"They raped every German female from eight to 80" after fall of Berlin, 1945 (Russia's Red Army)

[uhnope]

Last edited Tue Mar 3, 2015, 06:26 PM - Edit history (1)

Not exactly a "good" read but an important one.

Antony Beevor, author of the acclaimed new book about the fall of Berlin, on a massive war crime committed by the victorious Red Army.

"Red Army soldiers don't believe in 'individual liaisons' with German women," wrote the playwright Zakhar Agranenko in his diary when serving as an officer of marine infantry in East Prussia. "Nine, ten, twelve men at a time - they rape them on a collective basis."

The Soviet armies advancing into East Prussia in January 1945, in huge, long columns, were an extraordinary mixture of modern and medieval: tank troops in padded black helmets, Cossack cavalrymen on shaggy mounts with loot strapped to the saddle, lend-lease Studebakers and Dodges towing light field guns, and then a second echelon in horse-drawn carts. The variety of character among the soldiers was almost as great as that of their military equipment. There were freebooters who drank and raped quite shamelessly, and there were idealistic, austere communists and members of the intelligentsia appalled by such behaviour.

Beria and Stalin, back in Moscow, knew perfectly well what was going on from a number of detailed reports. One stated that "many Germans declare that all German women in East Prussia who stayed behind were raped by Red Army soldiers". Numerous examples of gang rape were given - "girls under 18 and old women included".

Marshal Rokossovsky issued order No 006 in an attempt to direct "the feelings of hatred at fighting the enemy on the battlefield." It appears to have had little effect. There were also a few arbitrary attempts to exert authority. The commander of one rifle division is said to have "personally shot a lieutenant who was lining up a group of his men before a German woman spreadeagled on the ground". But either officers were involved themselves, or the lack of discipline made it too dangerous to restore order over drunken soldiers armed with submachine guns.

Calls to avenge the Motherland, violated by the Wehrmacht's invasion, had given the idea that almost any cruelty would be allowed. Even many young women soldiers and medical staff in the Red Army did not appear to disapprove. "Our soldiers' behaviour towards Germans, particularly German women, is absolutely correct!" said a 21-year-old from Agranenko's reconnaissance detachment. A number seemed to find it amusing. Several German women recorded how Soviet servicewomen watched and laughed when they were raped. But some women were deeply shaken by what they witnessed in Germany. Natalya Gesse, a close friend of the scientist Andrei Sakharov, had observed the Red Army in action in 1945 as a Soviet war correspondent. "The Russian soldiers were raping every German female from eight to eighty," she recounted later. "It was an army of rapists."

Read more: http://www.theguardian.com/books/2002/may/01/news.features11?CMP=share_btn_fb

[COLGATE4]

1. There are those who think that, after the Nazi

depredations in Russia these actions were merely payback.

[radicalliberal]

4. Even Jewish women left in Berlin weren't spared.

The Red Army committed war crimes.

[COLGATE4]

7. I'm sure the Russian soldiers weren't particularly

concerned about those women being Jewish. They were German women, and that's all that counted. You call it "war crimes". They call it vengance.

[newthinking]

9. More like the nature of catastrophic war and what it can do.

There is an attempt to rewrite history with the Russians less of an ally and more of a complement to Nazi Germany.

The fact is that what Germany did to the Russian people was apocalyptic. They lost 20-30 million men, women, and children. They almost lost their country. Their women were raped as well.

That does not justify rape, but it provides a better understanding of how something like this comes about and can come about with any society under the right conditions. Most every family in Russia lost members and children that survived were orphaned in mass. The anger was surely intense and turned people literally crazy and unable to see those on the "other side" in more human terms.

In our own history, what happened in Vietnam? How many of our own military men essentially drove a huge industry of prostitution there. Pretty much sanctioned by our own generals as "just being the good old boys".

War is hell. And we need to learn more in how to conduct actions even if they are necessary and not losing our humanity. And even better, working hard to avoid war all together.

[Stuart G]

34. I have read that it could have been more. 40 M. The Germans invasion was as you said.."apocalyptic"

Horror is the wrong word. What the German army did cannot be adequately described. So when the so called "invaders" get invaded and destroyed, what do you expect???

