About the Nazi program of extermination of entire nations
Alexander Pronin
A truly cannibalistic document of Nazi Germany was the Ost general plan - a plan for the enslavement and destruction of the peoples of the USSR, the Jewish and Slavic population of the conquered territories.
An idea of how the Nazi elite saw the waging of a war of destruction can be gained from Hitler’s speeches to the highest command of the Wehrmacht on January 9, March 17 and March 30, 1941. The Fuhrer stated that a war against the USSR would be “the complete opposite of normal war in the West and Northern Europe,” it provides for “total destruction,” “the destruction of Russia as a state.” Trying to provide an ideological basis for these criminal plans, Hitler announced that the upcoming war against the USSR would be a “struggle of two ideologies” with “the use of brutal violence”, that in this war it would be necessary to defeat not only the Red Army, but also the “control mechanism” of the USSR, “ destroy the commissars and communist intelligentsia,” functionaries and in this way destroy the “worldview bonds” of the Russian people.
On April 28, 1941, Brauchitsch issued a special order “Procedure for the use of security police and SD in formations ground forces" According to it, Wehrmacht soldiers and officers were relieved of responsibility for future crimes in the occupied territory of the USSR. They were ordered to be ruthless, to shoot on the spot without trial or investigation anyone who offered even the slightest resistance or showed sympathy for the partisans.
The citizens were destined for either exile to Siberia without means of subsistence, or the fate of slaves of the Aryan masters. The justification for these goals was the racist views of the Nazi leadership, contempt for the Slavs and other “subhuman” peoples who interfere with ensuring the “existence and reproduction of the superior race” allegedly due to its catastrophic lack of “living space”.
“Racial theory” and “theory of living space” originated in Germany long before the Nazis came to power, but only under them acquired the status of a state ideology that covered large sections of the population.
The war against the USSR was considered by the Nazi elite primarily as a war against the Slavic peoples. In a conversation with the President of the Danzig Senate, H. Rauschning, Hitler explained: “One of the main tasks of German government is to prevent forever by possible means development of the Slavic races. The natural instincts of all living beings tell us not only the need to defeat our enemies, but also to destroy them.” Other leaders of Nazi Germany adhered to a similar attitude, primarily one of Hitler’s closest accomplices, Reichsführer SS G. Himmler, who on October 7, 1939 simultaneously took the post of “Reich Commissioner for Strengthening the German Race.” Hitler instructed him to deal with the issues of “returning” Imperial Germans and Volksdeutsche from other countries and creating new settlements as the German “living space in the East” expanded during the war. Himmler played a leading role in deciding the future that the population should expect in Soviet territory all the way to the Urals after the German victory.
Hitler, who throughout his political career advocated the dismemberment of the USSR, on July 16, at a meeting at his headquarters with the participation of Goering, Rosenberg, Lammers, Bormann and Keitel, defined the tasks of National Socialist policy in Russia: “The main principle is that so that this pie can be divided in the most convenient way, so that we can: firstly, own it, secondly, manage it and, thirdly, exploit it.” At the same meeting, Hitler announced that after the defeat of the USSR, the territory of the Third Reich should be expanded in the east at least to the Urals. He stated: “The entire Baltic region should become a region of the empire, Crimea with the adjacent regions, the Volga regions should become a region of the empire in the same way as the Baku region.”
At a meeting of the Wehrmacht high command held on July 31, 1940, dedicated to preparing an attack on the USSR, Hitler again stated: “Ukraine, Belarus and the Baltic states are for us.” He then intended to transfer the northwestern regions of Russia up to Arkhangelsk to Finland.
On May 25, 1940, Himmler prepared and presented to Hitler his “Some Considerations on the Treatment of the Local Population of the Eastern Regions.” He wrote: “We are extremely interested in under no circumstances uniting the peoples of the eastern regions, but, on the contrary, splitting them into the smallest possible branches and groups.”
A secret document initiated by Himmler called General Plan Ost was presented to him on July 15. The plan provided for the destruction and deportation of 80-85% of the population from Poland, 85% from Lithuania, 65% from Western Ukraine, 75% from Belarus and 50% of residents from Latvia, Estonia and the Czech Republic within 25-30 years.
45 million people lived in the area subject to German colonization. At least 31 million of them who would be declared “undesirable by racial indicators” were supposed to be evicted to Siberia, and immediately after the defeat of the USSR, up to 840 thousand Germans were to be resettled in the liberated territories. Over the next two to three decades, two more waves of settlers were planned, numbering 1.1 and 2.6 million people. In September 1941, Hitler stated that in the Soviet lands, which should become “provinces of the Reich,” it is necessary to carry out a “planned racial policy,” sending there and allocating lands not only to the Germans, but also to “Norwegians related to them by language and blood.” , Swedes, Danes and Dutch." “When settling the Russian space,” he said, “we must provide the imperial peasants with unusually luxurious housing. German institutions should be housed in magnificent buildings - governor's palaces. Around them they will grow everything necessary for the life of the Germans. Around the cities, within a radius of 30-40 km, there will be German villages that are striking in their beauty, connected by the best roads. There will be another world in which Russians will be allowed to live as they please. But on one condition: we will be masters. In the event of a rebellion, all we have to do is drop a couple of bombs on their cities, and the job is done. And once a year we will take a group of Kyrgyz people through the capital of the Reich, so that they become aware of the power and grandeur of its architectural monuments. The eastern spaces will become for us what India was for England.” After the defeat near Moscow, Hitler consoled his interlocutors: “Losses will be restored to a volume many times greater than theirs in the settlements for purebred Germans that I will create in the East... The right to land, according to the eternal law of nature, belongs to the one who conquered it, based on the fact that the old borders are holding back the growth of the population. And the fact that we have children who want to live justifies our claims to the newly conquered eastern territories.” Continuing this thought, Hitler said: “In the East there is iron, coal, wheat, wood. We will build luxurious houses and roads, and those who grow up there will love their homeland and one day, like the Volga Germans, will forever link their destiny with it.”
The Nazis had special plans for the Russian people. One of the developers of the Ost master plan, Dr. E. Vetzel, a referent on racial issues in the Eastern Ministry of Rosenberg, prepared a document for Himmler in which it was stated that “without complete destruction” or weakening by any means “the biological strength of the Russian people” to establish “German domination in Europe” will not succeed.
“This is not only about the defeat of a state centered in Moscow,” he wrote. - Achieving this historical goal would never mean a complete solution to the problem. The point, most likely, is to defeat the Russians as a people, to divide them.”
Hitler's deep hostility towards the Slavs is evidenced by the recordings of his table conversations, which from June 21, 1941 to July 1942 were conducted first by ministerial adviser G. Geim, and then by Dr. G. Picker; as well as notes on the goals and methods of occupation policy on the territory of the USSR, made by the representative of the Eastern Ministry at Hitler’s headquarters, W. Keppen, from September 6 to November 7, 1941. After Hitler’s trip to Ukraine in September 1941, Keppen records conversations at Headquarters: “At An entire block of Kyiv burned down, but quite a large number of people still live in the city. They make a very bad impression, outwardly they resemble proletarians, and therefore their numbers should be reduced by 80-90%. The Fuhrer immediately supported the proposal of the Reichsfuehrer (H. Himmler) to confiscate the ancient Russian monastery located near Kyiv, so that it would not turn into a center for the revival of the Orthodox faith and national spirit.” Both Russians, Ukrainians, and Slavs in general, according to Hitler, belonged to a race unworthy of humane treatment and the expense of education.
