German Plans to Seize Food from the Soviet Union

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Roberto
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#46

Post by Roberto » 30 Dec 2002, 23:05

oleg wrote:According to Krivosheev, that number is calculated by adding the number of “KIA, died from wounds, died of illnesses died in accidents, committed suicide, executed by order of the military tribunals” ,which is equal to 6885100, to the number of MIA and captured which is equal to 4559000, and then, subtracting number of people who returned from captivity ( 1836000) and the number of people from the liberated territories who thought to be MIA but then were found and conscribed into the army for the second time (937000).

Oleg,

Do you consider Krivosheev’s figures on POWs to be reliable?

The figure on servicemen who returned from captivity (1,836,000) seems strange to me, as Krivosheev’s own breakdown of returnees by nationality adds up to something like 1,386,000, IIRC, which suggests a transposition error in the higher figure.

As to the rest,
German historian Christian Streit ([i]Keine Kameraden: Die Wehrmacht und die sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen 1941-1945[/i],1997 edition, page 20) wrote:[…]Auch von russischer Seite sind vor kürzerem niedrigere Opferzahlen genannt worden. Eine Kommission von Militärhistorikern unter Generaloberst G.F.Krivosheev beziffert die Zahl der umgekommenen sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen auf 1.283.300. Die Berechnung hält allerdings einer näheren Überprüfung nicht stand. Deutschen Angaben zufolge, so die Studie ohne weiteren Beleg, seien 673.000 Gefangene ums Leben gekommen – eine absurde Behauptung angesichts der Deutlichkeit, mit der sich der millionenfache Tod der Gefangenen in den deutschen Akten niedergeschlagen hat. Die Kommission postuliert einfach, daß die in der deutschen Forschung verwendeten Gesamtzahlen, seien es nun 5,7 oder 5,2 Millionen, reine Propagandazahlen seien. Bei der Berechnung sind weder die deutschen Akten noch die Ergebnisse der deutschen Forschung verwendet worden. Die Zahlen der Kommission sind auch aus einem weiteren Grund unhaltbar: Als “Kriegsgefangene” werden nur die Soldaten der Roten Armee definiert. Die Angehörigen von Sonderformationen ziviler Behörden, der Volkswehr, der Arbeiterbataillone, der Miliz etc. werden ebenso ausgeklammert wie Mobilisierte, die vor der Eingliederung in die Truppe in Gefangenschaft gerieten. Gerade diese Gruppen bildeten aber 1941 einen erheblichen Teil der Gefangenen. Es kann nicht angehen, daß sie, die auf deutscher Seite als Kriegsgefangene gezählt wurden, bei der Berechnung der Gesamtzahl der Opfer ignoriert werden. […]
My translation:
[…]Also from the Russian site lower numbers of victims have been mentioned. A commission of military historians under Colonel-General G.F.Krivosheev puts the number of Soviet prisoners of war who perished at 1,283,300. The calculation does not stand up to closer scrutiny, however. According to German data, the study tells us without providing evidence, 673,000 prisoners lost their lives – an absurd assertion considering how clearly the death of millions of prisoners was recorded in the German files. The commission simply postulates that the total numbers used in German research, be it 5.7 or 5.2 million, were mere propaganda numbers. In the calculation neither the German files nor the results of German research have been taken into consideration. The commission’s numbers are unsustainable also for another reason: they define as prisoners of war only the soldiers of the Red Army. Members of special formations of civilian authorities, people’s defense, workers’ battalions, militia etc. are excluded, as are those mobilized who were taken prisoner before they were integrated into the troops. Especially these groups, however, made up a considerable part of the prisoners in 1941. It cannot be that they, who were counted as prisoners of war on the German side, are ignored when calculating the total number of victims. […]

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Toivo
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#47

Post by Toivo » 30 Dec 2002, 23:15

Thanks for clearing your point of view out Oleg. I could argue on ideological basis but this would go off topic and quite frankly, wouldn't change numbers :wink:
P.S. I was asking more your own personal opinion, not what officials of Soviet Union thought.

Regards


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Oleg Grigoryev
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#48

Post by Oleg Grigoryev » 31 Dec 2002, 01:01

viriato wrote:Oleg thanks for answering my questions, even if only partially. As to your question
Quote:
9-How many were those who were killed during the depopulation of the western territories during the 1941 and 1942 retreat?
Can you elaborate on depopulation? What do you mean exactly by that?
I was thinking on the evacuations that were carried away by the Soviet authorities in the the western territories prior to their occupation by the Germans. I could even further ask you how many persons were indeed evacuated? And how many died as a result of the evacuation, both in transit and after arrival due to disease, lack of good shelter, food or medicine, etc.?

You also stated:
That number is also included in the original figure.
Which original figure?

And:
Don’t know but what 1939-1940 deaths is have to do with 1941-1945?
Just curiousity. It has indeed almost nothing to do with deaths during 1941-1945, except the case of people arrested prior to 1941 but having been killed only thereafter.

And please don't forget to answer my questions 3a), 3b), 3c) and 5 in respect of collaborators. I would appreciate it.


