Who fought with the Germans in Crimea. Crimea during the Second World War - history in photographs. Barbaric destruction of objects

MINISTRY OF EDUCATION AND SCIENCE OF THE RUSSIAN FEDERATION

GBOU HE RK "Crimean Engineering and Pedagogical University"

Faculty of Engineering and Technology

Department of Technology and Fashion Design and Professional Pedagogy

Essay

« Crimea during the Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945»

Performed:

1st year student,

groups TDO-15

Eredzhepova Feruze

Simferopol 2015

The Great Patriotic War in Crimea.

1941-1945

The title of a city of Russian glory is not given just like that. Sevastopol received it not for the beautiful name that Catherine the Great gave it, and not for the beautiful view of the sea waves. This title is sprinkled with the blood of Russian soldiers and sailors - and in more than one war. In each of them, Crimeans, soldiers, sailors of Russia, demonstrated miracles of heroism, perseverance and courage. One of the most striking episodes showing the fighting spirit of the Crimeans was the Great Patriotic War.

Our entire history clearly demonstrates that enemies can defeat the Russian world only during great unrest. It was in this way that during the First World War, during the civil war, German troops came to Crimea. Russia was strong - the German generals did not even think about such success in their wildest dreams. In World War II, Hitler planned in advance the occupation of the peninsula. The calculation was twofold - for the “invincible Wehrmacht” and for sowing discord within the peoples of the Soviet Union. Only the order in which the German army appeared in Crimea in 1918 and 1941 was fundamentally different. During the Civil War, the German army entered Crimea with virtually no resistance - the reason for this was discord in Russia. During the Great Patriotic War, the Nazis came to Crimea after bloody battles, after the heroic defense of Sevastopol, which lasted 250 days. And only after this they began to sow discord, divide and conquer.

In the plans of the leadership of the Third Reich, Crimea was of strategic importance both for taking control of the Black Sea and for the subsequent attack on the Caucasus. That is why during the occupation of the peninsula by the Germans, significant human and material resources were used. The struggle for Crimea lasted for three years, which we can roughly divide into three periods:

The Fuhrer had very specific plans for the “pearl of Russia,” as Catherine II once lovingly nicknamed Crimea. Hitler decided that the peninsula should be settled by Germans and annexed directly to Germany, turned into "Gotenland", the country of the Goths. Thus, the Fuhrer, who knew history, wanted to emphasize the continuity of the “Aryan race” in Crimea, and at the same time directly control the most important bridgehead of the Black Sea. Simferopol was supposed to be renamed Gothenburg, and Sevastopol - Theodorichshafen. Subsequently, the SS even sent an expedition to the Crimean fortress of Mangup, where there was once the capital of the principality of Theodoro, destroyed by the Turks in 1475. Of course, as a result of the expedition, the local SS Fuhrer L. von Alvensleben found out that the Mangup fortress, along with many other cities on the southern coast of Crimea, was built by the Goths. That is, by the Germans, which “gave the right to return” Crimea to the jurisdiction of the heirs of this German tribe. On the eve of the war, one of Hitler's most important ideologists, Alfred Rosenberg, drew up a plan for the future occupation of the territory of the USSR. According to it, five Reichskommissariats were to manage the occupied lands: “Muscovy”, “Ostland” (Baltic states and Belarus), “Ukraine” (with Crimea), “Caucasus” and “Turkestan”. As you know, the Nazi blitzkrieg failed, so the Reich managed to create only two Reichskommissariats - “Ukraine” and “Ostland”. The German leadership understood that it was impossible to govern the occupied territories solely by military force, without using political methods. One of these methods was playing on national contradictions. Rosenberg planned that Crimea would become part of “Great Ukraine” under the name “Tavria”. He understood that it was only a stretch to classify Crimea as Ukraine, since the number of Ukrainians living on the peninsula was negligible. In order to somehow solve the problem, Rosenberg proposed evicting all Russians, Tatars and Jews from the peninsula. In this he followed the will of Hitler, who on July 16, 1941, at a meeting of the political leadership of the Third Reich, declared that Crimea “must be cleared of all strangers and populated by Germans.” At the same time, it should be controlled directly from Berlin, and its annexation to Ukraine should be of a purely technical nature.

The Great Patriotic War, which began on June 22, 1941, quickly reached Crimea. Already on September 24, 1941, seven German divisions, together with the Romanian corps as part of the 11th German Army of Army Group South under the command of General Erich von Manstein, began an attack on Crimea from the territory of occupied Ukraine through the Perekop Isthmus. With the help of artillery and aviation, in two days of battles they manage to break through the Turkish Wall and occupy Armyansk. With the forces of one cavalry and two rifle divisions, the Red Army task force under the command of Lieutenant General P. I. Batov goes on a counteroffensive. Due to the complete consumption of ammunition and large losses among the personnel of the divisions, Manstein decides to temporarily suspend the offensive on the peninsula. On October 18, 1941, three divisions of the 11th German Army attacked the Ishun positions, which were defended by coastal batteries and units of the Black Sea Fleet. After ten days of bloody battles, Manstein manages to break through the defenses of the Soviet troops. As a result, our Primorsky Army retreats to Sevastopol, and the 51st Army, previously transferred to Crimea from Odessa, retreats to Kerch, from where it is later evacuated to the Taman Peninsula. On October 30, 1941, the heroic defense of Sevastopol begins.

The first attempts of the German army to take the city "by raid" failed. At that time, the Sevastopol defensive region had excellent fortifications, which included two coastal defense batteries with 305-mm large-caliber guns. Consisting of the marines of the Black Sea Fleet, the garrison of Sevastopol, after being reinforced by the Primorsky Army, numbered about 50 thousand people with 500 guns. Powerful defenses allowed the Soviet army to defend the city for a year.

On December 17, 1941, the second assault on Sevastopol began. The city was subjected to severe bombing by German aircraft. The city's air defense was not prepared for such a turn of events, so the defenders suffered heavy losses.

Despite the fact that the Nazis managed to wedge into the Sevastopol defenses in the area of ​​the Mekenzi Heights, they were never able to make a breach in it. This was facilitated by the above-mentioned coastal defense batteries. Then the Germans delivered to the battlefield more powerful heavy guns of 420 and 600 mm calibers, as well as the unique Dora super-heavy railway artillery gun developed by Krupp. It fired 53 seven-ton (!) shells at the Sevastopol forts. It didn’t help - the city held on.

Moreover, even at the moment when the Germans were on the outskirts of Moscow, the Soviet command tried to seize the initiative from the enemy and carried out active operations in the Crimea. On December 26, 1941, a large landing was landed in Kerch and Feodosia. The 44th and 51st armies of the Transcaucasian Front and the Black Sea Fleet took part in it. The landing conditions were not just difficult, but, one might say, inhuman. A storm was raging on the cold December sea. The shore was covered with a crust of ice, which prevented the approach of ships. At the same time, the fleet did not have special means for unloading heavy equipment and delivering troops to an unequipped shore. Transport and fishing vessels were used for these purposes. Nevertheless, through incredible efforts, the landing operation was carried out. The main forces of the 44th Army under the command of General A.N. Pervushin landed in the port of Feodosia, and units of the 51st Army of General V.N. Lvov landed on the northeastern coast of the Kerch Peninsula. The Germans began to retreat: Feodosia was liberated on December 29, Kerch on the 30th, and by the end of January 2, 1942, the Kerch Peninsula was completely liberated from the invaders. Erich von Manstein believed that the fate of the German troops at that moment “hanged by a thread.”

