During the Great Patriotic War, about three and a half million soldiers were captured by the Soviets, who were later tried for various war crimes. This number included both the Wehrmacht military and their allies. Moreover, more than two million are Germans. Almost all of them were found guilty and received significant prison sentences. Among the prisoners there were also “big fish” - high-ranking and far from ordinary representatives of the German military elite.
However, the vast majority of them were kept in quite acceptable conditions and were able to return to their homeland. Soviet troops and the population treated the defeated invaders quite tolerantly. "RG" talks about the highest-ranking Wehrmacht and SS officers who were captured by the Soviets.
Field Marshal Friedrich Wilhelm Ernst Paulus
Paulus was the first of the German high military ranks to be captured. Along with him during Battle of Stalingrad All members of his headquarters - 44 generals - were captured.
On January 30, 1943 - the day before the complete collapse of the encircled 6th Army - Paulus was awarded the rank of Field Marshal. The calculation was simple - not a single top commander in the entire history of Germany surrendered. Thus, the Fuhrer intended to push his newly appointed field marshal to continue resistance and, as a result, commit suicide. Having thought about this prospect, Paulus decided in his own way and ordered an end to resistance.
Despite all the rumors about the “atrocities” of the communists towards prisoners, the captured generals were treated with great dignity. Everyone was immediately taken to the Moscow region - to the Krasnogorsk operational transit camp of the NKVD. The security officers intended to win the high-ranking prisoner over to their side. However, Paulus resisted for quite a long time. During interrogations, he declared that he would forever remain a National Socialist.
It is believed that Paulus was one of the founders of the National Committee of Free Germany, which immediately launched active anti-fascist activities. In fact, when the committee was created in Krasnogorsk, Paulus and his generals were already in the general camp in the Spaso-Evfimiev Monastery in Suzdal. He immediately regarded the work of the committee as “betrayal.” He called the generals who agreed to cooperate with the Soviets traitors, whom he “can no longer consider as his comrades.”
Paulus changed his point of view only in August 1944, when he signed an appeal “To prisoners of war German soldiers, officers and the German people.” In it, he called for the removal of Adolf Hitler and an end to the war. Immediately after this, he joined the anti-fascist Union of German Officers, and then Free Germany. There he soon became one of the most active propagandists.
Historians are still arguing about the reasons for such a sharp change in position. Most attribute this to the defeats that the Wehrmacht had suffered by that time. Having lost the last hope for German success in the war, the former field marshal and current prisoner of war decided to side with the winner. One should not dismiss the efforts of the NKVD officers, who methodically worked with “Satrap” (Paulus’s pseudonym). By the end of the war, they practically forgot about him - he couldn’t really help, the Wehrmacht front was already cracking in the East and West.
After the defeat of Germany, Paulus came in handy again. He became one of the main witnesses for the Soviet prosecution at the Nuremberg trials. Ironically, it was captivity that may have saved him from the gallows. Before his capture, he enjoyed the Fuhrer’s enormous trust; he was even predicted to replace Alfred Jodl, the chief of staff of the operational leadership of the Wehrmacht High Command. Jodl, as is known, became one of those whom the tribunal sentenced to hang for war crimes.
After the war, Paulus, along with other “Stalingrad” generals, continued to be captured. Most of them were released and returned to Germany (only one died in captivity). Paulus continued to be kept at his dacha in Ilyinsk, near Moscow.
He was able to return to Germany only after Stalin's death in 1953. Then, by order of Khrushchev, the former military man was given a villa in Dresden, where he died on February 1, 1957. It is significant that at his funeral, in addition to his relatives, only party leaders and generals of the GDR were present.
General of Artillery Walter von Seydlitz-Kurzbach
The aristocrat Seydlitz commanded the corps in Paulus's army. He surrendered on the same day as Paulus, albeit on a different sector of the front. Unlike his commander, he began to cooperate with counterintelligence almost immediately. It was Seydlitz who became the first chairman of Free Germany and the Union of German Officers. He even suggested that the Soviet authorities form German units to fight the Nazis. True, prisoners were no longer considered as a military force. They were used only for propaganda work.
After the war, Seydlitz remained in Russia. At a dacha near Moscow, he advised the creators of a film about the Battle of Stalingrad and wrote memoirs. Several times he asked for repatriation to the territory of the Soviet zone of occupation of Germany, but was refused each time.
In 1950, he was arrested and sentenced to 25 years in prison. Former general were kept in solitary confinement.
Seydlitz received his freedom in 1955 after the visit of German Chancellor Konrad Adenauer to the USSR. After his return, he led a reclusive life.
Lieutenant General Vinzenz Müller
For some, Müller went down in history as the “German Vlasov.” He commanded the 4th German Army, which was completely defeated near Minsk. Müller himself was captured. From the very first days as a prisoner of war he joined the work of the Union of German Officers.
For some special merits, he not only was not convicted, but immediately after the war he returned to Germany. That's not all - he was appointed Deputy Minister of Defense. Thus, he became the only major Wehrmacht commander who retained his rank of lieutenant general in the GDR army.
In 1961, Müller fell from the balcony of his house in a suburb of Berlin. Some claimed it was suicide.
Grand Admiral Erich Johann Albert Raeder
Until the beginning of 1943, Raeder was one of the most influential military men in Germany. He served as commander of the Kriegsmarine (German navy). After a series of failures at sea, he was removed from his post. He received the position of chief inspector of the fleet, but had no real powers.
Erich Raeder was captured in May 1945. During interrogations in Moscow, he spoke about all the preparations for war and gave detailed testimony.
Initially, the USSR intended to try the former grand admiral itself (Raeder is one of the few who was not considered at the conference in Yalta, where the issue of punishing war criminals was discussed), but later a decision was made on his participation in the Nuremberg trials. The tribunal sentenced him to life imprisonment. Immediately after the verdict was announced, he demanded that the sentence be changed to execution, but was refused.
He was released from Spandau prison in January 1955. Official reason became the prisoner's health condition. The illness did not stop him from writing his memoirs. He died in Kiel in November 1960.
