from further serving their sentences, and those who committed serious crimes on the territory of the USSR should be transferred as war criminals to the authorities of the GDR and the Federal Republic of Germany.

First Secretary of the CPSU Central Committee Nikita Khrushchev, in a secret letter to the First Secretary of the SED Central Committee Walter Ulbricht and Chairman of the Council of Ministers of the GDR Otto Grotewohl, said that “the issue of prisoners of war will undoubtedly be raised during negotiations with Adenauer on the establishment of diplomatic relations ...”, and in the event of successful completion of negotiations with the Chancellor of Germany, the USSR authorities intend to release 5,794 people from further serving their sentences. (that is, somewhat less than was ultimately released).

On September 28, 1955, a Decree of the Presidium of the USSR Supreme Court “On the early release of German citizens convicted by the judicial authorities of the USSR for crimes they committed against the peoples of the Soviet Union during the war” was signed (in connection with the establishment of diplomatic relations between the USSR and the Federal Republic of Germany). In 1955-1956 3,104 people were released early from places of detention in the USSR and repatriated to the GDR, 6,432 people to the Federal Republic of Germany; 28 Germans were detained at the request of the KGB (their further fate is not traced in the sources), four people were abandoned due to their filing of applications for Soviet citizenship. The release of prisoners of war was one of the first successes of the German government in the international arena.

The next year, 1957, the last of the Japanese prisoners returned to their homeland. This is where the page called “captivity” for World War II soldiers finally ended.

The ability to forgive is characteristic of Russians. But still, how amazing this property of the soul is - especially when you hear about it from the lips of yesterday’s enemy...
Letters from former German prisoners of war.

I belong to the generation that experienced the Second World War. In July 1943, I became a Wehrmacht soldier, but due to long training, I got to the German-Soviet front only in January 1945, which by that time passed through the territory of East Prussia. Then the German troops no longer had any chance in confronting the Soviet army. On March 26, 1945, I was captured by the Soviets. I was in camps in Kohla-Jarve in Estonia, in Vinogradovo near Moscow, and worked in a coal mine in Stalinogorsk (today Novomoskovsk).

We were always treated like people. We had the opportunity to spend free time and were provided with medical care. On November 2, 1949, after 4.5 years of captivity, I was released and was released as a physically and spiritually healthy person. I know that, in contrast to my experience in Soviet captivity, Soviet prisoners of war in Germany lived completely differently. Hitler treated most Soviet prisoners of war extremely cruelly. For a cultured nation, as the Germans are always represented, with so many famous poets, composers and scientists, such treatment was a disgrace and an inhumane act. After returning home, many former Soviet prisoners of war waited for compensation from Germany, but it never came. This is especially outrageous! I hope that with my modest donation I will make a small contribution to mitigating this moral injury.

Hans Moeser

Fifty years ago, on April 21, 1945, during the fierce battles for Berlin, I was captured by the Soviets. This date and the accompanying circumstances were of great importance for my subsequent life. Today, after half a century, I look back, now as a historian: the subject of this look into the past is myself.

On the day of my capture, I had just celebrated my seventeenth birthday. Through the Labor Front we were drafted into the Wehrmacht and assigned to the 12th Army, the so-called “Ghost Army”. After the Soviet Army launched “Operation Berlin” on April 16, 1945, we were literally thrown to the front.

Captivity came as a great shock to me and my young comrades, because we were completely unprepared for such a situation. And we knew nothing at all about Russia and Russians. This shock was also so severe because only when we found ourselves behind the Soviet front line did we realize the severity of the losses that our group had suffered. Of the hundred people who entered the battle in the morning, more than half died before noon. These experiences are among the most difficult memories of my life.

This was followed by the formation of trains with prisoners of war, which took us - with numerous intermediate stations - deep into the Soviet Union, to the Volga. The country needed German prisoners of war as a labor force, because factories that were inactive during the war needed to be restarted. In Saratov, a beautiful city on the high bank of the Volga, the sawmill began operating again, and I spent more than a year in the “cement city” of Volsk, also located on the high bank of the river.

Our labor camp belonged to the Bolshevik cement factory. Work at the factory was unusually difficult for me, an untrained eighteen-year-old high school student. The German “kameradas” did not always help in this case. People just needed to survive, to survive until they were sent home. In this pursuit, German prisoners developed their own, often cruel, laws in the camp.

In February 1947 I had an accident in a quarry, after which I could no longer work. Six months later I returned home as an invalid to Germany.