Which original figure?
that would be 26.6 millions of excessive deaths.
I was thinking on the evacuations that were carried away by the Soviet authorities in the the western territories prior to their occupation by the Germans. I could even further ask you how many persons were indeed evacuated? And how many died as a result of the evacuation, both in transit and after arrival due to disease, lack of good shelter, food or medicine, etc.?
. 7 million were evacuated in 1941-1942. Consider the fact that prior to war German occupied territories were home for 75 million people. Case study could be made out of Byelorussia . According to Byelorussians scholars prior to war population of this republic was 9.2 million people. After the war it amounted to 6.2 million. They calculated that during the occupation 2 219 316 Soviet citizens died in Byelorussia – this number includes POWs as well as civilian population. That number does not include however people who were deported to Germany, according to Byelorussian estimates 260000 never came back from there. They believe that all taken into account – it would come to every 3rd Byelorussian being dead as a result of war (not ethnic Byelorussian but rather people who lived on the territory of Byelorussia prior to war)


Just curiousity. It has indeed almost nothing to do with deaths during 1941-1945, except the case of people arrested prior to 1941 but having been killed only thereafter.
In 1936 USSR resettled 64000 ethnic Germans and Poles – mainly in Kazakhstan.
According to decision from February 10th 1940 USSR resettled 140000 people from newly acquired territories – 83% of them were ethnic Poles, 9% Ukrainians, 8% Germans and Byelorussians. According to decision from April 10th 1940 USSR resettled 78000 refugees from territories occupied by German Army – they mostly Jews – 84%. According to June 23 1940 decision 7000 Finns, Balts, Norwegians, Swedes were resettled form Murmansk region to Karelo-Finn ASSR. According to the same decision 1800 men of different ethnicities were moved to Altai region. According to decision from May 14 1941 another 86000 people were moved from newly acquired territories to elsewhere. Number of person executed would fall within number of total executions by NKVD given at 786,098 people. Number who died during resettlements would be inclusive in the 309000 figure given by MVD.


In regards to
a)in Germany due to allied bombing?
b)fighting against the USSR?


a) have no idea you can try to make some extrapolations using Byelorussian example - meaning first subtract 7 million of evacuees out of 75 (68 mil). Now if out 9.2 millions Byelorussians 0.26 mil were lost in Germany then the corresponding number for 68 mil is approximately 1 million 922 thousand people. This is obviously not very precise estimate (very bad rather) but this is the best I could do.
b) How many people died fighting USSR I don’t know since there could be a problem of double counting since on the one hand they could be counted (and probably were) as enemy losses on the other they were included into demographical studies. Both a and b are included in 26.6 million figure (excessive deaths)
c)
c)after their being handed over by the western allies to the USSR?
Well I consider “Vlaosvtsi” case. Out 149000 Vlasovstic that were given 6 years at the “special settlements” , 93446 were released in 1952-1953. As of January 1 1953 - 57000 were still in custody of MVD. Some number was eexecuted that number would be inclusive into 786,098 number (contrary to popular believe collaborationists were not summarily executed upon arrival to USSR). Out of 4200000 people who went through filtration camps 273000 were still in NKVD custody as of March 1st 1946. Out of 4200000 figure 2.352.686 were repatriated to USSR by Western Allies.

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Oleg Grigoryev
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#49

Post by Oleg Grigoryev » 31 Dec 2002, 01:17

Roberto wrote:
oleg wrote:According to Krivosheev, that number is calculated by adding the number of “KIA, died from wounds, died of illnesses died in accidents, committed suicide, executed by order of the military tribunals” ,which is equal to 6885100, to the number of MIA and captured which is equal to 4559000, and then, subtracting number of people who returned from captivity ( 1836000) and the number of people from the liberated territories who thought to be MIA but then were found and conscribed into the army for the second time (937000).

Oleg,

Do you consider Krivosheev’s figures on POWs to be reliable?

The figure on servicemen who returned from captivity (1,836,000) seems strange to me, as Krivosheev’s own breakdown of returnees by nationality adds up to something like 1,386,000, IIRC, which suggests a transposition error in the higher figure.