After a conversation with Hitler on July 8, 1941, the Chief of the General Staff of the Ground Forces, Colonel General F. Halder, writes in his diary: “The Fuhrer’s decision to raze Moscow and Leningrad to the ground is unshakable in order to completely get rid of the population of these cities, which otherwise we will then forced to feed during the winter. The task of destroying these cities must be carried out by aviation. Tanks should not be used for this. This will be a national disaster that will deprive not only Bolshevism of centers, but also Muscovites (Russians) in general.” Köppen specifies Halder’s conversation with Hitler, dedicated to the destruction of the population of Leningrad, as follows: “The city will only need to be encircled, subjected to artillery fire and starved to death...”.
Assessing the situation at the front, on October 9, Koeppen writes: “The Fuhrer gave an order to prohibit German soldiers from entering the territory of Moscow. The city will be surrounded and wiped off the face of the earth.” The corresponding order was signed on October 7 and confirmed by the main command of the ground forces in the “Instruction on the procedure for the capture of Moscow and the treatment of its population” dated October 12, 1941.
The instructions emphasized that “it would be completely irresponsible to risk one’s life German soldiers to save Russian cities from fires or to feed their population at the expense of Germany.” German troops were ordered to apply similar tactics to all Soviet cities, while it was explained that “the more the population of Soviet cities rushes into internal Russia, the more chaos in Russia will increase and the easier it will be to control and use the occupied eastern regions.” In an entry dated October 17, Koeppen also notes that Hitler made it clear to the generals that after the victory he intended to save only a few Russian cities.
Trying to divide the population of the occupied territories in areas where Soviet power was established only in 1939-1940. (Western Ukraine, Western Belarus, Baltic states), the fascists established close contacts with the nationalists.
To stimulate them, it was decided to allow “ local government" However, the restoration of their own statehood to the peoples of the Baltic states and Belarus was denied. When after the introduction German troops In Lithuania, nationalists, without the sanction of Berlin, created a government headed by Colonel K. Skirpa; the German leadership refused to recognize it, declaring that the issue of forming a government in Vilna would be decided only after victory in the war. Berlin did not allow the idea of restoring statehood in the Baltic republics and Belarus, resolutely rejecting requests from “racially inferior” collaborators to create their own armed forces and other attributes of power. At the same time, the Wehrmacht leadership willingly used them to form volunteer foreign units, which, under the command of German officers, participated in combat operations against partisans and at the front. They also served as burgomasters, village elders, in auxiliary police units, etc.
In the Reichskommissariat “Ukraine”, from which a significant part of the territory was torn away, included in Transnistria and the General Government in Poland, any attempts by nationalists not only to revive statehood, but also to create “Ukrainian self-government in a politically expedient form” were suppressed "
When preparing an attack on the USSR, the Nazi leadership attached paramount importance to the development of plans for using the Soviet economic potential in the interests of ensuring the conquest of world domination. At a meeting with the Wehrmacht command on January 9, 1941, Hitler said that if Germany “gets into its hands the incalculable riches of the vast Russian territories,” then “in the future it will be able to fight against any continents.”
In March 1941, for the exploitation of the occupied territory of the USSR, a paramilitary state-monopoly organization was created in Berlin - the Headquarters of the Economic Management “Vostok”. It was headed by two old associates of Hitler: Deputy G. Goering, Chairman of the Supervisory Board of the Hermann Goering concern, Secretary of State P. Kerner and Head of the Department of War Industry and Armament of the OKW, Lieutenant General G. Thomas. In addition to the “leadership group”, which also dealt with the workforce, the headquarters included groups of industry, agriculture, organization of enterprises and forestry. From the very beginning, it was dominated by representatives of German concerns: Mansfeld, Krupp, Zeiss, Flick, I. G. Farben." On October 15, 1941, excluding the economic commands in the Baltic states and the corresponding specialists in the army, the headquarters numbered about 10, and by the end of the year - 11 thousand people.
The plans of the German leadership for the exploitation of Soviet industry were set out in the “Directives for Management in the Newly Occupied Areas,” which received the name Goering’s “Green Folder” based on the color of the binding.
The directives provided for organizing on the territory of the USSR the extraction and export to Germany of those types of raw materials that were important for the functioning of the German military economy, and for restoring a number of factories for the purpose of repairing Wehrmacht equipment and producing certain types of weapons.
Most of the Soviet enterprises producing civilian products were planned to be destroyed. Goering and representatives of military-industrial concerns showed particular interest in the seizure of Soviet oil-bearing regions. In March 1941, an oil company was founded under the name Continental A.G., the chairmen of which were E. Fischer from the IG Farben concern and K. Blessing, a former director of the Reichsbank.
The general instructions of the Vostok organization dated May 23, 1941 on economic policy in the field of agriculture stated that the purpose of the military campaign against the USSR was “supplying the German armed forces, as well as ensuring long years food supply for the German civilian population." It was planned to realize this goal by “reducing Russia’s own consumption” by cutting off the supply of products from the southern black earth regions to the northern non-black earth zone, including to such industrial centers as Moscow and Leningrad. Those who prepared these instructions were well aware that this would lead to the starvation of millions of Soviet citizens. At one of the meetings of the Vostok headquarters it was said: “If we manage to pump everything we need out of the country, then tens of millions of people will be doomed to starvation.”
Economic inspectorates operating in the operational rear of German troops on the Eastern Front, economic departments in the rear of armies, including technical battalions of specialists in the mining and oil industries, units engaged in the seizure of raw materials, agricultural products and tools of production. Economic teams were created in divisions, economic groups - in field commandant's offices. In the units that exported raw materials and controlled the work of captured enterprises, specialists from German concerns were advisors. To the Commissioner for Scrap Metal, Captain B.-G. Shu and the inspector general for the seizure of raw materials, V. Witting, were ordered to hand over the trophies to the military concerns of Flick and I. G. Farben."
Germany's satellites also counted on rich booty for complicity in aggression.
The ruling elite of Romania, led by dictator I. Antonescu, intended not only to return Bessarabia and Northern Bukovina, which it had to cede to the USSR in the summer of 1940, but also to obtain a significant part of the territory of Ukraine.
In Budapest, for participation in the attack on the USSR, they dreamed of getting the former Eastern Galicia, including the oil-bearing areas in Drohobych, as well as all of Transylvania.
In a keynote speech at a meeting of SS leaders on October 2, 1941, the head of the Main Directorate of Imperial Security, R. Heydrich, stated that after the war, Europe would be divided into a “German great space”, where the German population would live - Germans, Dutch, Flemings, Norwegians, Danes both the Swedes and the “eastern space”, which will become a raw material base for the German state and where the “German upper class” will use the conquered local population as “helots”, that is, slaves. G. Himmler had a different opinion on this matter. He was not satisfied with the policy of Germanization of the population of the occupied territories pursued by Kaiser Germany. He considered it erroneous that the old authorities were trying to force the conquered peoples to renounce only native language, national culture, lead a German way of life and comply with German laws.
In the SS newspaper “Das Schwarze Kor” dated August 20, 1942, in the article “Should we Germanize?”, Himmler wrote: “Our task is not to Germanize the East in the old sense of the word, that is, to instill in the population the German language and German laws , but to ensure that only people of truly German, Germanic blood live in the East.”
