Figure 1.--

The Soviet Union at the time of the NAZI invasion had suceeded in regaining almost all of the old Tsarist empire. The primary exceptions were Finland and NAZI-occupied Poland. The core of the country was the Russian-Slavic hearland, but the Tsaeist/Soviet empire was the last great European empire. It contained millions of peoples who were not Russin and hd their own aspirations for statehood or at least autonomy. Two decades of Communism had created an even greater desire for independence as a result of the Soviet aetheism campaign and the supression of the various nationalities. The collectivization campaign and the Soviet orcestrated famine in the Ukraine created even further resentment. Some of the anti-Soviet feeling was of historc origins. Some of it was relatively recent such as the NKVD operations in the Baltic republics after they were annexed to the Soviet Union (1940). This was part of a series of agreesions made possivble by the NAZI-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact. As a result, many of these peoples had mixed loyalties. Many remained loyal to the Soviet Union. Other saw the Germans as potential liberators. While feeling was especially high among the non-Russian nationalities, there were also many Russians oppsed to Bolshevism and Stalin. A captured Red Army general helped form the Russian Liberatin Army (ROA). Few of these people who decided to make common cause with the Germans understood the nature of the NAZI state or the biolgical genecide that Hitler envisioned for the Slavs. Nor did the Non-Slavs understand where they stood in the NAZI race system or te consequences if the Germans had won the War. Some of the peoples most affected were the Baltic peoples, Chechans, Cossaks, Tartars, Ukranians, and Volga Germans. Berfore, during, and after the War these people sffered terrible reprisals. The full story may never be known because of lack of historical access to Soviet archives.

Russian Liberation Army (ROA)

The Russian Liberation Army (Русская Освободительная Армия--ROA) was the anti-Soviet forces that fought with the NAZIs after the German invasion of the Soviet Union (June 1941). The ROA was also known as the Vlasov Army, but Vlasov led only one part of the overall anti-Soviet groups that fought with the NAZIs. The ROA was not part of the initial NAZI planning for Barbarossa. Hitler was planning not only a military campaign in the east, but a war of extinction. Hitler's objective, however, was eventually Holocaust for the Slavic people of the Soviet Union. Only when Red Army resistance stiffened was the idea of a ROA given any real consideration. NAZI propaganda did not focus on the racial component, but rather rather stresses a campaign against Bolshevism. As a result, the NAZIs could recruit Russians and other Soviet peoples to their cause. The major ROA leader was former Red Army general Andrey Vlasov. He tried to unite all anti-Soviet Russians and other nationalities in opposing Stalin. Many were volunteers recruited from the POW camps which in the case of Soviet POWs were virtual death camps. The ROA also included eastern workers (Ostarbeiters) and Russian emigrés (even including anticommunist White Army veterans of the Russian Civil War).

Nationalities

The Soviet Union at the time of the NAZI invasion had suceeded in regaining almost all of the old Tsarist empire. The primary exceptions were Finland and NAZI-occupied Poland. The core of the country was the Russian-Slavic hearland, but the Tsaeist/Soviet empire was the last great European empire. It contained millions of peoples who were not Russin and hd their own aspirations for statehood or at least autonomy. Two decades of Communism had created an even greater desire for independence as a result of the Soviet aetheism campaign and the supression of the various nationalities. The collectivization campaign and the Soviet orcestrated famine in the Ukraine created even further resentment. Some of the anti-Soviet feeling was of historc origins. Some of it was relatively recent such as the NKVD operations in the Baltic republics after they were annexed to the Soviet Union (1940). This was part of a series of agreesions made possivble by the NAZI-Soviet Non-Aggression Pact. As a result, many of these peoples had mixed loyalties. Many remained loyal to the Soviet Union. Other saw the Germans as potential liberators. Some of the peoples most affected were the Baltic peoples, Chechans, Cossaks, Tartars, Ukranians, and Volga Germans. Berfore, during, and after the War these people sffered terrible reprisals. We are not sure about the Armenians. A Dutch reader writes, "I myself as a boy saw and talked with an Armenian in a German uniform during the German occupation of the Netherlands. He came from Yerivan in the Caucasus Mountains and he looked typical Near-Eastern. How he got into that German uniform and what he was doing in Holland I don't know. He spoke German quite well."