The activity of the Red Army did not stop there. The Black Sea Fleet marine corps landing in Yevpatoria on January 5, 1942, with the help of rebel townspeople, drove out the Romanian garrison. But even here the victory did not last long - two days later the reserves brought up by the Germans defeated the marine battalion. In mid-January, the Soviet front was broken through - the Germans captured Feodosia.

Despite the initial success of the Red Army in Kerch, it was not possible to develop the offensive. On February 27, 1942, the Crimean Front (formed near Kerch after the landing of the 44th, 47th and 51st armies) together with the Primorsky Army (under the command of General I.E. Petrov), located in Sevastopol, went on the offensive. Bloody battles continued for several months. And on May 7, 1942, the Germans launched Operation Bustard Hunt. The commander of the 11th Army, General Manstein, planned to defeat our troops, leaving them no opportunity to evacuate through the Kerch Strait. The weakest place in the defense of the Crimean Front was chosen for the strike - the narrow, 5-kilometer coast of the Feodosia Gulf. Here is what Manstein said about this operation in his memoirs: “The idea was to deliver a decisive blow not directly on the protruding arc of the enemy’s front, but in the southern sector, along the Black Sea coast, that is, in the place where the enemy, “Apparently, he least expected it.” Especially to support the Wehrmacht in the air, units of the 4th Luftwaffe Air Fleet under the command of General von Richthofen were transferred to Crimea. Despite its large numbers (about 308 thousand people), the Crimean Front was poorly controlled and therefore was not ready for an enemy attack. Having carried out a diversionary attack in the south along the Black Sea coast, Manstein, with the help of one tank division, penetrated the entire defense line right up to the Azov coast, opening the way for the Wehrmacht infantry. In ten days, from May 8 to May 18, 1942, one tank division and five infantry divisions defeated the Crimean Front, the total losses of which were enormous: 162 thousand people, almost 5 thousand guns, about 200 tanks, 400 aircraft, 10 thousand vehicles. The reason for such a catastrophic defeat lies in the mediocrity of the commanders of the Crimean Front. As stated in a special order from the Headquarters, the defeat was largely due to the serious mistakes of the commander of the Crimean Front, General D. T. Kozlov and the representative of the Headquarters, L. Z. Mehlis. For which they were both removed from their positions. On May 9, 1942, shortly before the defeat of the Crimean Front, Stalin sent Mehlis a telegram with the following content:

“Crimean Front, Comrade Mehlis:

I received your encryption number 254. You hold the strange position of an outside observer who is not responsible for the affairs of the Crimean Front. This position is very convenient, but it is completely rotten. On the Crimean Front, you are not an outside observer, but a responsible representative of Headquarters, responsible for all the successes and failures of the front and obliged to correct command errors on the spot. You, together with the command, are responsible for the fact that the left flank of the front turned out to be extremely weak. If “the whole situation showed that the enemy would advance in the morning” and you did not take all measures to organize a resistance, limited to passive criticism, then so much the worse for you. This means that you still do not understand that you were sent to the Crimean Front not as State Control, but as a responsible representative of Headquarters. You demand that we replace Kozlov with someone like Hindenburg. But you cannot help but know that we do not have Hindenburgs in reserve. Your affairs in Crimea are not complicated, and you could handle them yourself. If you had used attack aircraft not for secondary purposes, but against enemy tanks and manpower, the enemy would not have broken through the front and the tanks would not have gotten through. You don’t need to be Hindenburg to understand this simple thing while sitting on the Crimean Front for 2 months.

STALIN. Central Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks 9.V.42.”

Our army was just learning to fight. This is 1942, not 1941. There is no surprise, but Manstein crushes Kozlov. Do we know the great commander Kozlov? No. But Zhukov, Rokossovsky and many other famous military leaders will begin to become the creators of our Victory precisely from 1942. We fought worse in Crimea, and this unpleasant truth must be recognized. The prerequisite for the defeat of our army in Crimea is solely the inability of the commander to conduct combat operations properly...

Meanwhile, after the liquidation of the Crimean Front, the Germans were able to concentrate all their forces on the assault on Sevastopol. On June 7, 1942, the third, final and decisive assault on the city begins. It was preceded by a five-day bombing and shelling. The defenders did not have enough fighter aircraft, as well as shells for anti-aircraft artillery, which caused large losses - in some brigades only 30-35% of the personnel remained. In addition, the Germans, who dominated the air, sank transport ships approaching the city, thereby depriving the defenders of Sevastopol of ammunition and food. On June 17, after bloody battles, the Germans reached the foot of Sapun Mountain in the south and at the same time the foot of the Mekenzi Heights in the north of the city. Since the city was more fortified from the south, Manstein organized a surprise attack on the Northern Bay on the night of June 29 - German soldiers secretly crossed into the bay in inflatable boats. The height dominating the city, Malakhov Kurgan, was taken by the Germans on June 30. As in the Crimean War, the capture of Malakhov Kurgan became the final chord of the defense of Sevastopol. The defenders' ammunition, as well as drinking water, were running out, so the commander of the defense, Vice Admiral F. S. Oktyabrsky, received permission from Headquarters to evacuate the top and senior command staff of the army and navy from the peninsula with the help of aviation. The rest continued the selfless fight.

The heroic defense of Sevastopol, the main base of the Black Sea Fleet, lasted 250 days and nights. On July 1, 1942, the resistance of the defenders of Sevastopol was broken, and only isolated groups of Soviet soldiers and sailors fought over the next couple of weeks. The loss of Crimea changed the situation both on the Black Sea and on the southern flank of the Soviet-German front. The path to the Caucasus through the Kerch Strait was open to the German invaders. The German army was at the zenith of its power - the Germans were marching towards Stalingrad. To find themselves completely defeated and demoralized in the Stalingrad cauldron in six months...

Crimea was finally occupied by the Germans after the last defenders of Sevastopol fell or were captured. But the occupation should not be perceived as a one-time action. As German troops advanced across the peninsula behind the front line, occupation departments were created. Formally, the General District "Crimea", which was part of the Reichskommissariat "Ukraine", was created on September 1, 1941. It was headed by Erich Koch, whose residence was in the city of Rovno. The General District “Crimea” was governed by the General Commissariat under the command of A. Frauenfeld. Since until the summer of 1942 the territory of the Crimea district was the rear of the active army, problems were observed with the implementation of the planned administrative-territorial structure. Until General Manstein's 11th Army left Crimea in August-September 1942, the peninsula was under dual control: civilian and military. The first was only nominal, and the second was real. This state of affairs led to the fact that the center of the general district was moved from Simferopol to Melitopol, and the administrative unit itself received the name “Tavria” general district. Therefore, in historiography you can often find the combined name of the district “Crimea - Tavria”.

In the occupied territory of Crimea, the Nazis deployed their instruments of terror. In this sense, Crimea was no different from Belarus, Ukraine or Latvia, where immediately after the arrival of the “German liberators,” mass executions began and concentration camps were built. During their stay in Crimea, the Nazis shot 72 thousand Crimeans and tortured more than 18 thousand in prisons and camps. In addition to the civilian population, 45 thousand Soviet military personnel who were captured were destroyed. The local “Dachau” was the state farm near Simferopol “Red”, which was converted into a death camp. It held both Soviet prisoners of war and residents of Crimea. During the occupation, daily executions alone took the lives of more than 8 thousand people.