The achievement of this goal was served by the mass extermination of civilians and prisoners of war, which occurred from the very beginning of the invasion of German troops into the territory of the USSR. Simultaneously with the Barbarossa plan, the OKH order of April 28, 1941 “Procedure for the use of security police and SD in ground forces formations” came into force. In accordance with this order, the main role in the mass extermination of communists, Komsomol members, deputies of regional, city, district and village councils, Soviet intelligentsia and Jews in the occupied territory was played by four punitive units, the so-called Einsatzgruppen, designated by the letters Latin alphabet A, B, C, D. Einsatzgruppe A was assigned to Army Group North and operated in the Baltic republics (led by SS Brigade-Denführer W. Stahlecker). Einsatzgruppe B in Belarus (headed by the head of the 5th Directorate of the RSHA, SS Gruppenführer A. Nebe) was assigned to Army Group Center. Einsatzgruppe C (Ukraine, chief - SS Brigadeführer O. Rasch, inspector of the Security Police and SD in Königsberg) “served” Army Group South. Einsatzgruppe D, attached to the 2nd Army, operated in the southern part of Ukraine and Crimea. It was commanded by O. Ohlendorf, head of the 3rd Directorate of the RSHA (domestic security service) and at the same time the chief manager of the Imperial Trade Group. In addition, in the operational rear of the German formations advancing on Moscow, the punitive team “Moscow”, led by SS Brigadefuehrer F.-A., operated. Zix, head of the 7th Directorate of the RSHA (worldview research and its use). Each Einsatzgruppen consisted of 800 to 1,200 personnel (SS, SD, criminal police, Gestapo and order police) under the jurisdiction of the SS. Following on the heels of the advancing German troops, by mid-November 1941, the Einsatzgroups of armies “North”, “Center” and “South” exterminated more than 300 thousand civilians in the Baltic states, Belarus and Ukraine. They were engaged in mass murders and robbery until the end of 1942. According to the most conservative estimates, they accounted for over a million victims. Then the Einsatzgruppen were formally liquidated, becoming part of the rear forces.
In development of the “Order on Commissars”, the Wehrmacht High Command entered into an agreement on July 16, 1941 with the Main Directorate of Reich Security, according to which special teams of the Security Police and SD under the auspices of the head of the 4th Main Directorate of the Secret State Police (Gestapo) G Müller were obliged to identify politically and racially “unacceptable” “elements” among Soviet prisoners of war delivered from the front to stationary camps.
Not only party workers of all ranks, but also “all representatives of the intelligentsia, all fanatical communists and all Jews” were considered “unacceptable.”
It was emphasized that the use of weapons against Soviet prisoners of war is considered “as a rule, legal.” Such a phrase meant official permission to kill. In May 1942, the OKW was forced to cancel this order at the request of some high-ranking front-line soldiers, who reported that the publication of the facts of the execution of the lieutenants led to a sharp increase in the strength of resistance from the Red Army. From now on, political instructors began to be destroyed not immediately after captivity, but in the Mauthausen concentration camp.
After the defeat of the USSR, it was planned “within the shortest possible time” to create and populate three imperial districts: the Ingria district (Leningrad, Pskov and Novgorod region), Gothic district (Crimea and Kherson region) and Memel-Narev district (Bialystok region and Western Lithuania). To ensure connections between Germany and the Ingermanland and Gotha districts, it was planned to build two highways, each with a length of up to 2 thousand km. One would reach Leningrad, the other would reach Crimean peninsula. To secure the highways, it was planned to create 36 paramilitary German settlements (strong points) along them: 14 in Poland, 8 in Ukraine and 14 in the Baltic states. It was proposed to declare the entire territory in the East that would be captured by the Wehrmach as state property, transferring power over it to the SS administrative apparatus headed by Himmler, who would personally resolve issues related to granting German settlers the rights to own land. According to Nazi scientists, it would have taken 25 years and up to 66.6 billion Reichsmarks to build highways, accommodate 4.85 million Germans in three districts and settle them down.
Having approved this project in principle, Himmler demanded that it provide for the “total Germanization of Estonia, Latvia and the General Government”: their settlement by Germans within about 20 years. In September 1942, when German troops reached Stalingrad and the foothills of the Caucasus, at a meeting with SS commanders in Zhitomir, Himmler announced that the network of German strongholds (military settlements) would be expanded to the Don and Volga.
The second “General Plan of Settlement”, taking into account Himmler’s wishes to finalize the April version, was ready on December 23, 1942. The main directions of colonization in it were named northern (East Prussia - Baltic countries) and southern (Krakow - Lviv - Black Sea region). It was assumed that the territory of German settlements would be 700 thousand square meters. km, of which 350 thousand are arable lands (the entire territory of the Reich in 1938 was less than 600 thousand sq. km).
The “General Plan Ost” provided for the physical extermination of the entire Jewish population of Europe, the mass murder of Poles, Czechs, Slovaks, Bulgarians, Hungarians, and the physical extermination of 25-30 million Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians.
L. Bezymensky, calling the Ost plan a “cannibal document”, “a plan for the liquidation of the Slavs in Russia,” argued: “One should not be deceived by the term “eviction”: this was a familiar designation for the Nazis for killing people.”
“The General Plan Ost” belongs to history - the history of the forced relocation of individuals and entire nations,” said the report of the modern German researcher Dietrich Achholz at a joint meeting of the Rosa Luxemburg Foundation and the Christian Peace Conference “Munich Agreements - General Plan Ost - Benes Decrees. Causes of flight and forced relocation in Eastern Europe” in Berlin on May 15, 2004 - This story is as old as the history of humanity itself. But Plan Ost opened up a new dimension of fear. It represented a carefully planned genocide of races and peoples, and this in the industrialized era of the mid-20th century!” We are not talking here about the struggle for pastures and hunting grounds, for livestock and women, as in ancient times. The Ost master plan, under the guise of a misanthropic, atavistic racial ideology, was about profits for big capital, fertile lands for large landowners, wealthy peasants and generals, and profits for countless petty Nazi criminals and hangers-on. “The murderers themselves, who, as part of the SS task forces, in countless units of the Wehrmacht and in key positions of the occupation bureaucracy, brought death and fires to the occupied territories, only a small part of them were punished for their actions,” stated D. Achholz. “Tens of thousands of them “dissolved” and could some time later, after the war, lead a “normal” life in West Germany or somewhere else, for the most part avoiding persecution or at least censure.”
As an example, the researcher cited the fate of the leading SS scientist and expert Himmler, who developed the most important versions of the Ost master plan.” He stood out among those dozens, even hundreds of scientists - Earth researchers of various specializations, specialists in territorial and demographic planners, racial ideologists and eugenics specialists, ethnologists and anthropologists, biologists and doctors, economists and historians - who supplied data to the killers of entire nations for their bloody work. “It was this “master plan Ost” of May 28, 1942 that was one of the high-quality products of such killers at their desks,” the speaker notes. It really was, as the Czech historian Miroslav Karni wrote, a plan “in which scholarship and advanced technical techniques were invested scientific work, the ingenuity and vanity of the leading scientists of Nazi Germany,” a plan “that transformed the criminal phantasmagoria of Hitler and Himmler into a fully developed system, thought out to the smallest detail, calculated to the last mark.”
The author responsible for this plan, full professor and head of the Institute of Agronomy and Agricultural Policy at the University of Berlin, Konrad Meyer, called Meyer-Hetling, was an exemplary example of such a scientist. Himmler made him head of the "main staff service for planning and land holdings" in his "Imperial Commissariat for the Strengthening of the Spirit of the German Nation" and first as a Standarten and later as an SS Oberführer (corresponding to the rank of colonel). In addition, as a leading land planner in the Reich Ministry of Food and Agriculture, who was recognized by the Reichsfuehrer of Agriculture and the Ministry of the Occupied Eastern Regions, in 1942 Meyer was promoted to the position of chief planner for the development of all areas subject to Germany.