Stalin kept no count on dead. How many Stalin killed or were killed by Germans........An apt description:

"That does not justify rape, but it provides a better understanding of how something like this comes about and can come about with any society under the right conditions. Most every family in Russia lost members and children that survived were orphaned in mass. The anger was surely intense and turned people literally crazy and unable to see those on the "other side" in more human terms. "

I personally know a story about a family in the then Soviet Union, who had children, (told by one of the children, now in his 80s]..who said to make sure the kids survived, they sent him thousands of miles away I think that part that is now called Kazakhstan ., that is what happened. and he did survive and eventually came here.

[Blue_Tires]

2. The Red Army was hellbent on revenge

Some of it based in historical legacy (WWI and earlier)...

There's a very distinct reason why high-ranking German officers were looking for Americans to surrender to when Berlin fell...

[newthinking]

10. Are you saying that Americans were completely gentlemen and did not exploit European women?

Right...

These discussions are more and more into the territory of bigotry.

Russians are brutal and evil by nature! Bullshit.

They are as human as we are. Every fucking society struggles with catastrophe and so far we have yet to have any societies that have ascended and do not have their own "evil" conflicting natures, especially under duress.

[Blue_Tires]

12. At least do a little historical research before lashing out

because you're embarrassing yourself...

The Red Army's thirst for revenge is pretty well documented...I'd suggest you start with the formation of the Triple Entente in 1907 and move forward in time from there for a proper perspective of Russo-Teutonic relations leading up to the end of the Second World War...

Antony Beevor's Berlin: The Downfall 1945 is an excellent tome...

I haven't read it, but A Woman in Berlin: Eight Weeks in the Conquered City: A Diary has gotten excellent reviews, and I see it was also made into a movie...

So get back to me when you've read up on the topic a little...

[newthinking]

13. You missed my point

I am well aware of the history.

If we are bringing up historical tragedy with a view attempting to stereotype and paint it as distinctive to a particular group of people; that is not an objective look at "history" but an exercise in bigotry.


It is not me who is embarrassing themselves.

[newthinking]

14. Know your history - Mass rape was not confined to the Russian army. The Allies did as well

We are so fucking naive when it comes to what most **all** wars are, especially larger wars, and what transpires on "battlefields".

We are in the midst of a propaganda war trying to define a new enemy (Russia). In reality mass rape occurred on all sides in WWII.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2975016/New-book-alleges-Allied-soldiers-raped-one-million-Germans-end-Second-World-War.html

But hey, if it helps you to live with your world view to paint this with "American Exceptional ism" so be it. But don't complain if you get pushback and called on it.

[Blue_Tires]

17. Don't lecture me on history

The OP was referring to Red Army atrocities during the fall of Berlin, which is well documented -- And on cue, you reflexively try to dilute the discussion with some "whataboutism" over the allied forces...

If you want to discuss allied atrocities during the Second World War, start a new thread...

[newthinking]

18. You and I both KNOW that the OP was not about history, but making a particular narrative

and it is just as pertinent to talk about how war works and it's effects, and in fact more so on a progressive board.

I call total bullshit on your attempt to tell me that I have to accept history just as it is posted here and can't further the discussion with relevant material. This is not a third grade classroom in the US Southeast where some moron can tell me what I need to see and hear.

Geez, you are WAY WRONG on this.

[Blue_Tires]

21. How am I wrong?

Do you deny the Red Army committed atrocities during the fall of Berlin? Because you sure seem to have a hard time acknowledging it...

Do you want to compare how the Soviet Union treated their German POWs versus the allied forces?

[newthinking]

24. Are you and the OP the same person?

I am answering the OP. No I don't deny the atrocities, I thought I was clear. I just won't embrace the one sided simplified narratives. Atrocities occur on all sides of a major war like this in various degrees depending on the circumstances. War is incredibly violent and spreads violence.

Sure, and if you drop bombs from 20,000 feet above ground you can think to be conducting a war without such atrocities. But are we really? All war is by nature an atrocity. And the argument can be made that an unnecessary war is particularly heinous. So we certainly don't get any brownie points as a society either.

[virgogal]

28. Your nasty comment about the U.S. Southeast isn't quite fair .

Why on earth would you bash an entire region like that?

