Red Army atrocities

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Red Army atrocities refers to the systemic commission of crimes by Soviet military personnel in Eastern Europe in late 1944 and early 1945, particularly murder and rape.

Contents 1 History 2 Treuenbrietzen massacre 3 See also 4 External links 5 References 6 Further reading

[edit] History

Discussion of atrocities committed in Germany and throughout Eastern Europe by the end of the World War II and in its aftermath are rare in Russia.^[1] With rare exception (notably Alexander Solzhenitsyn) the evidence is based on Western sources.

When the Red Army entered German and Hungarian territory, some of its personnel engaged in plunder, rape, and murder of civilians, although the laws of the Red Army officially prohibited such activities. Such crimes were not uncommon during times of war, but atrocities of Red Army personnel became the object of a special investigation of journalists. The common notion is that these atrocities were a revenge for German atrocities in the territory of the Soviet Union (11,5 million civilian deaths) and for mass killing of Soviet POWs (3,6 million dead of total a 5,2 million POWs). This explanation is disputed by military historian Antony Beevor, at least with regards to the mass rapes. Beevor claims in his findings that Red Army soldiers also raped Russian and Polish women liberated from concentration camps, and contends that this undermines the revenge explanation.^[2]

Sources listed below estimate that at the end of World War II, Red Army soldiers raped more than 2,000,000 German women, an estimated 200,000 of whom later died from injuries sustained, committed suicide, or were murdered outright.^[3][4][5] After June 1945 the Soviet high command imposed punishments for rape ranging from arrest to execution. In 1947 Soviet troops were completely separated from the residential population of Berlin. Estimates of the total number of rape victims during 1944 and 1945 are as follows: Eastern Provinces: 1,400,000; zone of Soviet occupation excluding Berlin: 500,000; Berlin: 100,000.^[6][7][8] The 2,000,000 rape victims estimate is also supported by the research of historian Norman Naimark.^[9] In addition, many of these victims were raped repeatedly, some as many as 60 to 70 times.^[10]

During the occupation of Budapest (Hungary) it is estimated that 50,000 women were raped.^[11][12]

Fleeing from the advancing Soviet forces, possibly more than two million people in the eastern provinces of Germany (East Prussia, Silesia, Pomerania) died, many of cold and starvation, but many were murdered by Soviet forces, or killed while being caught up in combat operations.

[edit] Treuenbrietzen massacre

The Treuenbrietzen massacre took place during the last days of April and the first days of May 1945, after a tough battle in which the Red Army took and lost control of the village on more than one occasion; the Red Army rounded up around 1000 (mostly male) civilians and executed them in the nearby forest. These executions were allegedly made as retaliation for the death of a high ranking Soviet officer during the battle for control of the village.^[13]

[edit] See also

• List of Soviet Union perpetrated war crimes
• Nemmersdorf massacre
• Demmin
• Evacuation of East Prussia
• A Terrible Revenge

[edit] External links

• Swiss legation report of the Russian invasion of Hungary in the spring of 1945
• German rape victims find a voice at last, Kate Connolly, The Observer, June 23, 2002
• "They raped every German female from eight to 80", Anthony Beevor, The Guardian, May 1, 2002
• Remembering Rape: Divided Social Memory and the Red Army in Hungary 1944–1945, James Mark, Past & Present (2005) (The crimes during the Battle of Budapest)
• Excerpt, Chapter one The Struggle for Europe: The Turbulent History of a Divided Continent 1945-2002 - William I. Hitchcock - 2003 - ISBN 0-385-49798-9 ( The occupation of East Prussia)
• Description of the atrocities of the Red Army in East Prussia, quotations from Ilya Ehrenburg, poems by anti-cruelty Red Army officers and details of suicides and rapings of German women and children in East Prussia.
• Book Review: The Siege of Budapest: 100 Days in World War II
• HNet review of The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949.
• Mark Ealey: As World War II entered its final stages the belligerent powers committed one heinous act after another History News Network (Focus on the Asian front)

[edit] References

1. ^ Russians angry at war rape claims Telegraph.co.uk 01/25/2002
2. ^ Red Army troops raped even Russian women as they freed them from camps
3. ^ Richard Overy, Russia's War: Blood upon the Snow (1997), ISBN 1-57500-051-2
4. ^ Richard Overy, The Dictators: Hitler's Germany and Stalin's Russia (2004), ISBN 0-7139-9309-X
5. ^ Vadim Erlikman, Poteri narodonaseleniia v XX veke : spravochnik. Moscow 2004. ISBN 5931651071
6. ^ Helke Sander and Barbara Johr. BeFreier und Befreite. Krieg, Vegewaltigung, Kinder Fischer Taschenbuch Verlag (2005), ISBN 3-596-16305-6
7. ^ Franz W. Seidler and Alfred M. de Zayas. Kriegsverbrechen in Europa und im Nahen Osten im 20. Jahrhundert Hamburg-Berlin-Bonn (2002), p.122, ISBN 3-8132-0702-1
8. ^ Dokumentation der Vertreibung der Deutschen aus Ostmitteleuropa, 5 Bde, 3 Beihefte, Bonn 1953-1961
9. ^ William I. Hitchcock The Struggle for Europe The Turbulent History of a Divided Continent 1945 to the Present ISBN 978-0-385-49799-2 (0-385-49799-7)
10. ^ Ibid
11. ^ Mark, James "Remembering Rape: Divided Social Memory and the Red Army in Hungary 1944-1945" Past & Present - Number 188, August 2005, pp. 133
12. ^ "The worst suffering of the Hungarian population is due to the rape of women. Rapes - affecting all age groups from ten to seventy are so common that very few women in Hungary have been spared." Swiss embassy report cited in Ungváry 2005, p.350. (Krisztian Ungvary The Siege of Budapest 2005)
13. ^ Claus-Dieter Steyer, "Stadt ohne Männer" (City without men) , Der Tagesspiegel at [1]

• Elizabeth B. Walter, Barefoot in the Rubble 1997, ISBN 0-9657793-0-0
• Fisch, Bernhard, Nemmersdorf, Oktober 1944. Was in Ostpreußen tatsächlich geschah. Berlin: 1997. ISBN 3-932180-26-7. (about most of the Nemmersdorf atrocity having been set up by Goebbels)

[edit] Further reading

• Marta Hillers, A Woman in Berlin: Six Weeks in the Conquered City Translated by Anthes Bell, ISBN 0-8050-7540-2
• Beevor, Antony. Berlin: The Downfall 1945, Penguin Books, 2002, ISBN 0-670-88695-5
• Max Hastings "Armageddon: The Battle for Germany, 1944-1945, Chapter 10: Blood and Ice: East Prussia" ISBN 0-375-41433-9
• John Toland "The Last 100 Days, Chapter Two: Five Minutes before Midnight" ISBN 0-8129-6859-X
• Norman M. Naimark. The Russians in Germany: A History of the Soviet Zone of Occupation, 1945-1949. Harvard University Press, 1995. ISBN 0-674-78405-7