War of extermination
In their moral degradation, the German invaders, having lost their human appearance, had long since fallen to the level of wild animals.
Joseph Stalin, November 6 1941
In modern Russia, recalling the Great Patriotic War, they talk, write and shoot films about the causes of the war, military operations, mistakes of the Soviet command, they pay a lot of attention to the “fault” of Stalin. There are authors who justify the occupiers, collaborators, blacken the partisans, underground fighters. In their works, the USSR looks almost worse than the Third Reich, or stands on the same level with it in atrocities. They say that the arrival of the Germans was greeted by local residents with joy, and people lived under the invaders better than under the “bloody dictator” Stalin.
At the same time, they often forget that this war was very different from the others - previous and subsequent ones. It was a war to destroy our civilization and the whole nation. By the fall of 1941, the German leadership was generally planning to complete the operation to destroy the Soviet armed forces and occupy the European part of the USSR through the Arkhangelsk-Astrakhan line. Almost immediately after the seizure of territory, the Germans, with their inherent rationalism and practicality, began to "develop" the land. The methods of this “mastering” were planned in as detailed as the plan of the military campaign. Naturally, adjustments could be made in the course, but the essence did not change. Captured spaces were cleared of "racially inferior" residents of the USSR.
Thank God, and our people (and the leadership of the Union), that the Nazis failed to implement the plan of "blitzkrieg". He crashed on the firm political will of Moscow, the fierce resistance of soldiers, sailors, border guards, pilots, gunners and tankmen, the general power of the state, which our enemy underestimated. Therefore, the Nazis were able to realize only a part of their plans. But even this part is horrified by its scale and brutality of the methods of the occupation regime. According to the most modest estimates of the 70 millions of Soviet citizens, who were under the fifth invaders, every fifth did not live up to the Victory.
The Nazis methodically destroyed the Communists, employees of state bodies, prisoners of war, partisans, members of the underground, Jews. Virtually the entire occupied territory was turned into a giant death conveyor. Destroyed by direct methods, through the use of overwork, food restrictions, lack of basic medical care. Not only mature people became victims, but also children, old people. The Soviet army, advancing, met whole "death zones" into which cities, villages and villages were turned.
According to the USSR Chief Prosecutor at the Nuremberg Trials of Lev Smirnov, Soviet soldiers everywhere encountered crimes of unprecedented cruelty: “At the mass graves where the bodies of Soviet people, killed by“ typical German methods, ”rested, the bodies of teenagers swayed in the kilns of giant crematoriums, where those killed in the extermination camps were burned, on the corpses of women and girls who were victims of the sadistic inclinations of the fascist gangsters, on the dead bodies of children torn in half ... ” According to the American representative of the prosecution Taylor: "These atrocities took place as a result of carefully calculated orders and directives issued before or during the attack on the Soviet Union and were a coherent logical system."
War of extermination
6 June 1941, the Supreme Command of the Wehrmacht OKW issued a secret order ("Decree of the Commissioners"), which ordered the elimination of captured commissioners (political leaders). The order was signed by the field marshal, the chief of staff of the High Command, the German armed forces, Wilhelm Keitel. This order was supplemented by a number of orders. For example, the special order No. 1 of the OKW chief to the 21 directive No. 19 of May 1941 reported that the fight against Bolshevism "requires strict, decisive measures against Bolshevik agitators, partisans, saboteurs and Jews ...". 2 July 1941 was issued a special directive by the Reich General Security Directorate, signed by the head of the RSHA Reinhard Heydrich. She was addressed to the chiefs of the SS and the police in the occupied Soviet territories of the USSR and reported that workers of the Comintern, employees of the highest and middle rank, as well as the most active lower rank employees in the Communist Party, Central Committee, regional and district committees, commissioners, Jews ( party members and civil servants), as well as various radical elements (saboteurs, saboteurs, propagandists, arsonists, murderers, etc.).
22 June Hitler's hordes attacked the USSR. On the fourth day of the war the Germans entered Baranavichy. The German soldiery crumbled around the city, killed for a sidelong glance and behind closed doors. Four of them fell into the hands of the Soviet Red Army burned alive. In one of the villages near Borisov, the Nazis "had fun": 36 women and girls were brutally murdered, more were raped.
In Bialystok, the 309 police battalion, which entered the city after the Wehrmacht formations, was engaged in “appeasing" the population. First, the soldiers defeated the liquor stores, and then began to collect the Jews who lived in the city. The Nazis were not satisfied with the pogrom and began to shoot the detained Jews. They killed houses, on the streets, in the city park. The survivors were driven into the central synagogue and set on fire. Grenades were thrown at the windows, those who tried to escape were shot. As a result, only in the synagogue they killed up to 700 men. Wehrmacht officers surprised by these events, the habits of them were not there, were outraged. But there was no punishment, the police carried out their duties.