“According to eyewitnesses, a barbaric regime reigned in the camp. With exhausting and long hours of work, a loaf of bread was given per day for 6-8 people and one liter of gruel consisting of water and a small amount of barley bran. People were used as horse-drawn transport, they were harnessed to carts and carts loaded with stone and earth. When there was no work, prisoners were forced to drag stones and earth from one place to another and back. For offenses, prisoners were beaten with sticks and whips made of wire and bull skin... On the night of April 10-12, 1944, from 8 pm to 3 am, German executioners took prisoners out one by one and in small groups threw them alive into a well up to 24 meters deep . During the autopsy of the recovered bodies, only 10 people were found to have bullet wounds. A medical examination of the remaining recovered corpses (60 people) established that they were thrown into the well alive. About 200 corpses remained unextracted from that well... On November 2, 1943, at least 1,200 corpses were taken out of the camp; two kilometers from the camp in a gully in Dubki, they were doused with flammable substances and burned. When the commission examined the burning site, it was established that in the ravine in Dubki the burning of the corpses of civilians was carried out repeatedly in the period 1942-1943. The field where the burning took place is an area of ​​340 square meters. m. Burnt human bones, metal parts of clothing, and pieces of resin were found here.

At the direction of local residents, the commission found and examined the second place where prisoners from the camp were burned, at the end of the garden of the Krasny state farm, near the poultry farm, an area of ​​about 300 square meters. m where material evidence was found, as at the above-described burning site.

In addition, over 20 pits filled with human corpses were discovered in the camp. The commission established that in the Dubki tract near the camp territory, citizens from the SD, field gendarmerie, as well as citizens captured during raids were systematically brought from the camp, who were driven in groups into caponiers, where they were shot. Many victims fell into the pits alive. Only in 4 pits fully examined by the commission, 415 corpses were found... 122 people were identified, among them a group of artists and workers of the Crimean State Theater. The relatives of the captured were informed that the prisoners were allegedly being sent to Sevastopol, and the murdered themselves were informed about the same. Knapsacks, pillows, and blankets were found in the pits with the corpses. In one of the pits, out of 211 corpses, 153 male corpses were found with their hands twisted backwards and tied with wire...”

As elsewhere with the Germans, local “elements” were used to guard the concentration camps. It is no secret that many Nazi death camps (in particular, Sobibor) were guarded by Ukrainian nationalists. According to evidence, the camp at the Krasny state farm, according to the same German “scheme,” was guarded by Tatar volunteers from the 152nd Shuma auxiliary police battalion. The Nazis began their favorite tactic of pitting peoples against each other, which we saw in full after the coup in Ukraine, during the tragedy unfolding in the South-East. Where the population was not multinational, other methods of division were used. That is why we see such strange things when in one Bryansk region, populated in rural areas mainly by Russians, there was the Lokotsky district and the Dyatkovo district. In the first, self-government and a brigade under the command of Kaminsky functioned, fighting against the partisans, and in the second, full-fledged Soviet power operated and the Germans did not interfere there at all. And this is within one Russian region! Some helped the Germans fight partisans and civilians, others destroyed the invaders. When Kaminsky’s brigade was formed in the Lokotsky region, helping the occupiers, atrocities were committed in the same Bryansk region, sometimes with the participation of ethnic Russians against ethnic Russians. Just a few numbers:

“For more than two years, the horror of the fascist occupation lasted on the Bryansk land. The Nazis created 18 concentration camps for prisoners of war and 8 death camps for civilians. Many villages were destroyed for connections with the partisans, and their inhabitants, including children and old people, were shot or burned alive. So, in the village of Boryatino, Kletnyansky district, on June 30, 1942, all the men and many women were shot - 104 people, five people were hanged. In the village of Vzdruzhnoe, Navlinsky district, on September 19, 1942, 132 people were shot and tortured, in the village of Worki, 137 people were shot and burned, in July 1942, all 125 residents of the village of Uprusy, Zhiryatinsky district, were shot.”

So if you tell the truth, then tell it all...

This is what the head of the USSR partisan movement P.K. Ponomarenko wrote to Stalin on August 18, 1942: “The Germans are using all means to attract to the fight against the partisans... contingents from our population of the occupied regions, creating from them military units, punitive and police detachments . By this they want to ensure that the partisans get stuck in a fight not with the Germans, but with formations from the local population... There is frenzied nationalist propaganda around the formations... This is accompanied by incitement of national hatred and anti-Semitism. Crimean Tatars, for example, received gardens, vineyards and tobacco plantations taken from Russians, Greeks, etc.”

Why did the Nazis decide to choose for information processing and began to be deliberately attentive specifically to the Crimean Tatars, whom it is extremely difficult to call Aryans? The key to understanding the Nazis’ perception of the Crimean Tatars should be looked for in another country - Turkey. By providing patronage to the Crimean Tatar people, the leaders of the Third Reich were looking for an opportunity to drag Turkey into the war on the side of the Axis countries. For this purpose, Turkish delegations were invited to the peninsula several times. For the first time in October 1941, two Turkish generals came to Crimea - Ali Fuad Erden and Husnü Emir Erkilet. The official purpose of the trip was to get acquainted with the successes of the German troops. However, according to the memoirs of W. von Hentig, a representative of the Foreign Ministry of the Third Reich under the command of the 11th Army, they were least interested in military successes, but on the contrary, they were very active in the political intentions of the Germans regarding the Crimean Tatars. The second delegation from Turkey visited the peninsula during the period of its occupation by the Germans, on August 8, 1942. It even included members of the Turkish parliament, who were given a luxurious reception.

When it comes to collaboration during the Nazi occupation of Crimea, many remember only the Crimean Tatars through the efforts of Soviet propaganda. For the most part, this myth was a consequence of a national tragedy - the deportation of the Crimean Tatar people. However, it is worth noting that firstly, not all Crimean Tatars chose the path of collaboration. Secondly, not only the Crimean Tatars collaborated with the occupation administration. People who were active accomplices of the occupiers were appointed to the positions of heads of local self-government. Let's see who the Nazi appointees were. By the way, V. Maltsev was appointed to the post of Yalta burgomaster. The same one who, on the night of August 1, 1946, together with General Vlasov and other senior officers of the so-called “Russian Liberation Army” (ROA), was hanged in the courtyard of Butyrka prison. The head of the Simferopol city administration was also M. Kanevsky, a Russian by nationality. In Feodosia, the district administration was headed by the Ukrainian N. Andrzheevsky, and the city administration by the Russian V. Gruzinov, after him by the Belarusian I. Kharchenko.

Collaborationist military formations played a major role, helping the Wehrmacht in the fight against the Crimean partisans. Their number for the entire period of occupation was as follows: in Russian and Cossack units - about 5 thousand people, in Ukrainian units - about 3 thousand people, in parts of the eastern legions - about 7 thousand people and in Crimean Tatar formations - from 15 to 20 thousand Human.