From the beginning of the war, Meyer knew in every detail about all the planned abominations; Moreover, he himself drew up decisive conclusions and plans for this. In the annexed Polish regions, as he officially announced already in 1940, it was assumed “that the entire Jewish population of this region, numbering 560 thousand people, had already been evacuated and, accordingly, would leave the region during this winter” (that is, they would be imprisoned in concentration camps, where will undergo systematic destruction).
In order to populate the annexed areas with at least 4.5 million Germans (until now 1.1 million people had permanently lived there), it was necessary to “expel 3.4 million Poles train by train.”
Meyer died peacefully in 1973 at the age of 72 as a retired West German professor. The scandal surrounding this Nazi killer began after the war with his participation in Nuremberg trials over war criminals. He was indicted along with other SS ranks in the case of the so-called General Office for Race and Resettlement, sentenced by a United States court to a minor punishment only for membership in the SS and released in 1948. Although in the verdict the American judges agreed that he, as a senior SS officer and a person who worked closely with Himmler, should have “known” about the criminal activities of the SS, they confirmed that there was “nothing aggravating” for him under the “Ost General Plan” it cannot be argued that he “knew nothing about evacuations and other radical measures”, and that this plan “was never put into practice” anyway. “The prosecution representative really could not present irrefutable evidence, since the sources, especially the “master plan” from 1942, have not yet been discovered, D. Achholz notes bitterly.
And the court even then made decisions in the spirit of the Cold War, which meant the release of “honest” Nazi criminals and potential future allies, and did not think at all about attracting Polish and Soviet experts as witnesses.”
As for the extent to which the Ost master plan was implemented or not, the example of Belarus clearly demonstrates. The Extraordinary State Commission to reveal the crimes of the invaders determined that only the direct losses of this republic during the war years amounted to 75 billion rubles. in 1941 prices. The most painful and severe loss for Belarus was the extermination of over 2.2 million people. Hundreds of villages and hamlets were deserted, and the urban population sharply decreased. In Minsk at the time of liberation, less than 40% of the population remained, in the Mogilev region - only 35% of the urban population, Polesie - 29, Vitebsk - 27, Gomel - 18%. The occupiers burned and destroyed 209 of 270 cities and regional centers, 9,200 villages and hamlets. 100,465 enterprises were destroyed, more than 6 thousand km railway, 10 thousand collective farms, 92 state farms and MTS were plundered, 420,996 houses of collective farmers and almost all power plants were destroyed. 90% of the machine tools and technical equipment, about 96% of energy capacity, about 18.5 thousand vehicles, more than 9 thousand tractors and tractors, thousands of cubic meters of wood, lumber, hundreds of hectares of forests, gardens, etc. were cut down. By the summer of 1944, only 39% of the pre-war number of horses remained in Belarus, 31% of large cattle, 11% pigs, 22% sheep and goats. The enemy destroyed thousands of educational, health, scientific and cultural institutions, including 8825 schools, the Academy of Sciences of the BSSR, 219 libraries, 5425 museums, theaters and clubs, 2187 hospitals and outpatient clinics, 2651 children's institutions.
Thus, the cannibalistic plan for the extermination of millions of people, the destruction of the entire material and spiritual potential of the conquered Slavic states, which in fact was the Ost master plan, was carried out by the Nazis consistently and persistently. And all the more majestic, grandiose is the immortal feat of the soldiers and commanders of the Red Army, partisans and underground fighters, who did not spare their lives to rid Europe and the world of the brown plague.
Plan Ost is a fairly extensive topic for discussion and an entire book could easily be written about it, which we will not do now. In this article we will look at the Ost plan briefly and to the point. And let's start, probably, with the definition of this term.
Plan Ost or General Plan Ost (this term is also found) is a very extensive policy of world domination by the Third Reich of Nazi Germany in Eastern Europe.
One of the main goals of the Germans during the Ost plan was the full-scale eviction of the population of Poland (approximately 85%) and the settlement of these territories with Germans.
This plan was to be fully realized within thirty long years. The development of this project was carried out by the famous political and military figure of the Reich, Heinrich Himmler. In addition to him, it should also be noted such a person as Erhard Wetzel, because he was one of the main authors of this plan.
The idea called the Ost plan most likely appeared back in 1940 and its initiator was the same Himmler.
Himmler decided to implement his plan immediately after the imminent victory over the USSR, but the turning point in the Great Patriotic War completely abandoned the implementation of this project; in 1943 it was completely abandoned, since the Reich had to find a way to regain its advantage in the war.
Contents of the Ost plan
“Remarks and Proposals on the General Plan Ost” is the main document that can tell all the goals of the Nazis regarding the settlement of Eastern Europe.
In total, this document is divided into four large sections, which should be discussed in detail.
The issue of resettlement of Germans is discussed in the first section. According to the plan, they were supposed to occupy the eastern territories. At the same time, representatives of the Slavic peoples were also supposed to remain in these territories, but their number should not exceed 14 million people - these are small numbers, approximately 15% of the total population of those territories. In addition, this section states that all Jews living in these territories, and this is at least 6 million people, must be completely liquidated - that is, they all had to be killed without any exceptions.
The second question does not deserve special attention, but with the third the situation is different. It discussed the most pressing issue - the Polish one, because the Nazis believed that the Poles were the most hostile ethnic group towards the Germans and their issue needed to be resolved radically.
The author of the document says that it is impossible to kill all the Poles, this would completely undermine the trust of other peoples in the Germans, which the Germans did not want at all. Instead, they decided to resettle almost all the Germans somewhere. It was planned to deport them to the territory of South America, namely to the territory of modern Brazil.
In addition to the Poles, the future fate of Ukrainians and Belarusians was considered here. It was also not planned to kill these peoples. Approximately 65% of all Ukrainians were to be deported to Siberia, 75% of Belarusians were to follow the Ukrainians. It also says about the Czechs: 50% are to be deported and 50% should be Germanized.
The fourth section discusses the fate of the Russian people. The fourth section is one of the most important, since the Germans considered the Russian people to be one of the most problematic in the East, of course, after the Jews.
The Germans understood that the Russian people were extremely dangerous for them, they identified this in their biology, but they simply did not have the opportunity to destroy them completely. As a result, they wanted to find a way to somehow control the Russian population in the East. They developed a system that would reduce the birth rate among the Russian people.
In this section, the author also says that Siberians - the inhabitants of Siberia - are a separate people from the Russians.
Exists interesting fact, many historians believe that the word “eviction” cannot be interpreted directly, since the Germans considered this word to be the complete liquidation of those percentages of the population that were designated in the document.
In total, approximately 6.5 million ethnic Germans were supposed to move to the East, who were supposed to look after the remaining Slavic population (14 million). This was a document from 1941, but already in 1942 it was decided to double the number of immigrants - almost 13 million Germans.
Among this large number of Germans, about 20-30% should have been people engaged in agriculture, which would provide the entire German people with the necessary amount of food.
It is interesting that there was never a final version of the Ost plan, there were only a few projects, and even those were constantly rewritten and changed. The Germans planned to spend huge sums on the implementation of all these processes - more than 100 billion marks.
As a conclusion, it should be said that although the Ost plan was not implemented, which saved the lives of millions of people, many still died. Approximately 6 or 7 million people were killed during the German occupation of Eastern Europe. Moreover, of these 6-7 million civilians, the majority, which is quite understandable, of those killed were representatives of the Jewish ethnic group.
The very last document of the Ost plan was published in 2009 and anyone, having found the necessary scientific literature, can familiarize themselves with its full content and, so to speak, plunge into the monstrous plans of the leadership of the Third Reich regarding the population of Eastern Europe.
Maxim Khrustalev
Master plan "Ost"
“We must kill from 3 to 4 million Russians a year...”
