Why did the Germans take away the inhabitants of the USSR to Germany, and What happened to the stolen citizens of the USSR after the war

2024 Author: Richard Flannagan | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-15 23:55

At the beginning of 1942, the German leadership set itself the goal of taking out (or it would be more correct to say "hijack", take away by force) 15 million inhabitants of the USSR - future slaves. For the Nazis, this was a forced measure, to which they agreed gritted teeth, because the presence of citizens of the USSR would have a corrupting ideological influence on the local population. The Germans were forced to look for cheap labor, as their blitzkrieg failed, the economy, as well as ideological dogmas, began to burst at the seams.

Citizens of the USSR were driven away not only to Germany, but also to Austria, France, and the Czech Republic, which were annexed to the Third Reich. The population of the occupation territories was exported, mainly from Ukraine and Belarus. Since almost the entire male population was at war, the brunt of the burden fell on adolescents, women and children. Not just whole families were taken to work, but entire villages and villages. Everyone who was brought from the USSR wore a special patch with the inscription ost (translated as "east"), which is why they were nicknamed Ostarbeiters.

Self-confident Germans, many of whom were absolutely convinced that the citizens of the USSR were too stupid and childish to calculate the situation several steps ahead, launched a campaign to attract volunteers. Those who go to work in Germany were promised income, prospects, and most importantly, security. But there were practically no volunteers, and the deportation became violent.

Despite the fact that the campaigning work continued, raids were organized, policemen worked, people were caught practically on the street and put into carriages. Most often, adolescents and young women came across - those who can work a lot. The age of the main contingent is 16-18 years old, and the Nazis strove to observe approximate gender equality. The authorities, which were under the influence of the Nazis, sent out summons demanding to appear at the train. Such lists often included those who came from other territories where the war came earlier. The locals did not have time to get used to the refugees and felt less sorry for them. For those who invaded a foreign country, the lives of their inhabitants did not know absolutely nothing, because broken destinies, separated families - met all the time.

They were taken away in carriages, literally tamping people down, it was forbidden to go out at stops. In Germany, people were disinfected, carried out a cursory medical examination and deported to a camp, from where people were already assigned to a specific type of work. There is no exact data on how many people were taken away from the country. The numbers range from 3.5 to 5 million.

What kind of work awaited the citizens of the USSR in Germany?

Citizens of the USSR were actually brought into slavery, some ended up working in factories, others were ransomed by private individuals. And they chose carefully, checking their health, strength, skills. In many letters of the Ostarbeiters that have survived to our times, it is said that most often it was considered luck to get into private hands. It is not uncommon for ordinary Germans to treat the purchased workers like a human being, to feed them, take pity on them, hide them from the police, and even wait with them for the arrival of Soviet troops. However, the human factor played a decisive role here, because it could have happened exactly the opposite.

Basically, people were bought as servants, girls as servants, boys for more difficult, physical work. In addition, most of the young people who were brought in did not have any education, many of them did not even have time to finish school, so there is no need to talk about skilled labor.

In many ways, the position of the stolen captives depended on who they fell into. If some owners did not offend them, then others settled in the barn and fed them with slop, and they also had to work by unbending their backs. In addition, among them were city people, for whom physical labor on the farm was very unusual, and therefore difficult.

Young girls, mostly blondes, were chosen as servants in rich houses. Their position was in many ways much better than that of the others. However, these privileges ended with a warm bed and edible food, because the slave position for all of them was the same, and the position of "owner" and "thing" was oppressive.

Those who got into production were waiting for a 12-hour working day, where they had to work tirelessly. In addition, the food was very poor, tea, bread, cabbage and rutabagas are a typical diet for such a worker. However, there were also big problems with medical care, given that basic safety standards were not followed, any injury (and they happened often) could cause death. In addition, the sick slaves were certainly not needed by the system, it was easier to get rid of them.

It was possible to write letters at home, but they all underwent strict censorship, because at home they had to be sure that Germany had a wonderful life, a high level of well-being, and the citizens of the USSR were simply happy that they got here. And yes, relatives are also called to come. This is how the letters were supposed to look, according to the censors. And if there was freethinking in them, then the correspondence was torn, not delivered to the addressee, and the author could face punishment.

Ostarbeiters and their position in German society

There is a war going on in the world, fellow citizens, relatives beat the enemy, while those who were taken to Germany are forced to work for the good of fascism. This state of affairs extremely oppressed the Ostarbeiters, making them feel not just slaves and victims of the situation, but traitors. Although they also had ways to resist.

By the way, in order not to talk about the slave system, the German authorities obliged employers to pay wages to their workers brought from the USSR. The amount was just tiny. In addition, the owners now and then tried to deduct from there the amount for food, travel, accommodation, and imposed some fines. As a result, there was almost nothing left.

Those who worked in factories were paid with special stamps, which were accepted only in the stalls of the same factory, and the servants were often delayed wages or were not paid at all. Say, and so he lives on everything ready.

These and other circumstances made many think about escapes. This happened quite often, but most of them were unsuccessful, they managed to escape only closer to the end of the war, when the front line was as close as possible. After all, how to escape from the Germans, being in Germany, not knowing the language, not having money, and when they are looking for you? Those who were caught after escaping were punished, beaten, and sometimes shot. Sometimes, as a demonstrative gesture, the fugitive was sent to a concentration camp.

There was no question of an organized protest. And there are reasons for this too. First, we are talking about young people, most of them had no life and military experience. Secondly, those who worked in factories were almost always under the supervision of guards, they were not allowed to communicate with each other, to gather in a company. Those who were dismantled as servants lived separately and did not have the opportunity to meet. Although the documents of the fascists still indicate that they found the leaders of underground groups and shot them.