SS Brigadeführer Wilhelm Mohnke
The commander of the 1st SS Panzer Division "Leibstandarte SS Adolf Hitler" is one of the few SS generals captured by Soviet troops. The overwhelming number of SS men made their way to the west and surrendered to the Americans or British. On April 21, 1945, Hitler appointed him commander of a “battle group” for the defense of the Reich Chancellery and the Fuhrer’s bunker. After the collapse of Germany, he tried to break out of Berlin to the north with his soldiers, but was captured. By that time, almost his entire group was destroyed.
After signing the act of surrender, Monke was taken to Moscow. There he was held first in Butyrka, and then in Lefortovo prison. The sentence - 25 years in prison - was heard only in February 1952. He served his sentence in the legendary pre-trial detention center No. 2 of the city of Vladimir - “Vladimir Central”.
The former general returned to Germany in October 1955. Worked at home sales agent for the sale of trucks and trailers. He died quite recently - in August 2001.
Until the end of his life he considered himself an ordinary soldier and actively participated in the work of various associations of SS military personnel.
SS Brigadeführer Helmut Becker
SS man Becker was brought into Soviet captivity by his place of service. In 1944, he was appointed commander of the Totenkopf (Death's Head) division, becoming its last commander. According to the agreement between the USSR and the USA, all military personnel of the division were subject to transfer to Soviet troops.
Before the defeat of Germany, Becker, confident that only death awaited him in the east, tried to break through to the west. Having led his division through the whole of Austria, he capitulated only on May 9. Within a few days he found himself in Poltava prison.
In 1947, he appeared before the military tribunal of the troops of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Kyiv Military District and received 25 years in the camps. Apparently, like all other German prisoners of war, he could return to Germany in the mid-50s. However, he became one of the few top German military commanders to die in the camp.
The cause of Becker’s death was not hunger and overwork, which was common in the camps, but a new accusation. In the camp he was tried for sabotage of construction work. On September 9, 1952 he was sentenced to death penalty. Already on February 28 of the following year he was shot.
General of Artillery Helmut Weidling
The commander of the defense and the last commandant of Berlin was captured during the assault on the city. Realizing the futility of resistance, he gave the order to cease hostilities. He tried in every possible way to cooperate with the Soviet command and personally signed the act of surrender of the Berlin garrison on May 2.
The general’s tricks did not help save him from trial. In Moscow he was kept in Butyrskaya and Lefortovo prisons. After this he was transferred to the Vladimir Central.
The last commandant of Berlin was sentenced in 1952 - 25 years in the camps (the standard sentence for Nazi criminals).
Weidling was no longer able to be released. He died of heart failure on November 17, 1955. He was buried in the prison cemetery in an unmarked grave.
SS-Obergruppenführer Walter Krueger
Since 1944, Walter Kruger led the SS troops in the Baltic states. He continued to fight until the very end of the war, but eventually tried to break into Germany. With fighting I reached almost the very border. However, on May 22, 1945, Kruger’s group attacked a Soviet patrol. Almost all the Germans died in the battle.
Kruger himself was taken alive - after being wounded, he was unconscious. However, it was not possible to interrogate the general - when he came to his senses, he shot himself. As it turned out, he kept a pistol in a secret pocket, which could not be found during the search.
SS Gruppenführer Helmut von Pannwitz
Von Pannwitz is the only German who was tried along with the White Guard generals Shkuro, Krasnov and other collaborators. This attention is due to all the activities of the cavalryman Pannwitz during the war. It was he who oversaw the creation from the German side Cossack troops in the Wehrmacht. He was also accused of numerous war crimes in the Soviet Union.
Therefore, when Pannwitz, together with his brigade, surrendered to the British, the USSR demanded his immediate extradition. In principle, the Allies could refuse - as a German, Pannwitz was not subject to trial in the Soviet Union. However, given the severity of the crimes (there was evidence of numerous executions of civilians), the German general was sent to Moscow along with the traitors.
In January 1947, the court sentenced all the accused (six people were in the dock) to death. A few days later, Pannwitz and other leaders of the anti-Soviet movement were hanged.
Since then, monarchist organizations have regularly raised the issue of rehabilitating those hanged. Time after time, the Supreme Court makes a negative decision.
SS Sturmbannführer Otto Günsche
By his rank (the army equivalent is major), Otto Günsche, of course, did not belong to the German army elite. However, due to his position, he was one of the most knowledgeable people about life in Germany at the end of the war.
For several years, Günsche was Adolf Hitler's personal adjutant. It was he who was tasked with destroying the body of the Fuhrer who committed suicide. This became a fatal event in the life of the young (at the end of the war he was not even 28 years old) officer.
Gunsche was captured by the Soviets on May 2, 1945. Almost immediately he found himself in the development of SMERSH agents, who were trying to find out the fate of the missing Fuhrer. Some of the materials are still classified.
Finally, in 1950, Otto Günsche was sentenced to 25 years in prison. However, in 1955 he was transported to serve his sentence in the GDR, and a year later he was completely released from prison. Soon he moved to Germany, where he remained for the rest of his life. He died in 2003.
The greatness of the feat of our people in the Great Patriotic War lies in the fact that, although at a terribly high price, it endured a powerful blow to the hitherto invincible German army and did not allow it, as the Wehrmacht command had hoped, to carry out the notorious blitzkrieg to the East.
"SPECIAL TREATMENT"
Unfortunately, there are still many dark spots associated with this terrible war. Among them are the fates of Soviet prisoners of war. For during these years, 5,740,000 Soviet prisoners of war passed through the crucible of German captivity. Moreover, only about 1 million were in concentration camps by the end of the war. IN German lists the number of deaths was about 2 million. Of the remaining number, 818,000 collaborated with the Germans, 473,000 were killed in Wehrmacht camps in Germany and Poland, 273,000 died and about half a million were killed en route, 67,000 soldiers and officers escaped. According to statistics, two out of three Soviet prisoners of war died in German captivity. The first year of the war was especially terrible in this regard. Of the 3.3 million Soviet prisoners of war captured by the Germans during the first six months of the war, by January 1942, about 2 million had died or been destroyed. The mass extermination of Soviet prisoners of war even exceeded the rate of reprisals against Jews during the peak of the anti-Semitic campaign in Germany.
