On the eve of Victory Day, I would like to touch upon several important, fundamental issues. I will try to describe in general terms the pre-war potential of the USSR and Nazi Germany, and also give data on casualties on both sides, including the latest. There is also the latest data on the number of dead Yakuts.
The issue of losses in World War II has been discussed all over the world for more than a year. There are various estimates, including sensational ones. Quantitative indicators are influenced not only by various methods of calculation, but also by ideology, a subjective approach.
Western countries, led by the United States and Britain, tirelessly repeat the mantra that victory was “forged” by them in the sands of North Africa, Normandy, on the sea routes of the North Atlantic and with the help of bombing industrial facilities of Germany and its allies.
The war of the USSR against Germany and its allies is presented to the Western layman as "unknown". Some residents of Western countries, judging by the polls, in all seriousness claim that the USSR and Germany were allies in that war.
The second favorite saying of some Westerners and homegrown liberal democrats of the “Western persuasion” that the Victory over fascism was “littered with the corpses of Soviet soldiers”, “one rifle for four”, “the command threw its soldiers at machine guns, retreating was shot by detachments”, “ millions of prisoners”, without the help of the Allied troops, the victory of the Red Army over the enemy would have been impossible.
Unfortunately, after N.S. Khrushchev came to power, some of the Soviet military leaders, in order to elevate their role in the battle against the “brown plague” of the 20th century, described in their memoirs the execution of orders from the Headquarters of the commander-in-chief I.V. Stalin, as a result of which the Soviet troops suffered unreasonably high losses.
And few people pay attention to the fact that during the period of active defensive and offensive battles, the main task was and is to achieve replenishment - additional troops from the reserve. And in order to satisfy the request, you need to provide such a drill note about the heavy losses of the personnel of a particular military unit in order to receive replenishment.
As always, the truth lies in the middle!
At the same time, the official data on the losses of the Nazi armies from the Soviet side were often clearly underestimated or, conversely, overestimated, which led to a complete distortion of the statistical data on the military losses of Nazi Germany and its direct allies.
The trophy documents available in the USSR, in particular, the 10-day reports of the OKW (the high military command of the Wehrmacht), were classified, and only recently military historians have gained access to them.
For the first time, I.V. Stalin announced the losses of the Soviet people in the Great Patriotic War in 1946. He said that as a result of the German invasion, the Soviet Union irretrievably lost about seven million people in battles with the Germans, as well as due to the German occupation and the deportation of Soviet people to German penal servitude.
Then N.S. Khrushchev, in 1961, having debunked the personality cult of Stalin, in a conversation with the Deputy Prime Minister of Belgium, mentioned that 20 million people died in the war.
And, finally, a group of researchers led by G.F. Krivosheev estimates the total human losses of the USSR in the Great Patriotic War, determined by the demographic balance method, at 26.6 million people. This includes all those who died as a result of military and other actions of the enemy, who died as a result of military and other actions of the enemy, who died as a result of an increased mortality rate during the war in the occupied territory and in the rear, as well as persons who emigrated from the USSR during the war years and did not return after her graduation.
Data on the losses of G. Krivosheev's group are considered official. In 2001, the revised figures were as follows. USSR casualties:
- 6.3 million military personnel killed or died of wounds,
- 555 thousand died from diseases, as a result of accidents, incidents, sentenced to death,
- 4.5 million- were captured and disappeared without a trace;
General demographic losses - 26.6 million Human.
German casualties:
- 4.046 million servicemen died, died of wounds, went missing.
At the same time, the irretrievable losses of the armies of the USSR and Germany (including prisoners of war) are 11.5 million and 8.6 million (not counting 1.6 million prisoners of war after May 9, 1945), respectively.
However, new information is now emerging.
The beginning of the war - June 22, 1941. What was the balance of power between Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union? What forces and capabilities did Hitler count on when preparing an attack on the USSR? How realistic was the Barbarossa plan prepared by the Wehrmacht General Staff?
It should be noted that in June 1941 the total population of Germany, together with direct allies, amounted to 283 million man, and in the USSR - 160 million. The direct allies of Germany at that time were: Bulgaria, Hungary, Italy, Romania, Slovakia, Finland, Croatia. In the summer of 1941, the personnel of the Wehrmacht was 8.5 million people, four army groups with a total number of 7.4 million people were concentrated on the border with the USSR. Nazi Germany was armed with 5,636 tanks, more than 61,000 guns of various calibers, over 10,000 aircraft (excluding the weapons of allied military formations).
General characteristics of the Red Army of the USSR for June 1941. The total number was 5.5 million military personnel. The number of divisions of the Red Army is 300, of which 170 divisions were concentrated on the western borders (3.9 million people), the rest were stationed in the Far East (that's why Japan did not attack), in Central Asia, Transcaucasia. I must say that the divisions of the Wehrmacht were staffed according to the states of wartime, and each had 14-16 thousand people. The Soviet divisions were staffed according to the states of peacetime and consisted of 7-8 thousand people.