This is only the external side of the matter. During my stay in Saratov and then in Volsk, conditions were very difficult. These conditions are quite often described in publications about German prisoners of war in the Soviet Union: hunger and work. For me, the climate factor also played a big role. In the summer, which is unusually hot on the Volga, I had to shovel hot slag from under the furnaces at a cement plant; in winter, when it is extremely cold there, I worked in a quarry on the night shift.

Before summing up the results of my stay in the Soviet camp, I would like to describe here some more of what I experienced in captivity. And there were a lot of impressions. I will give just a few of them.

The first is nature, the majestic Volga, along which we marched every day from the camp to the plant. The impressions from this huge river, the mother of Russian rivers, are difficult to describe. One summer, when after the spring flood the river was rolling wide, our Russian guards allowed us to jump into the river to wash off the cement dust. Of course, the “supervisors” acted against the rules; but they were also humane, we exchanged cigarettes, and they were not much older than me.

In October, winter storms began, and by the middle of the month the river was covered with an ice blanket. Roads were laid along the frozen river; even trucks could move from one bank to the other. And then, in mid-April, after six months of captivity in the ice, the Volga flowed freely again: with a terrible roar, the ice broke, and the river returned to its old channel. Our Russian guards were overjoyed: “The river is flowing again!” A new time of the year has begun.

The second part of the memories is relationships with Soviet people. I have already described how humane our guards were. I can give other examples of compassion: for example, one nurse who stood at the camp gate every morning in the bitter cold. Those who did not have enough clothing were allowed by the guards to stay in the camp in winter, despite the protests of the camp authorities. Or a Jewish doctor in a hospital who saved the lives of more than one German, although they came as enemies. And finally, an elderly woman who, during the lunch break, at the train station in Volsk, shyly served us pickles from her bucket. It was a real feast for us. Later, before leaving, she came and crossed herself in front of each of us. Mother Rus', which I met in the era of late Stalinism, in 1946, on the Volga.

When today, fifty years after my captivity, I try to take stock, I discover that being in captivity turned my whole life in a completely different direction and determined my professional path.

What I experienced in my youth in Russia did not let me go even after returning to Germany. I had a choice - to push my stolen youth out of my memory and never think about the Soviet Union again, or to analyze everything I had experienced and thus bring some kind of biographical balance. I chose the second, immeasurably more difficult path, not least under the influence of my doctoral supervisor, Paul Johansen.
As stated at the beginning, it is to this difficult path that I look back today. I reflect on what I have achieved and note the following: for decades in my lectures I have tried to convey to students my critically rethought experience, receiving the most lively response. I could help my closest students more competently in their doctoral work and exams. And finally, I established long-term contacts with Russian colleagues, primarily in St. Petersburg, which over time developed into lasting friendships.

Klaus Meyer

On May 8, 1945, the remnants of the German 18th Army capitulated in the Courland Pocket in Latvia. It was a long-awaited day. Our small 100-watt transmitter was designed to negotiate terms of surrender with the Red Army. All weapons, equipment, vehicles, radio cars and the joy stations themselves were, according to Prussian neatness, collected in one place, on an area surrounded by pine trees. Nothing happened for two days. Then Soviet officers appeared and took us into two-story buildings. We spent the night cramped on straw mattresses. Early in the morning of May 11, we were lined up in hundreds, like the old distribution of companies. The foot march into captivity began.

One Red Army soldier in front, one behind. So we walked in the direction of Riga to a huge assembly camp prepared by the Red Army. Here the officers were separated from ordinary soldiers. The guards searched the things they took with them. We were allowed to leave some underwear, socks, a blanket, dishes and folding cutlery. Nothing else.

From Riga we marched in endless daytime marches to the east, to the former Soviet-Latvian border in the direction of Dünaburg. After each march we arrived at the next camp. The ritual was repeated: a search of all personal belongings, distribution of food and night sleep. Upon arrival in Dunaburg we were loaded into freight cars. The food was good: bread and American canned meat "Corned Beef". We went southeast. Those who thought that we were heading home were very surprised. After many days we arrived at the Baltic Station in Moscow. Standing on the trucks, we drove through the city. It's already dark. Was any of us able to make any notes?

At a distance from the city, next to a village of three-story wooden houses, there was a large prefabricated camp, so large that its outskirts were lost beyond the horizon. Tents and prisoners... The week passed with good summer weather, Russian bread and American canned food. After one of the morning roll calls, 150 to 200 prisoners were separated from the rest. We got on the trucks. None of us knew where we were going. The path lay to the northwest. We drove the last kilometers through a birch forest along a dam. After about a two-hour drive (or longer?) we were at our destination.