Muslims

Muslim populations were brought into the Russian Empire between 17th and 19th centuries by a series ot Tsars beginning with Catherine the Great. With World War I and the Revolution, Muslims attended to break free of the Russians. There were efforts to form independent Muslim states which were assisted by the Turks and their German allies. The Young Turks dreamed of a Greater Turkey Sultanate. An Islamic Army appeared in the Caucasus, made up of Azeris, Ajars, and other Caucasian Muslims. They were assisted by a Turkish army commanded by Nuri Pasha, firmly committed to Pan-Turanian ideas. They besieged non-Muslims towns in the Caucasus and starved them into submissions. Some participated in the Armenian Genocide. With the Revolution and the collapse of Tsarist military power, Muslims rose up in Central Asia. The free government of Turkestan was announced in Central Asia. The Emirs of Khiva and Bukhara proclaimed their independence. The Turkish-Tartar peoples in Crimea and the Volga Basin rose up. This occurred after the fall of the Tsar and the commencement of the Civil war. The Bolshevicks emerged victorious from the Civil war and deployed the Red Army in the rebelious areas to being them back under Russian control--now Societ rather thsn Tsarist. The Muslim population simmered, some resisting Stalin's collectivization and atheist campaigns. Stalin's Soviet Union was an atheist state which waged a ceasless campaign against religion. Much of the campaign was focused on the Orthodox Church of Russia. Churches were destoyed or defiled and priests arrested and sent to the Gulag. Other religions were also attacked, including Islam which wascwell estanlished in the Caucauses and Central Asia. These attacks caused considerable resentment, but Muslims were powerless to confront the NKVD and Red Army. One attempt occurred in Chechnya. Hasan Israilov, a forner cimmisar, led an uprising which was ruthlessly supresssed. Muslim acquiessence changed when NAZI Germany invaded the Soviet Unioin (June 22, 1941). Barbarossa and the approach of the NAZIs there came the apportunity of resisting Soviet domination. Muslims were not the only Soviet citizens welcoming the NAZIs. There was considerable rejoicing in both the Baltics and western Uukraine. Catholics in the Ukraine also welcomed the NAZIs. The other major group was Muslims. The first Soviet Muslims to come in contact with the NAZIs were the vast number of Red Army soldiers taken prisioner in the opening phase of Barbarossa. The NAZIs were stopped at Vostock-on-Don in 1941, but the Wheremacht 1942 summer offensive took the Germans into the Crimea and the Caucases.

NAZI Racism

Few of these people who decided to make common cause with the Germans understood the nature of the NAZI state or the biolgical genecide that Hitler envisioned for the Slavs. Nor did the Non-Slavs understand where they stood in the NAZI race system or the consequences if the Germans had won the War. The NAZIs were so anxious to seize Ukranian resources that they made it obvious how they regarded the Slavic Ukranians. They were more subtle in their dealings with the Muslim natinlities.

Deportations

Stalin ordered the forced resettlement of large numbers of non-Russisn Soviet citizens before, during, and after World War II. After seizing eastern Poland and the Baltic republics (Estonia, Latviam and Lithuania), large numbers were arrested and their families deported. During the War large numbers of people, mostly Muslims were forcibly resettled to isolated areas of the Soviet Union. One estimate suggests over 1.5 million people. Those deported included Volga Germans and seven nationalities grom the Crimea and the northern Caucasus were deported (the Crimean Tatars, Kalmyks, Chechens, Ingush, Balkars, Karachai, and Meskhetians. There were also other minorities evicted from the Black Sea coastal region (Bulgarians, Greeks, and Armenians). Stalin was concerned about resistance to Soviet rule, desores for independence, and collaboration with the NAZIs. The possibility of a German attack was given as the reason for resettling the ethnically mixed population of Mtskheta, in southwestern Georgia. The Balkars were reportedly disciplined because it was alleged that they sent a white horse as a gift to Adolf Hitler. The KGB and other security forces rounded up and transported the deportees mostly railroad cargo to isolated areas in Kazakhstan, Kirgizia, Siberia, Uzbekistan. These were not well planned deportations. Little arrangements were made to recieve them. Most accounts suggest that about 40 percent of the deportees perished. The Crimean Tatars had an especially horrendous experience. About half died of hunger in the first 18 after having been deportment. After the War there were deportments of Poles to the Poland. Large numbers of people were deported from the former Baltic republics after they were retaken from the NAZIs (1944). There had been some colaboration with the NAZIs in the Ukraine, but there was no large scale deportment, probably because of the number of people involved. After Stalin's death (1953), Nikita Khrushchev began the Destalinization process with a speech at the 20th Party Congress (February 1956). He condemned the deportations as a violation of Leninist principles.

Created: 5:15 PM 11/19/2007
Last updated: 1:03 AM 7/26/2009