Posted on 01/18/2018 1:30:31 PM PST by GoldenState_Rose
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".
Calls to avenge the Motherland, violated by the Wehrmacht's invasion, had given the idea that almost any cruelty would be allowed.
A number of other forces or influences were at work. Sexual freedom had been a subject for lively debate within Communist party circles during the 1920s, but during the following decade, Stalin ensured that Soviet society depicted itself as virtually asexual. This had nothing to do with genuine puritanism: it was because love and sex did not fit in with dogma designed to "deindividualise" the individual. Human urges and emotions had to be suppressed...
Most ill-educated Red Army soldiers suffered from sexual ignorance and utterly unenlightened attitudes towards women. So the Soviet state's attempts to suppress the libido of its people created what one Russian writer described as a sort of "barracks eroticism" which was far more primitive and violent than "the most sordid foreign pornography".
(Excerpt) Read more at theguardian.com ...
It happens at wars isn’t it? Did you know that thousands of US troops were convicted for raping the French who even weren’t the enemy? In contrast with the Allies including Russians the Germans usually killed women they raped and there were few left to complain.
You also shouldn’t trust the German numbers. They had race purity laws in place in 1945. Claiming rape by ‘an Asian’ was a way to get permit for abortion.
Not saying rest of Allies were saints.
But most European civilians who survived the warhave a favorable impression of the contribution made by Brit/American/Canadian troops et al.
But countries who fell under the spells of both Nazism AND Sovoet communism remain resentful of Russia, largely due to the lack of acknowledgment for its crimes.
My first point is made evident by the massive, massive immigration the United States saw in the postwar years from immigrants fleeing wartorn Europe. America was seen as a refuge. Not an evil war criminal regime.
“” “” But most European civilians who survived the warhave a favorable impression of the contribution made by Brit/American/Canadian troops et al.”” “”
Bias. Had the Soviets won the Cold War for Europe you could hear them saying the same thing about themselves.
Also your topic is rape and not a favorable impression of civilians. I fail to understand why Russian rape is any worse than rape by US or German troops. Do you believe overall ‘favorable impression’ makes rape better?
There is nothing good about Communism in postwar Europe but in no way it was any worse than Hitler’s plan. The fact many people complain is the evidence. There are few people survived to complain about the Nazis. They have simply ended up in ovens.
There was not a damned thing we could have done to prevent the Soviet actions in Eastern Germany or Berlin. Ike was not going to waste American lives over Berlin.
“” “” My first point is made evident by the massive, massive immigration the United States saw in the postwar years from immigrants fleeing wartorn Europe. America was seen as a refuge. Not an evil war criminal regime.”” “”
Who said US was an evil regime? Most immigrants were and are coming for economical reason. Have been this way forever. Europe was one big ruin at the time and US certainly weren’t.
Thanks for the follow up.
I was completely unaware of the sexual violence in the gulag.
I assumed, naively, that “political” prisoners behaved more humanely than criminals.
The United States Army conducted 904 court martials of soldiers for rape in France from June 1944 to the end of the war. The number of rapes actually committed is no doubt higher, but in no way was it “thousands of US troops were convicted for raping the French”
I might be wrong but it certainly weren’t a couple isolated cases. Things like that are part of war.
Rape and murder of civilians was not the policy of the United States Government. Yes, isolated cases, but always the actions of individual American soldiers. The number of rapes of French women are estimated to be about 3500. This is as compared to the probable millions of rapes of German women at the hands of the Soviet Army. The rape of German women, murder of Germans and the destruction of German private property was the official policy of the Soviet Government. They encouraged their soldiers to commit these crimes and Soviet military command turned a blind eye to the actions of their soldiers. That was until a few weeks after the end of the war, Moscow realized the problems caused by this conduct was interfering with ruling the defeated Germans. Moscow sent out the word to “Knock it off” and the Soviet Army immediately re-imposed it’s normal iron discipline on the troops. The rapes and murders stopped almost immediately.
Dear Norse,
The article above is an excerpt by an author who also wrote about Stalingrad.
I posted this earlier but: Ukraine this week banned his book from the country!
“He cited a passage that purportedly said “Ukrainian nationalists were tasked with shooting the children” in order to “spare the feelings of SS Sonderkommando,” a reference to forced work units made up of death-camp prisoner...”
https://www.rferl.org/a/beevor-historian-ukraine-ban-stalingrad/28980932.html
I believe you think it’s okay for Ukraine to rewrite history but for Russia it is totally bad not to daily apologize about every thing done wrong in theirs, true or fictional. True?
Viking. :(
I don’t think it right that Ukraine is banning that Stalingrad book. Why else would I post an excerpt from said historian?
If anything, Kiev’s actions attest to the author’s objectivity.
Yes that particular article is good but unfortunately the website as a whole seems to have an anti-Trump bias. Just realized.
I am a “millenial” and it literally PAINS me that there are not enough institutions and people (in media, academia, etc...) —> safekeeping the historical narrative about World War II. (Among other events of history.)
I am not advocating jingoism or indiscriminate patriotism, nor should we ever glorify war —> but we need to own our victories. Our contributions to the world.
We need to know why and how we won the Second World War. We need to know how and why Nazism took root beyond “Hitler was mean” “oh and people hated Jews.”
We need to understand what the Cold War vs USSR was about...we need to know why communism is so evil and how big of a threat it actually was beyond simplistic textbook definitions.
We need to know how: in spite of all our imperfections as a nation, we continue to have the moral high ground and have stood on the right of history during the world’s most crucial junctures and turning points.
In Russia, the most-watched TV broadcast every year is their Victory Day parade. That’s their “Super Bowl.” Stalin statues and portraits are en vogue again and any deviation or dissent expressed for the narrative causes one to be shunned. Dare to protest Crimea or the bloodshed in East Ukraine, and you’ll be deemed a foreign agent or extremist warranting arrest.
No joke.
On the other side of their border, the tiny country of Estonia has NATO and US troops march in *their* Independence (from Russia) Day parade at their capital in Talinn.
Not advocating military parades —> if anything, the fact we don’t have them, the fact we have antiwar protests and dissenting views expressed instead says something about our country and attests to its freedom and capacity for self-criticism and reflection...
But we are at a point now where even conservative-minded Americans are so skeptical and disillusioned to the point of being self-loathing.
Needs to change. Trump is only the beginning.
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