The forest camp consisted of three or four wooden barracks located partially at ground level. The door was located low, at the level of several steps down. Behind the last barracks, in which the German camp commandant from East Prussia lived, there were quarters for tailors and shoemakers, a doctor’s office and a separate barracks for the sick. The entire area, barely larger than a football field, was surrounded by barbed wire. A somewhat more comfortable wooden barrack was intended for security. There was also a sentry booth and a small kitchen on the premises. This place was to become our new home for the next months, maybe even years. It didn't feel like a quick return home.

In the barracks along the central passage there were two rows of wooden two-story bunks. At the end of the complex registration procedure (we did not have our soldier's books with us), we placed straw-filled mattresses on the bunks. Those located on the upper tier could be lucky. He had the opportunity to look out through a glass window measuring about 25 x 25 centimeters.

Exactly at 6 o'clock we got up. After that, everyone ran to the washbasins. At a height of approximately 1.70 meters, a tin drain began, mounted on a wooden support. The water went down to about the level of the stomach. In those months when there was no frost, the upper reservoir was filled with water. To wash, a simple valve had to be turned, after which water flowed or dripped onto the head and upper body. After this procedure, roll call on the parade ground was repeated every day. Exactly at 7 o'clock we went to the logging site in the endless birch forests surrounding the camp. I can't remember ever having to cut down any other tree other than birch.

Our “bosses,” civilian civilian overseers, were waiting for us on the spot. They distributed tools: saws and axes. Groups of three were created: two prisoners felled a tree, and the third collected leaves and unnecessary branches into one pile and then burned them. Especially in wet weather, this was an art. Of course, every prisoner of war had a lighter. Along with the spoon, this is probably the most important item in captivity. But with the help of such a simple object, consisting of a flint, a wick and a piece of iron, it was possible to set fire to rain-soaked wood, often only after many hours of effort. Burning wood waste was a daily norm. The norm itself consisted of two meters of felled wood, stacked. Each wooden stump had to be two meters long and at least 10 centimeters in diameter. With such primitive tools as blunt saws and axes, which often consisted of only a few ordinary pieces of iron welded together, it was hardly possible to fulfill such a norm.

After the work was completed, the stacks of wood were picked up by the “bosses” and loaded onto open trucks. At lunchtime, work was interrupted for half an hour. We were given watery cabbage soup. Those who managed to fulfill the norm (due to hard work and insufficient nutrition, only a few succeeded) received in the evening in addition to the usual diet, which consisted of 200 grams of wet bread, which however tasted good, a tablespoon of sugar and a pinch of tobacco, and straight porridge on the lid of the pan. One thing “reassured”: the food of our guards was little better.

Winter 1945/46 was very difficult. We stuck balls of cotton wool into our clothes and boots. We felled trees and stacked them until the temperature dropped below 20 degrees Celsius. If it got colder, all the prisoners remained in the camp.

Once or twice a month we were woken up at night. We got up from our straw mattresses and rode in a truck to the station, which was about 10 kilometers away. We saw huge mountains of forest. These were the trees we felled. The tree was to be loaded into closed freight cars and sent to Tushino near Moscow. The forest mountains instilled in us a state of depression and horror. We had to set these mountains in motion. This was our job. How much longer can we hold out? How long will this last? These night hours seemed endless to us. When daylight arrived, the carriages were fully loaded. The work was tiring. Two people carried a two-meter tree trunk on their shoulders to the carriage, and then simply pushed it without a lift into the open doors of the carriage. Two particularly strong prisoners of war were stacking wood inside the carriage into staples. The carriage was filling up. It was the turn of the next carriage. We were illuminated by a spotlight on a high pole. It was some kind of surreal picture: shadows from tree trunks and swarming prisoners of war, like some kind of fantastic wingless creatures. When the first rays of the sun fell on the ground, we walked back to the camp. This whole day was already a day off for us.

One January night in 1946 is particularly etched in my memory. The frost was so severe that after work the truck engines would not start. We had to walk on ice for 10 or 12 kilometers to the camp. The full moon illuminated us. A group of 50-60 prisoners trudged along, stumbling. People were moving further and further away from each other. I could no longer distinguish the person walking in front. I thought this was the end. To this day I don’t know how I managed to get to the camp.

Logging. Day after day. Endless winter. More and more prisoners felt morally depressed. The salvation was to sign up for a “business trip”. That’s what we called work on nearby collective and state farms. We used a hoe and a shovel to dig out potatoes or beets from the frozen ground. It was not possible to collect much. But anyway, what was collected was put into a pan and heated. Melted snow was used instead of water. Our guard ate what was cooked with us. Nothing was thrown away. The clearings were collected, secretly from the controllers at the entrance to the camp, they entered the territory and, after receiving evening bread and sugar, were fried in the barracks on two red-hot iron stoves. It was a kind of “carnival” food in the dark. Most of the prisoners were already asleep by that time. And we sat, absorbing the warmth with our exhausted bodies like sweet syrup.

