Andrei Vlasov in the service of the Third Reich
Photos from the case of General Vlasov
В previous article We talked about the origin of A. Vlasov, his quite successful military career in the pre-war years and at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War. This article will tell how Vlasov took the path of betrayal, his service to the Nazi authorities of Germany, his attempt to escape to the American sector, the inglorious end of the life of this traitor and his accomplices.
The way to the Germans
Historians still argue about Vlasov's motives for betrayal and the time when he decided to surrender. Some believe that he made his fateful choice even before the final catastrophe of the Second Shock Army. While surrounded, he allegedly cursed Stalin and the Headquarters in impotent rage for abandoning him, "the best general in the country" (as he considered himself), to his fate and doing nothing to evacuate him. And so he decided to take revenge - to go over to the German service. Indeed, unlike other soldiers and officers of the Second Shock Army, for some reason he went not to the east, but to the west. And when meeting the Germans, he did not try to introduce himself as an ordinary officer or even a soldier, but immediately gave his real name and military rank. However, other historians point out that Vlasov did not go to the Germans immediately, but only two weeks after the liquidation of the remnants of the Second Shock Army - on July 12, 1942. Were you hesitating, not knowing what to do? Or were you hoping to sit it out in the forest and then get in touch with the partisans?
Another question: why did General Vlasov, who had surrendered, cooperate with the Nazis? Was he afraid of the hardships of life in a concentration camp and even possible violence from the Germans? Did he no longer believe in the possibility of defeating Germany? Or was he an ideological enemy who, with his transfer to German service, received the opportunity to take revenge for his humiliation before his superiors and commissars? In his "Open Letter" he claimed that it was precisely in the encirclement:
“I have finally come to the conclusion that my duty is to call upon the Russian people to fight for the overthrow of the Bolshevik government, to fight for peace for the Russian people, to end the war for foreign interests that the Russian people do not need.”
And later he even came out with a call to “follow Lenin’s path” — to use the war to “liberate the people and the country from the Bolshevik regime.” He said that during World War I, Lenin and Trotsky retained power by entering into separate negotiations with the Germans and making significant concessions. And he would enter into an agreement with Hitler and “buy peace from Germany,” giving it the Baltics, Belarus, and Ukraine. In his “Open Letter” of March 3, 1943, Vlasov wrote:
“I call them (the Russian people) to the path of brotherhood and unity with the peoples of Europe, and first of all to the path of cooperation and eternal friendship with the great German people.”
Moreover, the excessively ambitious Vlasov seriously expected to enter history as "the liberator of Russia from the Bolshevik yoke", to appear on the pages of textbooks as a "fighter for democracy" and to stand in the same row with the Decembrists and Herzen. He believed in these fantasies so much that even in May 1945 he said that grateful descendants would not forget his "services" to Russia.
It is known that in 1942, Foreign Ministry adviser Gustav Hilder actually met with Vlasov and discussed the possibility of his participation in a puppet government of Russia that would "officially hand over" the territories of Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltics to Germany. However, in the summer of that year, the situation at the front was favorable for the German armies, and the negotiations were curtailed.
Another question: when exactly did Vlasov decide to go over to the side of Hitler and the Third Reich – even before he surrendered? Or did he waver later, unable to resist the temptation to exchange a concentration camp for a German general’s salary (six thousand Reichsmarks a month) and a comfortable mansion in Berlin? The debate continues, but the fact of Vlasov’s betrayal is obvious, and where and when the general made this decision is probably not very important.
German interest in the Vlasov case
And how could A. Vlasov be of interest to the German General Staff and intelligence? For three months he was in the encircled army and therefore, naturally, all the information he had about the plans of the Soviet command was hopelessly out of date. He could have given a characterization of the Red Army generals he knew, however, given his ambition and self-conceit, it can be assumed that it would have been of a derogatory nature and would have created a false impression of the incompetence of the Soviet commanders.
Vlasov himself clearly counted on cooperation with the top leadership of the Third Reich as the creator and even head of the anti-Bolshevik government of Russia in exile – nothing more and nothing less. And his ambitions were to be supported by an entire army recruited from Soviet prisoners of war. However, Hitler and his closest associates did not take Vlasov’s claims seriously; moreover, they treated him with undisguised contempt. Thus, it is known that Himmler called him a “runaway pig” and a fool, and Hitler – a “man from the quagmire”. For a long time, Vlasov was considered only an instrument of propaganda. Of course, there could be no talk of equal cooperation between the “high-bred” Aryans and the “Untermenschen” Slavs, and Vlasov “complained” to Soviet investigators in 1946:
“Until 1944, the Germans… used us only as a signboard that was advantageous to them… Our participation in all these (military) affairs even in 1945 hardly exceeded 5 percent”
And Vlasov himself was forced to “play” by the Nazi rules; when a Russian orderly dropped a tray with vodka glasses, he declared to his German guest:
"Please excuse me, this is an Untermensch."