The Red Army was armed with 11,000 tanks, of which 1,861 were T-34 tanks and 1,239 were KV tanks (the best in the world at that time). The rest of the tanks - BT-2, BT-5, BT-7, T-26, SU-5 with weak weapons, many vehicles were idle due to lack of spare parts. Most of the tanks were to be replaced with new vehicles. More than 60% of the tanks were in the troops of the western border districts.
Soviet artillery provided powerful firepower. On the eve of the war, the Red Army had 67,335 guns and mortars. Katyusha multiple launch rocket systems began to arrive. In terms of combat qualities, Soviet field artillery was superior to German, but was poorly provided with mechanized traction. The need for special artillery tractors was met by 20.5%.
In the western military districts, the Red Army Air Force had 7,009 fighters, long-range aviation had 1,333 aircraft.
So, at the first stage of the war, qualitative and quantitative characteristics were on the side of the enemy. The Nazis had a significant advantage in manpower, automatic weapons, and mortars. And thus, Hitler's hopes to carry out a "blitzkrieg" against the USSR were calculated taking into account the real conditions, the alignment of the available armed forces and means. In addition, Germany already had practical military experience gained as a result of hostilities in other European countries. Surprise, aggressiveness, coordination of all forces and means, the precise execution of orders from the Wehrmacht General Staff, the use of armored forces on a relatively small sector of the front - this was the proven, fundamental tactic of the military formations of Nazi Germany.
This tactic has worked exceptionally well in military operations in Europe; losses in Wehrmacht manpower were small. For example, in France, 27,074 German soldiers were killed and 111,034 wounded. At the same time, the German army captured 1.8 million French soldiers. The war ended in 40 days. The victory was absolute.
In Poland, the Wehrmacht lost 16,843 soldiers, Greece - 1,484, Norway - 1,317 and another 2,375 died on the way. These "historical" victories of German weapons indescribably inspired Adolf Hitler, and they were ordered to develop the "Barbarossa" plan - a war against the USSR.
It should also be noted that the question of surrender was never raised by the Supreme Commander-in-Chief I.V. Stalin, the Stavka quite soberly analyzed and calculated the current martial law. In any case, in the first months of the war there was no panic at the main headquarters of the armies; alarmists were shot on the spot.
In mid-July 1941, the initial period of the war ended. Due to a number of subjective and objective factors, the Soviet troops suffered serious losses in manpower and equipment. As a result of heavy fighting, using air supremacy, the German armed forces by that moment had reached the borders of the Western Dvina and the middle reaches of the Dnieper, advancing to a depth of 300 to 600 km and inflicting major defeats on the Red Army, especially on the formations of the Western Front. In other words, the priority tasks of the Wehrmacht were completed. But the tactics of "blitzkrieg" still failed.
The Germans met with fierce resistance from the retreating troops. The troops of the NKVD and the border guards were especially distinguished. Here, for example, are the testimonies of a former German sergeant who participated in the attacks on the 9th outpost of the border town of Przemysl: “... The fire was terrible! We left a lot of corpses on the bridge, but we never took possession of it right away. Then the commander of my battalion gave the order to ford the river on the right and left in order to surround the bridge and capture it whole. But as soon as we rushed into the river, the Russian border guards began to pour fire on us here too. The losses were terrible ... Seeing that the plan was frustrated, the battalion commander ordered to open fire from 80-mm mortars. Only under their cover did we begin to infiltrate onto the Soviet coast ... We could not move further as quickly as our command wanted. The Soviet border guards had firing points along the coastline. They sat down in them and shot literally to the last bullet ... Nowhere, never have we seen such stamina, such military tenacity ... They preferred death to the possibility of captivity or retreat ... "
Heroic actions made it possible to buy time for the approach of the 99th Infantry Division of Colonel N.I. Dementyev. Active resistance to the enemy continued.
As a result of stubborn fighting, according to US intelligence services, in December 1941, Germany lost 1.3 million people killed in the war against the USSR, and by March 1943, the Wehrmacht’s losses amounted to 5.42 million people (information declassified by the American side in our time ).
Yakutia 1941. What was the contribution of the peoples of the Yakut ASSR to the fight against Nazi Germany? Our losses. Heroic fighters of the Olonkho Land.
As you know, since 2013, the scientific work "History of Yakutia" has been prepared. Researcher at the Institute for Humanitarian Research and Problems of Indigenous Peoples of the North SB RAS Marianna Gryaznukhina, the author of the chapter of this scientific work, which refers to the human losses of the Yakut people during the Great Patriotic War, kindly provided the following data: the population of the Yakut Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic in 1941, on the eve of the war, was 419 thousand Human. 62 thousand people were called up and went to the front as volunteers.
However, this cannot be called the exact number of Yakuts who fought for their homeland. Several hundred people by the beginning of the war were serving in the army, a certain number studied at military schools. Therefore, the number of Yakutians who fought can be considered from 62 to 65 thousand people.