When I look at the past time from the height of the years I have lived, I can say that I have never, anywhere, in any place in the USSR noticed such a phenomenon as hatred of the Germans. It is amazing. After all, we were German prisoners, representatives of a people who, over the course of a century, twice plunged Russia into war. The Second War was unparalleled in its level of cruelty, horror and crime. If there were signs of any accusations, they were never “collective”, addressed to the entire German people.

At the beginning of May 1946, I worked as part of a group of 30 prisoners of war from our camp on one of the collective farms. Long, strong, newly grown tree trunks intended for building houses had to be loaded onto prepared trucks. And then it happened. The tree trunk was carried on the shoulders. I was on the “wrong” side. While loading the barrel into the back of the truck, my head was caught between two barrels. I was lying unconscious in the back of the car. Blood was flowing from the ears, mouth and nose. The truck took me back to camp. At this point my memory failed. I didn’t remember anything further.

The camp doctor, an Austrian, was a Nazi. Everyone knew about this. He did not have the necessary medicines and dressings. His only tool was nail scissors. The doctor said immediately: “Fracture of the base of the skull. There is nothing I can do here...”

For weeks and months I lay in the camp infirmary. It was a room with 6-8 two-story bunks. Mattresses stuffed with straw lay on top. When the weather was good, flowers and vegetables grew near the barracks. In the first weeks the pain was unbearable. I didn't know how to lie down more comfortably. I could barely hear. The speech resembled incoherent mumbling. Vision has noticeably deteriorated. It seemed to me that an object in my field of vision on the right was on the left and vice versa.

Some time before my accident, a military doctor arrived at the camp. As he himself said, he came from Siberia. The doctor introduced many new rules. A sauna was built near the camp gate. Every weekend prisoners washed and steamed in it. The food has also improved. The doctor visited the infirmary regularly. One day he explained to me that I would be in the camp until such time as I could not be transported.

During the warm summer months my health improved noticeably. I could get up and made two discoveries. First of all, I realized that I was alive. Secondly, I found a small camp library. On rough wooden shelves one could find everything that the Russians valued in German literature: Heine and Lessing, Berne and Schiller, Kleist and Jean Paul. As a person who had already given up on himself, but who managed to survive, I attacked the books. I read first Heine, and then Jean Paul, about whom I had never heard anything at school. Although I still felt pain when turning the pages, over time I forgot everything that was happening around me. Books enveloped me like a coat, protecting me from the outside world. As I read, I felt an increase in strength, new strength that drove away the effects of my trauma. Even after darkness fell, I could not take my eyes off the book. After Jean Paul, I began reading a German philosopher named Karl Marx. "18. Brumer Louis Bonaparte" immersed me in the atmosphere of Paris in the mid-19th century, and "The French Civil War" plunged me into the thick of the battles of Parisian workers and the Commune of 1870-71. My head felt like it had been wounded again. I realized that behind this radical criticism lay a philosophy of protest, expressed in an unshakable belief in man's individuality, in his ability to achieve self-liberation and, as Erich Fromm said, “in his ability to express inner qualities.” It was as if someone had lifted the veil of lack of clarity, and the driving forces of social conflicts acquired a coherent understanding.
I don't want to gloss over the fact that reading wasn't easy for me. Everything I had ever believed in was destroyed. I began to understand that with this new perception came a new hope, not limited to just the dream of returning home. It was the hope for a new life in which there would be a place for self-awareness and respect for man.
While reading one of the books (I think it was “Economic and Philosophical Notes” or maybe “German Ideology”), I appeared before a commission from Moscow. Its task was to select sick prisoners for further transportation to Moscow for treatment. "Will you go home!" - a doctor from Siberia told me.

A few days later, at the end of July 1946, I was driving in an open truck with several, standing as always and huddled closely together, across a familiar dam in the direction of Moscow, which was 50 or 100 km away. I spent several days in a kind of central hospital for prisoners of war under the supervision of German doctors. The next day I boarded a freight car lined with straw on the inside. This long train was supposed to take me to Germany.
During a stop in an open field, one train overtook us on neighboring rails. I recognized the two-meter trunks of birch trees, the same trunks that we felled en masse in captivity. The trunks were intended for locomotive fires. That's what they were used for. I could hardly think of a more pleasant farewell.
On August 8, the train arrived at the Gronenfelde assembly point near Frankfurt an der Oder. I received my release documents. On the 11th of that month, I, 89 pounds lighter but a new free man, walked into my parents' house.