From A. Hitler’s directive to A. Rosenberg on the implementation of the Ost General Plan (July 23, 1942):
“The Slavs must work for us, and if we no longer need them, let them die. Vaccinations and health protection are unnecessary for them. Slavic fertility is undesirable... education is dangerous. It is enough if they can count to one hundred... Each educated person– this is our future enemy. All sentimental objections should be abandoned. We must rule this people with iron determination... Military speaking, we must kill three to four million Russians a year.”
Many have probably heard about the “General Plan Ost”, according to which the Nazis were going to “develop” the lands they had conquered in the East. However, this document was kept secret by the top leadership of the Third Reich, and many of its components and applications were destroyed at the end of the war. And only now, in December 2009, this ominous document was finally published. Only a six-page excerpt from this plan appeared at the Nuremberg trials. It is known in the historical and scientific community as “Comments and proposals of the Eastern Ministry on the “General Plan ‘Ost’.”
As was established at the Nuremberg trials, these “comments and proposals” were drawn up on April 27, 1942 by E. Wetzel, an employee of the Ministry of Eastern Territories, after familiarizing himself with the draft plan prepared by the RSHA. As a matter of fact, it was on this document that until very recently all research on Nazi plans for the enslavement of the “eastern territories” was based.
On the other hand, some revisionists could argue that this document was just a draft drawn up by a minor official in one of the ministries, and it had nothing to do with real politics. However, at the end of the 80s, the final text of the Ost plan, approved by Hitler, was found in the federal archives, and individual documents from there were presented at an exhibition in 1991. However, it was only in November-December 2009 that the “General Plan “Ost” - the foundations of the legal, economic and territorial structure of the East” was fully digitized and published. This is reported on the Foundation’s website “ Historical memory».
As a matter of fact, the German government’s plan to “liberate living space” for Germans and other “German peoples,” which provided for the “Germanization” of the East and mass ethnic cleansing of the local population, did not arise spontaneously, and not on empty space. The first developments in this direction were German science community It began under Kaiser Wilhelm II, when no one had heard of National Socialism, and Hitler himself was just a skinny rural boy. As a group of German historians (Isabelle Heinemann, Willy Oberkrome, Sabine Schleiermacher, Patrick Wagner) clarifies in the study “Science, planning, expulsion: the “Ost” General Plan of the National Socialists”:
“Since 1900, racial anthropology and eugenics, or racial hygiene, can be spoken of as a specific direction in the development of science at the national and international levels. Under National Socialism, these sciences achieved the position of leading disciplines, providing the regime with methods and principles to justify racial policies. There was no precise and uniform definition of "race". Conducted racial studies raised the question of the relationship between “race” and “living space”.
At the same time, “the political culture of Germany already in the Kaiser’s empire was open to thinking in nationalist concepts. The rapid dynamics of modernization at the beginning of the twentieth century. greatly changed the way of life, daily habits and values and raised concerns about the “degeneration” of the “German essence”. “Salvation” from this irritating experience of a turning point lay, it seemed, in a re-awareness of the “eternal” values of the peasant “nationality.” However, the way in which German society intended to return to these “eternal peasant values” was chosen in a very peculiar way - the seizure of land from other peoples, mainly to the East of Germany.
Already in the First world war, after the capture of Western lands by German troops Russian Empire, the occupation authorities began to think about a new state and ethnic order for these lands. In the discussion about the goals of the war, these expectations were concretized. For example, the liberal historian Meinecke said: “Couldn’t Courland also... be useful to us as a land for peasant colonization if the Latvians are expelled to Russia? Previously this would have been considered fantastic, but it is not so impracticable.”
The not so liberal General Rohrbach put it more simply: “The land conquered by the German sword must serve exclusively the benefit of the German people. The rest can roll away." These were the plans for creating a new “national soil” in the East at the beginning of the twentieth century.
Around the same years, German scientists began to argue that “ appearance, spiritual, psychological and cultural values “allow us to conclude about the superiority of the Nordic race. Therefore, it is necessary to put an end to the mixing of races in order to prevent degeneration.” So all that remained for Hitler was to collect these “scientific ingredients”, synthesize both the “racial theory” and the idea of a new “living space”. Which is basically what he did in his book Mein Kampf in 1925. But it was just a journalistic brochure. The actual military conquests of vast territories populated by tens of millions of people prompted the Nazi leadership to approach the issue with truly German methodicality. This is how the “General Plan “Ost”” was created.
The mentioned group of German researchers reports that “in June 1942, agronomist Konrad Mayer handed over a memo to SS Reichsführer G. Himmler. This document became known as the “General Plan “Ost””. He personified the criminal nature of National Socialist policy and the unscrupulousness of the experts who participated in it. The “General Plan Ost” provided for the settlement of 5 million Germans in annexed Poland and in the occupied Western lands Soviet Union. Millions of Slavic and Jewish inhabitants were to be enslaved, expelled or exterminated. The scope of the “General Plan Ost” is indicated by this map, made in 1993 by Karl Heinz Roth and Klaus Carstens based on studied documents.
At the same time, the Historical Memory Foundation “insists that the plan was developed in 1941 by the Main Directorate of Reich Security. And, accordingly, it was presented on May 28, 1942 by an employee of the Office of the Headquarters of the Reich Commissioner for the Consolidation of the German People, SS Oberführer Meyer-Hetling under the title “General Plan “Ost” - the foundations of the legal, economic and territorial structure of the East.”
However, this contradiction is apparent, since the German authors clarify that “in the period between 1940 and 1943. Himmler ordered the development of a total of five options for the violent reconstruction of Eastern Europe. Taken together, they formed a comprehensive plan called the “General Plan “Ost””. Four options came from the office of the Reich Commissioner for the Strengthening of German Statehood (RKF), and one from the National Security Main Office (RSHA).
These departments had some “stylistic” differences in their approaches to this issue. As the German authors admit, “according to the RSHA plans of November 1941, 31 million people of the “foreign population” were to be deported to the East or killed. For 14 million “foreigners,” a future as slaves was planned.
Konrad Meyer’s “General Plan Ost” of June 1942 placed emphasis differently: the local population should now not be forcibly deported, but “relocated” within the occupied regions to collective farm lands. But this plan also provided for a decrease in population as a result of large-scale forced labor and the forced “liquidation of cities” (Entstädterung). In the future, it was a question of exterminating the vast majority of the population or dooming them to starvation.”
However, the Ost plan was preceded by the Rosenberg plan. This was a project developed by the Reich Ministry for Occupied Territories, headed by Alfred Rosenberg. On May 9, 1941, Rosenberg presented the Fuhrer with draft directives on policy issues in the territories that were to be occupied as a result of aggression against the USSR. Rosenberg proposed creating five governorates on the territory of the USSR. Hitler opposed the autonomy of Ukraine and replaced the term “governorate” with “Reichskommissariat”. As a result, Rosenberg’s ideas took the following forms of implementation.
The first, the Reichskommissariat Ostland, was to include Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania. "Ostland", where, according to Rosenberg, a population with "Aryan" blood lived, was subject to complete Germanization within two generations.
The second governorate - Reichskommissariat "Ukraine" - included Eastern Galicia (known in fascist terminology as "District Galicia"), Crimea, a number of territories along the Don and Volga, as well as the lands of the abolished Soviet Autonomous Republic of Volga Germans.
The third governorate was called the Reichskommissariat "Caucasus", and separated Russia from the Black Sea.
Fourth – Russia to the Urals.
The fifth governorate was to be Turkestan.