The architect of the genocide was not a member of the SS or even a representative of the Nazi Party, but just an elderly general who was on duty. military service since 1905. This is Infantry General Hermann Reinecke, who headed the department of prisoners of war losses in the German army. Even before the start of Operation Barbarossa, Reinecke made a proposal to isolate Jewish prisoners of war and transfer them into the hands of the SS for “special processing.” Later, as a judge of the "people's court", he sentenced hundreds of German Jews to the gallows.
At the same time, Hitler, having received active support from the Wehrmacht in the campaign of mass extermination of Jews, was finally convinced of the possibility of implementing a plan for the total destruction of individual nations and nationalities.
DEATH AND STATISTICS
Stalin's attitude towards his prisoners of war was extremely cruel, even despite the fact that his own son was among them in 1941. In essence, Stalin’s attitude to the issue of prisoners of war was manifested already in 1940 in the episode with the Katyn forests (execution Polish officers). It was the leader who initiated the concept “anyone who surrenders is a traitor,” which was later attributed to the head of the political department of the Red Army, Mehlis.
In November 1941, the Soviet side expressed a weak protest over the mistreatment of prisoners of war, while refusing to cooperate with the International Red Cross's efforts to exchange lists of people captured. Equally insignificant were the protests of the USSR at the Nuremberg trials, at which Soviet prisoners of war were represented by only one witness - medical service lieutenant Evgeniy Kivelisha, who was captured in 1941. The episodes cited by Kivelisha and confirmed by other testimony indicated that with Soviet military personnel were treated the same as representatives of Jewish nationality. Moreover, when gas chambers were first tested in the Auschwitz camp, the first victims were Soviet prisoners of war.
The Soviet Union did nothing to get the Nazis accused of crimes against prisoners of war - neither the elderly organizer and ideologist Reinecke, nor the commanders of the troops Hermann Hoth, Erich Manstein and Richard Ruff, nor the SS commanders Kurt Meyer and Sepp Dietrich, who were opposed Serious charges have been brought forward.
Unfortunately, most of our prisoners of war, released from German dungeons, were later sent to Soviet camps. And only after Stalin’s death the process of their rehabilitation began. Among them, for example, there were such worthy people as Major Gavrilov, a hero of defense Brest Fortress, who spent more time in Soviet camps than in German ones. Stalin is said to have precisely defined his attitude to this problem: “The death of one person is a tragedy, the death of several thousand people is a statistic.”
FATES OF GENERALS
The fates of not only many soldiers-prisoners of war are tragic, but also the fates of Soviet generals. Most of the Soviet generals who fell into German hands were either wounded or unconscious.
During the Second World War, 83 generals of the Red Army were captured by Germans. Of these, 26 people died for various reasons: shot, killed by camp guards, or died from disease. The rest were deported to the Soviet Union after the Victory. Of these, 32 people were repressed (7 were hanged in the Vlasov case, 17 were shot on the basis of Headquarters order # 270 of August 16, 1941 “On cases of cowardice and surrender and measures to suppress such actions”) and for “wrong” behavior in captivity 8 generals were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment.
After more than six months of inspection, the remaining 25 people were acquitted, but then gradually transferred to the reserve.
There are still many secrets in the fates of those generals who found themselves in German captivity. Let me give you a few typical examples.
The fate of Major General Bogdanov remains a mystery. He commanded the 48th Infantry Division, which was destroyed in the first days of the war as a result of the Germans advancing from the Riga region to the Soviet borders. In captivity, Bogdanov joined the Gil-Rodinov brigade, which was formed by the Germans from representatives of Eastern European nationalities to carry out anti-partisan tasks. Lieutenant Colonel Gil-Rodinov himself was the chief of staff of the 29th Infantry Division before his capture. Bogdanov took the position of chief of counterintelligence. In August 1943, the brigade's soldiers killed all German officers and went over to the side of the partisans. Gil-Rodinov was later killed while fighting on the side of the Soviet troops. The fate of Bogdanov, who also went over to the side of the partisans, is unknown.
Major General Dobrozerdov headed the 7th Rifle Corps, which in August 1941 was tasked with stopping the advance of the German 1st Panzer Group to the Zhitomir region. The corps' counterattack failed, partially contributing to the Germans' encirclement of the Southwestern Front near Kiev. Dobrozerdov survived and was soon appointed chief of staff of the 37th Army. This was the period when, on the left bank of the Dnieper, the Soviet command regrouped the scattered forces of the Southwestern Front. In this leapfrog and confusion, Dobrozerdov was captured. The 37th Army itself was disbanded at the end of September and then re-established under the command of Lopatin for the defense of Rostov. Dobrozerdov withstood all the horrors of captivity and returned to his homeland after the war. Further fate unknown.
Lieutenant General Ershakov was, in the full sense, one of those who were lucky enough to survive Stalin’s repressions. In the summer of 1938, at the height of the purges, he became commander of the Ural Military District. In the first days of the war, the district was transformed into the 22nd Army, which became one of three armies sent to the very thick of the battles - to the Western Front. At the beginning of July, the 22nd Army was unable to stop the advance of the German 3rd Panzer Group towards Vitebsk and was completely destroyed in August. However, Ershakov managed to escape. In September 1941, he took command of the 20th Army, which was defeated in the battle of Smolensk. At the same time, under unknown circumstances, Ershakov himself was captured. He went through captivity and remained alive. Further fate is unknown.
Before the start of the war, Lieutenant General Lukin commanded the Transbaikal Military District. In May 1941, Stalin, in a state of panic, decided to take a number of countermeasures to repeated manifestations of ill will on the part of Hitler. These included the creation of the 16th Army on the basis of the Transbaikal Military District, which was later redeployed to Ukraine, where it was destroyed in the first days of the war. Lukin subsequently commanded the 20th Army, and then the 19th, which was also defeated in the battle of Smolensk in October 1941. The commander was captured. In December 1942, Vlasov approached the mutilated general (without one leg, with a paralyzed arm) with an offer to join the ROA (Russian Liberation Army). Similar attempts were made by Trukhin, the chief of staff of the Vlasov army, a former colleague of Lukin, but they were not crowned with success. At the end of the war, Lukin returned to his homeland, but was not reinstated in active service (pretext: medical reasons).