Now about human losses. In recent years, a figure has been called - 32 thousand Yakutians, but it also cannot be considered accurate. According to the demographic formula, they did not return to the regions from the war, about 30% of those who fought died. It should be taken into account that 32 thousand did not return to the territory of Yakutia, however, some of the soldiers and officers remained to live in other regions of the country, some returned late, until the 1950s. Therefore, the number of residents of Yakutia who died at the front is approximately 25 thousand people. Of course, this is a huge loss for the small population of the republic.
In general, the contribution of the Yakut people to the fight against the "brown plague" is huge and has not yet been fully studied. Many became combat commanders, showed military skills, dedication, courage in battles, for which they were awarded high military awards. Residents of the Khangalassky district of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) fondly remember General Prituzov (Pripuzov) Andrey Ivanovich. Member of the First World War, commander of the 61st Guards Slavic Red Banner Division. The division fought through Romania, part of Austria and ended its journey in Bulgaria. The military general found his eternal rest in his native Pokrovsk.
How not to remember on the eve of Victory Day about the Yakut snipers - two of which were included in the legendary top ten snipers of the Second World War. This is Yakut Fedor Matveevich Okhlopkov, on whose personal account 429 killed Nazis. Before becoming a sniper, he destroyed several dozen Nazis with a machine gun and machine gun. And Fedor Matveyevich received the Hero of the Soviet Union only in 1965. Legendary person!
The second is Evenk Ivan Nikolaevich Kulbertinov- 489 killed Nazis. He taught sniper business to young soldiers of the Red Army. Originally from the village of Tyanya, Olekminsky district.
It should be noted that until the end of 1942, the Wehrmacht command missed the opportunity of a sniper war, for which they paid dearly. During the war, the Nazis began to hastily learn sniper art from captured Soviet military training films and memos for snipers. At the front, they used the same Soviet captured Mosin and SVT rifles. Only by 1944 did the Wehrmacht military units include trained snipers.
Our colleague, a lawyer, Honored Lawyer of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia) passed the worthy path of a soldier-front-line soldier Yuri Nikolaevich Zharnikov. He began his military career as an artilleryman, in 1943 he retrained as a T-34 driver, his tank was hit twice, the hero himself received severe shell shock. On his account, dozens of military victories, hundreds of killed enemies, a large number of broken and burned enemy heavy equipment, including German tanks. As Yuri Nikolayevich recalled, the calculation of enemy losses was carried out by the commander of a tank unit, and his concern was the constant maintenance of the mechanical part of the combat vehicle. For military exploits, Yu.N. Zharnikov was awarded many orders and medals, which he was proud of. Today, Yuri Nikolayevich is not among us, but we, the lawyers of Yakutia, keep his memory in our hearts.
Results of the Great Patriotic War. Losses of the German armed forces. The ratio of the losses of Nazi Germany and its direct allies with the losses of the Red Army
Let us turn to the latest publications of a prominent Russian military historian Igor Ludwigovich Garibyan, who did a tremendous amount of statistical work, studying not only Soviet sources, but also captured archival documents of the Wehrmacht General Staff.
According to Wilhelm Keitel, Chief of Staff of the Wehrmacht High Command - OKW, Germany lost 9 million soldiers killed on the Eastern Front, 27 million were seriously wounded (without the possibility of returning to duty), went missing, were captured, all this is united by the concept of "irretrievable losses ".
Historian Gharibian counted German losses from OKW's 10-day reports, and the following figures were obtained:
Germans and Austrians killed during hostilities - 7,541,401 people (data as of April 20, 1945);
Missing - 4,591,511 people.
Total irretrievable losses - 17,801,340 people, including disabled people, prisoners who died from diseases.
These figures refer to only two countries - Germany and Austria. This does not take into account the losses of Romania, Hungary, Finland, Slovakia, Croatia and other countries that fought against the USSR.
Thus, nine million Hungary lost only 809,000 soldiers and officers killed in the war against the Red Army, mostly young people aged 20 to 29 years. 80,000 civilians died in the fighting. Meanwhile, in the same Hungary in 1944, on the eve of the collapse of the fascist regime, 500,000 Hungarian Jews and Gypsies were exterminated, about which the Western media prefer to be "shamefully" silent.
Summing up, we must admit that the USSR actually had to fight one on one (in 1941-1943) with all of Europe, except for England. All factories in France, Poland, Belgium, Sweden, Norway, Finland, and Italy worked for the war. The Wehrmacht was provided not only with military materials, but also with the manpower of Germany's direct allies.
As a result, the Soviet people, showing the will to win, mass heroism both on the battlefield and in the rear, defeated the enemy and defended the Fatherland from the “brown plague” of the 20th century.
The article is dedicated to the memory of my grandfather - Stroev Gavril Egorovich, a resident of the Batamay village of the Ordzhonikidzevsky district of the Yakut Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic, the chairman of the Zarya collective farm, who died heroically in the Great Patriotic War in 1943, and all the Yakuts who did not return from the war.
Yuri PRIPUZOV,
President of the Yakut Republican
bar association "Petersburg",
Honored Lawyer of the Republic of Sakha (Yakutia).
