Who were the Vlasovites during the war? Vlasovites and the St. George ribbon: truth and myths Why did Vlasov create the ROA
Recently, attempts by a number of writers and activists of some political parties to justify and rehabilitate the Vlasov movement have become more frequent. Books are being published whose authors attribute certain noble goals to General Vlasov himself and his entourage, presenting them as ideological fighters against the Stalinist regime and selfless patriots of Russia. It comes to the point that discussions about the “moral significance of the Vlasov movement” are heard on the radio all over the country; Russian citizens are called upon to learn from the Vlasovites “how you can gain human dignity in the most difficult conditions.”
In the writings of modern myth-makers, the Vlasovites appear almost as knights without fear or reproach, who planned nothing but good and did nothing bad. These kind of nice people, who never raised weapons against their allies and their own people and were slandered in vain by the “red liars”.
Noble slaves of honor who had only one great goal - the creation of a strong, united and democratic Russia without Stalin, communists and Soviets.
To try to restore the truth, let’s cross out the “red slanderers” from the list of witnesses and give the floor to the Vlasovites themselves. True, they left behind a not so rich literary heritage. And this is understandable: writing about your betrayal is difficult and unpleasant; it’s easier to forget and try to start life from scratch. All the more valuable are the memories of one of the Vlasov officers, named simply and tastefully - “Traitor”. Author - Vladimir Gerlakh. The book was prepared by the Canadian publishing house S.B.O.N.R., and printed in Belgium. On the very first page there is a photograph, apparently tenderly preserved from those ancient times when the author commanded the Eastern Battalion and fought on the side of Nazi Germany. The location indicated is Nevers, France. And the time is July 1944. A fresh grave in the background. And in the front - the author in the uniform of a Nazi officer gives his last honor to the fallen soldiers of the 654th Eastern Battalion. Very romantic and touching... In his old age, a man indulged in memories of his fighting romantic youth, spent in the ranks of valiant and selfless fighters for the freedom and happiness of Mother Russia.
So, let’s let General Vlasov, a retired Nazi chief lieutenant from the Russian Liberation Army (ROA), speak out and see what he personally considered possible and necessary to communicate, that is, leave as a souvenir, for future generations of patriots.
The reader should be warned: the memoirs of a retired chief lieutenant are not easy reading. The author is clearly not a fan of Russian literature, grammar, or even spelling. Mr. Gerlach is tongue-tied, emotional, and loves to randomly scatter exclamation and question marks throughout the text - 20-30 per page. But in this case, it is not the style that is important, but the content. It is clear that there is no smell of editorial changes in the book. Everything is exclusively genuine, pristine.
The second volume of memoirs begins with the life of the Eastern Police Battalion in a Russian village occupied by the Germans. Gray everyday life... Either a German military cemetery is replenished with a new cross, then someone ungrateful runs over to the partisans, then the partisans attack and interfere with planned events. In general, various bad people do not allow the guardians of the “new order” to live in peace. They smuggle medicines and document forms into the forest, rummage through the boss’s things—in a word, they behave badly. And where, the author wonders, is the famous Russian hospitality?
But how I wanted, how I dreamed, to rebuild everything, to improve everything in a new, German way, to finally bring order to the Russian mess! The author talks about his dreams on page 64: “The Bolsheviks, in any case, will be defeated first, Germany, maybe later! And then you are welcome to us in liberated Russia. I won’t let anyone hurt you.”
That turns out to be the point! It is not clear, however, who will defeat victorious Germany after the defeat of the Bolsheviks? Could it be the eastern battalions of General Vlasov, created as an auxiliary German army, as native troops (einheimische Trappen)? And what kind of Russia are we talking about if in 1942 Vlasov himself proclaimed: what remains of Russia should become an authoritarian state, “a dominion, a protectorate or a state... with temporary or permanent German occupation.” And it will be included in the Nazi world order, led by the general himself in the role of military dictator. Here, grandma, is “liberated Russia.” But let's move on. We read the work of V Gerlach again.
“They lived peacefully and blessed a fellow White Guard (the author, presumably - L.L.) and shared their thoughts. Schulze died, and with his murderers he ran into a mine. Galanin thought about everything so cunningly that he himself, in a white jacket with a translator, picked flowers and basked in the sun while Isaev finished with Schultz! And when he completed his task, Isaev also ordered to be killed! And not only him, but also everyone who was in one way or another to blame for the death of his mistress, and those who themselves tortured and slaughtered her, Krasnikov with his Jews and dad with the merry ones, headman Savka and Taisiya! And when the policeman Zherdetsky was suddenly shot on Shuber’s orders, the whole city gasped and many even laughed! The trial was quick and just. They brought Zherdetsky to Chernaya Balka and put him on the run, no one knows why!”
It turns out that a very peaceful carnival life went on under the occupiers and Vlasovites! And the whole trouble was that “the Merry Jews were not real partisans, but simple cruel bandits.” That's how it is! Why did the cheerful Jews offend the Germans and Vlasovites? Well, okay, the Jews are always to blame for everything, but what does it have to do with being funny?
One should not think that the life of the Vlasovites was easy and carefree. Of course, the police battalion also had everyday work life: “The next day, the commandant of the city Shuber ordered all the state farmers to be expelled from the state farm “First of May” to Chernaya Balka to properly bury the executed communists, Zherdetsky and Jews, policemen walked the streets of the city, caught stray dogs, they shot there and threw them into the water.” So, stray dogs were caught, thrown into the water, the city was cleared... First from Jews and merry ones, at the same time from Zherdetsky, then from dogs. And bury the corpses at the same time. Trace. How could it be otherwise, gentlemen? After all, it’s not already the forty-first year - it’s the forty-second year! Already the carnival, joyful tricks had to be slowly hidden. It was possible before, in a simple way. Shoot and throw on the coastal sand, and now - bury! But what a dream!
It seemed that everything was about to go well and calmly in the Vlasov kingdom-state, but no. On a sunny, quiet day, the hero of the story calmly deigned to eat lunch in the officers' meeting, but a Soviet plane flew in, dropped a bomb and with a direct hit tore into pieces a good man and a wonderful friend - German Colonel von Rosen! Oh, those ruthless Soviet pilots! A German colonel from the Russian front was getting ready to go on a long-awaited vacation to his native Vaterland, to take a break from the suffering of war, and he was divided into two halves! The author clearly expects condolences from the reader. Will it just wait?
Then things got really bad: “German failures on the Eastern Front multiplied everywhere, on the mountain passes of the Caucasus mountains, in the Kalmyk steppes, near Stalingrad and further to the north... Entire regions were engulfed in the partisan movement.” The author so hoped that after the victory of the valiant German army he would receive the full reward for his “exploits”, but, alas, the Wehrmacht and the SS could not live up to the hopes placed on them.
Poor, unfortunate, kind and affectionate Russian people living in the occupied territories suddenly completely forgot everything good, everything good and joyful, created by the Germans and Vlasovites. On the contrary, they remembered the ancestors who beat the Teutons on Lake Peipsi and the banks of the Neva: “They were in a hurry to prove that they were no worse than these miracle heroes and they proved it very simply and easily, dying for their homeland with a smile! They surprised and horrified the Germans with their contempt for death, smiling, going to execution and saying that they were dying for Stalin! They suddenly loved him. And in the churches the priests again screamed for many years to the leader Stalin!” It’s strange and incomprehensible to the author why the Germans were greeted with flowers, with “Hitler the Liberator” posters, and after a short time they were flanked by the club of popular anger? However, the enemy’s testimony is worth a lot. It is clear that the uninvited liberators tormented the people so much that even Comrade. Against this background, Stalin with the NKVD and the Gulag seemed almost like St. George the Victorious, slaying a terrible serpent. Everything, as they say, is learned by comparison.
The partisans occupied the city, and the author gives a description of the events taking place in great detail, even somewhat approvingly, almost with German pedantry: “They did not torture, did not beat, and did not rip open their bellies, they put a stamp against the name of the criminal (involved in collaboration with the occupiers. - L. L) and they took him or her to the crowd of the rest of the guilty, and when there were enough of them, they took them to the shore and there they ended, precisely and simply, with a bullet in the rebellious back of the head and then let them swim.” One could believe it, but... With very great knowledge of the matter, the author describes events that he could not have attended or become a living witness to, because in this case he himself would have floated first with a bullet in the back of his head. So, most likely, he sets out not the partisan, but his own punitive experience accumulated in such cases. Memory unobtrusively moves the memoirist's pen. Everything is easy and simple, all you have to do is replace the policemen and Germans with partisans. Just something to do! Let us remember how vividly he described a little earlier the process of the “end” of all the merry ones, Jews and Zherdetsky on Chernaya Balka.