The fate of Major General Mishutin is full of secrets and mysteries. He was born in 1900, took part in the battles at Khalkhin Gol, and by the beginning of the Great Patriotic War he commanded a rifle division in Belarus. There he disappeared without a trace during the fighting (a fate shared by thousands of Soviet soldiers). In 1954, former allies informed Moscow that Mishutin held a high position in one of the Western intelligence services and worked in Frankfurt. According to the presented version, the general first joined Vlasov, and then last days War was recruited by General Patch, commander of the American 7th Army, and became a Western agent. Another story, presented by the Russian writer Tamaev, seems more realistic, according to which an NKVD officer who investigated the fate of General Mishutin proved that Mishutin was shot by the Germans for refusing to cooperate, and his name was used by a completely different person who was recruiting prisoners of war into the Vlasov army. At the same time, the documents on the Vlasov movement do not contain any information about Mishutin, and the Soviet authorities, through their agents among prisoners of war, from the interrogations of Vlasov and his accomplices after the war, would undoubtedly have established the actual fate of General Mishutin. In addition, if Mishutin died as a hero, then it is not clear why there is no information about him in Soviet publications on the history of Khalkhin Gol. From all of the above it follows that the fate of this man still remains a mystery.
At the beginning of the war, Lieutenant General Muzychenko commanded the 6th Army of the Southwestern Front. The army included two huge mechanized corps, which the Soviet command entrusted big hopes(they, unfortunately, did not come true). The 6th Army managed to provide strong resistance to the enemy during the defense of Lvov. Subsequently, the 6th Army fought in the area of the cities of Brody and Berdichev, where, as a result of poorly coordinated actions and lack of air support, it was defeated. On July 25, the 6th Army was transferred to the Southern Front and destroyed in the Uman pocket. General Muzychenko was also captured at the same time. He passed through captivity, but was not reinstated. Stalin's attitude towards the generals who fought on the Southern Front and were captured there was harsher than towards the generals captured on other fronts.
At the beginning of the war, Major General Novikov led a regiment that fought on the Prut River and then on the Dnieper. Novikov successfully commanded the 2nd Cavalry Division during the defense of Stalingrad and the 109th Rifle Division during the Battle of Crimea and during rearguard operations near Sevastopol. On the night of July 13, 1942, the ship on which the retreating units were evacuated was sunk by the Germans. Novikov was captured and sent to the Hammelsburg camp. He actively participated in the resistance movement, first in Hummelsburg, then in Flussenburg, where he was transferred by the Gestapo in the spring of 1943. In February 1944, the general was killed.
Major General Ogurtsov commanded the 10th Tank Division, which was part of the 15th Mechanized Corps of the Southwestern Front. The defeat of the division as part of the "Volsky group" south of Kyiv decided the fate of this city. Ogurtsov was captured, but managed to escape while being transported from Zamosc to Hammelsburg. He joined a group of partisans in Poland, led by Manzhevidze. On October 28, 1942 he died in battle on Polish territory.
The fates of Major Generals Ponedelin and Kirillov are a clear example of the despotism and cruelty that distinguished the Stalinist regime. On July 25, 1941, near Uman, the defeated forces of the Soviet 6th Army (under the command of the aforementioned Muzychenko), together with the 12th Army, entered the “battalion group” under the command of the former commander of the 12th Army, General Ponedelin. The battalion group fighting on the Southern Front was tasked with escaping the enemy encirclement. However, the group was defeated, and all units involved in the release operation were destroyed. Ponedelin and the commander of the 13th Rifle Corps, Major General Kirillov, were captured. Soon after, they were accused of desertion, and to this day their fate remains unknown.
In his memoirs, published in 1960, Army General Tyulenev, who commanded the Southern Front, does not mention this fact. However, he repeatedly quotes the text of a telegram signed by him and the corps commissar Zaporozhets, who was a commissar of the same front, in which Ponedelin is accused of “spreading panic” - at that time the most serious of crimes. However, facts indicate that Ponedelin, an experienced officer who held the position of chief of staff of the Leningrad Military District before the war, was used as a cover for mistakes made by the Southern Front itself and its commander, Army General Tyulenin.
Only in the late 80s was an attempt made in Soviet literature to pay tribute to generals Ponedelin and Kirillov, who flatly refused to cooperate with the Germans. This became possible after Headquarters Directive No. 270 of August 17, 1941 was declassified. It, in particular, blamed Lieutenant General Kachalov, commander of the 28th Army, who died a heroic death on the battlefield, as well as Major Generals Ponedelin and Kirillov in desertion and going over to the side of the enemy. In fact, the generals did not cooperate with the Germans. They were forced to take photographs with Wehrmacht soldiers, after which the fabricated photographs were distributed throughout the positions of the Soviet troops. It was precisely this kind of misinformation that convinced Stalin of the betrayal of the generals. While in the Wolfheide concentration camp, Ponedelin and Kirillov refused to go over to the side of the Russian Liberation Army. Kirillov was later transported to Dachau. In 1945, the Americans released Ponedelin, after which he immediately contacted the Soviet military mission in Paris. On December 30, 1945, Ponedelin and Kirillov were arrested. After five years in Lefortovo, serious charges were brought against them in the so-called “Leningrad case”. They were sentenced to death by a military tribunal and shot on August 25, 1950. General Snegov, commander of the 8th Rifle Corps, which was part of the “Ponedelin battalion group,” was also captured near Uman, but, in all likelihood, was not subjected to reprisals after returning home.
Major General of Tank Forces Potapov was one of five army commanders whom the Germans captured during the war. Potapov distinguished himself in the battles at Khalkhin Gol, where he commanded the Southern Group. At the beginning of the war, he commanded the 5th Army of the Southwestern Front. This association fought, perhaps, better than others until Stalin made the decision to shift the “center of attention” to Kyiv. On September 20, 1941, during fierce battles near Poltava, Potapov was captured. There is information that Hitler himself talked to Potapov, trying to convince him to go over to the side of the Germans, but the Soviet general flatly refused. After his release, Potapov was awarded the Order of Lenin, and later promoted to the rank of colonel general. Then he was appointed to the post of first deputy commander of the Odessa and Carpathian military districts. His obituary was signed by all representatives of the high command, which included several marshals. The obituary said nothing about his capture and stay in German camps.
