Proof of pre-planned Soviet mass rapes in Germany

[David Thompson]

Everyone -- Our readers are looking for sourced information about the topic -- documents or witness accounts showing mass rapes by Soviet forces at the end of WWII resulted from an intentional government plan. Posters who have specific sourced information are invited to provide it. We can do without inflammatory opinions, unsourced general allegations, and commentaries on off-topic matters.

[Yuri]

Well don't you think that the reputation of the Red Army was already in the mud....

Dear Lass!

Are you aware about concrete case with date and place then Red army soldiers committed a mass rape? Can you name even one German village or small town where all woment from 10 to 80 were raped? Well, not all but at least significant number.

Unlike big cities people live in villages or small towns for generations. I believe it is possible to find wittnesses even now.

For example my mother-in-law was born 1930 and as a girl live with her family under occupation in Ukraine (in her big village). No one girl or woman was raped by German or Italian soldiers. However Kalmyks (it is a people of Mongol origin) that wore German military uniforms committed a mass rape (poor girls fled from the village after the war). Btw, the Kalmyks were not punished.

The Lass heard from the girlfriend who heard from the aunt which heard from the neighbour which dreamt about all this …

I shall repeat already once the published document.

ÄÈÐÅÊÒÈÂÀ ÑÒÀÂÊÈ ÂÅÐÕÎÂÍÎÃÎ ÃËÀÂÍÎÊÎÌÀÍÄÎÂÀÍÈß ¹ 11072
ÊÎÌÀÍÄÓÞÙÈÌ ÂÎÉÑÊÀÌÈ 1-ÃÎ È 2-ÃÎ ÁÅËÎÐÓÑÑÊÈÕ È 1-ÃÎ ÓÊÐÀÈÍÑÊÎÃÎ ÔÐÎÍÒÎÂ
Î ÍÅÎÁÕÎÄÈÌÎÑÒÈ ÃÓÌÀÍÍÎÃÎ ÎÒÍÎØÅÍÈß Ê ÍÅÌÅÖÊÎÌÓ ÍÀÑÅËÅÍÈÞ È ÂÎÅÍÍÎÏËÅÍÍÛÌ

20 àïðåëÿ 19145 ã. 20 ÷àñ. 40 ìèí.
Ñòàâêà Âåðõîâíîãî Ãëàâíîêîìàíäîâàíèÿ ïðèêàçûâàåò:
1. Ïîòðåáîâàòü îò âîéñê èçìåíèòü îòíîøåíèå ê íåìöàì êàê ê âîåííîïëåííûì òàê è ãðàæäàíñêîìó íàñåëåíèþ è îáðàùàòüñÿ ñ íåìöàìè ëó÷øå.
Æåñòîêîå îáðàùåíèå ñ íåìöàìè âûçûâàåò ó íèõ áîÿçíü è çàñòàâëÿåò èõ óïîðíî ñîïðîòèâëÿòüñÿ, íå ñäàâàÿñü â ïëåí. Ãðàæäàíñêîå íàñåëåíèå, îïàñàÿñü ìåñòè, îðãàíèçóåòñÿ â áàíäû. Òàêîå ïîëîæåíèå íàì íå âûãîäíî.
Áîëåå ãóìàííîå îòíîøåíèå ê íåìöàì îáëåã÷èò âåäåíèå áîåâûõ äåéñòâèé íà èõ òåððèòîðèè è, íåñîìíåííî, ñíèçèò óïîðñòâî íåìöåâ â îáîðîíå.
2. Â ðàéîíàõ Ãåðìàíèè ê çàïàäó îò ëèíèè óñòüå ð. Îäåð, ð. Îäåð äî Ôþðñòåíáåðãà è äàëåå ð. Íåéñà (çàïàäíàÿ) ñîçäàâàòü íåìåöêóþ àäìèíèñòðàöèþ, à â ãîðîäàõ ñòàâèòü áóðãîìèñòðàìè íåìöåâ.
Ðÿäîâûõ ÷ëåíîâ íàöèîíàë-ñîöèàëèñòè÷åñêîé ïàðòèè, åñëè îíè ëîÿëüíî îòíîñÿòñÿ ê Êðàñíîé Àðìèè, íå òðîãàòü, à çàäåðæèâàòü òîëüêî ëèäåðîâ, åñëè îíè íå óñïåëè óäðàòü.
3. Óëó÷øåíèå îòíîøåíèÿ ê íåìöàì íå äîëæíî ïðèâîäèòü ê ñíèæåíèþ áäèòåëüíîñòè è ê ïàíèáðàòñòâó ñ íåìöàìè
Ñòàâêà Âåðõîâíîãî Ãëàâíîêîìàíäîâàíèÿ
È. Ñòàëèí
À. Àíòîíîâ