However, taking into account the author’s position on the issue of Russia and the time of writing the memoirs, it becomes clear why, for complete balance, Gerlach provides further descriptions of German atrocities after the temporary expulsion of the partisans: “And the Germans ran to the indicated address, acted accurately and quickly. The cow was immediately killed with a shot in the ear. Aunt Manya, who never learned to speak German, was kicked out of the barn and driven into the basement with forged boots. They poured gasoline from the cans they brought onto the floor and set it on fire.”
You read and feel an involuntary thrill when the author latently, involuntarily admires the accuracy and punctuality of the execution. They nailed me with one shot and stocked up on gasoline. A cow for meat. The meat, of course, is not stolen, but trophy, won from the aunt in battle. Aunt Manya - to the next world in a personal crematorium. You should have learned German on time, auntie!
He knows, he knows the subject, Mr. Vlasov! And how sweet the passage from Vlasov’s eloquent “Address of the Russian Committee... to the entire Russian people” dated December 27, 1942 sounds in this regard. Poor Aunt Manya, she died, but she never understood that “Germany is waging war not against the Russian people and their Motherland, but only against Bolshevism. Germany does not encroach on the living space of the Russian people and their national and political freedom.”
Let's skip a couple of dozen hard-to-read pages filled with attempts at spiritual introspection, love attempts and other things.
The marching trumpet sounds, and it’s time for the author to seriously fight. Life forces you. Gerlach, who is also the hero of the story, gets into trouble, where, together with the Germans, he participates in the defeat of a partisan detachment: “The remnants of the platoon hung the captured partisan commanders on the pillars of the railway station at dawn, then continued to drink. They sang German songs, hugged their commander, walked through the streets and touched the frightened nurses! A real gang!” What to add here - the author, of course, knows better. But how sweet it is to remember in old age, oh, how sweet! You can just see the blissful smile stretching the toothless, wrinkled mouth of the old warrior.
A kind, rude German general, hanging an honestly used Iron Cross around the neck of the author-hero, lamented: “We need these for the damned eastern battalions. He is now German in soul and body! And he will serve us not out of fear, but out of conscience! And he will die for Greater Germany! He will die with joy!
He will die with joy for the great Reich and the great Fuhrer!” Wow, the German, he split the essence of the matter. Otherwise, all sorts of nonsense like “let the Germans win first, and then let the Germans lose.” Nonsense, gentlemen, nonsense! Everything is clear and simple: the eastern battalions of the Vlasovites stand for the great Fuhrer!
A naive reader may ask: “Wait, these are all eastern battalions, policemen, but where is the ROA, where is General Vlasov?” And here they are! On page 200 they slowly appear from the camouflage of the eastern battalions: “In the center of the courtyard stood two people - a tall German sergeant major. next to him is a small, thin Russian officer in the uniform of the ROA, a strange mixture of a German uniform, Russian shoulder straps and buttonholes, in a German cap with a Russian cockade.” Whether he wants it or not, the author gives a damning portrait of the ROA. It couldn't be better.
The commander of the ROA battalion “had not slept since yesterday and was carousing in the company of three Russian girls working in the kitchen and two gendarmerie non-commissioned officers, formerly famous large landowners from East Prussia, people who knew how and loved to have fun. They staged something like an Athenian night, sitting in their underwear at a large table on which beautiful half-naked girls were dancing.” They celebrated an important event: “I returned a few days ago from a punitive expedition. It was successful: they managed to defeat and drive partisan bands far to the front, burn and raze an entire region to the ground. The population was partly destroyed, the survivors were driven after the fleeing partisans to certain death in the autumn forests.” That's it, today's guardians of the Vlasovites and their valiant general. These are the true words of one of them. Mr. Gerlach decisively swept away the shabby veil of beauty and sentiment.
So judge who they are, the Vlasovites, what they did in Russia, with whom and for what they fought.
But here is the Germans’ assessment of them: “Why do they serve with us? Because of nutrition! Vodka! Shag! For pants and boots! And the partisans will promise them a little more, they will run over to them and kill you and me.” And the current writers of myths about the Vlasovites, as they say, talk in all seriousness about chivalry, morality and nobility! Oh high! About Russia!
Some naive readers still believe that the Vlasovites did not fight with “their own”, they defected and surrendered. But before us are notes from a witness. He reports with undisguised pride that the ROA units, underestimated by the Germans, fought more desperately than their best security battalions: “It is surprising that the most reliable German security units were defeated and put to flight, they fled so far into the forest that they were hardly collected the next day .
And for some reason this disbanded, decayed and drunken company carried out the orders of the Germans and inflicted huge losses on the stricken partisans.”
Delighting modern admirers of General Vlasov, the author speaks from the distant past, revealing what the secret of such military zeal was: “How all the ROA fighters went crazy and took out all their anger and hatred of the Germans on the partisans!” That's it: beat your own people! Take out your anger! Do this with diligence and diligence for the sake of a future free and democratic Russia. There, years from now, they will finally appreciate your insane vigil and the deadly, spine-chilling sweat of every minute fear. Work honestly and decisively on every Deutsche Mark, every sip of schnapps and puff of an ersatz cigarette. Moreover, the German masters themselves took out their anger for the defeats at the front on the residents of the rear. The Vlasovites had someone to learn from.
Meanwhile, the price of German rations became increasingly higher: “At the front, in dirty trenches full of rats and lice, it was bad to lie under the hurricane fire of Russian Katyushas, which often completely drowned out German artillery. Katyushas turned out to be much more unpleasant and sinister than the German fog throwers (apparently, this refers to rocket-propelled mortars - the so-called “donkeys.” - L.L.), in addition, they (that is, the Red Army. - L.L.) suddenly good aviation appeared! In general, the smell on the Eastern Front was very unpleasant, and then rumors appeared about the transfer of the eastern battalions to France, where it was still very quiet and cultural.”
Now let’s try to clarify the rationale behind the transfer of the ROA army to the West. Until the Allied landings in June 1944, France was considered a place of rest and reorganization of battle-worn units that had distinguished themselves on the Eastern Front. Redeployment to France had to be earned! And the Vlasovites honestly worked out their rest - they fought desperately. When the Germans fought like this, one can and should call it military valor. They fought, willingly or unwillingly, but against strangers. The Vlasovites fought against their own, on the side of their enemies, which at all times was called military treason, betrayal. Simple and clear.
The author modestly titled his own adventures on the soil of occupied France “My Life! Or did I dream about you?” It is immediately clear that fine literature is not alien to man. Yes, there’s neither more nor less here! Just a few words - “in a bad dream.” Let's get acquainted with the adventures of the brave ROA Oberleutnant Gerlach on the land of beautiful France.
For two hours, frightened residents of the French town watched the ROA march similar to a horde raid. During the winter, a lot of troubles happened in the town, especially with the female population (let us remember in this regard the lamentations of modern myth-makers about the violence of the Red Army in the territories liberated from the Nazis): “More and more often we had to surrender ourselves, willy-nilly, to the new occupiers, and people were rummaging around the shops deft, quick hands." It was not only the “dexterous, quick hands” of the fighters for a “free democratic Russia” who fumbled. The poor French even asked the Germans to return the security battalion. No, they did not understand that this was how the Vlasovites expressed their holy feeling of hatred towards Stalin. It’s just that instead of the soldiers of the Red Army, more and more Frenchmen and especially Frenchwomen fell under the quick hand. And what was stolen was so bad! Steal - they stole, but the German authorities did not punish the Vlasovites for such pranks. Even though they are natives, they are our own!
To the complaints of the French, the Germans politely responded: “After all, these Russians, they are the best that we could find in Russia, so to speak, the cream of society!” No comments, readers! No comments! Let this saying rest on the conscience of Chief Lieutenant of the ROA Gerlach and the German officers.
One day the hero, who by that time had already become quite a big boss, was sitting in the headquarters and quietly indulging in bright dreams. For example, I dreamed of erasing the border between Germany and Russia. (At the end of the war, he succeeded in something similar - he buried the Germans and Vlasovites in one grave, in bulk. But that was later.) His dreams were interrupted by a call to headquarters. Why would this be, the brave officer wondered? “Perhaps their battalion, like all the others, received an order to go to the East at the disposal of General Vlasov, who was finally found and even began to give orders. He himself will command the battalion. Maybe he’ll even get a higher position.”