As to the rest,
German historian Christian Streit ([i]Keine Kameraden: Die Wehrmacht und die sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen 1941-1945[/i],1997 edition, page 20) wrote:[…]Auch von russischer Seite sind vor kürzerem niedrigere Opferzahlen genannt worden. Eine Kommission von Militärhistorikern unter Generaloberst G.F.Krivosheev beziffert die Zahl der umgekommenen sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen auf 1.283.300. Die Berechnung hält allerdings einer näheren Überprüfung nicht stand. Deutschen Angaben zufolge, so die Studie ohne weiteren Beleg, seien 673.000 Gefangene ums Leben gekommen – eine absurde Behauptung angesichts der Deutlichkeit, mit der sich der millionenfache Tod der Gefangenen in den deutschen Akten niedergeschlagen hat. Die Kommission postuliert einfach, daß die in der deutschen Forschung verwendeten Gesamtzahlen, seien es nun 5,7 oder 5,2 Millionen, reine Propagandazahlen seien. Bei der Berechnung sind weder die deutschen Akten noch die Ergebnisse der deutschen Forschung verwendet worden. Die Zahlen der Kommission sind auch aus einem weiteren Grund unhaltbar: Als “Kriegsgefangene” werden nur die Soldaten der Roten Armee definiert. Die Angehörigen von Sonderformationen ziviler Behörden, der Volkswehr, der Arbeiterbataillone, der Miliz etc. werden ebenso ausgeklammert wie Mobilisierte, die vor der Eingliederung in die Truppe in Gefangenschaft gerieten. Gerade diese Gruppen bildeten aber 1941 einen erheblichen Teil der Gefangenen. Es kann nicht angehen, daß sie, die auf deutscher Seite als Kriegsgefangene gezählt wurden, bei der Berechnung der Gesamtzahl der Opfer ignoriert werden. […]
My translation:
[…]Also from the Russian site lower numbers of victims have been mentioned. A commission of military historians under Colonel-General G.F.Krivosheev puts the number of Soviet prisoners of war who perished at 1,283,300. The calculation does not stand up to closer scrutiny, however. According to German data, the study tells us without providing evidence, 673,000 prisoners lost their lives – an absurd assertion considering how clearly the death of millions of prisoners was recorded in the German files. The commission simply postulates that the total numbers used in German research, be it 5.7 or 5.2 million, were mere propaganda numbers. In the calculation neither the German files nor the results of German research have been taken into consideration. The commission’s numbers are unsustainable also for another reason: they define as prisoners of war only the soldiers of the Red Army. Members of special formations of civilian authorities, people’s defense, workers’ battalions, militia etc. are excluded, as are those mobilized who were taken prisoner before they were integrated into the troops. Especially these groups, however, made up a considerable part of the prisoners in 1941. It cannot be that they, who were counted as prisoners of war on the German side, are ignored when calculating the total number of victims. […]
I don't have his book however I do have an access to two of his article one is written in 1998 and another is used in 2000 publication “Who was Who during GPW.” In both instances he operates with 1836000 figure

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Oleg Grigoryev
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#50

Post by Oleg Grigoryev » 31 Dec 2002, 01:25

ErikHolm wrote:Thanks for clearing your point of view out Oleg. I could argue on ideological basis but this would go off topic and quite frankly, wouldn't change numbers :wink:
P.S. I was asking more your own personal opinion, not what officials of Soviet Union thought.

Regards
My personal opinion? Obviously death of innocent people is a tragedy to put it mildly. However if average Russian can understand Estonians etc who thought against both Germans and Soviets for their country independence, they most definitely would not understand those who put SS uniform on.

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#51

Post by Darrin » 05 Jan 2003, 14:01

oleg wrote: Totall detah between 1941-9145 is 37 million not 26. 6. 37 Million does include mortality.

Here's how TOTAL demographic losses were calculated by Goskomstat (State Statistics Committtee) during the Gorbachev period:
USSR population on 22 June 1941 -- 196.7
USSR population on 31 Dec 1945 -- 170.5
Of them, born before 22.06.41 -- 159.5
Total population loss -- 37.2
Children prematurely died during the war -- 1.3
Natural mortality est. from 1940 level -- 11.9
Total EXCESS population loss during the war -- 26.6
Note that this includes emigration. Number of emigrants is estimated at 600,000. Therefore, the official estimated of war deaths is 26 million. However, an American demographer named Maksudov pointed out the unsanctioned emigration of ethnic Poles. Since the number is unknown, and it is also uncertain whether it was taken into account in the original Goskomstat estimates, the number of deaths might be reduced. So, 26 million should be treated as the highest bound, probably around 25 million -- lowest.
Correspondingly, since military casualties are better accounted than civilian, the number of civilian deaths is calculated by subtracting military losses from total losses. The most reliable estimate for now is Krivosheev's, which gives us 8.6 million military demographic casulaties. Therefore, total civilian losses are in the area of 16.4 - 17.4 million. It should be noted that they include losses of partisans, people's militia units, and conscripts who were called up but weren't put on strength in their units before perishing (applies to the first month of the war).
The total civilian losses consist of a combination of civilians directly murdered by the occupiers and civilians who prematurely died due to worsened living conditions (starvation, epidemics) both on the occupied territories and on the homefront.
A post-war commission made the following estimate of the mortality attributed DIRECTLY to the occupiers:
Deliberately exterminated: 7,420,379
Died as slave laborers in Germany: 2,164,313
Died of the harsh conditions of the occupation regime: 4,100,000
Total: 13,684,692
That leaves us with 1.8-2.8 million excess deaths on the homefront, including mass starvation of civilians in Leningrad and other besieged cities.
Sources: Krivosheev, "Rossiia i SSSR v voinakh XX veka"; Harrison, "Accounting for War"

During the afghan war millions of people lived in refugee camps in neighbouring coutries for decads. Afganistan had a tiny % of the rus 1941 pop would have. An est of 600,000 total emigrants sounds low.