Since June 1943, a recruitment point for the Vlasov “Russian Liberation Army” appeared on the peninsula. It should be said that he was not popular. If among the Crimean Tatars the Germans easily played on national contradictions, then of the Russians over the entire time they hardly managed to recruit only a few thousand people into the ranks of the ROA (including those languishing in concentration camps). And then, closer to the beginning of 1944, at least a third of them went over to the side of the partisans.

Thus, talking about collaboration among only Crimean Tatars is fundamentally wrong. It is also important to note that, according to the 1939 census, the Crimean Tatars were the second largest nationality of the peninsula - 19.4% (218,179 people) of the total population (Russians - 49.6%, 558,481 people). Therefore, based on the national policy that Rosenberg promoted, they were a priority even in comparison with the Ukrainians, of whom at that time there were only 13.7% on the territory of the peninsula. And the Germans directed their main efforts towards pitting Russians and Crimean Tatars against each other. However, not all representatives of the Crimean Tatar people chose this path. For example, the head of the Southern headquarters of the partisan movement, Comrade Seleznev, closer to the spring campaign of 1944 for the liberation of Crimea, said in a radiogram: “The atrocities, robberies, and violence of the Germans are aggravating and embittering the population of the occupied territories. Dissatisfaction with the occupiers is growing daily. The population awaits the arrival of the Red Army. It is characteristic that Crimean Tatars en masse become partisans" Thus, the commissar of the 4th partisan brigade was Mustafa Selimov. There were 501 Crimean Tatars in the brigade itself, which was approximately a quarter of its strength. In general, with the beginning of the Great Patriotic War, many Crimean Tatars stood up to defend our country along with its other peoples. In particular, Abdraim Reshidov served as commander of a bomber aviation regiment. During the entire war, he flew 222 combat missions and was awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. Fighter pilot Akhmet Khan Sultan personally shot down 30 German planes, for which he was twice awarded the title of Hero of the Soviet Union. 15 fascist tanks were knocked out by guns under the command of Seitnafe Seitveliev during the defense of Odessa, in the battles of Kerch and Sevastopol, in the Battle of Kursk and during Operation Bagration.

In November 1941, there were 27 partisan detachments in Crimea with a total number of 3,456 people. The leadership of the partisan movement was carried out by the headquarters of the Crimean partisan movement formed in October 1941. The headquarters was headed by Colonel A.V. Mokrousov. 27 partisan detachments operated in six districts, into which the entire territory of the peninsula was conditionally divided. The partisans fought hard and decisively, causing great inconvenience to the 11th Army. The commander of the 11th Army, Erich von Manstein, said this during interrogation at the Nuremberg Tribunal: “The partisans became a real threat from the moment we captured Crimea (in October-November 1941). There can be no doubt that in Crimea there was a very extensive partisan organization that had been created for a long time. Thirty fighter battalions... represented only part of this organization. The bulk of the partisans were in the Yayla mountains. There were probably many thousands of partisans there from the very beginning... But the partisan organization was by no means limited to those detachments that were located in the Yayla mountains. It had large bases and its assistants mainly in cities... The partisans tried to control our main communications. They attacked small units or single vehicles, and at night a single vehicle did not dare to appear on the road. Even during the day, the partisans attacked small units and single vehicles. In the end we had to create a system of sorts of convoys. All the time that I was in Crimea (until August 1942), we could not cope with the danger from the partisans. When I left Crimea, the fight with them was not over yet.”

At 13:00 On July 1, 1942, German soldiers hoisted a flag with a swastika over Panorama. And just four days later, the Ministry of Propaganda invited a group of journalists from neutral countries to Sevastopol. The newspaper “Voice of Crimea” published by the occupiers on July 10, 1942 stated: “The picture unfolding before us is one of chaos and destruction. With difficulty we make our way through the rubble cluttering the streets... Thick smoke envelops the city. The first inhabitants, mainly women and old people, begin to emerge from the cellars. You can see from them how glad they are that this horror is finally over... In the port, the tops of the masts of sunken military ships rise from the water... During the battles to capture Sevastopol from June 7 to July 4, 97,000 prisoners were taken, including the deputy commander General Novikov's army captured or destroyed 467 guns, 26 tanks, 824 machine guns, 758 grenade launchers, 86 anti-tank guns. Bolshevik losses ranged from 30 to 40 thousand people. Total losses of German troops: 872 officers, 23,239 non-commissioned officers and soldiers."

On July 9, the Germans began re-registration of the population in order to identify communists and Komsomol members, as well as to establish human reserves of the working population. At the same time, people were discovered who were ready to cooperate with the Germans. A very strict registration regime was established in Sevastopol, and each resident was obliged to register at his police station within 48 hours. If, during the check of documents in the house, at least one person did not have a residence permit, then all family members were shot.

The Germans introduced a curfew: in the autumn-winter period from 5 pm to 6 am, and in the spring-summer period from 8 pm to 6 am. Those detained by patrol during curfew and who did not have night passes were first checked by the police and then sent to forced labor for up to 10 days.

In Soviet times, our journalists and writers told so many monstrous lies about the German army that now we have to quote German sources more in order to distinguish ourselves from these liars. Alexei Tolstoy started lying back in 1941. Here he deliciously and knowledgeably describes how in the middle of the village a German soldier paws a fourteen-year-old plump Russian girl. And here is such a “truthful” film “Come and See”. Well, the “red count” was smart and cunning, and honestly worked on the mansion, dacha, car and antiques at a truly count level. And everyone else is just stupid hacks.

If soldiers of the European army in the 20th century, in front of the officers and with their consent, rape young girls and break the heads of babies, then in battle this unit will obviously not unconditionally obey those officers, but, speaking in Russian, will become an uncontrollable herd of savages.

Another question is that in order to carry out combat missions, the German command, as well as the command of the American and Red Armies, violated military law, that is, committed war crimes.

In Sevastopol, the Germans first of all wanted to put Sevmorzavod into operation. In this regard, the commandant of the Sevastopol fortress issued an order on July 16, 1942: “All workers, female workers and employees of enterprises must immediately report to their previous places of work. Persons who do not show up for work will be considered saboteurs and the strictest penalties will be applied to them: under wartime conditions - execution.

I especially draw the attention of the people who worked at the enterprise called “Marine Plant”. They are required to immediately report to the police department and receive the “Shipyard” stamp in their passport, since a ship repair yard will begin work in Sevastopol any day now. Those who do not appear within three days will be shot."

Obersturmbannführer SD Frick reported to the manager of the shipbuilding and ship repair enterprises of the South (Reichskommissariat “Ukraine” in Nikolaev) about the state of Sevmorzavod: “A cursory inspection of the enterprise has been carried out. The workshop buildings were destroyed and the equipment was taken away. The south side docks are destroyed. The dock on the north side is in better condition; the boat port is damaged, but can be restored. The slipways were on fire and were partially preserved. Morton's boathouse is blown up.

In order to avoid the mistakes that occurred during the capture of Nikolaev, I carried out a series of lightning-fast large and small actions to fix the workforce. Each identified employee of the enterprise received a receipt: “I confirm with my signature that I have received a message about mandatory attendance at work. I know that for failure to comply with the order, my house, yard and all property will be confiscated from me or my family. If I don’t show up for work, my house will be burned down and my relatives will be taken hostage.”

Each identified plant employee was taken to the commandant’s office and put in a car. Accompanied by soldiers, he drove around the fortress, indicating the location of at least three factory workers. After this, he received the right to return to his family. In this way, it has already been possible to identify more than three hundred specialists...