However, this plan seemed “half-hearted” to Hitler, and he demanded more radical solutions. In the context of German military successes, it was replaced by the “General Plan Ost”, which generally suited Hitler. According to this plan, the Nazis wanted to resettle 10 million Germans to the “eastern lands”, and from there deport 30 million people to Siberia, and not only Russians. Many of those who glorify Hitler's collaborators as freedom fighters would also be subject to deportation if Hitler had won. It was planned to evict 85% of Lithuanians, 75% of Belarusians, 65% Western Ukrainians, 75% of the inhabitants of the rest of Ukraine, 50% each of Latvians and Estonians.
By the way, about Crimean Tatars, about which our liberal intelligentsia loved to lament so much, and whose leaders continue to pump up the rights to this day. In the event of a German victory, which most of their ancestors served so faithfully, they would still have to be deported from Crimea. Crimea was to become a “purely Aryan” territory called Gotengau. The Fuhrer wanted to resettle his beloved Tyroleans there.
The plans of Hitler and his associates, as is well known, thanks to the courage and colossal sacrifices of the Soviet people, failed. However, it is worth reading the following paragraphs of the above-mentioned “comments” to the Ost plan - and see that some of its “creative heritage” continues to be implemented, moreover, without any participation of the Nazis.
“In order to avoid an increase in population that is undesirable for us in the eastern regions... we must consciously pursue a policy to reduce the population. By means of propaganda, especially through the press, radio, cinema, leaflets, short brochures, reports, etc., we must constantly instill in the population the idea that it is harmful to have many children. It is necessary to show how much money it costs to raise children, and what could be purchased with these funds. It is necessary to talk about the great danger to a woman’s health that she is exposed to when giving birth to children, etc. Along with this, the broadest propaganda of contraceptives should be launched. It is necessary to establish widespread production of these products. The distribution of these drugs and abortions should not be restricted in any way. Every effort should be made to expand the network of abortion clinics... The better the quality of abortions performed, the more confidence the population will have in them. It is clear that doctors must also be authorized to perform abortions. And this should not be considered a violation of medical ethics..."
It is very reminiscent of what began to happen in our country with the beginning of “market reforms”.
Source – “Advisor” – a guide to good books.
The art of war is a science in which nothing succeeds except what has been calculated and thought out.
Napoleon
Plan Barbarossa - a plan for a German attack on the USSR, based on the principle lightning war, blitzkrieg. The plan began to be developed in the summer of 1940, and on December 18, 1940, Hitler approved a plan according to which the war was to end in November 1941 at the latest.
Plan Barbarossa was named after Frederick Barbarossa, the 12th century emperor who became famous for his campaigns of conquest. This contained elements of symbolism, to which Hitler himself and his entourage paid so much attention. The plan received its name on January 31, 1941.
Number of troops to implement the plan
Germany was preparing 190 divisions to fight the war and 24 divisions as reserves. 19 tank and 14 motorized divisions were allocated for the war. The total number of troops that Germany sent to the USSR, according to various estimates, ranges from 5 to 5.5 million people.
The apparent superiority in USSR technology is not worth taking into account, since by the beginning of the wars, Germany's technical tanks and aircraft were superior to those of the Soviet Union, and the army itself was much more trained. Suffice it to recall the Soviet-Finnish war of 1939-1940, where the Red Army demonstrated weakness in literally everything.
Direction of the main attack
Barbarossa's plan determined 3 main directions for attack:
- Army Group "South". A blow to Moldova, Ukraine, Crimea and access to the Caucasus. Further movement to the line Astrakhan - Stalingrad (Volgograd).
- Army Group "Center". Line "Minsk - Smolensk - Moscow". Promotion to Nizhny Novgorod, aligning the Volna - Northern Dvina line.
- Army Group "North". Attack on the Baltic states, Leningrad and further advance to Arkhangelsk and Murmansk. At the same time, the “Norway” army was supposed to fight in the north together with the Finnish army.
| SOUTH | CENTER | NORTH | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Target | Ukraine, Crimea, access to the Caucasus | Minsk, Smolensk, Moscow | Baltic states, Leningrad, Arkhangelsk, Murmansk |
| Number | 57 divisions and 13 brigades | 50 divisions and 2 brigades | 29th Division + Army "Norway" |
| Commanding | Field Marshal von Rundstedt | Field Marshal von Bock | Field Marshal von Leeb |
| common goal | Get on line: Arkhangelsk – Volga – Astrakhan (Northern Dvina) |
||
Around the end of October 1941, the German command planned to reach the Volga - Northern Dvina line, thereby capturing the entire European part THE USSR. This was the plan for the lightning war. After the blitzkrieg, there should have been lands beyond the Urals, which, without the support of the center, would have quickly surrendered to the winner.
Until about mid-August 1941, the Germans believed that the war was going according to plan, but in September there were already entries in the diaries of officers that the Barbarossa plan had failed and the war would be lost. The best proof that Germany in August 1941 believed that there were only a few weeks left before the end of the war with the USSR was Goebbels’ speech. The Minister of Propaganda suggested that the Germans collect additional warm clothes for the needs of the army. The government decided that this step was not necessary, since there would be no war in the winter.
Implementation of the plan
The first three weeks of the war assured Hitler that everything was going according to plan. The army moved forward rapidly, winning victories, Soviet army suffered huge losses:
- 28 divisions out of 170 were put out of action.
- 70 divisions lost about 50% of their personnel.
- 72 divisions remained combat-ready (43% of those available at the start of the war).
Over the same 3 weeks, the average rate of advance of German troops deep into the country was 30 km per day.
By July 11, the Army Group “North” occupied almost the entire Baltic territory, providing access to Leningrad, the Army Group “Center” reached Smolensk, and the Army Group “South” reached Kyiv. These were the latest achievements that were fully consistent with the plan of the German command. After this, failures began (still local, but already indicative). Nevertheless, the initiative in the war until the end of 1941 was on the side of Germany.
Germany's failures in the North
Army “North” occupied the Baltic states without any problems, especially since there was practically no partisan movement there. The next strategic point to be captured was Leningrad. Here it turned out that the Wehrmacht was beyond its strength. The city did not capitulate to the enemy and until the end of the war, despite all efforts, Germany was unable to capture it.
Army Failures Center
Army "Center" reached Smolensk without problems, but was stuck near the city until September 10. Smolensk resisted for almost a month. The German command demanded a decisive victory and the advancement of troops, since such a delay near the city, which was planned to be taken without large losses, was unacceptable and called into question the implementation of the Barbarossa plan. As a result, the Germans took Smolensk, but their troops were pretty battered.
Historians today assess the Battle of Smolensk as a tactical victory for Germany, but a strategic victory for Russia, since it was possible to stop the advance of troops towards Moscow, which allowed the capital to prepare for defense.
Complicated the advance of the German army deep into the country partisan movement Belarus.
Failures of the Army South
Army “South” reached Kyiv in 3.5 weeks and, like Army “Center” near Smolensk, was stuck in battle. Ultimately, it was possible to take the city due to the clear superiority of the army, but Kyiv held out almost until the end of September, which also hampered the advance of the German army and made a significant contribution to the disruption of Barbarossa’s plan.
Map of the German advance plan
Above is a map showing the German command's offensive plan. The map shows: in green – the borders of the USSR, in red – the border to which Germany planned to reach, in blue – the deployment and plan for the advancement of German troops.
General state of affairs
- In the North, it was not possible to capture Leningrad and Murmansk. The advance of the troops stopped.
- It was with great difficulty that the Center managed to reach Moscow. At the time the German army reached the Soviet capital, it was already clear that no blitzkrieg had happened.