Even according to olegs figures the total deaths on the home front not due to germany might add up to 2.8 millin at most. To ALL other causes not just starvation and over 4 years of war. In fact many were conc in isolated areas like lenningrad where the rus prevneted thier own civ pop from leaving. Therby causing some of the starvation themselves. In stalingrad a place the army had a hard enough time supplying itself and a place were the civs were forced to remain. Thier are reports in Beavor of the rus civ pop selling bread to the gers in stalingrad. Doesn´t sound like the civilians were either starving or had horrible relations with the occupier.

Did the ger try to exterminate the jews definatly. Did the gers do horrible thinghs to rus communits certainly. Did the ger do bad things to the rus POWs yes. Did the ger really try to exterminate all russians and slavs definatly not. In fact relativitly few of the civ pop who were not jews communist or slave labours died of any cause.

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#52

Post by viriato » 05 Jan 2003, 17:57

Oleg wrote:
7 million were evacuated in 1941-1942. Consider the fact that prior to war German occupied territories were home for 75 million people.
Are you sure that only 7 million were evacuated? I heard of higher estimates some on the range of 20-25 million. And 7 million is less than 10% of your 75 million. Moreover I thought of many cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv and those on the Donbass, Mensk and Homel to be thinly populated (comparatively) when the German armies entered there.

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Roberto
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#53

Post by Roberto » 06 Jan 2003, 11:26

Darrin wrote:In fact many were conc in isolated areas like lenningrad where the rus prevneted thier own civ pop from leaving. Therby causing some of the starvation themselves.
Why do we keep reading stuff like this?

The Soviets evacuated quite a lot of people from Leningrad, and would have evacuated more but for inadequate organization, belated realization of the danger and difficulties caused by German air attacks.
Harrison E. Salisbury ([i]The 900 Days[/i], pages 242 and following) wrote:[…]Evacuation from Leningrad had been on-again off-again. For the most part it involved children, first sent to the nearby countryside and then re-evacuated to the Urals and other distant areas. To organize the exodus, a special department had been created by the Leningrad Soviet. Up to the eleventh of August it sent out of Leningrad 467,648 persons. But that figure had been largely nullified by the inward flow of refugees from the Baltic states. On August 10 it was decided to send another 400,000 women and children out of the city. The figure was upped to 700,000 only four days later. In reality, nothing like these numbers were evacuated. When the circle closed, 216,000 persons had been processed but not evacuated. The railroads were not able to handle the volume. They were being heavily bombed. For instance, on August 15 105 German bombers attacked the Chudovo railroad station, and on August 18 they damaged the Volkhov River bridge on the Leningrad-Moscow line, tying up traffic.[…]
As to the Russians having caused the starvation themselves, how about having a look at the Führer’s own policies in regard to Leningrad?

The siege of Leningrad was a rather particular kind of siege, the purpose of which was not to force the surrender of an enemy stronghold, but to obliterate a large urban center and to get rid of a population that the conqueror would otherwise have to feed – something which, in accordance with its occupation and exploitation policies, it was not willing to do.

This sinister policy, which turns the implementation of siege warfare against a civilian population into an act of mass murder, becomes apparent from a number of documents shown on the thread

The Siege of Leningrad in German Documents
http://www.thirdreichforum.com/phpBB2/v ... 90772acf50

Of which I will here quote only one:

The Führer’s Decision on Leningrad (Entschluß der Führers über Leningrad), transmitted by the Naval Warfare Command (Seekriegsleitung) to Army Group North on 29.09.1941 (Tagebuch der Seekriegsleitung, quoted in Max Domarus, Hitler Reden und Proklamationen 1932-1945, Volume 4, Page 1755)
Betrifft: Zukunft der Stadt Petersburg
II. Der Führer ist entschlossen, die Stadt Petersburg vom Erdboden verschwinden zu lassen. Es besteht nach der Niederwerfung Sowjetrußlands keinerlei Interesse an dem Fortbestand dieser Großsiedlung. Auch Finnland hat gleicherweise kein Interesse an dem Weiterbestehen der Stadt unmittelbar an seiner neuen Grenze bekundet.
III. Es ist beabsichtigt, die Stadt eng einzuschließen und durch Beschuß mit Artillerie aller Kaliber und laufendem Laufeinsatz dem Erdboden gleichzumachen.
IV. Sich aus der Lage der Stadt ergebende Bitten um Übergabe werden abgeschlagen werden, da das Problem des Verbleibens und der Ernährung der Bevölkerung von uns nicht gelöst werden kann und soll. Ein Interesse an der Erhaltung auch nur eines Teils dieser großstädtischen Bevölkerung besteht in diesem Existenzkrieg unsererseits nicht. Notfalls soll gewaltsame Abschiebung in den östlichen russischen Raum erfolgen.
My translation:
Subject: Future of the City of Petersburg
II. The Führer is determined to remove the city of Petersburg from the face of the earth. After the defeat of Soviet Russia there can be no interest in the continued existence of this large urban area.[my emphasis] Finland has likewise manifested no interest in the maintenance of the city immediately at its new border.
III. It is intended to encircle the city and level it to the ground by means of artillery bombardment using every caliber of weapon, and continual air bombardment.
IV. Requests for surrender resulting from the city’s encirclement will be denied, since the problem of relocating and feeding the population cannot and should not be solved by us. In this war for our very existence, there can be no interest on our part in maintaining even a part of this large urban population.[my emphasis] If necessary forcible removal to the eastern Russian area is to be carried out.