The last general (and one of two Air Force generals) captured by the Germans was Aviation Major General Polbin, commander of the 6th Guards Bomber Corps, which supported the activities of the 6th Army, which surrounded Breslau in February 1945. He was wounded, captured and killed, and only then did the Germans establish the identity of this man. His fate was completely typical of everyone who was captured in the last months of the war.
Division Commissioner Rykov was one of two high-ranking commissars captured by the Germans. The second person of the same rank captured by the Germans was the commissar of the brigade Zhilyankov, who managed to hide his identity and who later joined the Vlasov movement. Rykov joined the Red Army in 1928 and by the beginning of the war he was commissar of the military district. In July 1941, he was appointed one of two commissars assigned to the Southwestern Front. The second was Burmistenko, a representative of the Ukrainian Communist Party. During the breakthrough from the Kyiv cauldron, Burmistenko, and with him the front commander Kirponos and the chief of staff Tupikov, were killed, and Rykov was wounded and captured. Hitler's order required the immediate destruction of all captured commissars, even if this meant the elimination of "important sources of information." The Germans tortured Rykov to death.
Major General Samokhin was a military attaché in Yugoslavia before the war. In the spring of 1942, he was appointed commander of the 48th Army. On the way to his new duty station, his plane landed in German-occupied Mtsensk instead of Yelets. According to the former chief of staff of the 48th Army, and later marshal Soviet Union Biryuzov, the Germans then captured, in addition to Samokhin himself, Soviet planning documents for the summer (1942) offensive campaign, which allowed them to take countermeasures in a timely manner. An interesting fact is that shortly after this, Soviet troops intercepted a German plane with plans for a summer offensive of the German army, but Moscow either drew the wrong conclusions from them or completely ignored them, which led to the defeat of Soviet troops near Kharkov. Samokhin returned from captivity to his homeland. Further fate is unknown.
Major General Susoev, commander of the 36th Rifle Corps, was captured by the Germans dressed in the uniform of an ordinary soldier. He managed to escape, after which he joined an armed gang of Ukrainian nationalists, and then went over to the side of the pro-Soviet Ukrainian partisans led by famous Fedorov. He refused to return to Moscow, preferring to remain with the partisans. After the liberation of Ukraine, Susoev returned to Moscow, where he was rehabilitated.
Air Major General Thor, who commanded the 62nd Air Division, was a first-class military pilot. In September 1941, while commander of a long-range aviation division, he was shot down and wounded while conducting ground combat. He went through many German camps and actively participated in the resistance movement of Soviet prisoners in Hummelsburg. The fact, of course, did not escape the attention of the Gestapo. In December 1942, Thor was transported to Flussenberg, where on February 23, 1943, “special processing methods” were applied to him.
Major General Vishnevsky was captured less than two weeks after he assumed command of the 32nd Army. At the beginning of October 1941, this army was abandoned near Smolensk, where within a few days it was completely destroyed by the enemy. This happened at a time when Stalin was assessing the likelihood of military defeat and planning to move to Kuibyshev, which, however, did not prevent him from issuing an order for the destruction of a number of senior officers who were shot on July 22, 1941. Among them: the commander of the Western Front, Army General Pavlov ; Chief of Staff of this front, Major General Klimovskikh; the chief of communications of the same front, Major General Grigoriev; Commander of the 4th Army, Major General Korobkov. Vishnevsky withstood all the horrors of German captivity and returned to his homeland. Further fate is unknown.
During the Great Patriotic War, 78 Soviet generals were captured by the Germans. 26 of them died in captivity, six escaped from captivity, the rest were repatriated to the Soviet Union after the end of the war. 32 people were repressed.
Not all of them were traitors. Based on the Headquarters order of August 16, 1941 “On cases of cowardice and surrender and measures to suppress such actions,” 13 people were shot, another eight were sentenced to imprisonment for “improper behavior in captivity.”
But among the senior officers there were also those who, to one degree or another, voluntarily chose to cooperate with the Germans. Five major generals and 25 colonels were hanged in the Vlasov case. There were even Heroes of the Soviet Union in the Vlasov army - senior lieutenant Bronislav Antilevsky and captain Semyon Bychkov.
The case of General Vlasov
They are still arguing about who General Andrei Vlasov was, an ideological traitor or an ideological fighter against the Bolsheviks. He served in the Red Army from Civil War, studied at the Higher Army Command Courses, advanced through career ladder. In the late 30s he served as a military adviser in China. Vlasov survived the era of great terror without shocks - he was not subjected to repression, and even, according to some information, was a member of the district military tribunal.
Before the war, he received the Order of the Red Banner and the Order of Lenin. He was awarded these high awards for creating an exemplary division. Vlasov received under his command an infantry division that was not distinguished by any particular discipline or merit. Focusing on German achievements, Vlasov demanded strict compliance with the charter. His caring attitude towards his subordinates even became the subject of articles in the press. The division received a challenge Red Banner.
In January 1941, he received command of a mechanized corps, one of the most well-equipped at that time. The corps included new KV and T-34 tanks. They were created for offensive operations, but in defense after the start of the war they were not very effective. Soon Vlasov was appointed commander of the 37th Army defending Kyiv. The connections were broken, and Vlasov himself ended up in the hospital.
He managed to distinguish himself in the battle for Moscow and became one of the most famous commanders. It was his popularity that later played against him - in the summer of 1942, Vlasov, being the commander of the 2nd Army on the Volkhov Front, was surrounded. When he reached the village, the headman handed him over to the German police, and the arriving patrol identified him from a photo in the newspaper.
In the Vinnitsa military camp, Vlasov accepted the Germans’ offer of cooperation. Initially, he was an agitator and propagandist. Soon he became the leader of the Russian Liberation Army. He campaigned and recruited captured soldiers. Propagandist groups and a training center were created in Dobendorf, and there were also separate Russian battalions that were part of different parts of the German armed forces. The history of the Vlasov Army as a structure began only in October 1944 with the creation of the Central Headquarters. The army received the name “Armed Forces of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia.” The committee itself was also headed by Vlasov.