Conclusion: Russian workers have proven their ability to work effectively for the Bolshevik regime. There is no reason to believe that they will not be able to work just as effectively for the benefit of the Reich.

It is necessary: ​​without under any circumstances allowing the energetic rhythm we have set to slow down, to carry out a detailed inspection of the enterprise in the coming days, for which purpose we will send specialists from the Shipyards Administration. Pace, pace, pace - the condition that the mistakes made in Nikolaev will not spread like ulcers of sabotage in Sevastopol. Every Russian from the first day of the establishment of a new order should feel firm authority and a guiding hand. I must understand: we Germans - here and here - will not leave!

Immediately inspect the Russian cruiser, half-sunk in the bay as a result of the successful actions of our aviation. The name of this cruiser is "Chervona Ukraine", which means "Red Ukraine", "Bolshevik Ukraine", "Communist Ukraine". The restoration of the cruiser will strengthen our fleet on the Black Sea and dramatically increase the prestige of our ship repair services.

Immediately take all measures to lift and restore the 100-ton floating crane and floating dock flooded in the bay, for which purpose urgently organize two rescue teams consisting of specialists from the Shipyards Administration and Russian workers. Without lifting mechanisms and a dock, ship repairs are impossible...”

“We make every citizen of the city of Sevastopol responsible for the life and health of the German Army, for the elimination of all acts of sabotage, such as fires, explosions, etc.

I hereby order:

If in one of the houses or their suburb, day or night, something harmful happens to anyone from the German army, no matter how, then the inhabitants of that house will be shot.

If there are acts of sabotage (fires, mine explosions, etc.), attacks or shots fired on the streets or squares of one section of the city, then I will evacuate that section of the city, and the residents will be subject to forced labor. In particularly severe cases, the strictest measures will be taken.

We have only one goal: the restoration of the city, protection, peace, suitable work for everyone and, finally, ensuring a carefree human life."

Sevastopol historian V.B. Ivanov writes: “To maintain the “new order”, punitive authorities were created in the city. In the corner building on the street. Red Descent (modern V. Kuchera Street) housed the German gendarmerie (headed by Lieutenant Shreve), numbering more than 20 people.

On the street Private, house 90, the security service (SD) headed by Sturmscharführer Meyer was located. The SD employed seven investigators, three translators, and a security detachment of 20-25 people. The main task of the SD was to identify communists, employees of state security and police agencies, employees of the state apparatus, partisans and underground fighters.

Ortskomedatur (local commandant's office), which was located on the street. Lenin (the modern building of the Leninsky District Court) was headed by Major Kupershlyagel until July 30, 1942, then Lieutenant Colonel Gansch was appointed. Subordinate to it were the City Government, headed by the burgomaster, or city mayor (N. Madatov, and from August 1942 P. Supryagin), and the Schutzpolice (German police). Without instructions or permission from the commandant’s office, neither the city government nor the local police could carry out any activities. The main task of all eight departments of government was to organize the provision of German military units and institutions with food and material resources.

On Pushkinskaya Street in house No. 2 the main department of the Russian auxiliary police was located, headed by Chief Police Chief B.V. Korchminov-Nekrasov. It consisted of 120 people in 1942, and about 300 in 1944.

An investigative and search unit, or criminal police, was created at the main directorate of the auxiliary police. In December 1942, it became known as the auxiliary security police and became subordinate to the SD.

In addition to punitive agencies, intelligence agencies operated in Sevastopol: the secret field police (SFP), the counterintelligence department of the Abwehr “Darius-305”. All German governing bodies and authorities were called upon to impose a “new order” in Sevastopol.

From the report of SD Obersturmbannführer Frick: “The SS Sonderkommando, consisting of 800 people, who specially arrived at the fortress, the SD administration, the commandant’s office, the police, together with the military units brought in to help, carried out a number of large-scale actions in order to identify commissars, commanders of the Red Army, Bolsheviks from civilians, Komsomol members , all identified are processed (killed). On July 12, at the Dynamo sports stadium, Jews were gathered (number - rounded - 1500), who were previously given an order to sew a yellow star on their sleeves, the gathered ones were formalized.

On July 14, all residents were urgently evicted from the coastal zone of the fortress, which allows viewing the bay and monitoring the movement of ships; the width of the zone is 2-4 km; those who expressed dissatisfaction are formalized.

The commandant issued an order four times obliging everyone to hand over surplus food with the exception of 10 kg of flour products, 10 kg of cereals, 1 kg of fat. The lack of food will force everyone to quickly re-register; those who hid the food are registered.”

It is clear that the Germans committed war crimes not only in Sevastopol, but throughout Crimea.

In 1941-1944. 85.5 thousand people, mostly Russians, were taken from Crimea to Germany for forced labor. Of these, in 1945-1947. 64 thousand returned.

After the landings in Kerch and Feodosia, the Nazis feared the landing of Soviet troops in Yalta and on January 14, 1942, they drove 1,300 men aged 17 to 55 to the Potato Town camp near Simferopol. By July 1942, when the Yalta residents were liberated, more than 500 people had died from hunger and disease. In addition to the Jews, about 900 peaceful Yalta residents became victims of the Nazis in Yalta, according to the city’s Extraordinary State Commission, not counting those killed in the “Potato Town.” The number of victims is derived from the volume of burials.

Having captured the city of Kerch in November 1941, the Germans immediately issued an order that stated: “Residents of Kerch are invited to hand over to the German command all the food available in each family. If any food is found, the owner is subject to execution." By next order (No. 2), the city government ordered all residents to immediately register all chickens, roosters, ducks, chicks, turkeys, geese, sheep, cows, calves, and draft animals. Owners of poultry and livestock were strictly prohibited from using poultry and livestock for their own needs without special permission from the German commandant. After the publication of these orders, general searches began in all houses and apartments.

Upon the arrival of the Red Army in Kerch in January 1942, when examining the Bagerovo ditch, it was discovered that for a kilometer in length, 4 m wide and 2 m deep, it was filled with the corpses of women, children, old people and teenagers.

According to the most likely estimate, the Germans and their accomplices killed up to 50 thousand civilians in Crimea, the vast majority of whom were Russians and Jews.

If the Germans robbed and killed on orders, their Romanian allies robbed and stole as much as possible. No wonder in Crimea and Odessa the Romanians were nicknamed “Robber Army”! The morals of the Romanians were well described by Ivan Kozlov in the book “In the Crimean Underground”: “Four Romanian soldiers settled down in the kitchen. Semyon Filippovich began to ask where they were from, but the Romanians only shook their heads.

Grisha also tried to talk to the soldiers, but to no avail. Then he took a stick, put it to his shoulder like a gun, and said:

Bolshevik. Poof! Poof!

The Romanians laughed and nodded. Returning to the room, Grisha left the door open: there would be less suspicion.

It’s not easy to bring them, damned ones,” the hostess swore loudly as she collected lunch, “dirty, lousy.” No matter how you watch, they will certainly steal something, be it an onion or a potato. Such a cheating breed.

What about the Germans? - I asked.

A German doesn’t steal secretly,” Semyon Filipich shook his head, sitting down at the table, “whatever he likes, he’ll put it in his pocket, say “gut” - and goodbye.”