Everything turned out to be outrageously simpler. The headquarters reported that the forced idleness is over! “Today at dawn the Allies landed on the Norman coast! Glory to God and our Fuhrer! Finally, we have the opportunity to put an end to all these Judeo-capitalists forever! Heil Hitler!
Like this! Thank God and “Heil Hitler”! Otherwise, the Vlasovites stagnated in the rear. But they have not yet been sent to Normandy, but rather sent the valiant army of the ROA to fight the French partisans - the makissars (“maquis”). Together with the German security battalions and the Gestapo, the Vlasovites had to organize a fist for a major punitive operation. While they were preparing, the “Poppies” got ahead of them and killed an entire platoon of Vlasovites. “Thirty people died immediately when they ran into an ambush, stupidly, ingloriously (as if somewhere the Vlasovites died with glory. - L.L.) - they had to be avenged!” It was for the Vlasovites that the Gestapo, SS, Petain and other “best” people gathered to take revenge.
It wasn't an easy walk. From the bell tower, the French, under the leadership of the local priest Pichot, opened fire on the invaders with a machine gun. The author believes that such an act indicates that “Monsieur has lost his mind due to old age or drank too much wine.” This is how a Vlasovite understands the essence of the Resistance in a simple way. The forces of the parties turned out to be too unequal, and, having come to their senses after the first fright, the punitive forces opened fire on the Maki from their guns. With shouts of “Vive la France!” the French died. (Here we will have to omit the overly naturalistic details and details.)
The Vlasovites “sneaked up to the platform where the bells hung, immediately finished off the still living boys, looked with surprise at the face of the murdered priest... With anger they fired a burst at the already cold corpse, threw the corpses over the broken wall of the bell tower, took away a working machine gun and machine guns and climbed down". These are disciplined warriors: they threw off the corpses and carefully took away the weapons. You can feel the German training.
Then, as usual, they killed the hostages and, amid the groans of the dying, went to rob the “prosperous and thrifty” French. However, the author does not encourage unorganized robbery, and therefore personally organizes a brothel, distracting soldiers from amateur activities with the bodies of selfless assistants from local prostitutes. Confiscations for the benefit of the Reich are a sacred matter, but engaging in too vulgar looting is ugly! Apparently, the Vlasov horde, drunk with blood and wine, no longer responded to commands and exhortations. I had to build a last line of defense out of whores.
Here a ten-year-old girl, brutally raped by the Vlasovites in front of her mother, appears on the stage. (For some reason, ten-year-olds in the book are periodically raped in various situations. Why would this be?) The valiant author, without flinching, shoots the criminal with a Mauser. “Don’t follow the example of the Germans,” the author urges. “Remember our homeland, be worthy of its sons!” That's how! Suddenly I remembered my homeland! Where is it now, his homeland? By the way, we again have to remember the “atrocities” of the Red Army and assume that many of them were committed by the Vlasovites dressed in Soviet military uniforms, blessed by Messrs. Himmler and Goebbels, that is, in the literal sense, “who took an example from the Germans.”
When describing battles and campaigns, the author sometimes gets carried away and the terminology familiar from war times slips in: “We made it into the mountains safely, except for a short battle with terrorists on a loop near Arlef.” Is it clear, reader? The partisans, the “poppies”, it turns out, are terrorists, and the author with his battalion of Vlasovites are the defenders of Russia, France, freedom and democracy. But because you can mess around with them, terrorists, and take them prisoners? “They caught and shot a boy who didn’t even have time to throw away his English machine gun, searched the body (again this kind pedantry adopted from the German masters! Don’t let good things go to waste! - L.L.), took away the wallet with documents and money, then moved on to do a task". And How! “Everyone left on their bicycles cheerfully and singing; behind the cyclists was a truck with a machine gun, just in case.”
As on the Eastern Front, in France the Vlasovites honestly practiced the German shag and did it, as we see, “fun and with songs.” On page 311, the author describes with poorly contained delight the battle and defeat of the partisan and Canadian detachments: “The Russians rushed to the assault with a mad shout of hurray. They did not stop either in front of the dense thickets of thorns or in front of the arrows perched in the trees; they quickly removed them from there and finished them off. Everyone, both the Makissars and the Canadians, were afraid that the Russians would attack them at night and hastily erected barricades and dug ditches around the camp.
Yvonne (the captured French woman - L.L.) could have thought about her wounded, but they were not there, they were all finished off by brutal Russian soldiers, avenging the death of their beloved commander.” One question. If on the Eastern Front the Vlasovites fought for a free, independent Russia, against Stalin, then against whom did they fight so fiercely on the Western Front, exterminating the French and Canadians? Why did they work off German rations not out of fear, but out of conscience, during the suppression of the Polish uprising in Warsaw? Gentlemen, the myth-makers prefer to remain silent about this.
Some Russians and Soviet prisoners of war fled at that time from death camps, labor camps, concentration camps and fought the Germans in the ranks of the Maquis. Others, Vlasovites, released from the same camps for a bowl of stew, killed children, clergy, raped, burned. And now some of our “guardians of democracy” have a desire to ennoble this rabble. Present them as knights of the struggle for a new Russia, liberators.
Let us return, however, to the text of the book and read how the Vlasovites fought on the territory of the Reich itself against our allies in the anti-Hitler coalition, for example, the Canadians. It turns out that they fought conscientiously: “The news was not bad: we have already repulsed these bastards twice, knocked out two tanks. It’s a pity, there’s nothing to get, no guns.” The author himself bypassed the enemy from the rear and “threw the first company at them, the devils ran away.” Let us recall a piquant detail: the publication that published Gerlach’s work is precisely Canadian!
Yes, in the end the Vlasovites outdid even the Germans. When, having fallen into the sack, the true Aryans decide to surrender to the allies, the hero-author yells in their faces: “You are just cowards! I’ll show you how to die with honor!” The Germans understand him very correctly: “After all, he commands the Eastern battalion of Russian traitors.”
Joining the ranks of the Vlasov army is a difficult step. In the photograph taken by a front-line German photo reporter near Stalingrad in the summer of 1942, the faces of Russian prisoners who agreed to bring machine gun cartridges to the Germans are clearly visible behind the backs of the German machine gunners. While they themselves are not yet shooting at yesterday’s comrades, at “their own,” but the MG belts they bring bring death on the other side of the invisible dividing line. Later, in the camp, they will choose a loaf of bread with a piece of cheese or sausage and a glass of vodka, break ranks and stand next to the recruiters from the ROA. Then, dressed in German uniforms, they will take an oath to Hitler. But for the new owners all this is not enough, and then they will be “tied” with blood, forcing them to kill civilians. There is no need to idealize the ROA and the Vlasovites; they were not threatened with “free cheese” and, as we see, they worked in full.
G. Popov, belatedly demanding in the book “War and Truth” from someone unknown and what kind of “truth,” meticulously lists all the categories of “traitors.” Mr. Popov believes that the police officers who “maintained order” are people who fall outside the category of traitors. Perhaps, but not all. There were practically no such people. The Germans gave weapons not at all to maintain order, but to establish a very specific “new German order.” Including for shooting partisans, capturing and killing hiding Jews, for punitive expeditions. And those who did not understand this or performed their duties half-heartedly, without sufficient zeal, were simply shot by the pedantic Teutons along with the rest. Or a little later.
The same must be said about the “nationals”, who do not fall under the category of “traitors”. But how else can one evaluate people who furiously fought with the soldiers of one of the countries of the anti-Hitler coalition? SS is always SS. And they went to the SS after the “school” of police punitive detachments, after murders and robberies on the territory of Russia, Belarus and Ukraine. After the destruction of the Jewish population, communists and Komsomol members in their own republics.
The police and “national” units that retreated along with the Nazis ultimately found themselves united with the Vlasov units, and this fact speaks volumes. By the way, inspired by the “excellent work” of the Vlasovites in France, by the end of the war Himmler decided to bring most of them under the banner of the SS. And nothing, the Vlasovites “merrily and with songs” went under the black banners of the SS.