The following quotes are from:

Christian Gerlach, Krieg, Ernährung, Völkermord, Hamburg 1998

[page 10]
Hätte das NS-Regime im Mai 1941 ein plötzliches Ende gefunden, wäre es vor allem durch die Morde an 70 000 Kranken und Behinderten in der sogenannten “Euthanasie”-Aktion, an mehreren zehntausend jüdischen und nichtjüdischen Polen und an vielen tausend Konzentrationslagerinsassen im Deutschen Reich berüchtigt geblieben. Zum Ende des Jahres 1941 was die Zahl der Opfer der deutschen Gewaltpolitik um über drei Millionen Menschen angewachsen (die Gefallenen der Roten Armee nicht gerechnet) – darunter etwa 900 000 Juden, neun Zehntel davon in den besetzten sowjetischen Gebieten, und annähernd zwei Millionen sowjetische Kriegsgefangene. Erst im Laufe des Jahres 1942 wurde dann die jüdische Bevölkerung Europas zum größten Opfer der deutschen Vernichtungspolitik.

[Footnote: Weitere große Opfer hatte bis dahin die deutsche Politik zur angeblichen Partisanenbekämpfung (mindestens 100 000 Menschen, vor allem in Weißrußland, Mittelrußland und Serbien, wurden getötet) sowie die Hungerblockade gegen Leningrad mit Hunderttausenden Toten hervorgerufen]
My translation:
Had the NS-regime suddenly come to an end in May 1941, it would have remained infamous mainly on account of the murder of 70 000 sick and handicapped in the so-called “euthanasia” – action, of several ten thousand Jewish and non-Jewish Poles and of many thousand concentration camp inmates in the German Reich. At the end of the year 1941 the number of victims of German policies of violence had increased by more than three million people (not counting the battle dead of the Red Army) – among them about 900 000 Jews, nine tenths thereof in the occupied Soviet territories, and approximately two million Soviet prisoners of war. [footnote] Only in the course of the year 1942 the Jewish population then became the main victim of German extermination policies.

[Footnote: Further huge number of victims had until then been claimed by the German policy of alleged anti-partisan warfare (at least 100 000 people, mainly in Belorussia, Central Russia and Serbia were killed) and the hunger blockade against Leningrad with hundreds of thousands of dead]
[pages 29 and following]
Beide Konzepte, der Hungerplan und die “Territoriallösung Sowjetunion”, waren utopisch und praktisch nicht zu verwirklichen. Man konnte weder Millionen Menschen einfach zum Verhungern zwingen, Städte und ganze Gebiete absperren [footnote] zumal mit schwachen Sicherungstruppen, noch was die Durchführung einer Deportation so vieler Millionen jüdischer Menschen in dünnbesiedelte, weit entfernte und verkehrstechnisch schlecht erschlossene Gebiete angesichts der voraussehbaren Transportprobleme in der westlichen Sowjetunion technisch durchführbar. In jedem Fall waren beides Nachkriegspläne. Es waren gewissermaßen noch destruktive Visionen, die erst bei ihrem Scheitern zur Suche nach realisierbaren Vernichtungplänen führten.

[Footnote: Gemeint ist hier der Normalfall im Besatzungsgebiet. Die Aushungerung von Leningrad 1941 bis 1943, der mindestens 600 000 Menschen zum Opfer fielen, was eine Ausnahme; die deutsche Belagerung band wesentliche Teile zweier deutscher Armeen]
My translation:
Both concepts, the Hunger Plan and the “Territorial Solution Soviet Union” were utopian and could not be carried out in practice. It was not possible to simply force millions of people to starve to death, seal of cities and whole regions [footnote], especially with the weak security troops, nor was it technically possible to carry out the deportation of so many millions of Jewish people to the thinly populated, far away areas with few transportation facilities. Both were in any case plans for the postwar period. They were in a certain sense mere destructive visions, which only after their failure led to the search for extermination plans that could be implemented.

[Footnote: This refers to the normal case in the occupation area. The starvation of Leningrad, from 1941 to 1943, which claimed at least 600 000 victims, was an exception; the German siege tied down most of two German armies]
Darrin wrote:Did the ger do bad things to the rus POWs yes. Did the ger really try to exterminate all russians and slavs definatly not.
No, they just wanted to decimate them. My translation from Christian Streit, Keine Kameraden. Die Wehrmacht und die sowjetischen Kriegsgefangenen 1941-1945, 1997 edition, pages 188 and 189:
[...]There can be no doubt that it was one [italic are Streit's] of the goals of the NS leadership in the war in the East "to weaken the Russians in such a way that they can no longer overwhelm us with the masses of their people". Hitler and Himmler by no means intended to kill the prisoners of war in their entirety (italics are Streit's) - except for the "undesirables". They knew that one would need them as slave laborers for the "Building of the East" [Aufbau im Osten]. A decimation of the prisoners as well as the civilian population by hunger, however, was seen by them as altogether desirable, given that in their opinion there were "far too many of them anyway".[...]
The Nazi government started a war of aggression and conquest perfectly conscious of what it would or might lead to:
It is a question of existence, thus it will be a racial struggle
of pitiless severity, in the course of which 20 to 30 million Slavs and Jews will perish through military actions and crises of food supply.