The Germans despised Romanian thieves. In Simferopol, Sevastopol and other cities of Crimea, there were frequent cases when the Russian population beat Romanian robbers with anything. Raise your hand against a German, and you will immediately be “registered” in the SD, but the Germans usually did not stand up for beaten Romanians.

The natural reaction to German atrocities was the strengthening of the partisan movement.

However, Soviet and party bodies were preparing for partisan warfare even before the German invasion of Crimea. On October 23, 1941, by decree of the Bureau of the Crimean Regional Committee of the All-Union Communist Party of Bolsheviks, A.B. was appointed commander of the partisan detachments of the Crimea. Mokrousov. The choice of the regional committee was successful. Black Sea sailor Mokrousov participated in the October Uprising in Petrograd, and from March 1918 - at command posts in the Red Army. In August-November 1921, he commanded the Crimean Insurgent Army, operating in the rear of Wrangel. In 1937-1938 Mokrousov fought in Spain.

By the same decree, the secretary of the Simferopol city party committee, S.B., was appointed commissar of partisan detachments. Martynov, and the chief of staff - I.K. Sour cream.

According to the same resolution, the chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of Crimea allocated 2 million rubles for the partisan movement.

On October 31, 1941, by order No. 1, Mokrousov announced the organization of five partisan regions located in mountainous and forested areas, and appointed commanders, commissars and chiefs of staff of these regions. 24 partisan detachments were created on a voluntary basis from party and Soviet activists, from fighters of extermination battalions. Three independent detachments were formed later from the commanders and soldiers of the Primorsky and 51st armies, who lingered in the mountains and forests of Crimea during the retreat to Sevastopol and Kerch. In total, by the end of 1941, the partisan detachments numbered more than 3,700 people, including 1,315 fighters and commanders who joined the detachments during the retreat of the armies.

The bases of the five partisan regions were located in the mountains and forests of Yalta from Old Crimea to Balaklava. In the Kerch region, three detachments were created, which were based in the underground quarries. Food and other supplies were designed for a significantly smaller number of partisans than actually turned out to be. Moreover, these reserves could not be replenished by the population, since there were almost no settlements in the mountainous and forested areas.

The partisan detachments were located in a very small area, which made it difficult for them to maneuver. The partisans did not have topographic maps. Subsequently, they confiscated Soviet tourist maps with the situation marked on them, right down to the shepherd's paths, from the killed German officers.

In the post-war years, Soviet propaganda exaggerated the successes of the partisan movement and constantly used the cliches “the earth was burning everywhere under the feet of the occupiers”, “all Soviet people rose to fight”, etc. Therefore I will turn to German documents.

Already on November 20, Manstein issued an order: “Behind the front, the struggle also continues. Guerilla snipers, dressed in civilian clothes, shoot at individual soldiers and small units. Using sabotage methods, planting mines and infernal machines, the partisans are trying to disrupt our supplies... They destroy crops and enterprises, mercilessly dooming the urban population to starvation.”

Soon guerrilla warfare began in earnest. “According to the reports we have received,” says a memo dated November 14, 1941, compiled by a counterintelligence officer of the 11th Army, “a well-organized, centrally led partisan organization is operating in the southern part of Crimea. At its disposal in the mountains of Yalta are large and small bases in which there are many weapons, food, entire herds of livestock and other supplies... The partisans’ tasks include the destruction of communications and transport facilities and attacks on rear services and transport convoys.”

According to Mokrousov’s report dated March 21, “the total number of partisan detachments is 26, united in 4 districts, the 5th district was liquidated on March 18, 1942 for operational reasons and all personnel were transferred to the 4th district. The total number of personnel is 3180 people.

A total of 156 combat operations were carried out. In addition, 78 combat operations were carried out when attacking enemy units during combing. Manpower was destroyed - 4,040 soldiers and officers. 350 vehicles with ammunition, food and people were destroyed. 2 tanks were knocked out, 12 convoys were destroyed, 1 mill and 6 bridges were blown up, and Beshui-Kopi was taken out of service. 10,000 m of telephone and telegraph cable were removed.

Our losses: 175 people were killed, 200 people were wounded, 58 were missing and 15 messengers. Major General Comrade Averkin is among the missing. The fate of the Sevastopol detachment is still unknown...

The partisan detachments are provided with food on a starvation ration for no more than 10 days, but the 3rd and 4th regions are not provided with food at all, as a result of which 18 deaths and 30 people were recorded. at death's door.

All units lack medicines (bandages, iodine, cotton wool, etc.) and surgical instruments.

During their stay in the forest, the soldiers' uniforms became unusable, mainly shoes, clothes, and underwear. Ammunition and weapons are provided, with the exception of the 2nd region. There are absolutely no anti-tank grenades, mines and explosives...

Over the course of 4 months, 362 of the identified traitors and traitors to the Motherland were destroyed in populated areas of the mountainous and wooded part of Crimea and in partisan detachments...

The overwhelming majority of the Tatar population in the foothill and mountain villages is pro-fascist, from among whose residents the Gestapo created volunteer detachments that are currently used to fight the partisans, and in the future the possibility cannot be ruled out against the Red Army...

The activities of partisan detachments are complicated by the need for armed struggle on two fronts: against the fascist occupiers, on the one hand, and against armed gangs of mountainous Tatar villages.”

On December 5, 1941, Manstein sent his senior commander, Commander-in-Chief of Army Group South, a report on the organization of the fight against partisans and the successes achieved in this. The report said: “To eliminate this danger (according to our information, there are 8 thousand partisans in Crimea), we took decisive measures; sometimes troops had to be diverted to fight the partisans (sic!).

At this time, the following are taking part in actions against partisans:

a) headquarters for combating partisans (Major Stefanus); its task is to collect information and provide recommendations on the implementation of necessary activities;
b) Romanian mountain rifle corps with the 8th cavalry and 4th mountain rifle brigades;
c) 24th, 52nd and 240th anti-tank fighter divisions;
d) in the sector of the 30th Corps: the Romanian motorized cavalry regiment and units of the 1st Mountain Infantry Brigade;
e) in the Kerch mines; engineer battalion and units of infantry regiments of the 46th Infantry Division;
f) cordons are set up on various mountain roads and escort teams are used.

To date, the following results have been achieved: 19 partisan camps were liquidated, 640 were destroyed and 522 partisans were captured, a large number of weapons, equipment and ammunition were captured or destroyed (including 75 mortars, 25 machine guns, 20 cars and a large number of trucks, 12 warehouses for equipment and ammunition), as well as livestock, fuel and lubricants and two radio installations."

The partisans also fought against the economic activities of the Germans. The occupiers created the main economic department “South”, which led the economic department “Dnepropetrovsk”, which included the territory of the Dnepropetrovsk and Zaporozhye regions, Northern Tavria and Crimea. In Crimea, the Germans opened two economic branches - in Kerch and Sevastopol. But they failed to restore industrial production, and agriculture was restored only to a small extent.

According to the report of the Crimean branch of the SD dated April 8, 1942, “the partisans, whose activities are still active, began to abandon attacks on individual German soldiers or single vehicles and switched mainly to massive raids on villages and other actions with the aim of capturing food."

This coincides with data from other German sources. “On the night of February 7-8, Kosh was attacked by 300 partisans.” “On February 9, 150 partisans... broke into the village of Shlia and completely plundered it.” A few days earlier, the partisans occupied the village of Kazanly. After which 500 partisans attacked Baksan and 200 partisans raided the village of Beshui.