Fyodor Trukhin - creator of the army
According to some historians, for example, Kirill Alexandrov, Vlasov was more of a propagandist and ideologist, and the organizer and true creator of the Vlasov army was Major General Fyodor Trukhin. He was the former head of the Operations Directorate of the North-Western Front, a professional general staff officer. Surrendered himself along with all the headquarters documents. In 1943 Trukhin was the head training center in Dobendorf, from October 1944 he took the post of chief of staff of the Committee for the Liberation of the Peoples of Russia. Under his leadership, two divisions were formed, and the formation of a third began. In the last months of the war, Trukhin commanded the Southern Group of the Committee's armed forces located in Austria.
Trukhin and Vlasov hoped that the Germans would transfer all Russian units under their command, but this did not happen. With almost half a million Russians who passed through the Vlasov organizations in April 1945, his army de jure amounted to approximately 124 thousand people.
Vasily Malyshkin – propagandist
Major General Malyshkin was also one of Vlasov’s comrades. Finding himself captured from the Vyazemsky cauldron, he began to collaborate with the Germans. In 1942, he taught propaganda courses in Vulgaida, and soon became assistant to the head of training. In 1943, he met Vlasov while working in the propaganda department of the Wehrmacht High Command.
He also worked for Vlasov as a propagandist and was a member of the Presidium of the Committee. In 1945 he was a representative in negotiations with the Americans. After the war, he tried to establish cooperation with American intelligence, even wrote a note on the training of Red Army command personnel. But in 1946 it was still transferred to the Soviet side.
Major General Alexander Budykho: service in the ROA and escape
In many ways, Budykho’s biography was reminiscent of Vlasov’s: several decades of service in the Red Army, command courses, command of a division, encirclement, detention by a German patrol. In the camp, he accepted the offer of brigade commander Bessonov and joined the Political Center for the Fight against Bolshevism. Budykho began to identify pro-Soviet prisoners and hand them over to the Germans.
In 1943, Bessonov was arrested, the organization was disbanded, and Budykho expressed a desire to join the ROA and came under the control of General Helmikh. In September he was appointed to the post of staff officer for training and education of the eastern troops. But immediately after he arrived at his duty station in Leningrad region, two Russian battalions fled to the partisans, killing the Germans. Having learned about this, Budykho himself fled.
General Richter – sentenced in absentia
This traitor general was not involved in the Vlasov case, but he helped the Germans no less. Having been captured in the first days of the war, he ended up in a prisoner of war camp in Poland. 19 German intelligence agents caught in the USSR testified against him. According to them, from 1942 Richter headed the Abwehr reconnaissance and sabotage school in Warsaw, and later in Weigelsdorf. While serving with the Germans, he wore the pseudonyms Rudaev and Musin.
The Soviet side sentenced him to capital punishment back in 1943, but many researchers believe that the sentence was never carried out, since Richter went missing in the last days of the war.
The Vlasov generals were executed by verdict of the Military Collegium of the Supreme Court. Most - in 1946, Budykho - in 1950.
In General's destinies during the Second World War.
During military operations, for one reason or another, military personnel are sometimes captured, so according to archival data from Germany, during all the years of World War II, a total of almost 35 million people were captured; according to researchers, officers from this total number of prisoners amounted to about 3%, and the number of captured military officers with the rank of generals was less, just a few hundred people. However, it is precisely this category of prisoners of war that has always been of particular interest to the intelligence services and various political structures warring parties, therefore most of all experienced ideological pressure and other various forms of moral and psychological influence.
In connection with which the question involuntarily arises, which of the warring parties had greatest number captured senior military officials with the rank of generals, in the Red Army or in the German Wehrmacht?
From various data it is known that during the Second World War, 83 generals of the Red Army were captured in German captivity. Of these, 26 people died for various reasons: shot, killed by camp guards, or died from disease. The rest were deported to the Soviet Union after the Victory. Of these, 32 people were repressed (7 were hanged in the Vlasov case, 17 were shot on the basis of Headquarters order No. 270 of August 16, 1941 “On cases of cowardice and surrender and measures to suppress such actions”) and for “wrong” behavior in captivity 8 generals were sentenced to various terms of imprisonment. The remaining 25 people were acquitted after more than six months of inspection, but then gradually transferred to the reserve (link: http://nvo.ng.ru/history/2004-04-30/5_fatum.html).
The vast majority of Soviet generals were captured in 1941, a total of 63 generals of the Red Army. In 1942, our army suffered a number of defeats. And here, surrounded by the enemy, 16 more generals were captured. In 1943, three more generals were captured and in 1945 - one. In total during the war - 83 people. Of these, 5 are army commanders, 19 corps commanders, 31 division commanders, 4 chiefs of army staff, 9 chiefs of army branches, etc.
In the book of modern researchers of this issue, F. Gushchin and S. Zhebrovsky, it is stated that allegedly about 20 Soviet generals agreed to cooperate with the Nazis; according to other sources, there were only 8 generals who agreed to cooperate with the Germans (http://ru.wikipedia.org /wiki) if this data corresponds to reality, then of these 20 only two generals are known who voluntarily and openly went over to the side of the enemy, this is Vlasov and another of his fellow traitors, the former commander of the 102nd Infantry Division, brigade commander (major general) Ivan Bessonov is the one who in April 1942 proposed to his German masters to create special anti-partisan corps, and that’s it, the names of the traitor generals are not specifically mentioned anywhere.
Thus, the majority of Soviet generals who fell into the hands of the Germans were either wounded or unconscious and subsequently behaved with dignity in captivity. The fate of many of them still remains unknown, just as the fate of Major General Bogdanov, commander of the 48th Rifle Division, Major General Dobrozerdov, who headed the 7th Rifle Corps, is still unknown, the fate of Lieutenant General Ershakov, who in September 1941 took command of the 20th Army, which was soon defeated in the battle of Smolensk.
Smolensk became a truly unlucky city for Soviet generals, where Lieutenant General Lukin commanded at the beginning the 20th Army, and then the 19th Army, which was also defeated there in the battle of Smolensk in October 1941.
The fate of Major General Mishutin is full of secrets and mysteries, an active participant in the battles at Khalkhin Gol, at the beginning of the Great Patriotic War he commanded an infantry division in Belarus, and there he disappeared without a trace during the fighting.