(ÖÀÌÎ ÐÔ. ô. 148à, îï. 3763, ä. 212, ë. 13. Ïîäëèííèê)
(ÐÀ 16. ÂÎ 5(4). Òåððà, Ì., 1999)
======================

×ëåíû ÑÒÀÂÊÈ Âåðõîâíîãî Ãëàâíîêîìàíäîâàíèÿ âåñíîé 1945 ãîäà áûëè:

1. ìàðøàë È. Ñòàëèí – Íàðîäíûé êîìèññàð îáîðîíû ÑÑÑÐ – Âåðõîâíûé Ãëàâíîêîìàíäóþùèé
2. ìàðøàë Ã. Æóêîâ – êîìàíäóþùèé âîéñêàìè 1-ãî áåëîðóññêîãî ôðîíòà - çàìåñòèòåëü Âåðõîâíîãî Ãëàâíîêîìàíäóþùåãî
3. ìàðøàë À. Âàñèëåâñêèé – êîìàíäóþùèé âîéñêàìè 3-ãî Áåëîðóññêîãî ôðîíòà
4. ãåíåðàë àðìèè Í. Áóëãàíèí – çàìåñòèòåëü Íàðîäíîãî êîìèññàðà îáîðîíû
5. ãåíåðàë àðìèè À. Àíòîíîâ – íà÷àëüíèê Ãåíåðàëüíîãî øòàáà
6. àäìèðàë Í. Êóçíåöîâ - ãëàâíûé êîìàíäóþùèé Âîåííî-Ìîðñêèì Ôëîòîì

Âîçìîæíî, êîìó-òî áóäåò èíòåðåñíî ïðî÷åñòü òåêñò àðõèâíîãî äîêóìåíòà, èìåþùåãî, êàê ïðåäñòàâëÿåòñÿ, ïðÿìîå îòíîøåíèå ê òåìå.
Ìîè èçâèíåíèÿ, åñëè êòî-òî ðåøèò, ÷òî ýòîò òåêñò â äàííîì ñëó÷àå ëèøíèé.
*************
Probably, someone will be interesting prohonour the text of the archival document having as it is represented, the direct attitude to a theme.
My apologies if someone will solve, that this text in this case superfluous.
/

INSTRUCTION THE STAVKA OF SUPREME COMMANDS #11072.
TO COMMANDERS ARMIES 1-ST AND 2-ND BELARUS AND 1-ST UKRAINE OF FRONTS

ABOUT NECESSITY OF THE HUMANE ATTITUDE TO THE GERMAN POPULATION AND CAPTURED

On April, 20th, 1945........................... 20 hour 40 minutes

The STAVKA of Supreme Commands orders:
1. To demand from armies to change the attitude to Germans as to captured and to civilians and to address with Germans better.
Cruel treatment with Germans causes in them fear and forces them to persistently resist, not surrendering in a captivity. The civilians, being afraid of revenge, will be organized in gangs. Such position to us is not favourable.
More humane attitude to Germans will facilitate conducting operations in their territory and, undoubtedly, will lower persistence of Germans on defense.
2. In areas of Germany to the West from a line a mouth of the river Oder, River Oder up to Furstenberg and further the river of Naas (Neise western) to create German administration, and in cities to put burgomasters of Germans.
Rank-and-file members of a national socialist party if they loyally concern to Red Army to not detain, and to detain only leaders if they had not time to get away.
3. Improvement of the attitude to Germans should not lead to decrease in vigilance and to familiarity with Germans