In the “Proposals of the Ministry of Affairs of the Occupied Eastern Regions on the structure and personnel of the Russian (Vlasov) National Committee” dated March 8, 1943, General Vlasov was assigned the role of chairman, and Mr. Kaminsky was recommended to perform primarily political functions. A few words about this worthy politician from Vlasov’s circle. As a source of “inspiration”, in order to avoid accusations of bias, we will use the book “Waffen-SS. Hitler's Elite Guard at War 1939-1945", written by Professor of History at Columbia University (USA) D. G. Stein. Bronislav Kaminsky is a former Soviet engineer, SS Brigadefuehrer, commander of the Kaminsky Brigade. This brigade committed numerous crimes in Voronezh. precise front against the civilian population, especially distinguishing itself during the suppression of the uprising in Warsaw in August 1944. Crimes in the Polish capital were recorded in numerous documents, and these crimes were so inhuman and cruel that even representatives of the German command wrote complaints and reports to Berlin.
Kaminsky served the Germans in Russia so faithfully that he was given the honor of leading a certain semi-autonomous entity in the occupied territory, where he terrorized the population until the arrival of the Red Army. Kaminsky's gang, in terms of staffing levels, corresponded to a combat brigade of SS troops, and was armed with artillery and tanks from Soviet captured ones, handed over by grateful owners. During the suppression of the Warsaw Uprising, Kaminsky's brigade was already completely officially united with other SS units by Himmler's personal order.
Trying to confirm their new “high” status of the SS, Kaminsky’s people “worked” with all their might: captured rebels were doused with gasoline and burned alive, infants were impaled on bayonets and put out of windows like flags, women were hung in rows upside down from balconies. In general, they carried out, as best they could, the order of their Reichsführer, which was that violence and horror would stop the uprising in a matter of days.
The crimes of the newly minted SS men turned out to be so terrible and shocking that Colonel General Guderian, together with SS Gruppenführer Fegelen, asked Hitler to remove Kaminsky’s people both from Warsaw and from the Eastern Front in general. The latter turned out to be incomplete, the brigade was not disbanded, and soon Kaminsky’s people smoothly joined the ranks of Vlasov’s ROA. The fate of Kaminsky himself, according to the official German version, is sad - on the orders of SS Gruppenführer von der Bach-Zalewski, he was shot. According to other sources, he calmly survived the war and died at an old age in one of the Arab countries.
At the beginning of the war, Hitler did not want to hear about the participation of other, “non-German” armies other than the Finnish one in the Eastern Campaign. But life very soon confronted him with the need to accept help from Slovaks, Hungarians, Romanians, Italians, and Spaniards. The same thing happened with the Russians. And the words of the myth-makers that Vlasov did not want to be towed by the SS are, alas, only words that can deceive few people. “The fear that Vlasov may one day use against us the position that he will occupy with our help has no basis,” said German Foreign Ministry official G. Hilger, who oversaw Vlasov and his “army,” authoritatively.
At the end of the war, Hitler literally radiated anger when the best weapons were transferred to the newly formed “Russian” SS units, bypassing the battle-worn Wehrmacht divisions, but he could not do anything. Himmler had enormous influence and real power. It is not surprising that in the book “Waffen-SS” a photograph of Vlasov is shown along with such executioners as Kaminsky and Dirlin-Wager.
In light of all this, G. Popov’s clumsy passage touches: they say, Vlasov could have calmly sat out the war in the camp - but he decided to fight. I could, but there are no women, no soft beds, or delicacies in the camp. And I really wanted all this sweet stuff, especially women, whom the general was a big fan of. So he chose to stay away from the bunk and lived beautifully until the end. The primitive human, purely physiological, animal urges of Vlasov and his entire army are understandable and explainable, but they are by no means worthy of glorification and romantic flair.
Modern myth-makers not only adore round, summary, generalized, gigantic numbers in which a lot can be hidden. They still prefer to speak not on their own behalf, but on behalf of the entire people. Such is the well-known traitor to the Motherland Rezun (Suvorov), such is G. Popov. “The people - and, accordingly, the army - did not want to fight, much less die, for the Soviet system, for Stalinist socialism, for the dictatorship of the proletariat.” That's it, directly and honestly, on behalf of all the people, no more, no less.
It turns out that all the volunteers who went to war, all the heroes of 1941 and subsequent years are just fairy tales, fiction. So, they fought for Hitler joyfully, cheerfully, with songs, but not for the Motherland? No, Mr. Popov, if we’re going to tell the truth, then the whole truth. Some fought for their Motherland, for socialism, which, despite all Stalin’s perversions and atrocities, gave them a lot, a lot, for a happy life. Others are for physical survival, for bread and butter, for hatred of others who have not betrayed. They also fought out of servile, servile groveling before the power of the strong “superman”—Hitler. Just as they later hated him for not being so “over the top,” he was thrown into dust, and did not live up to their lackey hopes of living a satisfying life in his master’s shadow.
During the war, many former soldiers, officers and generals were captured. The vast majority of them retained their military and officer honor. General D. Karbyshev remained faithful to the Oath and Motherland to the end. Bright is his memory. His name will forever be a source of inspiration, maintaining the spirit of patriotism among army youth. And not only the army.
Soviet General P. Grigorenko, a real general, a fighting one, who went through the war, by the will of fate became a staunch opponent of Soviet power - but not an enemy of the Soviet people. He honestly renounced his general's privileges, went through the circles of hell during Brezhnev's times, but never betrayed his Oath. Being an honest man, Grigorenko did not betray his comrades, did not betray the people. No one will dare throw a stone at him. You may or may not share his views, but you cannot help but respect him as a person. He is an ascetic and a man of honor.
Russian generals Denikin and Wrangel did not become traitors and traitors. They fulfilled the Oath as they understood it, remaining faithful to it to the end. Even when neither Nicholas II, nor the empire, nor even the Provisional Government existed. Their great delusions, their good thoughts, their pain for their Motherland are now part of history. We have the right not to share their views, but it is possible and necessary to understand them. Their personalities, in human terms, command respect.
“Atomic General” Academician Sakharov did not betray his people either. Yes, he uncompromisingly fought against the vices of the Soviet system, as he understood them, but remained a patriot of the country until his last breath. And he died with pain for her fate. You can also disagree with him and the views he expressed, you can argue, but you cannot disrespect him.
On the other side of the barrier are those who ran over to the enemy, betrayed, and violated the Oath. They themselves placed themselves on the other side of a certain moral line that unites Grigorenko, Karbyshev, Sakharov, Denikin, and many others. Behind the border of invisible red flags are the German General Vlasov, Chief Lieutenant Vladimir Gerlach, assorted Vlasov men, SS men, policemen and punitive forces.
Vlasovites, or fighters of the Russian Liberation Army (ROA) are controversial figures in military history. Until now, historians cannot come to a consensus. Supporters consider them fighters for justice, true patriots of the Russian people. Opponents are unconditionally confident that the Vlasovites are traitors to the Motherland, who went over to the side of the enemy and mercilessly destroyed their compatriots.
Why did Vlasov create the ROA?
The Vlasovites positioned themselves as patriots of their country and their people, but not of the government. Their goal was supposedly to overthrow the established political regime in order to provide people with a decent life. General Vlasov considered Bolshevism, in particular Stalin, the main enemy of the Russian people. He associated the prosperity of his country with cooperation and friendly relations with Germany.
Treason to the Motherland
Vlasov went over to the enemy’s side at the most difficult moment for the USSR. The movement that he promoted and in which he recruited former Red Army soldiers was aimed at the destruction of the Russians. Having sworn an oath of allegiance to Hitler, the Vlasovites decided to kill ordinary soldiers, burn down villages and destroy their homeland. Moreover, Vlasov presented his Order of Lenin to Brigadeführer Fegelein in response to the loyalty shown to him.
Demonstrating his devotion, General Vlasov gave valuable military advice. Knowing the problem areas and plans of the Red Army, he helped the Germans plan attacks. In the diary of the Minister of Propaganda of the Third Reich and the Gauleiter of Berlin, Joseph Goebbels, there is an entry about his meeting with Vlasov, who gave him advice, taking into account the experience of defending Kyiv and Moscow, on how best to organize the defense of Berlin. Goebbels wrote: “The conversation with General Vlasov inspired me. I learned that the Soviet Union had to overcome exactly the same crisis that we are overcoming now, and that there is certainly a way out of this crisis if you are extremely decisive and do not give in to it.”