Only at the end of the 80s was an attempt made to pay tribute to generals Ponedelin and Kirillov, who flatly refused to cooperate with the Germans.
The fate of Major General Potapov of the tank forces was interesting; he was one of the five army commanders whom the Germans captured during the war. Potapov distinguished himself in the battles at Khalkhin Gol, where he commanded the Southern Group, and at the beginning of the war he commanded the 5th Army of the Southwestern Front. After his release from captivity, Potapov was awarded the Order of Lenin, and later promoted to the rank of Colonel General. Then, after the war, he was appointed to the post of first deputy commander of the Odessa and Carpathian military districts. His obituary was signed by all representatives of the high command, which included several marshals. The obituary said nothing about his capture and stay in German camps. So it turns out that not everyone was punished for being in captivity.
The last Soviet general (and one of two Air Force generals) captured by the Germans was Aviation Major General Polbin, commander of the 6th Guards Bomber Corps, which supported the activities of the 6th Army, which surrounded Breslau in February 1945. He was wounded, captured and killed, and only then did the Germans establish the identity of this man. His fate was completely typical of everyone who was captured in the last months of the war.(link: http://nvo.ng.ru/history/2004-04-30/5_fatum.html).
What about the captured German generals? How many of them ended up at Stalin's grubs under the protection of NKVD special forces? If, according to various sources, there were from 4.5 to 5.7 million Soviet soldiers and commanders captured by the Germans, and there were almost 4 million Germans and their allies captured in the USSR, a difference of a whole million in favor of the Germans, then For the generals, the picture was different; almost five times more German generals were captured by the Soviets than Soviet ones!
From the research of B.L. Khavkin it is known:
The first captured generals ended up in the GUPVI (Main Directorate for Prisoners of War and Internees (GUPVI) of the NKVD-MVD of the USSR) in the winter of 1942-1943. These were 32 prisoners of Stalingrad led by the commander of the 6th Army, Field Marshal General Friedrich Paulus. In 1944, another 44 generals were captured. 1945 was especially successful for the Red Army, when 300 German generals were captured.
According to information contained in a certificate from the head of the prison department of the Ministry of Internal Affairs
Colonel P.S. Bulanov dated September 28, 1956, in total there were
376 German generals, of which 277 were released from captivity and repatriated to their homeland, 99 died. Among the dead, the official statistics of the GUPVI included those 18 generals who were sentenced to death by the Decree of April 19, 1943 and hanged as war criminals.
The number of captured generals and admirals included the highest ranks of the ground forces, Luftwaffe, navy, SS, police, as well as government officials who received the rank of general for services to the Reich. Among the captured generals, most were representatives of the ground forces, as well as, oddly enough, retirees(link: http://forum.patriotcenter.ru/index.php?PHPSESSID=2blgn1ae4f0tb61r77l0rpgn07&topic=21261.0).
There is practically no information that any of the German generals were captured wounded, shell-shocked, or with weapons in their hands, and surrendered in a civilized manner, with all the attributes of the old Prussian military school. More often than not, Soviet generals burned alive in tanks, died on the battlefield and went missing.
Captured German generals were kept practically in resort conditions, for example, in camp No. 48, founded in June 1943 in the former rest house of the Central Committee of the Railway Workers' Trade Union in the village of Cherntsy, Lezhnevsky district, Ivanovo region, in January 1947 there were 223 captured generals, of which 175 Germans, 35 Hungarians, 8 Austrians, 3 Romanians, 2 Italians. This camp was located in a park in which linden trees grew, there were walking paths, and flowers bloomed in the flower beds in the summer. The zone also had a vegetable garden, occupying about 1 hectare of land, in which the generals worked at will, and vegetables from which were supplied to their table in addition to the existing food standards. Thus, the generals' nutrition was improved. The patients were given an additional ration, which included meat, milk and butter. However, there were also hunger strikes in the camp, the participants of which protested against poor service in the canteen, under-delivery of rationed food, blackouts, etc. There were no attempts to escape from captivity, or attempts to raise any kind of riot or uprising among the German generals.
A completely different picture was observed with the Soviet generals, 6 of them, risking their lives, escaped from the camp in order to continue to fight in the ranks of the partisans, these are Major Generals I. Alekseev, N. Goltsev, S. Ogurtsov, P. Sysoev, P. Tsiryulnikov and brigade commissar I. Tolkachev (link: http://ru.wikipedia.org/wiki). Another 15 Soviet generals were executed by the Nazis for preparing escapes and underground activities.
Much is known about the cooperation of German generals with the Soviet authorities; facts confirm that the generals collaborated with the Soviets very actively and willingly, for example, in February 1944, Generals Seidlitz and Korfes took a personal part in agitation work in German military units surrounded in the area Korsun-Shevchenkovsky. Seidlitz and Korfes even met with Army General Vatutin, with whom a plan of action was agreed upon. 500 thousand copies of Seidlitz’s appeal to the officer corps and soldiers of the encircled group with a call to stop resistance in order to avoid senseless casualties were printed and dropped from airplanes. The German general Seidlitz apparently dreamed of becoming the new liberator of Germany and even asked the Soviet leadership to give him permission to form German national units, but the Russians, like the Germans, did not trust defectors; captured Germans were allowed mainly to engage in propaganda work to disintegrate the enemy troops at the front and nothing more, and Vlasov received the Germans’ go-ahead to actually form ROA troops only in the fall of 1944. right before the start of the catastrophe of the Third Reich, when the Germans no longer had anyone to send to the front line.
Soon in the summer of 1944, immediately after the last attempt on Hitler's life, realizing that the Reich was coming to an end, almost all the generals led by Paulus rushed to cooperate with the Soviet administration. From that moment on, Paulus reconsidered his position in relation to the anti-fascist movement and on August 14 he entered to the Union of German Officers and makes an appeal to the German troops at the front, the appeal was broadcast on the radio, leaflets with its text were thrown into the location of the German troops, apparently this had an impact on many soldiers and officers. Goebbels’ department even had to launch a counter-propaganda campaign to prove that this appeal was a falsification.
