Babushkas on the Battlefield [OC]
I came across this anecdote from Germany's WWII land invasion of Soviet Russia, while reading Panzer Leader by Heinz Guderian (pioneer of the blitzkrieg tactic). :)
Posted Dec 4, 2014, 12:25 AM UTC · edited
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I was born in Poland and my three of my grandparents survived long enough to tell me stories of the war. Most of my immediate family comes from territories occupied by Russia and Austria-Hungary before WW1 - Lithuania and Ukraine today.
My maternal grandmother was a kid during WW2 and she once told me a surprising story. She lived near Rzeszow in Poland and as such she fell into the German-occupied territory after 1939 but it was also very far from most major population centres and almost at the border with the USSR so it was much more regular military than second-rate occupying troops. She told me how in winter of 1940/41 - her family had very little to eat because the winter came early and harsh and they had trouble raising crops during wartime and so they faced starvation because she had 8 siblings. They were saved by the nearby Wehrmacht regiment. She would go every day or every other day to the barracks with a huge tin canister, walk up to the guards and then wait as they would bring it back filled with soup and sometimes with a loaf of bread. They kept them alive through winter this way.
My maternal grandfather on the other hand lived in the Lithuanian part of Poland and as such fell under Soviet rule. They said it was as if a vicious horde came down and they took everything. When in 1941 the Germans invaded the USSR it was relatively peaceful until the front came back. He also said that the local Wehrmacht was very civil in its conduct and that German Army were a significant improvement over the Red Army.
Both also remember that the Germans were occupying forces and did terrible things but that it was far from uniformly malicious in nature. It was much more like some of the American soldiers in Iraq - many are gung-ho assholes or Chris Kyles but many are friendly and helpful and try to do something for the local people instead of just running around their back yards shooting everyone.
My paternal grandfather on the other hand was 17 when the Soviets invaded Poland and his father (my great-grandfather) was arrested and executed by the NKVD in 1939. When the Germans invaded the USSR in 1941 he signed up for military service as means to deal with political pressure. He fought with the Red Army since 1942 and then joined 2nd Polish Army (in 1944 or 1945 IIRC.) He was a tank commander and fought most major battles with the exception of Stalingrad proper. He did fought at Battle of Kursk though and went as far as Dresden (again IIRC). Despite the fact that he spent four years killing Germans he really did not have any particular hate towards them - perhaps as a result of fighting alongside an oppressor - and did not much like to talk about the war too much. He had some great stories about what the realities of eastern front were though...
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It's interesting isn't it? If Hitler hadn't been as radically racist towards Slavs (or of he had hidden it until he had won the war) he could've raised tons of infantry divisions from nationalities that did NOT want to be a part of the Soviet Union (Ukrainians, etc)
Those infantry might've made the difference, but instead, like the Japanese after the Rape of Nanking, he alienated the people he conquered and turned them against him!
Piss-poor tactics, but it's a jolly good thing for us he did!
Guderian was laid off at the end of 1941, and in 1942 Hitler greatly complicated German tank production with a multitude of designs, while the Russians kept cranking out T34s.
Then this happened. Guderian's commentary is hilarious.
This is a great book. I'm amazed how often Guderian and other Wehrmacht commanders were flat out ignoring and disobeying the idiotic and conflicting orders from high command.
I assume there are many other war books like this, but I'm amazed how Guderian had such a detailed recollection of troop movements, his thoughts and involved leadership activities every single day of the campaigns. He must have had a photographic memory and a hell of a journal.
That is not necessarily true. Poland had a beef with Germany that extended beyond Hitler. As a matter of fact most of Hitler's aggressive plans towards Poland were the same ideas /Prussian politicians in Germany had before him - like Gustav Strossman for example. There was a significant degree of animosity between both nations for reasons completely unrelated to Hitler. Also Hitler was nothing out of the ordinary - perhaps a bit more grotesque - because many countries in the region had fascist tendencies. Italy, Hungary, Austria even Romania - they were all ruled by authoritarian regimes. Poland itself was ruled by essentially a military junta since 1926 informally and formally after 1935! Poland turned fascist faster than Germany FFS!
That being said Poles always seem to have hated Russia more and the Bolsheviks in particular. If Hitler came to Poland and treated the population like in France then there would still be partisans fighting him and the government in exile in London (the same government which essentially gave Poland up for grabs) pretending to rule. It would take a long time and not locking up Jews in ghettos and camps for the Poles to start treating Hitler differently. Yes you read it right - treatment of Jews who comprised 6% of Poland's population was a significant factor in why Poles would not go down easily. While there were plenty of people who turned Volksdeutsche for practical reasons (either this or you are second on the list to go after they finish with the Jews) very few people actually accepted German occupation.
As for every other Soviet-occupied country however.... well if Hitler came to Ukraine and said "you can become a province in the Reich and some day if you learn German and say heil a lot you will be citizens" then I'm pretty sure that places like Belarus, Ukraine and every single Baltic state would start chanting heil Hitler overnight. That would give Germany additional 40m people and a good chance of pushing USSR back
But Hitler came and started exterminating the native population to clear off space for greater Germany. During the war over 10 million civilians died on the Eastern front. It is estimated that between 4 and 9 million died due to military actions against civilian population. 6 million died as result of famine and other indirect causes - which in fact were just as deliberate and encouraged by the German authorities.
Between 1 and 2,5 holocausts in Russia alone in the course of a couple of years.
I think that makes you turn around and love Stalin pretty quickly.