In the wings of the fascists
Vlasovites took part in brutal reprisals against civilians. From the memoirs of one of them: “The next day, the commandant of the city, Shuber, ordered all the state farmers to be expelled to Chernaya Balka and the executed communists to be properly buried. So stray dogs were caught, thrown into the water, the city was cleared... First from Jews and merry ones, at the same time from Zherdetsky, then from dogs. And bury the corpses at the same time. Trace. How could it be otherwise, gentlemen? After all, it’s not the forty-first year already—it’s the forty-second year! Already the carnival, joyful tricks had to be slowly hidden. It was possible before, in a simple way. Shoot and throw on the coastal sand, and now - bury! But what a dream!”
ROA soldiers, together with the Nazis, smashed partisan detachments, talking about it with gusto: “At dawn they hung captured partisan commanders on poles of a railway station, then continued to drink. They sang German songs, hugged their commander, walked through the streets and touched the frightened nurses! A real gang!
Baptism of fire
General Bunyachenko, who commanded the 1st Division of the ROA, received an order to prepare the division for an attack on a bridgehead captured by Soviet troops with the task of pushing Soviet troops back to the right bank of the Oder in this place. For Vlasov’s army it was a baptism of fire - it had to prove its right to exist.
On February 9, 1945, the ROA entered its position for the first time. The army captured Neuleveen, the southern part of Karlsbize and Kerstenbruch. Joseph Goebbels even noted in his diary “the outstanding achievements of General Vlasov’s troops.” ROA soldiers played a key role in the battle - thanks to the fact that the Vlasovites noticed in time a camouflaged battery of Soviet anti-tank guns ready for battle, the German units did not become victims of the bloody massacre. Saving the Fritz, the Vlasovites mercilessly killed their compatriots.
On March 20, the ROA was supposed to seize and equip a bridgehead, as well as ensure the passage of ships along the Oder. When during the day the left flank, despite strong artillery support, was stopped, the Russians, whom the exhausted and dispirited Germans were waiting with hope, were used as a “fist”. The Germans sent Vlasovites on the most dangerous and obviously failed missions.
Prague Uprising
The Vlasovites showed themselves in occupied Prague - they decided to oppose the German troops. On May 5, 1945, they came to the aid of the rebels. The rebels demonstrated unprecedented cruelty - they shot at a German school with heavy anti-aircraft machine guns, turning its students into a bloody mess. Subsequently, the Vlasovites retreating from Prague clashed with the retreating Germans in hand-to-hand combat. The result of the uprising was the robberies and murders of the civilian population and not only the Germans.
There were several versions of why the ROA took part in the uprising. Perhaps she tried to earn the forgiveness of the Soviet people or sought political asylum in liberated Czechoslovakia. One of the authoritative opinions remains that the German command issued an ultimatum: either the division carries out their orders, or it will be destroyed. The Germans made it clear that the ROA would not be able to exist independently and act according to its convictions, and then the Vlasovites resorted to sabotage.
The adventurous decision to take part in the uprising cost the ROA dearly: about 900 Vlasovites were killed during the fighting in Prague (officially - 300), 158 wounded disappeared without a trace from Prague hospitals after the arrival of the Red Army, 600 Vlasov deserters were identified in Prague and shot by the Red Army
Another interpretation of the events of 70 years ago
The uprising of the inhabitants of Prague against the German garrison four days before the complete surrender of German troops continues to be one of the most controversial events in Czech history.
Russian historian Kirill Aleksandrov draws attention to documents, as he claims, from the Archives of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation, which other historians prefer not to remember. They were published in his work “Vlasovites in the Prague Battles: Unknown Pages of the Prague Uprising of 1945” (Notes of the Russian Academic Group in the USA. Volume 31. pp. 493 - 536).
Who benefits?
This is perhaps the most interesting question regarding the events in Prague from May 5 to May 9, 1945. Alexandrov comes to the interesting conclusion that no one benefited from the Prague Uprising. This massacre, using aviation, heavy artillery and tanks, which took the lives of more than 2 thousand Prague residents, was the last thing the residents of Prague needed. Prague had the status of an “occupied” city and a hospital city (there were 50 thousand wounded Wehrmacht soldiers in 18 hospitals), and therefore if it was bombed, it was only “by mistake.” Neither the Germans nor their opponents, Bunyachenko’s Vlasovites, needed the fighting in Prague, since both of them only lost the precious time needed to retreat to the American zone of responsibility. Stalin did not need this uprising, because the communists did not constitute an absolute majority in the leadership of the uprising. The Western allies also had no use for the uprising, since the demarcation line ran 150 km south of Prague, and no one wanted complications with the Soviet ally. At this time, the Americans reached the Karlovy Vary - Pilsen - Ceske Budejovice line agreed upon with the USSR and stopped. They not only did not intend to “help” Prague, but did not even allow armed Czechs there.
The Red Army planned long maneuvers. Only on May 12, all fronts were supposed to unite and on May 20, slowly enter Prague. This is humanly understandable. Nobody wanted to fight anymore! Except, of course, Czech politicians. By the way, the Czech communists did not support the idea of uprising.
Politics and common sense
In 1939 - 1945 in the Czech Republic it was not possible to create any resistance comparable to the Resistance movement in Poland, Greece, and Yugoslavia. There was nothing here even like the French operetta “resistance”: a brutal French “macho” with a lush mustache and crimson berets, who, as it turned out, did not create any problems for the Wehrmacht, since the French police successfully dealt with the “resistance”, without distracting such a trifle of vacationing German soldiers.
The Czechs, at the call of Hitler, became “the blacksmiths of German weapons” in a disciplined and responsible manner. They worked diligently. There is not a single fact of sabotage during the entire war. The weapons were made to last. It was thanks to the Skoda factories that the Wehrmacht switched from carts to cars.
The Bartos commandant’s office and the Czech National Council realized that a “small victorious war” over an already defeated enemy could rehabilitate both the Czech government in London and themselves as “resisters” before the allies. However, General K. Kultvashr, the leader of Bartosz, and his deputy Captain J. Nehansky (Jiri), as professionals, understood that the rebels armed with light small arms would be quickly killed by the forces of the Prague garrison.
Vlasovites as allies
The command of the Bartosz commandant's office was intensively looking for allies. But the Americans and the British showed no interest in the Prague Uprising. The Vlasovites “offended by the Germans” remained. The first contacts between representatives of the headquarters of the uprising and the command of the 1st Infantry Division of the Armed Forces of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia (VS KONR) are dated by the historian Alexandrov on April 30, 1945. The official version says that the Vlasovites “came to the rescue” only after hearing the calls of the rebels on the radio on May 5.
The first division under the command of Major General S.K. Bunyachenko consisted of 20 thousand soldiers with tanks and heavy artillery. The forces were not enough to take control of the city of a million, but the division decisively changed the balance of forces in favor of the rebels. Contrary to the popular opinion of Soviet and Czech historians about the size of the Prague garrison at 50 thousand people, in fact there were no more than 10 thousand combat-ready Wehrmacht soldiers in Prague, and with the same number of rebels, the involvement of the Vlasovites creates an almost threefold preponderance of forces in favor of the over-cautious Czechs . It turns out that without Bunyachenko’s consent to provide assistance to the rebels, there simply would not have been any uprising!
Motives of the Vlasovites
Much has been written about why the Vlasovites agreed to help the rebels. Of course, even then war correspondents created many myths. American newspapers, for example, wrote that the Vlasovites, they say, “tried to earn the forgiveness of the Soviet people.” Some historians believe that the Vlasovites sought to obtain political asylum in liberated Czechoslovakia. These versions are not supported by documents. The leadership of the uprising did not and could not give the Vlasovites any guarantees. Historian Alexandrov believes that the Germans “left the Vlasovites no choice.” On May 2, the commander of the Prague garrison, General von Toussenn, announced an ultimatum to Bunyachenko: either the division follows the orders of the German command, or it will be destroyed. In addition, ordinary soldiers had already begun to actively desert; there was a threat of losing control over the division if it was not turned against the Germans. Perhaps Bunyachenko hoped to “impress” the Americans, to whom he planned to surrender. On May 3, the military leadership of the uprising received Bunyachenko’s guaranteed consent to joint actions. According to historian Aleksandrov, it was this decision by Bunyachenko that led the military commandant’s office “Bartosh” to decide to revolt. General Vlasov himself did not support this decision. He did not become a double traitor. By the way, it was the announced participation of the Vlasovites that forced the communists to change their position and agree to the uprising; they did not want Prague to be liberated by traitors.