4nd Commander tank Colonel-General Erich Göpner said in an order to the troops: “The war against Russia is an essential part of the struggle for the existence of the German people. This is a long-standing struggle of the Germans against the Slavs, the defense of European culture from the Moscow-Asian invasion ... This fight should be aimed at ruining today's Russia, and therefore should be waged with unprecedented cruelty ... ” And the troops followed these orders.
There were German murderers and local associates. 30 June the Germans took Lvov. The Nachtigall battalion entered the city (it was part of the German commando division Brandenburg 800), which was formed mainly from members and supporters of the Organization of Ukrainian Nationalists (Bandera movement). Roman Shukhevych commanded the battalion directly. The officers of the Abwehr (military intelligence and counterintelligence of Germany), who prepared this battalion, had no reason to complain about his military and political training, but further events confused even the hardened German intelligence officers. Ukrainian Nazis staged a real massacre in the city. "Yids" and "Muscovites" were brutally killed. Spared neither women nor children. Later, SS units joined the “hunt”, which entered the city a little later. Only in the first days in the city more than 4 thousand people were killed.
Similar reprisals took place all over Western Ukraine. They were killed only because the person was a Jew, a Pole, a Moskal or a Bolshevik. They did not lag behind the Ukrainian Nazis and the SS fighters and Wehrmacht soldiers. In the dormitory of a Lviv garment factory, they raped and killed 32 young women. Drunken soldiers caught the girls on the streets of Lviv and dragged them to Kosciuszko Park, where they were raped, many were disfigured and killed. Priest V. Pomaznev tried to call the soldiers to reason: he was beaten, his beard was burned and he was slaughtered.
The 1 SS Panzer Division “Leibstandard SS Adolf Hitler” “distinguished itself” in atrocities — it was part of the 1 Panzer Group under the command of Colonel-General Ewald von Kleist. On the night before the invasion of the Soviet Union, the elite fighters were explained how to behave in the war of extermination: “Break the Russian skull and you will protect yourself from them forever! You are the infinite lord in this country! The life and death of the population is in your hands! We need Russian spaces without Russians! ”In one of the settlements near Rivne, the SS units encountered particularly fierce resistance and suffered significant losses. After the capture of the village, the angry Nazis drove several dozens of old women and children, and shot them. Soon the division commander Josef Dietrich issued an order not to take prisoners, to shoot them on the spot. Behind the division there were special teams that destroyed the village behind the village, people hiding in basements and cellars, “smoked” with grenades. After the division remained "desert".
The seizure of the Baltic republics was very swift, so few had time to evacuate. On the day when the Germans entered Kaunas, local Nazis staged a massacre in the city. Lithuanian nationalists competed with the SS in cruelty, in a few days more than 4 thousand people were killed, houses and synagogues were defeated. By July 11, according to SD data, 7800 Jews were exterminated in Kaunas. Local nationalists rendered the Germans great help in finding not only Jews, but communists, Red Army men.
In Riga, immediately after the capture of the city began mass arrests. Workers who welcomed in the 1940 year, joining the USSR, representatives of Soviet and party institutions, in general, all ordinary people from other republics, were arrested. They mocked, arrested, and most often, they did not return home, they were taken to the forest and shot. During the 2-3 weeks, approximately 12 thousands of Jews and as many Russians were exterminated. In addition, concentration camps, “death camps,” were quickly established in the Baltics. They destroyed not only local residents, but also brought people from other regions of the USSR.
For the mass destruction of civilians in the territories occupied by the Third Reich, operational (punitive) special-purpose groups were created - the Einsatzgruppen der Sicherheitspolizei und des SD security groups (SD). Einsatzgrupp followed the units of the Wehrmacht advancing to the east and responsible for the security of the rear, “cleansing” it from Communists, Jews, Gypsies, “asocial elements”, Soviet intelligentsia, etc. In May 1941 of the year was created four einsatzgruppen. They divided the front line by geographic principle: group “A” - the Baltic republics were in their area of responsibility (zone of advance of Army Group “North”); Group “B” - Minsk, Smolensk, Moscow Region (Army Group “Center”); Group "C" - the area of Kiev; Group "D" - the southern part of Ukraine (Army Group "South"). In addition, established Sonderkommando (him. Sonderkommando, a special team), they were used in close proximity to the front line.