The STAVKA of Supreme Commands
I. Stalin
A. Antonov

(The central Archive of the Ministry of Defence of the Russian Federation
Fund 148à, the inventory 3763, a file 212, a leaf 13. The original)

The note:

Members STAVKA of Supreme Commands in the spring of 1945 were:

1. marshal I. Stalin - the National Commissioner of defense of the USSR - Supreme Commander in Chief
2. marshal G. Zhukov - commander of armies 1st Belarus front - the assistant to Supreme Commander in Chief
3. marshal A.Vasilevsky - commander of armies 3st Belarus front
4. general N.Bulganin - the assistant to the National Commissioner of defense of the USSR
5. general A.Antonov - the Chief of the General Staff Red Army
6. admiral N. Kuznezov ( Smith ) - main commander of Navy Fleet

/
Yuri

[Kentaurus]

Lots of sources on Red Army mass rapes here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Army_atrocities

[Yuri]

Lots of sources on Red Army mass rapes here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Red_Army_atrocities

You search for a black cat in a dark room whereas this cat there is not present.

Is lie the statement that the Soviet Government and the Supreme Command of Red Army, ostensibly, initiated and encouraged violence concerning the German population. This malicious calumny of the western propagation pursues quite a definite purpose – to excite hatred of Germans to Russian. Guess from an once: - what for and for whom it is necessary?

P. S. quality of the help: recollect, how the American propagation (referring on, ostensibly, incontestable sources) «convincingly proved» that Iraq has the weapon of mass destruction.

[David Thompson]

Yuri -- (1) We don't think much of unsourced opinion posts here:

3. Opinions

Since the purpose of this section of the forum is to exchange information and hold informed discussions about historical problems, posts which express unsolicited opinions without supporting facts and sources do not promote the purposes of the forum. Consequently, such posts are subject to deletion after a warning to the poster.

The same reasoning applies to opinion threads.

H&WC Section Rules
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=53962

Consider this your warning.

(2) We're not impressed by agitprop arguments such as:

Is lie the statement that the Soviet Government and the Supreme Command of Red Army, ostensibly, initiated and encouraged violence concerning the German population. This malicious calumny of the western propagation pursues quite a definite purpose – to excite hatred of Germans to Russian. Guess from an once: - what for and for whom it is necessary?

P. S. quality of the help: recollect, how the American propagation (referring on, ostensibly, incontestable sources) «convincingly proved» that Iraq has the weapon of mass destruction.

either. If you have sourced information on the subject matter, feel free to post. If you don't, wait until you do.

[Andreas]

I do not think anyone in this thread has shown that the rapes (which no doubt did occur in significant numbers), were pre-planned. I think all the available evidence shows that they were in fact not pre-planned, with accounts of officers taking action in Ryan's work on Berlin, and Soviet memoirs talking about the political preparation they got before going into Hungary, i.e. not to see the Hungarians as their enemies, but as a people to be liberated. Yet once there, this preparation went out of the window, as e.g. Ungvary's book on the battle of Budapest shows. Incidentally, I agree that if anything, the Stalin quote indicates further that nothing was pre-planned, but that a callous, medieval approach was taken to the behaviour of the soldiers. So tolerated it was (for a time), but pre-planned, I think not.

From a military point of view, encouraging wide-scale rape and plunder also appears counterproductive to me, due to the corrosive effects it will have on unit cohesion and discipline. I think Beevor's view is similar, and it is telling that the person who started this post quoted quite selectively from the Telegraph article:

Having always in the past slightly pooh-poohed the idea that most men are potential rapists, I had to come to the conclusion that if there is a lack of army discipline, most men with a weapon, dehumanised by living through two or three years of war, do become potential rapists.