However, Frau Bielenberg, the widow of a high-ranking SS officer, who was acquainted with Himmler himself and yearned for “male affection,” condescended to close communication with Untermensch Vlasov and even became his lover.
Career of a traitor
So, Lieutenant General Vlasov, who had surrendered, was sent to the Prominent camp near Vinnitsa, where captured generals, colonels and officers of the General Staff were held.
A. Vlasov in a prisoner of war camp, first days in captivity
Here he very quickly and easily established contacts with representatives of German intelligence and the Department of the General Staff of Foreign Troops in the East. He signed the first leaflet compiled for him by the Wehrmacht Propaganda Department on September 10, 1942. And on September 17, he was transferred to Berlin, where Vlasov met the former brigade commissar and member of the Military Council of the 32nd Army G. N. Zhilenkov and the former battalion commissar M. A. Zykov, who had previously gone over to the German side.
Zykov and Zhilenkov with German officers on the far right. Photo taken between 1942 and 1944.
These traitors would become loyal collaborators of Vlasov. Zhilenkov would later be hanged in Moscow on August 1, 1946. But Zykov, because of his Jewish origins, would be secretly arrested and killed by the Gestapo in 1944. In the meantime, all three of them composed the so-called "Smolensk Appeal", published on January 13, 1943. It was printed in a print run of three million copies, and leaflets with it were dropped from airplanes over the positions of Soviet troops. German sources claim that this "appeal of the Russian Committee had an extraordinary success, especially in the middle and northern sectors of the front. Divisions of Army Groups Center and North reported an increase in the number of deserters."
Representatives of the headquarters of these groups of troops invited Vlasov to the front to speak to prisoners of war and the civilian population.
On March 3, 1943, Vlasov's already cited open letter "Why I took the path of fighting Bolshevism" was published. The Nazi curators were so pleased with their protégé that they recommended him for the award of the "For Courage" badge for citizens of the Eastern peoples, 2nd class - Vlasov received it on April 23 of the same year. But he was denied the creation of his own army: Hitler himself, at a meeting at headquarters on June 8, 1943, declared that this was a "first-class fantasy"; Germany only needed Russian slaves who would work for free both in German families and in the factories of the Third Reich. Vlasov, in the Fuhrer's opinion, was needed only at the front lines, and he should act only "with his name and his photographs." But the first "Russian battalions" had already begun to form - now they were disarmed.
"Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia" and "Russian Liberation Army"
In 1944, the situation changed, and the situation at the front forced the German leadership to reconsider its views on the use of units made up of Soviet prisoners of war. Especially since Vlasov continued to lie with inspiration and make unrealistic promises. For example, he told Himmler on September 16, 1944:
"Mr. Minister! I know that today I can end the war against Stalin. If I had a shock army made up of citizens of my fatherland, I would reach Moscow and then end the war by telephone, talking to my comrades who are on the other side."
Andrei Vlasov and Heinrich Himmler, cover of the German magazine "Signal"
By this time, the German leaders were already in the position of drowning men clutching at straws, and therefore allowed Vlasov to begin the formation of the so-called Russian Liberation Army (ROA).
ROA Commander-in-Chief A. Vlasov in the Dabendorf camp near Berlin
But first, on November 14, 1944, the creation of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (KONR) was announced in Prague. Collaboration with it proved fatal for many weak-willed Soviet prisoners of war and civilians forcibly taken to the territory of the Reich.
The Manifesto of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia stated:
"Humanity is experiencing an era of the greatest upheavals... The forces of imperialism, led by the plutocrats of England and the USA, whose greatness is built on the oppression and exploitation of other countries and peoples... the forces of internationalism, led by Stalin's clique, dreaming of a world revolution... are covering up their criminal goals with slogans of defending freedom, democracy, culture and civilization... Two years ago, Stalin could still deceive the peoples with words about the domestic, liberating character of the war. But now the Red Army has crossed the state borders of the Soviet Union, broken into Romania, Bulgaria, Serbia, Croatia, Hungary and is drenching foreign lands with blood... The goal of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia is:
a) The overthrow of Stalin's tyranny, the liberation of the peoples of Russia from the Bolshevik system;
b) Ending the war and concluding an honorable peace with Germany;
c) Creation of a new free people's state without Bolsheviks and exploiters.