At the beginning of 1942, the commander of the 30th Corps, General von Salmuth, established the exact number of hostages to be shot for each killed or wounded German or Romanian: “All hostages must be imprisoned in concentration camps. Food for the hostages is provided by the population of their villages. For every German or Romanian soldier killed by partisans, 10 hostages should be shot, and for every wounded German or Romanian soldier, one hostage; if possible, executions should be carried out near the place where the German or Romanian soldier was killed. The corpses of those shot should not be removed for three days.

Arrests of hostages in places where there are no troops (and especially in the mountains) should be carried out by the 1st Romanian Mountain Brigade. For this purpose, the corresponding points must be temporarily occupied by troops."

Below is a list of the locations of concentration camps for hostages, as well as the units and units responsible for their maintenance. The last paragraph of Salmut's order read: “Concentration camps are to be established at the following points” (see Table 8).

Table 8

Here you should pay attention to two points. Firstly, the source is German official documents first published in London in 1954, so they cannot be labeled as Soviet propaganda. Secondly, it clearly follows from the document that the reprisals in Crimea were carried out not by SS troops, who were not there at all then, but by German and Romanian field units.

And here is a German leaflet from the same source, posted in Simferopol: “On November 29, 1941, 40 male residents of the city of Simferopol were shot, which was a repressive measure:

1) for the death of a German soldier who, on November 22, 1941, was blown up by a mine in an area about which the commandant’s office had not received any information about possible mining;

From the beginning of 1942, the command of the Soviet army established air communications with the partisans. During the period from April 7, 1942 to October 1, 1943 alone, 507 sorties were flown into the partisan detachments of the Crimea, of which 274 were carried out by Li-2, TB-3 aircraft and 233 by U-2 and PR-5 aircraft.

A total of 270,729 kg of cargo were delivered, including 252,225 kg of food, 600 sets of uniforms, 120 machine guns, 5 anti-tank rifles, 4 DP light machine guns, 1,980 grenades, 92,563 rounds of ammunition (various), 885 different mines, 3,487 kg of tola, 54 sets radio supplies, 2 sets of printing houses.

During the same period, 776 people were removed from partisan detachments, of which 747 were sick and wounded partisans, 7 people and 22 children were recalled. And 137 people were sent to partisan detachments, of which 78 were cured partisans, 30 demolitions, 15 party activists, 14 command and leadership workers.

An interesting quote from a letter from Commissioner P.R. Yampolsky to the Secretary of the Crimean Regional Committee B.C. Bulatov on October 14, 1943: “An unfortunate incident happened with a tank. We captured a serviceable medium tank, drove it far away from the battlefield, got stuck in a ravine close to the forest, we had no tankers, we fiddled around until the engines jammed. Fedorenko made a decision and burned the tank. I scolded him to the hilt for such a decision, but you can’t return the tank. Now he is given the task of getting another tank instead.”

But along with the successes of the partisan movement, any objective historian must also recognize the fact that the Germans used the so-called Khivi in ​​Crimea, and on a much larger scale than in any other region of the USSR occupied in 1941-1944.

So, for example, in the fall of 1943, the defense of the coast from the village of Koktebel to Dvuyakornaya Bay (wide beaches and convenient landing sites, he himself came from these places) was guarded by the Azerbaijani Khivi battalion. It consisted of 60 Germans and 1090 Azerbaijanis. The battalion was armed with 42 light machine guns, 80 heavy machine guns, 10 battalion and 10 regimental mortars, as well as 16 anti-tank guns. At the same time, the railway from Vladislavovka to Islam-Terek was guarded by a Khiwi company consisting of 150 Georgians.

However, the real support of the Wehrmacht in Crimea were the Crimean Tatars, who served in the Khivi, in self-defense units and other units.

In order to attract the Crimean Tatars and Turkey to the fight against the “Bolsheviks,” the Reich leadership began to use Crimea as bait in the summer of 1941. At the end of the summer of 1941, employees of the German embassy in Turkey met with the leaders of the Crimean Tatar emigration. The visit to Berlin in October 1941 of Turkish generals Ali Fuad Erden (head of the military academy) and Husnu Emir Erkilet contributed to a positive solution to the issue of involving the Crimean Tatar emigration in active German politics. During the negotiations, Ali Fuad expressed the hope that after the end of hostilities in Crimea, an administration would be formed in which Crimean Tatars would largely participate. This, in turn, could greatly influence the Turkish government in favor of the decision to have Turkey enter the war on the side of Germany.

The statement of an active member of the pro-German group in Turkey, Nuri Pasha (Enver Pasha’s brother), is eloquent: “Granting freedom to such a small area as Crimea would not be a sacrifice for the German Empire, but a politically wise measure. This would be propaganda in action. In Turkey it would find an even greater response.”

It is necessary to note the duality that took place in German propaganda on the “Eastern Question”. On the one hand, the invasion of the USSR began under the slogan of “destruction of the Bolshevik-Asian beast,” and propaganda was built in this direction. Leaflets and brochures with photographs of Soviet soldiers of various Asian nationalities and the following text were distributed among German soldiers in huge quantities: “This is what the Tatar-Mongol creatures are like! The Fuhrer’s soldier is protecting you from them!” The SS propaganda organs published the brochure “Der Untermensch” as a reference manual for German troops. Soldiers were encouraged to view the local population as harmful germs that needed to be destroyed. The peoples of the East were called in the brochure “dirty Mongoloids, bestial bastards.”

But, on the other hand, it was precisely in relation to the so-called “eastern” peoples that the German command demanded that maximum respect be shown locally. Thus, Manstein issued two orders on November 20 and 29, 1941, in which he demanded respect for the religious customs of the Muslim Tatars and called for not allowing any unjustified actions against the civilian population.

An important element in coordinating the work of the Wehrmacht High Command, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and repressive structures to involve the Crimean Tatars in the anti-Soviet struggle was the creation of a representative office of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs at the headquarters of the 11th Army in Crimea. The duties of the representative were performed by the leading employee of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Major Werner Otto von Hentin.

German propaganda bore fruit. Of the 90 thousand residents of Crimea mobilized into the Red Army in July-August 1941, 20 thousand were Tatars. All of them became part of the 51st Army operating in the Crimea, and during the retreat almost all deserted.

During the invasion of German troops into Crimea, the Tatars acted as guides for German units and helped them cut off the path of the retreating Soviet troops. In Bakhchisaray, a large group of Tatars greeted the Germans with bread and salt and thanked them for their liberation from the Russians.

In the winter of 1941/42, the Germans began recruiting Tatars. As a result, 9,255 people were recruited, with the largest number of volunteers being recruited in Karasubazar - 1,000 people. Of these volunteers, 8,684 people were sent to units of the 11th German Army, and the rest were declared unfit for combat service and separated into small groups of 3-10 people and distributed among companies, batteries and other military units stationed near Sevastopol and on the Kerch Peninsula .

At the same time, 1,632 people were recruited through Einsatzgruppe “D” (SS unit), who were consolidated into 14 self-defense companies, stationed in accordance with their serial numbers in the following settlements: Simferopol, Biyuk-Onlar, Beshue, Baksan, Molbay, Biy-Eli, Alushta, Bakhchisarai, Koush, Yalta, Taraktash (12th and 13th companies) and Dzhankoy.