Heinrich Himmler, June 1941, as quoted by Christopher Browning,
in Nazi Policy, Jewish Workers, German Killers p. 23.

Source of quote:

http://www.holocaust-history.org/quote.cgi?source50

Protocol of a meeting of the secretaries of state on 2.5.1941
Source: International Military Tribunal, Nuremberg 1948, Volume 31, page 84
[…]1.) Der Krieg ist nur weiterzuführen, wenn die gesamte Wehrmacht im 3. Kriegsjahr aus Rußland ernährt wird.
2.) Hierbei werden zweifellos zig Millionen Menschen verhungern, wenn von uns das für uns Notwendige aus dem Lande herausgeholt wird.
3.) Am wichtigsten ist die Bergung und Abtransport von Ölsaaten, Ölkuchen, dann erst Getreide. Das vorhandene Fett und Fleisch wird voraussichtlich die Truppe verbrauchen.[…]
My translation:
[…]1.) The war can only be continued if the whole Wehrmacht is fed out of Russia in the 3rd war year.
2.) Due to this umpteen million people will doubtlessly starve to death when we take what is necessary for us out of the land.[my emphasis]
3.) Most important is the collection and shipment of oil seeds and oil cake, only thereafter of grain. The available fat and meat will presumably be consumed by the troops.[…]
File note on a meeting about economic policies and organization of the economy in the newly occupied territories with Hermann Göring on 8.11.1941
Bundesarchiv/Militärarchiv, WI ID/1222
[…] Hinsichtlich der Ernährung bemerkte er [Göring], daß die Truppe ihren Bedarf an Konserven wesentlich einschränken müsse. Der Wehrmacht machte er den Vorwurf, dass sich im Gebiet um Minsk in den Wäldern noch grosse Viehherden herumtreiben, die aber wegen der Partisanen nicht geborgen werden können. Einsatz von Truppen sei unbedingt notwendig.
Das Schicksal der Grosstädte insbesondere Leningrads sei ihm völlig schleierhaft. In diesem Kriege werde das grösste Sterben seit dem dreissigjährigen Krieg sein.
Wenn das Getreide nicht abbefördert werden kann, soll dieses zur Schweinezucht verwandt werden. Ab 1943 verlange er eine Höchstausnutzung der Ukraine. Die Versorgung ganz Europas müsse dann sichergestellt sein. […]
My translation:
[…] In regard to food matters he [Göring] remarked that the troops must significantly reduce their consume of conserves. To the Wehrmacht he addressed the reproach that in the area around Minsk there are still huge herds of cattle running around in the woods which cannot be collected due to the partisans. The deployment of troops was absolutely necessary.
The fate of the major cities, especially Leningrad, was completely indifferent to him.[my emphasis] [Translator’s note: the German term “schleierhaft” literally means “veilful” and may also be translated as “unexplainable”. Translating the term as “indifferent” (in the sense of “I don’t know what will happen to them, and I couldn’t care less”) was considered to better fit the context, however] This war would see the greatest dying since the Thirty Years War.[my emphasis]
If the grain could not be shipped off it should be used for raising pigs.[my emphasis] From 1943 onward he required a maximum exploitation of the Ukraine. The food supply of the whole of Europe must then be guaranteed. […]


And so on.
Darrin wrote:In fact relativitly few of the civ pop who were not jews communist or slave labours died of any cause.
Ukrainian cities in the rich black-earth zone under Nazi occupation:
Alexander Werth ([i]Russia at War 1941-1945[/i], 2000 Caroll & Graf Publishers New York, pages 607/608) wrote:

There had been 900.000 people in Kharkov before the war, but when the war spread to Ukraine, and the refugees started pouring in from the west, this figure swelled to 1,200,000 to 1,300,000. Later, in October 1941, with the Germans approaching, the evacuation of Kharkov began in real earnest. Most of the larger plants were more or less successfully evacuated, among them the great Tractor Plant, with nearly all its workers. By the time the Germans came, some 700,000 people had left the city. Now there were only 350,000. What had happened to the rest?
According to the Russian authorities, the disappearance of half the population of October 1941 is accounted for as follows: it has been established that 120,000 people, mostly young people, had been deported as slaves to Germany; some 70,000 or 80,000 had died of hunger, cold and privation, especially during the terrible winter of 1941-2; some 30,000 had been killed by the Germans, among them some 16,000 Jews (men, women and children) who had remained behind in Kharkov; the rest had fled to the villages. Various checks I made in the next days suggested that the figure for deaths from hunger, et cetera, was slightly, but not greatly, exaggerated; so too was the figure for non-Jews shot, but the figure for the Jews was correct. On the other hand, the figure for slave-labor deportations was, if anything, an underestimate.
Richard Overy([i]Russia’s War[/i], Penguin Books 1998, pages 132 and following) wrote: […]The conquest of the Eastern territories was a gigantic colonial war, not a war to emancipate the peoples of Eurasia. Hitler saw the German future in the East in terms of colonial exploitation. A German governing class would rule the region, supported by a network of garrison cities – rather like the fortified towns of the Roman empire – around which would cluster settlements of German farmers and traders. Plans were drawn up for a web of high-speed motorways to link the regional centres with Berlin and a wide-gauge double-checked railway, around which would sweep the new imperial élite through land tilled by modern helots, millions of Slavs laboring for the master race. Any of the new colonial peoples surplus to the requirements of the empire were to be transported to Slavlands beyond the Urals or left to die.[…]
The exact number of Ukrainians who died at the hands of the German occupiers will probably never be known. Death was meted out arbitrarily. Peasants who, when questioned by German officials, admitted to being able to read and write were liable to be shot as ‘intellectuals’. Farmers who withheld food stocks or refused to work in the fields for the Germans were hanged as an example to the rest. In the district of Rivne the German farm administrators introduced flogging for everything from slack work to the failure of peasants to remove their caps in the presence of the Germans; they imposed curfews; the carrying of a knife was punishable by death. Thousands of peasants were hanged or shot for suspected partisan activity. Throughout the Ukraine 250 villages and their populations were deliberately obliterated to encourage good behavior in the rest.
Thousands more died of starvation. The seizure of food supplies to feed the vast German army and its hundreds of thousands of horses left the cities of the conquered regions desperately short of food. In the Ukraine it was decided to eliminate ‘superfluous eaters’, primarily Jews and the populations of the cities. In Kiev the meagre food ration was cut sharply (200 grams of bread per week), roadblocks were set up to prevent food from entering the city and the collective-farm markets supplying the city were suspended. As the supply of food reached famine levels, the peoples of the East were denied effective medical care. In Kharkov around 80,000 died of starvation, in Kiev almost certainly more. […]

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Roberto
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#54

Post by Roberto » 06 Jan 2003, 11:33

Darrin wrote:Thier are reports in Beavor of the rus civ pop selling bread to the gers in stalingrad. Doesn´t sound like the civilians were either starving or had horrible relations with the occupier.
What exactly does Beevor write in this respect? Please help my memory.

From Antony Beevor’s Stalingrad, Part One, Section 4. The following passages were translated from the Portuguese translation of the book. Readers who have the English language original may therefore notice some differences in wording in relation to their text. The passages quoted are related to the German attack on and Soviet counteroffensive before Moscow in late 1941.
[...]Winter came with all force, with snow, icy winds and temperatures under twenty degrees below zero. The motors of German tanks became frozen. At the front lines, the exhausted infantry soldiers dug shelters to protect themselves from both the cold and enemy bombardments. However, the ground had begun to freeze and become so hard that they had to light great fires before commencing to dig. General staff personnel and rear guard troops occupied the houses of the peasants, expelling the Russian civilians into the snow.

[...]

A German officer described how he and his soldiers had been shocked when witnessing the satisfaction of Russian civilians taking the clothes off the dead bodies of their own compatriots. The German soldiers, however, took the clothes and boots of living civilians for their personal use and then left them in the vast icy spaces, where in most cases they ended up dying of cold or hunger. Higher officers complained that their soldiers looked like Russian peasants but showed no sympathy for the victims whom they had robbed their only hope for survival under those conditions. A bullet would have been less cruel.
During the retreat from Moscow, the German soldiers grabbed all heads of cattle and reserves of food that they managed to find, even tearing out the floor planks of living rooms to search for the potatoes that were sometimes stored underneath. The furniture and parts of the houses were used as firewood. Never a population suffered so much, on both sides of the war. On 17 November, Stalin signed an order giving instructions to units of the Red Army - air force, artillery, parachutists and units of partisans - to “destroy and reduce to ashes” any houses and farms in an extension of up to sixty kilometers behind the German front lines so as to deny shelter to the enemy. The fate of Russian women and children was not taken into consideration for a single instant.[...]

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Oleg Grigoryev
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#55

Post by Oleg Grigoryev » 06 Jan 2003, 12:03

viriato wrote:Oleg wrote:
7 million were evacuated in 1941-1942. Consider the fact that prior to war German occupied territories were home for 75 million people.
Are you sure that only 7 million were evacuated? I heard of higher estimates some on the range of 20-25 million. And 7 million is less than 10% of your 75 million. Moreover I thought of many cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv and those on the Donbass, Mensk and Homel to be thinly populated (comparatively) when the German armies entered there.

