German soldiers on the eastern front

the germans captured hundreds of thousands of russians early in the war ,many who were willing to fight their own countrymen to rid russia of the bolshevics , also, serving in the german army would allow them to eat ,always a good thing...at wars end they were promptly turned over to the tender mercies of the nkvd and all their worldly cares were soon put to rest .

 

A bit of correction
Slovines? You probably mean Slovakians. There were Slovenes in the wehrmacht but those were forcibly mobilised in their area of occupation which was annexed to the reich. Same goes for Poles.

I agree that Italians fought well but were undereqipped and unders supplied.

No. Volga Germanci ( Volga Germans) were mostly sent to exile (Sibiria) some however did fight in the RKKA.

Some did collaborate willingly others changed their mind after "thender mercies" of Wehrmacht. Once they collaborated there was no road back.
From Axis history forum topic with translations from Christian Gerlach, Kalkulierte Morde dealing with murder of soviet POW's in Bielorusian republic alone:
http://forum.axishistory.com/viewtopic.php?t=8034

Perhaps thet could also explain Soviet attitudes to german POW's and civilians later on.

 

Likely enough. The fighting on the Eastern Front reached levels of savagery that were never matched anywhere else in the ETO, with neither the Wehrmacht nor the Red Army winning any humanitarian awards as far as their treatment of POWs or enemy civilians went.

 

the germans reaped what they sowed in russia .

 

Yep! They sure did!

 

IVE HEARD THAT russian pows repatriated to their homeland after the war did not fare so well either .anyone have any figures on the numbers who died in camps behind the iron curtain post war ,anyone?

 

That depends. For example VVS maj. Bychkov (HSU) who was a propaganda tool for ROA (Vlassov's army) was investigated, cleared and released from the miitary service in 1948. Basicly the returned POW's from german POW camps ussualy had no big problems. They were however relativly qickly demobilised. And there was stigma attached to them.

Those who were cought wearing german uniform were in many cases excecuted or sent to Sibiria. Especcialy in Austria Brits were turning over also large number of poeple not eliagble for "repatriation" ( like german component of von Panwitz's 15. cossack cavalery corps, old emigrees ( from 1917)... Even among those many survived. From 6 higher officers "repatriated" in Austria only one was eligable for repatriation under the Jalta treaty (T.I.Domanov), reast were either old czarist/white officers/leaders ( gen.S.N.Krasnov, P.N. Krasnov, gen. A.G. Shkuro, sultan Kljch Girey -leader of caucassian units ) or germans (gen. d. cavalerie Helmut von Panwitz commander of 15. cossack corps)

Among german POW's in the POW camps moratility was not as high as it was belived. Most of them died right after capture (summary executions) in the transport and first months after capture. Stalingrad example is notable here as Soviets simply didn't imagine that there would be such huge number of POW's and that they will be in such horrible state due to hunger. Also if you werw an SS trooper your chancehes of survival after the capture were small indeed (if captured by Soviets, french or american)

One also has to account for the non gemans fighting in wehrmacht who changed sides ( croat regiment captured in Staligrad, thousands of Slovenes, Poles, Czehs, Slovakians...) and were later killed fighting the germans. Also the basic equasion for calculating POW deaths is wrong ( number of entire grerman army - deaths on the field - returned from the west - returned from SSSR = dead in SSSR).

 

thats a good point about the stalingrad pows ,tiso , by the time they surrendered most were likely so starved and worn out that they would have died like flys regardless of whose pow cage they entered . and the russians were hard pressed to feed their own soldiers in 42.

we see pictures / movies of scarcrow prisoners who lived to see liberation from burma or aushwitcz in 45 and we assume that they have been saved ,actually they would usually expire in the next weeks or months despite good food and care because of liver ,kidney failure ect.

 

some of this is true...by april 43 50,000 of the 90,000 plus captured were dead..the forced march to the camps across the frozen steppes didnt help nor did the typhus epidemic that swept the camps on arrival.