Beevor is careful to qualify any suggestion that what happened from 1944 onwards is in any way typical of male behaviour in peacetime. But he admits that he was "shaken to the core" to discover that Russian and Polish women and girls liberated from concentration camps were also violated.

"That completely undermined the notion that the soldiers were using rape as a form of revenge against the Germans," he said.

"By the time the Russians reached Berlin, soldiers were regarding women almost as carnal booty; they felt because they were liberating Europe they could behave as they pleased. That is very frightening, because one starts to realise that civilisation is terribly superficial and the facade can be stripped away in a very short time."

Article in full

All the best

Andreas

[Penn44]

...
Yet once there, this preparation went out of the window, as e.g. Ungvary's book on the battle of Budapest shows. Incidentally, I agree that if anything, the Stalin quote indicates further that nothing was pre-planned, but that a callous, medieval approach was taken to the behaviour of the soldiers. So tolerated it was (for a time), but pre-planned, I think not.

From a military point of view, encouraging wide-scale rape and plunder also appears counterproductive to me, due to the corrosive effects it will have on unit cohesion and discipline. ...
Andreas

I concur, and add that a policy of widespread rape and plunder would greatly complicate the occupation without providing a clear benefit.

Penn44

.

[storebjørn]

I looks to me that it was at best only a half-hearted effort to stop this until the Communists saw it was counter-productive during the occupation.

During the war, this would not have been counterproductive as the Communtis were ethnically cleansing East Preussia for its civilian population. We know rape is an effective weapon to achieve this. (Darfur, Jugoslavia. etc.)

[Andreas]

You are welcome to provide any proof you may have for the allegation. I would however point out that rape is not a more effective method of ethnic cleansing than soldiers going from door to door ordering people to leave. In any case, the removal of the civilian population occured before the occupation by the Red Army in many cases.

All the best

Andreas

[storebjørn]

Two million rapes shouts out that at most there were half-hearted measurses to combat rape. This does not happen where any rapist is shot for example. What was the penalty for rape, and was the rules followed?

I suspect the following:
According to communist lore, the Red Army was filled with heroic socialist troops. The propaganda was massive about the heroics of the red army. Heroic people don't rape, so the issue was suppressed successfully in stead of handeled with determination.

I did not claim the Communists had a plan to rape during the war, altough this was maybe not clear from the last post. All I wanted to say was that the situation during the war and during the occupation was different regarding rapes beeing counter-productive.

Dönitz says at Nuremberg that they evacuated the Ostdeutche because of Jalta and because they feared how the Germans was going to be treated by the Communists. The most effective form of cleansing is getting your enemy to do it himself.

[Kunikov]

Two million rapes shouts out that at most there were half-hearted measurses to combat rape. This does not happen where any rapist is shot for example. What was the penalty for rape, and was the rules followed?

I suspect the following:
According to communist lore, the Red Army was filled with heroic socialist troops. The propaganda was massive about the heroics of the red army. Heroic people don't rape, so the issue was suppressed successfully in stead of handeled with determination.

I did not claim the Communists had a plan to rape during the war, altough this was maybe not clear from the last post. All I wanted to say was that the situation during the war and during the occupation was different regarding rapes beeing counter-productive.

Dönitz says at Nuremberg that they evacuated the Ostdeutche because of Jalta and because they feared how the Germans was going to be treated by the Communists. The most effective form of cleansing is getting your enemy to do it himself.

There is no real source that '2 million rapes' took place, and the German 'evacuation,' at least from the reading I did on it, is in my opinion exaggerated.

[Andreas]

Two million rapes shouts out that at most there were half-hearted measurses to combat rape. This does not happen where any rapist is shot for example. What was the penalty for rape, and was the rules followed?