Not nice.

[newthinking]

29. I was referencing the religious nuts.

Who have a lot of sway in many communities and have affected curriculum in many districts in the south. But Point taken. There are a lot of good people there too.

[HERVEPA]

31. I'm sorry. I can't accept your comments w/o an accompanying RT or Sputniknews article

[840high]

32. ....

[geek tragedy]

3. USSR and Nazi Germany were not victim and aggressor, but merely two hyper-evil states

that turned on each other, one getting the advantage early, the other late.

[newthinking]

11. There is that rewriting of history in action

[Pooka Fey]

37. +1

[BobbyBoring]

5. Armageddon by Leon Uris in an excellent read on the subject.

By the wars end, everyone was tired of Germans period.

[Justina For Justice]

6. Shameful Anti-Russian Propaganda to Justify Yet More War.

The horrible events described in this post took place in 1945, the same year the decorious American government dropped nuclear bombs and burned thousands of Japanese women alive. All these actions are war crimes and should have been prosecuted.

But why do you post an article about alleged 1945 Russian horrors in 2015, based on a book published in 2002? What other reason do you have other than to justify hatred of Russians in 2015? Do you do so in order to justify the dropping of more nuclear bombs, this time on the Russians.

This is pure, war-mongering propaganda. It is a shameful ploy to justify more war and more wealth for the defense contractors.

[newthinking]

8. Good observation

Last edited Tue Mar 3, 2015, 09:54 PM - Edit history (1)

This OP is not pertinent to the current situation. So what is the OP expressing here? Really, is it not clear?

[Pooka Fey]

36. + 1000

[newthinking]

15. A million women were raped by Allied soldiers in Germany in the immediate aftermath of World War II

Sometimes propaganda OPs like this one lead to further learning on the subject.

Anyone who is not naive knows that war is just plain dirty and the dirty little secret is there is no such thing as a "humane" war. Even wars with the best of purposes bring about these crimes. It is part of the nature of war.

Sure enough the same abuses amongst the allies are recorded. Think unhope would post this link? Naw, it does not fit his stereotyping methods.

A million women were raped by Allied soldiers in Germany in the immediate aftermath of World War II
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2975016/New-book-alleges-Allied-soldiers-raped-one-million-Germans-end-Second-World-War.html

[marmar]

16. More of those inconvenient truths.

[newthinking]

19. Yep, On another thread they were trying to claim that all the atrocities occurred by one party

It sure was inconvenient when the discussion turned to our own.

Sometimes this place surprises me. This is supposedly a progressive board. Seems progressives would prefer to regress than to see the truth when it does not fit their exceptional narrative.

[uhnope]

20. lol. "Allied soldiers" included Russia

and that's where that number comes from.

[radicalliberal]

22. I'm sorry your topic has been overrun by trolls.

I love the "logic" shown by these Putinistas and the other assorted trolls.

Following that line of "reasoning," if I posted a link to an article about the lynchings and other barbarities that took place under Jim Crow in the U.S., I guess I'd be "anti-white" or if I posted about the Holocaust, I'd be anti-German, etc., etc.

For the ignorant: The topic concerns an historical subject. Keep your hypocritical Russian politics out of it.

I'm sickened by the point of view that has been expressed in this topic that some civilian victims of war crimes are less deserving of sympathy than others. I'm amazed that such a callous view regarding victims of mass rape has been expressed in a progressive forum. Ordinarily, I'd expect the rape apologists to be found in a RW or "Men's Rights" forum. Amazing!

I'm amazed by the point of view that atrocities committed by an invader force justify atrocities committed against women of the country under consideration. Hitler was not voted into office. When Nazi Germany invaded Poland, there weren't any massive demonstrations of support for the invasion. In fact, many of the streets were quiet.

During WW2 ethnic Serbs (along with Gypsies and Jews) were horribly brutalized by the fascist regime in Croatia. So, I suppose that gave Serbs during the break-up of the former Yugoslavia the right to commit atrocities against Croats, including those who had been born after WW2? When does ethics ever come into play? I guess it all depends on whose ox gets gored. Forget about common humanity. Pathetic!