Official version
The first action of the local population against the German occupation on the territory of the Czech Republic took place on May 1, 1945 in the provincial Přerov due to the spread of rumors about the surrender of the Germans. The uprising was suppressed and 24 rebels were shot. On May 2, the death of Hitler and the transfer of power to Admiral Doenitz were officially announced in all newspapers of the protectorate. On May 4th, the Minister of Post, Telegraph and Communications Kamenitsky issued a decree banning inscriptions in German. Residents everywhere began to paint over and tear down signs with German inscriptions. In some places anti-German slogans and the Czech tricolor appeared. According to the official version, it was this decree that led to the confrontation between the Czechs and Germans and served as the reason for the uprising. The Germans allegedly started shooting at Czechs who were destroying German inscriptions. However, from the documents published by Alexandrov, it is clear that without guarantees of help from Bunyachenko, the Czechs would not have rebelled.
Prague newspapers about the uprising
Alexandrov’s documents can be supplemented with newspaper reports. The official newspaper of the protectorate “People's Politics” (Národní Politika) No. 107 dated May 5, 1945 contains very interesting information. The message “People of Prague, hold the fate of your dear city in your hands,” written in bold type, states that the German military authorities declared Prague a “hospital city.” This status means that the Wehrmacht will abandon all military operations in Prague, both on the ground and in the air. The Allies also supported this agreement and did not bomb Prague. However, the newspaper calls, now everything depends on the residents of the city, who must behave as usual, that is, devote time to their daily activities, avoiding various actions that would “give the police and troops a reason to use force.” “Now the question is that you crown your prudence, which you have shown for six whole years, with truly patriotic behavior in moments of fateful and most important!” Like, you’ve been patient for six years, so just be patient for a couple more days! Another article in the same newspaper reports that “the political situation in the Czech Republic and Moravia is characterized by calm and order. The common wish prevailed that the Czech Republic and Moravia, which during the war for almost six years were in the true sense an island of peace, would enter the post-war period in peace and order.”
The uprising was started by the police and armed forces of the Protectorate. On May 5 at 11:00 am, armed police and traitors from the Protectorate army unexpectedly attacked the Prague Radio building, unexpectedly for the German SS guards. After an hour and a half battle, Prague Radio began broadcasting the famous call for help in all languages at 12:33.
The first issue of the Sunday List (Nědelni list), dated May 6, indicates that the leaders of the uprising were faced with an unexpected problem. Robberies began in the city. The new authorities threaten the robbers with death and declare the property of “our enemies,” that is, the Germans, public property. On the same day, the first issue of the communist Rudé Pravo and the “Liberated Czech Word” was published with slogans calling not to make any agreements with the Germans and to fight to the last. On the streets, civilians build barricades. But the torrential rain that begins drives the “rebels” home.
“The Liberated Czech Word” No. 2 for May 7 reproaches the Germans for using aviation and artillery against the population of Prague. In the city of destruction. There is also a short note about the atrocities of the “Hitler Youth”. The wounded German boys were taken to an orthopedic clinic in Prague. Relatives brought them weapons. The boys shot from the windows at passers-by. The motives are not reported; perhaps the teenagers were simply defending themselves. It is clear that the local “Hitler Youth”, children aged 15-17, were most likely from Prague. The Velvet Revolution did not work out. A terrible and bloody massacre began on the streets of Prague: Germans against Czechs. In addition, 3,600 “political” prisoners were released from the bombed Pankrac prison, as the newspaper reports, but Russian emigrants recall that a lot of criminals joined the uprising, who were then caught by the Red Army.
"The merits of the Vlasovites"
Historian Alexandrov believes that the main merit of the Vlasovites is that they “cut” the city into northern and southern parts and did not allow SS troops to help the Prague garrison. Allegedly, by doing so they saved thousands of lives. However, if there had been no uprising at all, there would have been even more lives saved, including the lives of children. The rebels, for example, shot at a German school with heavy anti-aircraft machine guns, turning its students into bloody mincemeat. After that, the Germans no longer spared anyone. All Czech newspapers for May 8 note that after the official surrender of the garrison, many German units continue to fight and are no longer subordinate to any command. The blissful and relaxed anticipation of the end of the war gave way to the most severe frenzy. The Vlasovites retreating from Prague clashed with the retreating Germans in fierce hand-to-hand combat, while both went in the same direction: to surrender to the Americans. In Prague, robberies and murders of civilians, and not only Germans, began.
Vlasovites as “liberators”
The Vlasovites did not liberate Prague - after their departure, German units entered the city. The Red Army “cleaned” Prague from armed criminals and individual Wehrmacht soldiers, who were no longer commanded by anyone.
The cost of Bunyachenko’s adventure was high: approximately 900 Vlasovites were killed during the battles in Prague (officially 300), 158 wounded disappeared without a trace from Prague hospitals after the arrival of the Red Army, 600 Vlasov deserters were identified in Prague and shot by the Red Army. Western journalists were not allowed into Prague until the “cleansing” was completed.
Sergey Gagen, Candidate of Historical and Legal Sciences
They didn’t sigh “oh, if only I knew” (because they knew what they were getting into), and didn’t expect mercy, and didn’t expect amnesty - only the Vlasovites.
Long before our unexpected meeting on the prison bunks, I knew about them and was perplexed about them.
At first these were leaflets that had been soaked many times and dried many times, lost in the tall grasses of the front-line Oryol strip that had not been cut for three years. They announced the creation in December 1942 of some kind of Smolensk “Russian committee” - either claiming to be a semblance of the Russian government, or not. Apparently, the Germans themselves have not yet decided this. And that’s why the uncertain message even seemed like just a fiction. The leaflets contained a photograph of General Vlasov and outlined his biography. In the unclear photograph, the face seemed well-fed and successful, like all our generals of the new formation. (They told me later that this was not so, that Vlasov looked more like a Western general - tall, thin, wearing horn-rimmed glasses). And from the biography this luck seemed to be confirmed: the service as a military adviser to Chiang Kai-Shek was not tainted. The first shock of his life came when his 2nd Shock Army was mediocrely left to die of hunger and surrounded. But what phrases of that biography could be trusted at all? *(8) Looking at this photo, it was impossible to believe that this was an outstanding person or that he had been deeply rooted for Russia for a long time. And the leaflets announcing the creation of the ROA - the “Russian liberation army” were not only written in bad Russian, but also with an alien spirit, clearly German, and even disinterested in the subject, but with rude boastfulness about their well-fed porridge and cheerful mood from the soldiers. I couldn’t believe in this army either, and if it really existed, then what kind of cheerful mood was there?.. That’s how only a German could lie. *(9)
We soon learned that the Russians really are against us and that they fight harder than any SS men. In July 1943, near Orel, a platoon of Russians in German uniform defended, for example, Sobakinskiye Vyselki. They fought with such despair, as if they had built these Vyselki themselves. One was driven into a cellar, hand grenades were thrown at him, he fell silent; but as soon as they tried to go down, he whipped him again with a machine gun. Only when they dropped an anti-tank grenade there did they find out that he had a hole in the cellar, and in it he hid from the explosion of anti-personnel grenades. One must imagine the degree of stupor, shell shock and hopelessness in which he continued to fight.
They defended, for example, the indestructible Dnieper bridgehead south of Tursk, there were unsuccessful battles hundreds of meters away there for two weeks, and the battles were fierce and the frosts were the same (December 1943). In this exhaustion of a multi-day winter battle, in camouflage suits that hid an overcoat and a hat, there were both of us, and near Malye Kozlovichi, they told me, there was such a case. While rushing between the pines, two people got confused and lay down next to each other, and no longer understanding exactly, they shot at someone and somewhere. Both have Soviet machine guns. They shared cartridges, praised each other, and swore at the freezing grease of the machine gun. Finally, the serving stopped completely, they decided to light a cigarette, threw off their white hoods from their heads - and then they saw an eagle and a star on each other’s hats. Let's jump up! Machine guns don't fire! They grabbed me and, wielding them like clubs, began chasing each other: it’s not politics or the motherland, but a deep, cavernous mistrust: I’ll feel sorry for him, but he’ll kill me.
In East Prussia, a few steps away from me, three captured Vlasovites were led along the side of the road, and a T-34 four was just rumbling along the highway. Suddenly one of the prisoners turned around, jumped and fell like a swallow under the tank. The tank dodged, but still crushed him under the edge of its track. The crushed man was still squirming, red foam coming to his lips. And one could understand him! He preferred a soldier's death to hanging in a dungeon.