- In the South it was not possible to take Odessa and seize the Caucasus. By the end of September, Hitler's troops had just captured Kyiv and launched an attack on Kharkov and Donbass.
Why Germany's blitzkrieg failed
Germany's blitzkrieg failed because the Wehrmacht prepared the Barbarossa plan, as it later turned out, based on false intelligence data. Hitler admitted this by the end of 1941, saying that if he had known the real state of affairs in the USSR, he would not have started the war on June 22.
The tactics of lightning war were based on the fact that the country has one line of defense on the western border, all large army units are located on the western border, and aviation is located on the border. Since Hitler was sure that everything Soviet troops located on the border, then this formed the basis of the blitzkrieg - to destroy the enemy army in the first weeks of the war, and then quickly move deeper into the country without encountering serious resistance.
In fact, there were several lines of defense, the army was not located with all its forces on the western border, there were reserves. Germany did not expect this, and by August 1941 it became clear that the lightning war had failed and Germany could not win the war. The fact that the Second World War lasted right up to 1945 only proves that the Germans fought in a very organized and brave manner. Thanks to the fact that they had the economy of the whole of Europe behind them (speaking of the war between Germany and the USSR, many for some reason forget that the German army included units from almost all European countries) they were able to fight successfully.
Did Barbarossa's plan fail?
I propose to evaluate the Barbarossa plan according to 2 criteria: global and local. Global(reference point - the Great Patriotic War) - the plan was thwarted, since the lightning war did not work out, the German troops were bogged down in battles. Local(landmark – intelligence data) – the plan was carried out. The German command drew up the Barbarossa plan based on the assumption that the USSR had 170 divisions on the country’s border and there were no additional echelons of defense. There are no reserves or reinforcements. The army was preparing for this. In 3 weeks, 28 Soviet divisions were completely destroyed, and in 70, approximately 50% of the personnel and equipment were disabled. At this stage, the blitzkrieg worked and, in the absence of reinforcements from the USSR, gave the desired results. But it turned out that the Soviet command had reserves, not all troops were located on the border, mobilization brought high-quality soldiers into the army, there were additional lines of defense, the “charm” of which Germany felt near Smolensk and Kiev.
Therefore, the failure of the Barbarossa plan should be considered as a huge strategic mistake of German intelligence, led by Wilhelm Canaris. Today, some historians connect this man with English agents, but there is no evidence of this. But if we assume that this is really the case, then it becomes clear why Canaris palmed Hitler off with the absolute lie that the USSR was not ready for war and all the troops were located on the border.
There are certain reasons to believe that the Soviet leadership, especially Stalin, seriously expected to remain aloof from the outbreak of the world war. And the prerequisites for this should have been our military power, unprecedented in scale at that time. Of course, the power is potential, hypothetical, in reality useless, as time has shown.
CARD GAMES
In September 1940, the People's Commissariat of Defense reported to the Politburo of the Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks its considerations for the deployment of troops at the western border in light of the events that had taken place in Europe. It was assumed that the concentration of the main forces German army most likely north of the mouth of the San River. Therefore, the main forces of our army need to be deployed from the Baltic Sea to Polesie, in the Baltic and Western districts.
Stalin suggested that the main blow would be in the southwest, to seize Ukraine, the Donetsk basin, and the Caucasus - the richest industrial, raw materials and agricultural areas. This is what it says in the Soviet History of the Second World War.
A new plan was developed, which appeared by the end of 1940. According to it, the main enemy attack was expected in the Lviv-Kyiv direction. An auxiliary strike could have been delivered from East Prussia to Vilnius-Vitebsk.
The concentration of the main forces in the Lvov-Kiev direction was aimed at preventing the advance of large enemy tank masses into Ukraine. It was taken into account that in this direction the terrain was most convenient for the deployment of tank and motorized infantry units, of which we had much more German ones. It is important to note that the military still assumed the possibility of a flank attack on the central group of Germans by part of the forces in the southern direction, but subject to the mandatory retention of the Kovel, Rivne, Lvov area.
In December 1940, a meeting of the senior command staff of our army was held, at which the problems of modern war were discussed. An interesting description was given by the then Chief of the General Staff Meretskov in his report on the draft Field Manual to the Soviet and German troops. He argued that our division was much stronger than the German one and would certainly defeat it in a head-on battle. In defense, our division will repel the attack of two or three enemy divisions. In an offensive, one and a half of our divisions will overcome the defense of the enemy division. According to the army general’s plan, it turned out that our division had no less than double superiority over the German one. This is a typical assessment for those times.
After the meeting, two operational-strategic games took place on maps, the concept of which reflected the Soviet military doctrine. According to the instructions for the first game, the “western” (commander Zhukov) carried out an attack on the “eastern” (commander Pavlov) and by July 23-25 advanced into the territory of Belarus and Lithuania 70-120 km from the border. But as a result of retaliatory actions, they were thrown back to their original position by August 1.
According to the instructions for the second game, the South-Eastern Front of the “Western” (commander Pavlov) and their allies began fighting On August 1, 1941, against the Lvov-Ternopil group of the “eastern” (commander Zhukov) and invaded the territory of Ukraine to a depth of 50-70 km, however, at the Lviv-Kovel line they were met with a strong counterattack of the South-Eastern Front of the “eastern” and by the end of 8 August retreated to pre-prepared lines.
In the games there was not even an attempt to consider the actions of the “Easterns” in the event of an attack by a real enemy. That is, it was assumed that the plan to cover the state border was carried out successfully in the first days. What seemed to the game developers for granted in conditions of superiority in forces and means, especially in aviation and tanks. In the first game - 2.5:1 for tanks, 1.7:1 for aviation. In the second - for tanks 3:1, for aircraft 1.3:1.
In both games, the attacking side was the Eastern side. In the first game, the offensive of the “Easterns” was interrupted by a flank attack by the “Westerns”. In the second game, the Eastern offensive was more successful.
On March 11, 1941, a “refined plan” was drawn up for the strategic deployment of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union, taking into account the results of the games. In this regard, it was finally recognized as the main direction of the enemy’s attack in the south, to capture Ukraine. Accordingly, our troops had to concentrate there in order to defeat the attackers and, in the very first stage of the war, cut off Germany from the Balkan countries, deprive it of its most important economic bases and decisively influence the Balkan countries regarding their participation in the war against the USSR. After successfully repelling the first strike with powerful mechanized formations, carry out and develop a deep breakthrough and quickly decide the outcome of the war.
THE PREVENTIVE STRIKE REMAINED ON PAPER
By this time, the German army had already been prepared - all that remained was to turn on the mechanism for the massive transfer of formations and units from the western regions of Germany to the border of the USSR. Moreover, the German command relied on the superiority of the railway network, believing that it did not have of great importance, where the troops planned for concentration in the east will be located - in Pomerania, Brandenburg, Silesia or in Western Germany. The further the forces are from the upcoming concentration area, the more sudden the start of this concentration will be, which Germany is able to carry out much faster than the enemy.
In fact, the ratio of the speed of mobilization and deployment of the army, which was at the beginning of the First World War, has been preserved: Germany in 10 days, Russia in 40. The fact is that the railway network developed in the USSR in the 20-30s. extremely unsatisfactory, and in the newly captured areas they only managed to change the existing network to a wider gauge. It should be especially noted that at that time military power was understood somehow one-sidedly: tanks, guns, planes, people. But the fact that there weren’t enough roads, and it was extremely dangerous, didn’t bother me.
In May 1941, the notorious document appeared signed by the then deputy chief of the operational department of the General Staff. He insisted on the need to seize the initiative from the German command and forestall it in deployment. To do this you need to attack the German army, which is in the process of deployment. This is favored by the fact that Germany is bogged down in a war with England.