I repeat, I never thought I'd see members of a progressive website defend gang rape! No compassion at all! Just lousy, rotten, stinking politics! That's all I'll say. If I stay here much longer in the presence of these people with their odious, hypocritical sanctimoniousness, I'm likely to puke! Shame on you people! Go sniff your flowers and hug a few trees while you're chortling over the systematic gang rape of women, even young girls, who had the misfortune to live in the wrong country!

[uhnope]

23. thank you so much. Your comparison to white supremacists is very apt.

It's bizarre that Putinistas take over threads on DU to promote totally anti-liberal, anti-Democratic BS.

Your comparison to white supremacists is very apt. Imagine if they came on DU and posted on threads about, for example, the Ferguson crisis, and started saying the discussion was "anti-white." They'd be seen as obvious white supremacists and racists. But these actual fascist supporters of Putin spew all over threads about Russia.

thanks again

[newthinking]

25. oh baloney. Did you even read the link. It is a cold war LIE that it was soley the red army

It was all the allies (and certainly the axis) including the "western allies". You believe a cold war myth. That war was brutal, and war in general is only good in that at times it can be somewhat less of an evil than the alternative.

Right from the article:

'I researched the book for over a year and-a-half,' she said. 'I wanted to tell the story of what 'happened from the perspective of the victims. I wanted to reconstruct the crimes as gently as I could.'

She said the 'terrible crimes' did not only take place in the Soviet zones of occupation - long chronicled and well-known about - but also in French, British and American sectors.

'Soldiers of the western Allies were also guilty,' said Mrs. Gebhardt, a renowned historian in Germany who tracked down some victims to interview them about their ordeal at the hands of Briish and American soldiers.

She said the false impression grew up after the war that German women gave themselves to western soldiers because they brought with them things they desperately needed - nylons, food, cigarettes, coffee.

'The impression grew that there was no rape in the west but rather a kind of prostitution grew up,' said the author.

But in fact countless women were raped, she said, with soldiers believing they could treat the as they wanted after bearing coveted gifts.

[MillennialDem]

26. Not to mention... well let's look at the numbers but the vast vast vast majority of the

Axis was defeated by the Soviet Union.

[newthinking]

27. Two million Soldiers were at the gate of Berlin during the Yalta Conference

And a whole lot of them had lost family members.

"The three Soviet fronts had altogether 2.5 million men (including 78,556 soldiers of the 1st Polish Army), 6,250 tanks, 7,500 aircraft, 41,600 artillery pieces and mortars, 3,255 truck-mounted Katyusha rocket launchers (nicknamed 'Stalin's Pipe Organs'), and 95,383 motor vehicles, many manufactured in the US."

[COLGATE4]

30. And the ones that hadn't lost family members

had lots of opportunity to take in the ravages the Nazis had committed in Russia. One of the standing orders to Konev's troops was to the effect of "Don't count the days. Don't count the miles. Count only the number of Germans you have killed".

[gladium et scutum]

35. Earlier in the War

it was a different line of thought. In "Red Road from Stalingrad", Mansur Abdulin recounts that when he first joined his combat unit in Dec 1942 the Commander lectured the new troops exhorting them to kill at least 1 German before they died.

[uhnope]

33. look at that...they still haven't stopped. nt

[Pooka Fey]

38. DU 81st Chairborne Propaganda

Your only goal in this OP is to manipulate history with the goal of whipping up your DU public into hating Russians.

Many combat atrocities happened in WWII with the Americans committing their fair share. But those stories don't fit into your propaganda narrative, so you jump all over those posters who point out that inconvenient truth. We can start with Hiroshima, Nagasaki, and Dresden, and Hamburg. Then we can talk about why non-strategic villages in Normandy were bombed to rubble by the Americans to the consternation of our French Resistance Allies.

Best advice to the DU 81st Chairborne, since you believe in the justice of your cause so deeply, it would be wrong for you to shirk your duty now. Get on that flight to Eastern Europe, and then get on the 1st train to Ukraine. Plenty of other foreign fighters have joined up to fight those evil Russkies. Don't let the Nazi SS badges worn by the guys on your Ukraine team bother you too much.

http://www.ibtimes.co.uk/ukrainian-soldiers-filmed-wearing-nazi-helmets-deny-neo-nazi-links-1465306

[uhnope]

39. DU is not Duma Underground--you are wrong

You are wrong, I am not motivated by hate--I have Russia friends and clients as well as Ukrainian friends who speak Russian. I am motivated by concern for them and disgust at Putin's increasing fascism as he wages wars and occupies other countries.