Einsatzgruppeni noted in the mass destruction of the Jewish population. It was worked out a certain method for the destruction of Jewish communities. After the first pogroms and massacres, in which local residents often took part (this was typical of the Baltic States and Western Ukraine), the Jews were ordered to move to a specially created ghetto (isolated residential areas). On the day appointed for the slaughter, the Jews were ordered to gather in the central square of the settlement or in a building. Then, as a rule, under the pretext of being sent to work, or resettlement, they were sent to the place of execution. At the same time, the places of residence of the Jews were cordoned off by units of the Wehrmacht, and the soldiers searched the house behind the house, destroying those who were hiding. So, in Kiev, in literally two days - 29-30 of September 1941 of the year, more than 33 thousand people were destroyed.
The exact number of people killed in this way is unknown. Only Jews in the USSR were killed up to 2 million people. By the end of 1941, the Einsatzgruppen group reported the following data: Group A - more than 249 thousand murdered Jews; Group B - more than 45 thousand people; Group C - 95 thousand killed; Group D - 92 thousand killed Jews.
During punitive operations, the occupiers did not stand on ceremony with the local “racially inferior” population. The connections of the SS cavalry brigade under the command of Fegelein at the end of July “pacified” the Belarusian villages of the Starobinsky district. In two weeks, only one brigade regiment destroyed a 6509 man and 239 arrested. In August, the 221 and 286 security divisions carried out punitive operations in the Ivatsevichi area and around Lepel, and the 162 and 252 infantry divisions in the Bogushevsky region. As a result, 13788 civilians and 714 military were killed only in the Bogushevsky district, not counting the destroyed settlements.
Loved punishers and "have fun." Rape was a massive phenomenon in this war. In the town of Shatsk, Minsk Region, all the girls were raped, then they were naked expelled to the square and forced to dance. Those who refused were shot. In the village of Rekty all the girls were taken to the forest, raped and killed. In the village of Lyady, a German soldier first looted houses, and then the Germans demanded 18 girls to “entertain” the command. When the order was not executed, they took it away. The girls, among them were 13-14 summer, raped and killed. In the village of Berezovka, Smolensk region, the Nazis raped and took with them all the women and girls aged 16-30 years. In the village of Hills under Mogilyov, German sadists grabbed six girls. They were raped, then their eyes and breasts were cut out. One was torn with tilted trees.
They loved Hans and Fritz to photograph their "exploits". In this regard, they resemble the current globalizers - NATO soldiers. Complete impunity leads to brutality. Enough data was preserved to understand that atrocities and massacres were the norm for the German occupiers.
Under the city of the Island, the German Air Force bombed a train on which children were taken out. The planes not only bombed the train, but also arranged a hunt for scattering children. Another squad was bombed near Mogilyov: the children fled into the forest, and German tanks got out of it. This was the SS division "Reich" - they began to crush children. No wonder Adolf Hitler spoke of the need for the development of a “defacement technique,” that is, the elimination of entire racial units. For the Germans, there was no longer any difference whom to kill - the enemy’s soldiers or children, they cleared the “living space” for themselves.
The office of Paul Joseph Goebbels worked well. Virtually every German soldier managed to instill that the war in the East is very different from the military campaigns in the West. In the East, they fought against the Russian-Jewish Asiatic hordes, which are worse than rabid animals, nonhumans, who cannot be taken prisoner. The destruction of prisoners of the Red Army took place everywhere. Often they were not just killed, but also scoffed - they poked out their eyes, ripped off their bellies, cut out stars on their bodies, crushed them with tanks, etc. Wounded Red Army soldiers, during their retreat, if it was not possible to pick them up, they asked to kill them in order not to fall into the hands of the Nazis.
The advancing German troops carried with them hell. In the village of Bely Rast, Guderian tankers were entertained by shooting at 12-year-old Volodya Tkachev, who became a “living target.” In the city of Ruse, a brothel was staged in a cinema, forcibly driving girls there.
During the counteroffensive of the Soviet troops near Moscow, the Red Army soldiers found many traces of the monstrous atrocities of the Nazi soldiers. Scorched villages, destroyed cities, where the Germans destroyed almost the entire infrastructure. In the villages there was not a whole house. Women, old women and children hid in the woods, in dugouts and near fires. Men were hijacked for engineering work and shot during the retreat. In a number of villages, the entire population was burned down. Military censorship detained letters from soldiers, which described the atrocities of the Nazis. The actions of the invaders were so terrible that it was simply not possible to tell the whole truth. The internal affairs authorities recorded more and more new cases of atrocities by the occupiers. The reality was worse than any newspaper truth.
It is amazing how the Soviet soldiers were able to maintain the highest level of discipline in enemy territory. They saw with their own eyes the hell that the Hitlerite hordes brought to the Soviet land.
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