They were left with no choice. They couldn't fight any other way. They were left with no choice to try to be more kind to themselves. If one “pure” captivity was already recognized by us as an unforgivable betrayal of the homeland, then what about those who took the enemy’s weapons? The behavior of these people with our propaganda clumsiness was explained by: 1) betrayal (biologically? flowing in the blood?) and 2) cowardice . But not by cowardice! A coward seeks where there is indulgence, condescension. And only the last extreme, only extreme despair, only unquenchable hatred of the Soviet regime, only contempt for their own safety could bring them to the “Vlasov” detachments of the Wehrmacht. For they knew: here there will not be a glimpse of mercy for them! In our captivity, they were shot as soon as they heard the first intelligible Russian word from their mouths. In Russian captivity, as well as in German captivity, the Russians had it worst of all.
This war generally revealed to us that the worst thing on earth is to be Russian.
I recall with shame how, during the exploration (that is, plunder) of the Bobruisk cauldron, I walked along the highway among broken and fallen German vehicles, scattered trophy luxury - and from the lowlands, where drowned carts and cars were mired, German battlers wandered lost and smoky fires from the trophies, I heard a cry for help: “Mr. Captain! Mr. Captain! It was a man on foot in German trousers, naked from the waist up, already completely bloodied - on his face, chest, shoulders, back - shouting to me for protection in purely Russian, and a special sergeant, sitting on a horse, drove him in front of him with a whip and the horse’s pressure. He slashed him across his naked body with a whip, not allowing him to turn around, not allowing him to call for help, he drove him and beat him, causing new red abrasions from his skin.
This was not the Punic, not the Greco-Persian war! Anyone with power, an officer of any army on earth, had to stop the extrajudicial torture. Any – yes, but – ours?.. Given the cruelty and absoluteness of our division of humanity? (If [not with us], [not ours], etc., then I am worthy only of contempt and destruction.) So, I WAS CAREFUL to defend the Vlasov man in front of the special officer, I DID NOT SAY OR DO ANYTHING, I PASSED PAST AS WELL NOT HEARING - so that this plague, recognized by everyone, does not spread to me (what if this Vlasovite is some kind of super-villain?.. what if the special officer thinks about me..? what if..?) Yes, it’s simpler for someone who knows the situation in the army then - Would this special officer still listen to an army captain?
And with a brutal face, the special officer continued to whip and drive the defenseless man like a beast.
This picture remained in front of me forever. This is almost a symbol of the Archipelago; it can be placed on the cover of a book.
And they foresaw all this, foresaw it - and yet they sewed a shield with a white-blue-red border, St. Andrew's field and the letters ROA onto the left sleeve of the German uniform. *(10) Residents of the occupied regions despised them as German mercenaries, the Germans - for their Russian blood. Their pathetic newspapers were processed by the German censor cleaver: Great Germany and the Fuhrer. And that’s why the Vlasovites were left to fight to the death, and in their spare time vodka and vodka.
DOOM - that was their existence all the years of war and foreign land, and no way out anywhere.
Hitler and his entourage, already absent from everywhere, already on the eve of their death, still could not overcome their persistent distrust of individual Russian formations, decide on integral Russian divisions, on the shadow of an independent Russia not subordinate to them. Only in the wake of the final collapse, in November 1944, was the late spectacle allowed (in Prague): the convening of a “committee for the liberation of the peoples of Russia” uniting all national groups and the publication of a manifesto (still a bastard, because it was not allowed to think of Russia outside of Germany and beyond Nazism). Vlasov became the chairman of the committee. Only in the autumn of 1944 did the Vlasov All-Russian divisions begin to form. *(11) Probably, wise German politicians assumed that this is where Russian workers (ost-sheep) would rush to dismantle the weapons. Yes, the Red Army stood on the Vistula and the Danube... And as if in mockery, to confirm the foresight of the most short-sighted Germans, these Vlasov divisions, with their first and last independent action, struck... at the Germans! Already with the general collapse, already without coordination with the Oberkomando, Vlasov by the end of April gathered his two and a half divisions near Prague. Then it became known that the SS General Steiner was preparing to destroy the Czech capital and not give it up in its entirety. And Vlasov ordered his divisions to go over to the side of the rebel Czechs. And all the resentment, bitterness, anger that the forced Russian breasts had accumulated against the Germans over these cruel and stupid three years was now released in an attack on the Germans: from an unexpected direction, they were kicked out of Prague. (Did all the Czechs figure out later [[which]] Russians saved their city? Our history is distorted, and they say that Prague was saved by Soviet troops, although they could not have made it in time.)
And then the Vlasov army began to retreat towards the Americans, towards Bavaria: their only hope was in the allies - that they would be useful to the allies and then their long hanging in the German noose would be illuminated with meaning. But the Americans met them with an armed wall and forced them to surrender into Soviet hands, as envisaged by the Yalta Conference. And in the same May, in Austria, Churchill took the same loyal allied step (out of usual modesty, which was not announced in our country): he transferred to the Soviet command a Cossack corps of 90 thousand people, *(12) and many more convoys - old, small and women who did not want to return to their native Cossack rivers. (The great man, whose monuments would eventually cover all of England, ordered that these too be given to death.)
In addition to the hastily created Vlasov divisions, many Russian units continued to sour in the depths of the German army, under indistinguishable German uniforms. They ended the war in different areas and in different ways.
A few days before my arrest, I too came under Vlasov’s bullets. There were Russians in the East Prussian cauldron that we surrounded. One night at the end of January, their unit made a breakthrough to the west through our location without artillery preparation, in silence. There was no solid front, they quickly went deeper, took my sound battery sticking out forward in pincers, so that I barely had time to pull it along the last remaining road. But then I returned for the damaged car and before dawn I saw how, having accumulated in camouflage suits in the snow, they suddenly got up, rushed with a bang to the firing positions of the 152nd millimeter division at Adlig Schwenkitten and threw grenades at twelve heavy guns, not allowing them to do not a shot. Under their tracer bullets, our last group ran three kilometers through the virgin snow to the bridge over the Passarge River. They were stopped there.
Soon I was arrested, and before the Victory Parade we were now all sitting together on the Butyrka bunks, I finished smoking after them and they after me, and together with someone else we carried out a tin six-bucket bucket.
Many of the “Vlasovites,” like the “spies for an hour,” were young people, born between 1915 and 1922, that very “young unfamiliar tribe,” which the fussy Lunacharsky hastened to greet on behalf of Pushkin. Most of them ended up in the military formations of the same the wave of chance by which their comrades ended up as spies in the neighboring camp depended on the recruiter who arrived.
The recruiters mockingly explained to them - mockingly, if only this were not the truth! - “Stalin abandoned you!”, “Stalin doesn’t care about you!”
Soviet law put them outside of themselves even before they put themselves outside of Soviet law.
And they signed up... Alone, just to escape from the death camp. Others hoped to go over to the partisans (and they did! and then fought for the partisans! - but by Stalin’s standards this did not soften their sentence at all). However, the shameful forty-first year, a stunning defeat after many years of boasting, ached in someone; and someone considered the first culprit of these inhuman camps to be Stalin. And so they, too, reached out to declare themselves, about their formidable experience; that they are also parts of Russia and want to influence its future, and not be a toy of other people’s mistakes.
But fate laughed at them even more bitterly; they became even worse pawns. With stupid superficiality and conceit, the Germans only allowed them to die for their Reich, but did not allow them to think about an independent Russian destiny.
And the allies were two thousand miles away - and what kind of allies will they turn out to be?..
The word “Vlasovite” for us sounds like the word “uncleanliness”; it seems that we defile the mouth with just this sound and therefore no one dares to utter two or three phrases with the subject “Vlasovite”.
But that's not how history is written. Now, a quarter of a century later, when most of them died in the camps, and the survivors live in the far north, I wanted to remind you with these pages that this phenomenon is quite unprecedented in world history: that several hundred thousand young people *(13) between the ages of twenty and thirty raised arms against their Fatherland in alliance with its worst enemy. What, perhaps, we need to think about: who is more to blame - these young people or the gray Fatherland? That this cannot be explained by biological betrayal, but there must be social reasons.
Because, as the old proverb says: [horses don’t roam for food].