The 7 million figure sounds reasonable if you consider all factors that went into equation. Railways had to move heavy equipment, personnel who serves it, stocks of raw material that could be salvaged, wounded, families of military personnel etc in one direction , and at the same time move reserves and military material into another, considering tempo of initial German advance and consequent havoc that it caused – you see the idea.
Moreover I thought of many cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv and those on the Donbass, Mensk and Homel to be thinly populated (comparatively) when the German armies entered there.
on what basis did you think that?

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Oleg Grigoryev
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#56

Post by Oleg Grigoryev » 06 Jan 2003, 12:05

An est of 600,000 total emigrants sounds low
- why?

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#57

Post by viriato » 06 Jan 2003, 21:24

Hi Oleg. You asked:
Quote:
Moreover I thought of many cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv and those on the Donbass, Mensk and Homel to be thinly populated (comparatively) when the German armies entered there.

on what basis did you think that?
As you might see in the quote given by Roberto, Kharkiv had lost two thirds of her pre-war population (and not half as stated):
Alexander Werth (Russia at War 1941-1945, 2000 Caroll & Graf Publishers New York, pages 607/608) wrote:


There had been 900.000 people in Kharkov before the war, but when the war spread to Ukraine, and the refugees started pouring in from the west, this figure swelled to 1,200,000 to 1,300,000. Later, in October 1941, with the Germans approaching, the evacuation of Kharkov began in real earnest. Most of the larger plants were more or less successfully evacuated, among them the great Tractor Plant, with nearly all its workers. By the time the Germans came, some 700,000 people had left the city. Now there were only 350,000. What had happened to the rest?
It is a little hard to believe that if a city (and a big one) lost two-thirds of the pre-war population prior to her occupation by the German forces, that only a total of less of 10% were evacuated in the occupied territories.

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#58

Post by viriato » 06 Jan 2003, 21:31

Hi Oleg. You asked:
Quote:
Moreover I thought of many cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv and those on the Donbass, Mensk and Homel to be thinly populated (comparatively) when the German armies entered there.

on what basis did you think that?
As you might see in the quote given by Roberto, Kharkiv had lost two thirds of her pre-war population (and not half as stated):
Alexander Werth (Russia at War 1941-1945, 2000 Caroll & Graf Publishers New York, pages 607/608) wrote:


There had been 900.000 people in Kharkov before the war, but when the war spread to Ukraine, and the refugees started pouring in from the west, this figure swelled to 1,200,000 to 1,300,000. Later, in October 1941, with the Germans approaching, the evacuation of Kharkov began in real earnest. Most of the larger plants were more or less successfully evacuated, among them the great Tractor Plant, with nearly all its workers. By the time the Germans came, some 700,000 people had left the city. Now there were only 350,000. What had happened to the rest?
It is a little hard to believe that if a city (and a big one) lost two-thirds of the pre-war population prior to her occupation by the German forces, that only a total of less of 10% were evacuated in the occupied territories.

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#59

Post by Roberto » 06 Jan 2003, 21:55

viriato wrote:Hi Oleg. You asked:
Quote:
Moreover I thought of many cities like Kyiv, Kharkiv and those on the Donbass, Mensk and Homel to be thinly populated (comparatively) when the German armies entered there.

on what basis did you think that?
As you might see in the quote given by Roberto, Kharkiv had lost two thirds of her pre-war population (and not half as stated):
Alexander Werth (Russia at War 1941-1945, 2000 Caroll & Graf Publishers New York, pages 607/608) wrote:


There had been 900.000 people in Kharkov before the war, but when the war spread to Ukraine, and the refugees started pouring in from the west, this figure swelled to 1,200,000 to 1,300,000. Later, in October 1941, with the Germans approaching, the evacuation of Kharkov began in real earnest. Most of the larger plants were more or less successfully evacuated, among them the great Tractor Plant, with nearly all its workers. By the time the Germans came, some 700,000 people had left the city. Now there were only 350,000. What had happened to the rest?
These data do not necessarily counter Oleg’s statement. We don’t know how many of the 700,000 who left the city were residents of Kharkov and how many were from among the 300,000 to 400,000 refugees who had at first fled into the city. If the 500,000 to 600,000 who remained were mostly residents of Kharkov, the city lost about half its resident population to evacuation.

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#60

Post by viriato » 06 Jan 2003, 23:15

Roberto the quote you have given us speaks of 350 thousand remaining in the city when the Germans came in. Not 500 to 600 thousand. However it is not the difference between the two-thirds and the one-half that is important, but that one between the two-thirds (or even one-half) and the one of less than 10%. Of course I know I'm making a very simple, indeed crude extrapolation. Perhaps cities were evacuated the most, the countryside less so, "eastern" cities (like Kharkiv) more than "western" ones (like Lviv), etc. Thus it would be intersting to know where the evacuees came from. But is that possible? Does Oleg know it?

Anyway what I'm trying to think is, if a city like Kharkiv lost at least half the population to evacuation and the other cities I mentioned too had lost a great number of people to evacuation, and knowing also that the USSR at that time had a good part of her inhabitants living in cities (perhaps not 50% but close) how could we have a mean of less than 10%?

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