The protests of the Ostarbeiters were rather of a different nature, those who had the opportunity secretly provided assistance to the prisoners of war. But those close to them were negligible. Most often these were reciprocal insults, disobedience and petty sabotage. For example, it was ordered to make plantings, plant seeds. The sabotage of this process became noticeable after a few months, when it was too late to plant something new. Stones were thrown into the mechanisms to break them. And other petty dirty tricks and sabotage.

Freedom is near or a new captivity

Did the guys, unwittingly deported to Germany, understand that their release, even by their compatriots, would be very conditional? Probably yes. However, the victory of the USSR in the war was perceived by them as the end of this terrible series of events, an opportunity to change their lives for the better, finally, to become a free person and to build their own lives.

It is not known for certain how many Ostarbeiters died when Germany was bombed. The British during such a bombing destroyed a whole camp of workers, in which more than 200 people died. And this is only a small part that has been officially confirmed.

Returning to their homeland did not at all mean the end of the tests. Many began to suspect them of betrayal, it was not in vain that the Germans sang that in Germany "heaven on earth" awaited them. Everyone who was brought from Germany and other countries occupied by the Nazis was placed in filtration camps in which they had to wait for their fate.

Many prisoner workers were in western Germany, where most of the German factories were located. This part of the country was liberated by American and British soldiers. Many former citizens of the USSR, fearing to fall under a wave of repression in their country, left with their allies to the West and settled there. According to various sources, their number varies from 300 to 450 thousand people. And this, despite the fact that the Yalta agreements implied the mandatory extradition of Soviet citizens. This decision was also forced, since in the camps of America and England there were a huge number of Soviet citizens, whose content was not cheap at all.

Stalin demanded the return to their homeland of all citizens of the USSR, an agreement was concluded according to which all of them had to return "regardless of their desire." However, the last condition for the allies did not seem so important, because, in their opinion, it was obvious that anyone wants to go home to their loved ones. Americans who were captured by the Germans were considered heroes in their homeland and had all the honors. However, Soviet citizens had a completely different story.

A special department, which was engaged in the return of USSR citizens to their homeland, was created in the fall of 1944; it was this organization that introduced a new term for Ostarbeiters into circulation and began to call them repatriates. All of them, immediately after returning to their homeland, were awaited by filtration camps, interrogations from the NKVD and SMERSH officers. If a person turned out to be under suspicion, his associates reported on him, then he was sent to the GULAG. Often, young men faced equally difficult work in their homeland - they were sent to restore destroyed mines.

Despite the fact that most of the repatriates left for the countries of the Third Reich not at all of their own free will, in their homeland they were still a disadvantaged category of the population for a long time, they were treated with constant suspicion - after all, they lived in the den of the enemy and he left them alive, fed, watered. Hard work and humiliation were tactfully silent. There was no question of getting a decent job or education.

Repatriates in Soviet camps

Many who were among those whom the Germans used as labor force recalled that the conditions in which they found themselves in their homeland were not much different from the labor camps. The Soviet camps were not ready for the massive influx of yesterday's ostarbeiters, as a result they were overcrowded, people spent the night right on the dirty floor, starving.

Could the Soviet state, which was unable to protect its fellow citizens, accuse them of treason and interrogate yesterday's children who survived all the horrors of war in a foreign country? It could. Soviet girls who ended up in slavery recalled that at first they were called nothing less than "Russian pigs", and in their homeland they were called "German bedding".

By forcibly returning citizens to their homeland, the Soviet government tried to protect itself from foreign opposition, which could have been created by former compatriots. Well, the second reason is the return of workers to the country, because it was necessary to restore the country after the war years. However, the British and Americans were eager to provide political asylum to those who were afraid to return to their homeland. However, this was not widespread, because even the allies feared Stalin's anger. In addition, on the territory that the USSR had already seized, there were camps with American and British prisoners.

Returning home was not much different from the process of hijacking from it. Those who could not be deceived were brought into the carriages by force, beaten with truncheons, dozens of men were herded into one carriage, women and children into others. Many would rather commit suicide than go back.

The officers of the NKVD and SMERSH actively worked in this direction, so actively that they knitted and transported to the USSR everyone who spoke Russian, not really understanding who is who. In addition, by this time, many of the young people had managed to create families with foreign citizens, loved ones were again separated and destinies were breaking.

"Why did you survive?" - asked during interrogations of Russian Jews who were taken prisoner by the Germans. Their fate was even more unenviable than that of their comrades. In total, more than 80 thousand Jews were taken away from the USSR in German captivity. Many of them hid their nationality, posing as the Muslim peoples of the union. However, the very fact that a person managed to stay alive, having been in the enemy's lair, seemed extremely suspicious to the “enkeveshniks”.

In 1955-57, rehabilitation was announced, when it became known for certain that the population was taken away by force. But by that time, most of the captives were no longer alive, the fate of their loved ones and relatives were crippled. This topic is considered unpleasant not only in Russia and the CIS countries, but also in many others. Until today, the exact number of people who fell into these millstones is unknown. The Soviet government in every possible way underestimated the number of its citizens deported to Germany. They tried to erase this shameful fact from history. However, in the school curriculum this is not even a question, most authors talk about it in passing.

However, the Fuhrer was not a tyrant and despot for everyone. Young and tender Eva Braun, who had dreamed of becoming Hitler's wife all her life, chose to die with him than live without him.