War is a cruel test, it does not spare even generals and marshals. A general in the army is a very big power, and with it a very big responsibility. Every military leader has ups and downs, each has his own destiny. One becomes a national Hero forever, and the other disappears into oblivion.
When people talk about Soviet military leaders of the Great Patriotic War, they most often remember Zhukov, Rokossovsky, and Konev. While honoring them, we almost forgot the Soviet generals who made a huge contribution to the victory over Nazi Germany.
1.Arm Commander Remezov is an ordinary Great Russian.
In 1941, the Red Army abandoned city after city. Rare counter-offensives by our troops did not change the oppressive feeling of impending disaster. However, on the 161st day of the war - November 29, 1941, the elite German troops of the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler tank brigade were driven out of the largest southern Russian city of Rostov-on-Don. Stalin telegraphed congratulations to senior officers taking part in this battle, including the commander of the 56th division, Fyodor Remezov. It is known about this man that he was an ordinary Soviet general and called himself not a Russian, but a Great Russian. He was also appointed to the post of commander of the 56th on the personal order of Stalin, who appreciated Fyodor Nikitich’s ability, without losing composure, to conduct a stubborn defense against the advancing Germans, who were significantly superior in strength. For example, his decision, strange at first glance, with the forces of the 188th Cavalry Regiment to attack German armored vehicles in the area of the Koshkin station (near Taganrog) on October 17, 1941, which made it possible to withdraw the cadets of the Rostov Infantry School and parts of the 31st Division from a crushing blow. While the Germans were chasing the light cavalry, running into fiery ambushes, the 56th Army received the necessary respite and was saved from the Leibstandarte-SS Adolf Hitler tanks that broke through the defenses. Subsequently, Remezov’s bloodless fighters, together with soldiers of the 9th Army, liberated Rostov, despite Hitler’s categorical order not to surrender the city. This was the first major victory of the Red Army over the Nazis.
2. Vasily Arkhipov – tamer of the “royal tigers”<к сожалению не нашел фото>.
By the beginning of the war with the Germans, Vasily Arkhipov had successful combat experience with the Finns, as well as the Order of the Red Banner for breaking through the Mannerheim Line and the title of Hero of the Soviet Union for personally destroying four enemy tanks. In general, according to many military men who knew Vasily Sergeevich well, at first glance he accurately assessed the capabilities of German armored vehicles, even if they were new products of the fascist military-industrial complex. Thus, in the battle for the Sandomierz bridgehead in the summer of 1944, his 53rd Tank Brigade met the “Royal Tigers” for the first time. The brigade commander decided to attack the steel monster in his command tank in order to inspire his subordinates by personal example. Using the high maneuverability of his vehicle, he several times walked into the side of the “sluggish and slow beast” and opened fire. Only after the third hit did the “German” burst into flames. Soon his tank crews captured three more “royal tigers”. Twice Hero of the Soviet Union Vasily Arkhipov, about whom his colleagues said “doesn’t drown in water, doesn’t burn in fire,” became a general on April 20, 1945.
3. Rodimtsev: “But pasaran.”
Alexander Rodimtsev in Spain was known as Camarados Pavlito, who fought in 1936-1937 with Franco's Falangists. For the defense of the university city near Madrid, he received the first gold star of a hero of the Soviet Union. During the war against the Nazis, he was known as the general who turned the tide of the Battle of Stalingrad. According to Zhukov, Rodimtsev’s guards are literally last moment struck the Germans who came to the banks of the Volga. Later, recalling these days, Rodimtsev wrote: “On that day, when our division approached the left bank of the Volga, the Nazis took Mamayev Kurgan. They took it because for every one of our fighters there were ten fascists advancing, for every one of our tanks there were ten enemy tanks, for every “Yak” or “Il” that took off there were ten “Messerschmitts” or “Junkers”... the Germans knew how to fight, especially in such numerical and technical superiority." Rodimtsev did not have such forces, but his well-trained soldiers of the 13th Guards Rifle Division, also known as the Airborne Forces formation, fighting in the minority, turned fascist Hoth tanks into scrap metal and killed a significant number of German soldiers of Paulus’s 6th Army in hand-to-hand urban battles . As in Spain, in Stalingrad Rodimtsev repeatedly said: “but pasaran, the Nazis will not pass.”
4. Alexander Gorbatov - enemy of Beria<к сожалению не смог загрузить фото>.
Former non-commissioned officer tsarist army Alexander Gorbatov, who was awarded the rank of major general in December 1941, was one of those who were not afraid to conflict with his superiors. For example, in December 1941, he told his immediate commander Kirill Moskalenko that it was stupid to throw our regiments into a frontal attack on the Germans if there was no objective need for this. He responded harshly to the abuse, declaring that he would not allow himself to be insulted. And this after three years of imprisonment in Kolyma, where he was transferred as an “enemy of the people” under the notorious 58th article. When Stalin was informed about this incident, he grinned and said: “Only the grave will correct the hunchback.” Gorbatov also entered into a dispute with Georgy Zhukov regarding the attack on Orel in the summer of 1943, demanding not to attack from the existing bridgehead, but to cross the Zushi River in another place. At first Zhukov was categorically against it, but, on reflection, he realized that Gorbatov was right. It is known that Lavrenty Beria had a negative attitude towards the general and even considered the stubborn man his personal enemy. Indeed, many did not like Gorbatov’s independent judgments. For example, after carrying out a number of brilliant operations, including the East Prussian one, Alexander Gorbatov unexpectedly spoke out against the assault on Berlin, proposing to begin a siege. He motivated his decision by the fact that the “Krauts” would surrender anyway, but this would save the lives of many of our soldiers who went through the entire war.
5. Mikhail Naumov: lieutenant who became a general.
Finding himself in occupied territory in the summer of 1941, wounded senior lieutenant Mikhail Naumov began his war against the invaders. At first he was a private in the partisan detachment of the Chervony district of the Sumy region (in January 1942), but after fifteen months he was awarded the rank of major general. Thus, he became one of the youngest senior officers, and also had an incredible and one-of-a-kind military career. However, such a high rank corresponded to the size of the partisan unit led by Naumov. This happened after the famous 65-day raid stretching almost 2,400 kilometers across Ukraine to Belarusian Polesie, as a result of which the German rear was pretty bled dry.