The second thing that, according to Vasilevsky, favored the offensive operation was that out of the supposedly 287 German divisions, only 120 (actually 123) were concentrated on our border. And Germany could field 180 divisions (including 19 tank and 15 motorized) and up to 240 - together with the allies.
The idea was to deliver the main blow with the forces of the Southwestern Front in the direction of Krakow-Katowice and cut off Germany from its allies - Hungary and Romania. The left wing of the Western Front was supposed to strike in the direction of Sedlec-Demblin. This blow could have shackled the Warsaw group and contributed to the defeat of the Lublin group by the Southwestern Front. It was necessary to conduct an active defense against Finland, East Prussia, Hungary, and Romania, but be prepared to strike against Romania.
All this looked not only like a project, but even stupidity from the point of view of the direction of the attacks and their goals. Indeed, it took Germany almost a year to develop and implement the Barbarossa plan. But Germany had an excellent military apparatus, which we practically did not have.
In short, there was clearly not enough time to prepare a major offensive operation. Even less experience. And the sad example of the Finnish campaign allows us to doubt the possibility of successful offensive actions of our army in those conditions and in its condition. The assumptions that are now emerging that preemptive strike would allow us to defeat Germany more easily. As well as the version that entering the war in 1939 would be a great blessing.
PLANS OF GERMANY
Already in October 1939, Hitler formulated the idea of a Western campaign - a decisive blow and a quick victory, a deep breakthrough of tank units through the Ardennes to the English Channel coast and the encirclement of the bulk of enemy troops. Conduct the offensive on the widest possible front so that the enemy cannot organize a strong defense. Dismember his front. Concentrate large forces in the depths of your troops, aiming them against individual sections of the enemy’s front. It is then that it will be possible to more fully realize the superiority of the German leadership. The main thing is the will to defeat the enemy.
This is very important to emphasize - the attacker himself chooses the direction, time, and force of the blow. The defender’s destiny is to withstand the first blow, regroup, wear down the enemy with competent defense, and only then strike himself. This is great art, which we did not have at all then.
In November 1939, Hitler, at a meeting of the Wehrmacht leadership, stated that Russia did not pose a threat at the moment, and its armed forces had low combat effectiveness. A little more than six months pass - and the tone becomes even more categorical: a war against the USSR, as opposed to a war with France, will only look like a game of Easter cakes. The basis for such a statement was the idea that the Soviet officer corps was not able to provide qualified leadership of troops, which was confirmed by the experience of the Finnish campaign.
The chief of staff of the 4th German Army, Blumentritt, on May 9, 1941, at a meeting in the operational department of the ground forces headquarters, argued that the Soviet military command was inferior to the German one: it thought formally and did not show self-confidence. The remaining senior military leaders should be even less feared than the former, well-trained generals tsarist army. German troops are superior to the enemy in combat experience, training and weapons. The systems of command and control, organization and training of troops are the most correct. There will be stubborn battles for 8-14 days, and then success will not be long in coming. The glory and aura of invincibility that precedes the Wehrmacht everywhere will have a particularly paralyzing effect on the enemy.
If we remember that in July 1940, when Hitler’s first orders were given to begin practical training operations against the USSR, they were talking about its duration of about 5 months, but within a year the period was reduced to almost a week. Hitler immediately started talking about the main attack on Moscow, which would create extremely unfavorable conditions for military operations of the most powerful Soviet group in Ukraine (war with an “inverted front”).
General considerations about the possibility of developments were set out in a memorandum prepared on September 15, 1940 by Colonel Lossberg, head of the ground forces group in the operations department of the German General Staff. In his opinion, in the war against Germany, the USSR had three options: a preventive strike on the German troops beginning to concentrate near the border; taking on the blow of the German armed forces, deploying at the border in order to hold in their hands new positions captured on both flanks (Baltic and Black Seas); a retreat into the depths of one’s own space in order to impose on the advancing armies the difficulties of extended communications and the associated supply difficulties, and then only in the further course of the campaign a counterattack.
The first option seemed incredible - at best, operations against Finland or Romania. The second option is more likely, since it cannot be assumed that such a powerful military power will cede its richest regions, including recently conquered ones, without a fight. In addition, a particularly well-equipped network of air force ground facilities has been deployed west of the Dnieper. When retreating, this network will be lost.
For the German army, such a solution, in which the enemy will take the battle with large forces at an early stage, is favorable, because after defeat in the border battle, the Soviet command is unlikely to be able to ensure an organized withdrawal of the entire army.
If the Soviet troops make plans in advance to first take the attack of the German troops with small forces, and concentrate their main group in the deep rear, then the boundary of the latter’s location north of the Pripyat swamps could be a powerful water barrier formed by the Dvina (Daugava) and the Dnieper . Lossberg considered such an unfavorable decision possible. But it seemed incredible to him that the southern regions of Ukraine south of the Pripyat swamps would be left without a fight.
Of the three options, the most likely was the one that was most unfavorable for us. In fact, this is what happened. Moreover, the impossibility for Stalin to act differently was calculated - political, psychological, and even economic.
All subsequent German developments developed these ideas. In mid-December 1940, a preparatory strategic game for Operation Barbarossa took place at the headquarters of the ground forces command. The plan for the operation was outlined by Paulus. He called the first goal the capture of Ukraine (including Donbass), Moscow, and Leningrad. This made it possible to capture almost the entire military and heavy industry. The second goal is to achieve the Arkhangelsk-Volga-Astrakhan line. According to the developers, such an outcome would deprive the USSR of any hope for revival.
When assessing the possible behavior of the Soviet command, the calculation was clearly made on its desire to provide stubborn resistance on the border. Motives - it is difficult to decide to voluntarily give up areas that were recently captured. And besides, try to weaken the German forces from the very beginning and ensure the possibility of deploying the army.
Therefore, the tasks of the German ground forces were formulated in this way - with the support of aviation, destroy the enemy’s best personnel troops, achieving a decisive battle, and thereby prevent the systematic and full use of the enormous human potential of the USSR. After the success of the first breakthrough, strive to destroy the enemy forces piece by piece and prevent them from creating a united new front. If with the help of these decisions it is not possible to achieve the final victory of the war, then the enemy will still not be able to hold out, much less achieve a turning point in the war.
On January 31, 1941, a directive appeared on the strategic deployment of German ground forces, which finally enshrined the intention to destroy Soviet troops by quickly moving forward tank strike groups to prevent withdrawal into the interior of the country. Moreover, our command was expected to carry out major offensive operations to eliminate the German breakthrough, as well as to ensure the withdrawal of troops beyond the Dnieper-Dvina line.
On June 11, 1941, Hitler's directive # 32 was released, in which, after the defeat of the USSR, by the fall of 1941 (this is approximately 3 months, this is exactly the period expected back in March for " final decision Russian problem") was to be followed by a breakthrough to the Middle East (through Turkey or from Transcaucasia and through Egypt) in 1942. This plan was confirmed in Hitler’s July directive, however, the collapse of the USSR was expected by the winter of 1941 with access to the Volga.
The Soviet leadership hoped that the German leadership would realize the danger of an attack on the USSR. Stalin, as a pragmatist, assumed that it was impossible for Hitler to successfully carry out a campaign against the USSR. And he believed that there simply wouldn’t be a war. And Hitler cleverly took advantage of Stalin’s natural desire.
As for the ratio of the military potential of the USSR and Germany in 1939 and 1941, it has not changed, since internal politics in the USSR, leadership style, principles of military planning and everything else have not changed. Therefore, severe defeats were inevitable.