Compatriots, brothers and sisters in Europe! Remember that you are now working for a common cause, for the heroic liberation troops. Multiply your efforts and your labor exploits!"
a) The overthrow of Stalin's tyranny, the liberation of the peoples of Russia from the Bolshevik system;
b) Ending the war and concluding an honorable peace with Germany;
c) Creation of a new free people's state without Bolsheviks and exploiters.
Compatriots, brothers and sisters in Europe! Remember that you are now working for a common cause, for the heroic liberation troops. Multiply your efforts and your labor exploits!"
Participants of this forum later recalled that it ended in a grand drinking bout, during which “people fell to the floor and fell asleep.” The Baltic German Sergei Froelich (born in 1904 in Riga), who was appointed as a liaison officer under Vlasov, claimed:
"This licentiousness was due to desperation. We all understood that this initiative came too late."
The core of the forming 1st division of the Russian Liberation Army (ROA) was the infamous brigade of SS-Brigadeführer Bronislav Kaminsky. This unit is also known as RONA – “Russian Liberation People’s Army”. In 1941-1943, Kaminsky’s subordinates burned 24 villages in the Bryansk and Vitebsk regions, killing more than 10 Soviet citizens, 203 of whom were burned alive. And on August 5, 1944, Kaminsky’s brigade carried out a terrible massacre in the Warsaw district of Okhota (15 civilians died). An eyewitness recalled his first impression of these punishers:
"A wild horde of armed and unarmed people dressed in a motley uniform poured out of the carriage. Among them were women covered in jewelry, and the officers, who were as dissolute as most of the soldiers, had three, four, five pairs of watches on their hands."
B. Kaminsky in the photo on March 21, 1944.
S. Bunyachenko, the former commander of the 389th rifle division of the Red Army who went over to the German side and was now appointed commander of the First Division of the ROA, which included Kaminsky’s brigade, did not hesitate to call his subordinates bandits, robbers and murderers.
S. K. Bunyachenko
Meanwhile, on January 28, 1945, Vlasov received the post of commander-in-chief of the armed forces of KONR; the command of two divisions was officially transferred to Vlasov by the German inspector general of “volunteer units” E. Kestring on February 10.
The commander of the 2nd regiment of the First Division of the ROA V. Artemyev recalled that everyone already understood the “uselessness of their struggle against the communist regime,” but they had high hopes for the Americans, who would supposedly provide asylum to every participant in the “Liberation Movement.” Even then, many soldiers and officers tore off German emblems from their uniforms, but the official order from the OKW to replace them with ROA insignia followed only on March 2 – the KONR forces were given the status of an army of an allied state.
Vlasov in front of a line of ROA soldiers
The true attitude of the Germans towards the Vlasov "government" is evidenced by the Soviet military engineer P. N. Paliy, who was in captivity. According to him, when asked by officers of the First Division of the ROA about what relations would be between Russia and Germany after the war, the German General Kestring answered:
"Everything west of the Urals will be under German control, everything to the east will be entirely yours."
It should be noted that this happened in February 1945 – such was the degree of adequacy of some of Hitler’s fanatical supporters.
Combat operations of the ROA
In 1944, some ROA units were sent to the Western Front – the Wehrmacht leaders did not dare send them into battle against the Red Army, fearing mass desertion. These units encountered American troops, whose command, having found out that they were Russian, generously offered the traitors to surrender, guaranteeing... a return to their homeland. The Vlasovites understood perfectly well how they would be met in the USSR, and they were afraid not only (and not so much) of the Chekists, but of the ordinary soldiers, who, as a rule, shot them on the spot – and the officers were far from always able to stop them (however, it must be assumed that they did not try too hard to protect the traitors). Front-line artilleryman Mikhail Kano claimed:
“None of us were interested in the reasons why the former Red Army soldier began to serve the Germans, whether for ideological reasons or to avoid dying of hunger in a prisoner of war camp.”
He also described an incident when a column of captured Vlasovites was literally crushed by the Soviets before his eyes. a tank. The driver-mechanic was later court-martialed, but his actions did not evoke the slightest condemnation from the witnesses of this incident. Frightened by the prospect of returning to their homeland, the Vlasovites began to put up such stubborn resistance to the Allies that they greatly embittered them; the Americans then very willingly and without any ceremony sent them to the Soviet Union in whole trains and steamships. They did not stand on ceremony with the "refuseniks": they were dragged out of the church by the hair (August 12, 1945, Kempten), sleeping pills were mixed into their coffee (Fort Dick, New Jersey), sleeping gases were used.