Just imagine: a field - and unkempt, hungry, maddened horses are roaming around in it.(A.I. Solzhenitsyn, “The Gulag Archipelago”)
Very contradictory. Over time, historians cannot agree on when the army itself began to form, who the Vlasovites were and what role they played during the war. In addition to the fact that the very formation of soldiers is considered, on the one hand, patriotic, and on the other, treacherous, there is also no exact data on exactly when Vlasov and his soldiers entered the battle. But first things first.
Who is he?
Vlasov Andrey Andreevich was a famous political and military figure. He started on the side of the USSR. Participated in the battle for Moscow. But in 1942 he was captured by the Germans. Without hesitation, Vlasov decided to go over to Hitler’s side and began to collaborate against the USSR.
Vlasov remains a controversial figure to this day. Until now, historians are divided into two camps: some are trying to justify the actions of the military leader, others are trying to condemn. Vlasov's supporters shout furiously about his patriotism. Those who joined the ROA were and remain true patriots of their country, but not of their government.
The opponents long ago decided for themselves who the Vlasovites were. They are confident that since their boss and they themselves joined the Nazis, they were, are and will remain traitors and collaborators. Moreover, patriotism, according to opponents, is just a cover. In fact, the Vlasovites went over to Hitler’s side only in the name of saving their lives. Moreover, they did not become respected people there. The Nazis used them for propaganda purposes.
Formation
It was Andrei Andreevich Vlasov who first spoke about the formation of the ROA. In 1942, he and Baersky created the “Smolensk Declaration,” which was a kind of “helping hand” for the German command. The document discussed a proposal to found an army that would fight against communism on Russian territory. The Third Reich acted wisely. The Germans decided to report this document to the media in order to create resonance and a wave of discussion.
Of course, such a step was aimed primarily at propaganda. Nevertheless, the soldiers who were part of the German army began to call themselves ROA military men. In fact, this was permissible; theoretically, the army existed only on paper.
Not Vlasovites
Despite the fact that already in 1943, volunteers began to form into the Russian Liberation Army, it was still too early to talk about who the Vlasovites were. The German command fed Vlasov “breakfasts”, and in the meantime gathered everyone who wanted to join the ROA.
At the time of 1941, the project included more than 200 thousand volunteers, but then Hitler did not yet know about such an amount of help. Over time, the famous “Havi” (Hilfswillige - “those willing to help”) began to appear. At first the Germans called them “our Ivans.” These people worked as security guards, cooks, grooms, drivers, loaders, etc.
If in 1942 there were just over 200 thousand Hawis, by the end of the year there were almost a million “traitors” and prisoners. Over time, Russian soldiers fought in the elite divisions of the SS troops.
RONA (RNNA)
In parallel with the Khawi, another so-called army is being formed - the Russian People's Liberation Army (RONA). At that time, one could hear about Vlasov thanks to the battle for Moscow. Despite the fact that RONA consisted of only 500 soldiers, it served as a defensive force for the city. It ceased to exist after the death of its founder Ivan Voskoboynikov.
At the same time, the Russian National People's Army (RNNA) was created in Belarus. She was an exact copy of RON. Its founder was Gil-Rodionov. The detachment served until 1943, and after Gil-Rodionov returned to Soviet power, the Germans disbanded the RNNA.
In addition to these “Nevlasovites,” there were also legions that were famous among the Germans and were held in high esteem. And also the Cossacks who fought to form their own state. The Nazis sympathized with them even more and considered them not Slavs, but Goths.
Origin
Now directly about who the Vlasovites were during the war. As we already remember, Vlasov was captured and from there began active cooperation with the Third Reich. He proposed creating an army so that Russia would become independent. Naturally, this did not suit the Germans. Therefore, they did not allow Vlasov to fully implement his projects.
But the Nazis decided to play on the name of the military leader. They called on the Red Army soldiers to betray the USSR and enroll in the ROA, which they did not plan to create. All this was done on behalf of Vlasov. Since 1943, the Nazis began to allow ROA soldiers to express themselves more.
Perhaps this is how the Vlasov flag appeared. The Germans allowed the Russians to use sleeve stripes. They looked like Although many soldiers tried to use the white-blue-red banner, the Germans did not allow it. The remaining volunteers, of other nationalities, often wore patches in the form of national flags.
When the soldiers began wearing patches with the St. Andrew’s flag and the inscription ROA, Vlasov was still far from command. Therefore, this period can hardly be called “Vlasov”.
Phenomenon
In 1944, when the Third Reich began to realize that a lightning war was not working out, and their affairs at the front were completely deplorable, it was decided to return to Vlasov. In 1944, Reichsführer SS Himmler discussed with the Soviet military leader the issue of forming an army. Then everyone already understood who the Vlasovites were.
Despite the fact that Himmler promised to form ten Russian divisions, the Reichsführer later changed his mind and agreed to only three.
Organization
The Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia was formed only in 1944 in Prague. It was then that the practical organization of the ROA began. The army had its own command and all types of troops. Vlasov was both the chairman of the Committee and the commander-in-chief of which, in turn, both on paper and in practice, were an independent Russian national army.
The ROA had allied relations with the Germans. Although the Third Reich was involved in financing. The money the Germans issued was credit and had to be repaid as soon as possible.
Vlasov's thoughts
Vlasov set himself a different task. He hoped that his organization would become as strong as possible. He foresaw the defeat of the Nazis and understood that after this he would have to represent the “third side” in the conflict between the West and the USSR. The Vlasovites had to implement their political plans with the support of Britain and the United States. Only at the beginning of 1945 was the ROA officially presented as the armed forces of an allied power. Within a month, the fighters were able to receive their own sleeve insignia, and an ROA cockade on their hat.
Baptism of fire
Even then they began to understand who the Vlasovites were. During the war they had to work a little. In general, the army took part in only two battles. Moreover, the first took place against Soviet troops, and the second against the Third Reich.
On February 9, the ROA entered combat positions for the first time. The actions took place in the Oder region. The ROA performed well, and the German command highly appreciated its actions. She was able to occupy Neuleveen, the southern part of Karlsbize and Kerstenbruch. On March 20, the ROA was supposed to seize and equip a bridgehead, and also be responsible for the passage of ships along the Oder. The army's actions were more or less successful.
Already at the end of March 1945, the ROA decided to get together and unite with the Cossack Cavalry Corps. This was done in order to show the whole world their power and potential. Then the West was quite cautious about the Vlasovites. They didn't particularly like their methods and goals.
The ROA also had escape routes. The command hoped to reunite with the Yugoslav troops or break into the Ukrainian Insurgent Army. When the leadership realized the inevitable defeat of the Germans, it was decided to go west on their own to surrender to the Allies there. It later became known that Himmler wrote about the physical elimination of the Committee's leadership. This was precisely what became the first reason for the escape of the ROA from under the wing of the Third Reich.
The last event that remains in history was the Prague Uprising. Units of the ROA reached Prague and rebelled against Germany along with the partisans. Thus, they managed to liberate the capital before the arrival of the Red Army.
Education
Throughout history, there was only one school that trained soldiers in the ROA - Dabendorf. Over the entire period, 5 thousand people were released - that's 12 issues. The lectures were based on harsh criticism of the existing system in the USSR. The main emphasis was precisely the ideological component. It was necessary to re-educate captured soldiers and raise staunch opponents of Stalin.
This is where real Vlasovites graduated. The photo of the school's badge proves that it was an organization with clear goals and ideas. The school did not last long. At the end of February she had to be evacuated to Gischübel. Already in April it ceased to exist.
Controversy
The main dispute remains what the Vlasov flag was. Many people to this day argue that it is the current state flag of Russia that is the banner of “traitors” and followers of Vlasov. In fact, this is how it is. Some believed that the Vlasov banner was with the St. Andrew’s Cross, some individual collaborators used the modern tricolor of the Russian Federation. The latter fact was confirmed even by video and photography.
Questions also began about other attributes. It turns out that the awards of the Vlasovites in one way or another relate to the currently famous dispute about the St. George’s Ribbon. And here it is worth explaining. The fact is that the Vlasov ribbon, in principle, did not exist at all.
Nowadays, it is the St. George ribbon that is attributed to those defeated in the Great Patriotic War. It was used in awards for members of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia and the ROA. And initially it was attached to the Order of St. George back in imperial Russia.
In the Soviet award system there was a guards ribbon. It was a special sign of distinction. It was used to design the Order of Glory and the medal “For Victory over Germany.”
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