I think it is quite obvious that whatever the penalty was, it was not applied in the vast majority of cases.

I suspect the following:
According to communist lore, the Red Army was filled with heroic socialist troops. The propaganda was massive about the heroics of the red army. Heroic people don't rape, so the issue was suppressed successfully in stead of handeled with determination.

Again, from the reading I have done so far, it is quite possible that the issue was suppressed in terms of reporting. What it was, in my view, was a breakdown of discipline on an epic scale, in which the dehumanising effects on the mind of four years of a war without mercy, the latter half of it fought over the devastated part of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus that suffered under the occupation, the liberation of Auschwitz, the continuing pointless resistance to the last when all was lost already etc. pp found themselves an outlet in a way that would have been quite familiar to Cromwell.

I did not claim the Communists had a plan to rape during the war, altough this was maybe not clear from the last post. All I wanted to say was that the situation during the war and during the occupation was different regarding rapes beeing counter-productive.

I fully agree - it is interesting to speculate how much the rapes had to do with the reluctance of the newly liberated peoples of Hungary and East Germany to accept their liberators.

Dönitz says at Nuremberg that they evacuated the Ostdeutche because of Jalta and because they feared how the Germans was going to be treated by the Communists. The most effective form of cleansing is getting your enemy to do it himself.

Quite so. I think however that this fear may have been created by the knowledge of how the German occupiers behaved in the Soviet Union, and the expectation that the situation may now become reversed.

All the best

Andreas

[roadkill_]

Against this horrific background, Stalin and his commanders condoned or even justified rape, not only against Germans but also their allies in Hungary, Romania and Croatia. When the Yugoslav Communist Milovan Djilas protested to Stalin, the dictator exploded: "Can't he understand it if a soldier who has crossed thousands of kilometres through blood and fire and death has fun with a woman or takes some trifle?"

And when German Communists warned him that the rapes were turning the population against them, Stalin fumed: "I will not allow anyone to drag the reputation of the Red Army in the mud."

The rape of Germany left a bitter legacy. It contributed to the unpopularity of the East German communist regime and its consequent reliance on the Stasi secret police. The victims themselves were permanently traumatised: women of the wartime generation still refer to the Red Army war memorial in Berlin as "the Tomb of the Unknown Rapist".

Source-

http://ww2battles.com/soviet/russiacrimes.htm

now it is proved that it was nothing but pre-planned orgy led by beria & co the million dollar question is will russia come to term with it and bring to justice those surviving war criminals and compensate the victims or will russia deny and remain in stalinist mold?

The two million dollar question is: How can anyone be so far removed from reality as to consider Stalin's manifested indifference to reports of Red Army atrocities to constitute proof of a "pre-planning" of such atrocities?

Stalin condoned it, encouraged it even, which is just as bad as planning it. Personally i feel a pro Stalin undercurrent here disguised under a "lack of proof" response.

Also, some people pin the holocaust on Hitler based on a few vague rants, but when it comes to Stalin openly condoning mass rape those same people will say, "no, thats not good enough, we need proof that he masterminded it"

[Kunikov]

Stalin condoned it, encouraged it even, which is just as bad as planning it. Personally i feel a pro Stalin undercurrent here disguised under a "lack of proof" response.

Also, some people pin the holocaust on Hitler based on a few vague rants, but when it comes to Stalin openly condoning mass rape those same people will say, "no, thats not good enough, we need proof that he masterminded it"

When did he encourage it? As for condoning it, why were orders going out to the contrary? There is no 'pro Stalin' anything here, we all want the same thing, facts and the truth, as best as we can present it.

[Steen Ammentorp]

@roadkill_
As already stated by host David Thomsen unsourced opinion is not welcomed here, and whether your personal feelings may be on the undercurrent here then it is irrelevant since what counts is documented and sourced posts.

@Sergey Romanov
An off topic remark about roadkill_ was removed - please remain from such comments.

/Steen Ammentorp