And on April 13-14, 1945, Vlasovites entered into battle with units of the Soviet Army (First Belorussian Front) for the first and last time. Bunyachenko's 1st Division stormed Soviet positions on the Oder, but suffered a defeat. Two days later, on April 15, contrary to the orders of the German command, it moved south to surrender to the Allied forces.
The inglorious end of an army of traitors
On May 1, Bunyachenko's division approached Prague, and on May 4, an uprising broke out in the city. The SS troops were ordered to destroy the city, and then the Czechs turned to the ROA. The Germans did not expect a blow in the back and began to leave the city. After this, the newly created Czech government announced to the Vlasovites that it had never asked them for help, and that the representatives of the Prague Uprising headquarters who entered into negotiations were impostors and adventurers who had no authority.
The Czechs advised the Vlasovites to surrender to the Red Army units approaching Prague. As a result, on May 7, Bunyachenko's division resumed its movement south. At that time, German troops still remained in Prague, and they finally capitulated to the Red Army units only on May 11. And on May 9, Bunyachenko's retreating division met with a tank unit of the American army. After negotiations on the terms of surrender, it folded on May 11. weapon and was stationed in the Shlisselburg area. On the same day, another high-ranking Vlasovite, Major General Meandrov, surrendered the ROA headquarters and the remnants of the 2nd division to the Americans.
On May 12, the Americans informed the Vlasovites that Shlisselburg was part of the Soviet occupation zone, and panic broke out among the traitors. About 10 Vlasovites tried to leave Shlisselburg in small groups and individually, but the Americans later handed over almost all of them to representatives of the Soviet authorities (including Bunyachenko). Several hundred fugitives fell into the hands of Czech military units, who also did not stand on ceremony with them: ROA Major General Boyarsky was shot, staff officer Shapovalov was hanged, Major General Trukhin and other Vlasovites were handed over to representatives of the Soviet troops. Another 10 soldiers and officers of the 1st ROA Division remained in Shlisselburg and were handed over en masse by the Americans to their Soviet allies.
Arrest of A. Vlasov
On April 13, the day of the inglorious battle of the 1st ROA Division with the Red Army, Vlasov finally entered into a legal marriage with Frau Bielenberg in Karlsbad. It is hard to believe, but from that moment on this lady began to call herself the ruler of Russia (!).
On April 18, Vlasov's representatives entered into unsuccessful negotiations with the commander of the 7th American Army, Patch, and then the Swiss authorities refused to grant political asylum to the traitor.
On May 11, Vlasov arrived at the location of Bunyachenko's division. On May 12, 1945, Captain M. I. Yakushev's reconnaissance group, with the tacit consent of the Americans, arrested the traitor in front of Bunyachenko and the soldiers of his disarmed division. Vlasov's translator, Ressler, describes the last attempt at negotiations with the Americans:
"Vlasov went towards the American tanks. I went with him... We approached the Americans. They were grinning, chewing gum, not reacting to Vlasov's words... They put us in a car."
During the search, thirty thousand Reichsmarks were confiscated from Vlasov; it is difficult to say where he was going to pay with them. On May 15, 1945, A. Vlasov was taken to Lubyanka. The first court hearing for him and 11 high-ranking KONR and ROA figures opened only on July 30, 1946.
Vlasov in the dock, 1946.
Vlasov and other KONR leaders during their trial, 1946.
The investigation lasted more than a year, and the accused fully admitted their guilt. On July 31, they were all sentenced to death, the sentence was carried out on August 26, 1946.
Attempt to rehabilitate traitors
In 2001, the Main Military Prosecutor's Office received a petition asking for a review of the case of Vlasov and his accomplices and his rehabilitation under the law on victims of political repression, and it was submitted by representatives of the clergy. You won't believe it, but the charges of anti-Soviet agitation and propaganda were dropped, and this part of the sentence was overturned due to the lack of corpus delicti! But Vlasov and other members of the ROA were still denied full rehabilitation.
However, a careful study of the situation reveals that at the time of filing this appeal, Vlasov and his accomplices had already been formally rehabilitated based on the decision of the Constitutional Court of the Russian Federation, which in 1992 overturned all repressive sentences of the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks), duplicated by the Military Collegium. And therefore, Vlasov and 11 activists of KONR and ROA can be considered innocent. Such are the sad consequences of the coup d'etat carried out on December 7, 1991 in Belovezhskaya Pushcha by Yeltsin, Kravchuk and Shushkevich. And the inaction of the current authorities, who turn a blind eye to this outrageous and seemingly incredible situation.
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