What are you motivated by? Please tell us your opinion of the growing fascism and decline of democracy in Russia.

[Pooka Fey]

40. Start by cleaning your own house, before you take on cleaning up your neighbor's

Maybe you should look to cleaning up the rising fascism (police brutality, targeting and killing of Americans of Color, domestic black-out interrogation sites, Guantanamo) and decline of democracy (Citizen's United) in your own American house.

I believe the Russians along with their Continental European partners are more capable and better placed, geographically and culturally, to clean up this mess in Ukraine. Those political leaders could accomplish this infinitely better without the American "War Inc." Military Industrial Complex threatening war and demonizing the Russian president and people with the full force of their bought-and-paid-for Media Monopoly.

A statement was made during the ceasefire negotiations in Minsk "Russia and Europe are part of the same civilization". Sometimes what is not said (i.e. "not the USA&quot speaks volumes. Russia managed to create a civilization that gave the world Tchaikovsky, Rachmaninoff, Tolstoy, Russian Ballet and Nijinsky, Dostoyevsky, Chekhov, Stravinsky, Prokofiev, Nabokov, Solzhenitsyn to name just a few examples well known to most Americans. My point is that, there are competent Russians and Europeans for the job. In Ukraine, I am less convinced of this. Nevertheless, the TEAM AMERICA WORLD POLICE policy is worse than absurd, it is bringing us closer to the ultimate absurdity: nuclear war.

Your implication that the USA is somehow concerned with fighting fascism and promoting democracy in the former Soviet region is, to my mind, ideologically based to the point of being delusional. The USA is militarily supporting a current Ukrainian regime that has open Nazi elements both in the government and the military --- the "Azov Battalion". So much fundamental confusion on this issue means it is pointless to continue the conversation with you.

Peace

[uhnope]

41. lol, refuse to answer the question and then say "it is pointless to continue the conversation"

What a joke.
How insulting you think Russia is "cleaning up" the Ukraine. Sounds like Milosevic's ethnic cleansing.

" in your own American house." so what do you care, wherever you are?

My god--Russia is the aggressor and a destroyer of democracy, a force of growing fascism, but you seemed to have bought the Kremlin talking points hook, line and stinker.

[Pooka Fey]

42. Willful malicious slander of my writing. Accusing me of promoting ethnic cleansing?

You are a real piece of it.

I believe the Russians along with their Continental European partners are more capable and better placed, geographically and culturally, to clean up this mess in Ukraine. Those political leaders could accomplish this infinitely better without the American "War Inc." Military Industrial Complex threatening war and demonizing the Russian president and people with the full force of their bought-and-paid-for Media Monopoly.

For you, Moran, to clean up "this mess" means the current CIVIL WAR IN UKRAINE. But you knew that already. What a tool.

[uhnope]

43. instead of insults, why not just answer the question

tell us what you think of Putin's government that is slaughtering its liberals, jailing and killing its journalists, demonizing and persecuting its gays, while its neo-Nazi death squads run a reign of terror against all the above and more? Please tell us how you condemn the growth of fascism in Russia and the invasion of Crimea and eastern Ukraine. Then we'll believe you care at all about peace and democracy in the world and not the more sinister implications of having Russians "clean up this mess in Ukraine."

[Pooka Fey]

44. See post 38

Best advice to the DU 81st Chairborne, since you believe in the justice of your cause so deeply, it would be wrong for you to shirk your duty now. Get on that flight to Eastern Europe, and then get on the 1st train to Ukraine. Plenty of other foreign fighters have joined up to fight those evil Russkies. Don't let the Nazi SS badges worn by the guys on your Ukraine team bother you too much.

[uhnope]

45. AKA no answer. So which of Putin's fascist policies do you most prefer?

Or feel free to tell us you condemn them all.

[roamer65]

46. One would think we all would have learned from the unspeakable horrors of WW2.

But by current trends, we seem to be almost hell bent to repeat them with another world war.

God have mercy on us.