Each Tatar self-defense company consisted of three platoons and numbered from 50 (Dzhankoy) to 175 (Yalta) people. The companies were commanded by German officers. The rank and file were dressed in standard Wehrmacht uniforms, but without insignia. The company's armament initially consisted of personal small arms, and later they received heavy machine guns and mortars. According to the plans of the German command, the partisans were supposed to get bogged down in the fight not with the Germans, but with formations from the local population.

Already in February 1942, separate units of Tatar volunteers numbering up to 200-250 people took part in the battles for the Kerch Peninsula, and then in the assault on Sevastopol.

In the first half of 1942, the occupation authorities began to create “Schuma” battalions from the Tatars. Unlike self-defense companies, whose actions were usually limited to the area of ​​their formation, the Schuma battalions were planned to be used throughout Crimea and even beyond its borders.

By November 1942, 8 “Schuma” battalions were formed, stationed in the following settlements: Simferopol - No. 147 and No. 154, Kazasubazar - No. 148, Bakhchisarai - No. 149, Yalta No. 150, Alushta - No. 151, Dzhankoy - No. 152 and Feodosia - No. 153.

Organizationally and operationally, the battalions were subordinate to the SS Fuhrer and the chief of police of the Tauris district, SS Brigadefuhrer JI. von Alvensleben.

Each battalion was supposed to consist of a headquarters and four companies of 124 people each. Each company consists of one machine gun and three infantry platoons. The battalion's nominal strength is 501 people, but in fact it ranges from 240 to 700 people. The battalion was commanded by a Tatar, most often a former junior commander of the Red Army. Each battalion had 9 Germans - 1 liaison officer and 8 non-commissioned officers. In a number of cases, the Germans used Tatar battalions to carry out punitive actions and to guard concentration camps. For example, on February 4, 1942, the Tatars, led by Yagya Smail, took part in the massacre of residents of the village of Chair. At the same time, 15 civilians were brutally killed.

Since the spring of 1942, a concentration camp was located on the territory of the Krasny state farm, where the Germans killed over 8 thousand residents of Crimea during the occupation. The camp was guarded by Tatars from the 152nd "Schuma" battalion. Senior Lieutenant of the Red Army V. Fainer recalled: “The abuse of prisoners of war... had no limits. The Tatar volunteers forced (some prisoner of war) to reveal that he was a Jew, and then... handed over the unfortunate man, for which they received 100 marks.”

According to the Simferopol Muslim Committee, village elders organized about four thousand more people to fight the partisans. In addition, about five thousand volunteers were supposed to leave later to replenish military units. According to German documents, with a population of Crimea of ​​about 200 thousand people, the Crimean Tatars gave the German army 20 thousand. If we consider that about 10 thousand people were drafted into the Red Army, then we can assume that all combat-ready Tatars in 1942 were fully taken into account.

With the beginning of the occupation of Crimea, the Nazi Security Service (SD) immediately created the “Muslim Committee”, and then on its basis the “Tatar Committee” with its center in Simferopol. Jelal Abduraimdov was appointed chairman. The committee had six departments: for recruiting volunteers for the German army; to provide assistance to families of volunteers; culture; religion; propaganda and agitation; administrative and office. Local committees have also been established in some cities and towns.

To organize pro-German self-government in Crimea, the German authorities brought from Turkey the elderly Jafar Seydamet, the Minister of Foreign Affairs in the “Crimean Regional Government” of 1918. Later, to form a more solid administration, the German leadership planned the last khan of the Crimean Tatars, Sultan Giray.

The "Tatar Committee" had a number of printed publications, including the newspaper "Azat Krym" ("Liberated Crimea", editor Mustafa Krutyev) and the magazine "Ana-Yurt" ("Motherland"), which campaigned for the creation of a Tatar state under protectorate of Germany.

What did “Liberated Crimea” write? Here, for example, on March 3, 1942: “After our German brothers crossed the historical ditch at the gates of Perekop, the great sun of freedom and happiness rose for the peoples of Crimea.”

March 10, 1942 Alushta. At a meeting organized by the Muslim Committee, “Muslims expressed their gratitude to the Great Fuhrer Adolf Hitler - Effendi for the free life he had given to the Muslim people. Then they held a service for the preservation of life and health for many years to Adolf Hitler - effendi.”

In the same issue: “To the Great Hitler - liberator of all peoples and religions!” 2 thousand Tatars from the village of Kokkozy and the surrounding area “gathered for a prayer service... in honor of the German soldiers. We made a prayer to the German martyrs of the war... The entire Tatar people prays every minute and asks Allah to grant the Germans victory over the whole world. Oh, great leader, we tell you with all our hearts, with all our being, believe us! We, Tatars, give our word to fight the herd of Jews and Bolsheviks together with German soldiers in the same ranks!.. May God thank you, our great Master Hitler!”

March 20, 1942 “Together with the glorious brothers - the Germans, who arrived in time to liberate the world of the East, we, the Crimean Tatars, declare to the whole world that we have not forgotten the solemn promises of Churchill in Washington, his desire to revive the Jewish power in Palestine, his desire to destroy Turkey, capture Istanbul and the Dardanelles, raise an uprising in Turkey and Afghanistan, etc. and so on. The East is waiting for its liberator not from lying democrats and swindlers, but from the National Socialist Party and from the liberator Adolf Hitler. We took an oath to make sacrifices for such a sacred and brilliant task."

And here is a pearl from April 10, 1942: “To the liberator of oppressed peoples, the son of the German people, Adolf Hitler. We, Muslims, with the arrival of the valiant sons of Great Germany in Crimea, with your blessing and in memory of long-term friendship, stood shoulder to shoulder with the German people, took up arms and began to fight to the last drop of blood for the great things you put forward universal ideas- the destruction of the red Jewish-Bolshevik plague to the end and without a trace.

Our ancestors came from the East, and we waited for liberation from there, but today we are witnesses that liberation is coming to us from the West. Perhaps for the first and only time in history it happened that the sun of freedom rose from the west. This sun is you, our great friend and leader, with your mighty German people. Presidium of the Muslim Committee".

As we see, Gorbachev, with his notorious “universal human values,” had a worthy predecessor.

In April 1942, enlightened Aryans suddenly became seriously concerned about the state of agriculture and livestock farming of the Tatar population. For this purpose, courses for sheep breeders were created near Yevpatoria, and courses for winegrowers near Yalta. At these courses, young Tatars learned to shear sheep, grow grapes, drive all types of cars, parachute jump, shoot all types of small arms, as well as encryption and much more, so necessary in peasant life. But, alas, when these enlightened young men appeared behind the front line, they were captured by the villains from the NKVD. I think that now all these innocently repressed sheep farmers and winegrowers have been posthumously rehabilitated.

The Crimean Tatars actively participated in the assault on Sevastopol in June-July 1942. Here is what the Sevastopol historian Captain 2nd Rank I.S. writes about this. Manyushin: “On July 2, the boat on which senior lieutenant V.K. Kvariani and Sergeant P. Sudak, received holes in the hull, and began to settle from the water received. One engine stalled, and the boat had to turn to the shore occupied by the Nazis. All this happened in the coastal area near Alushta. On the shore there was a battle between the paratroopers and an armed group of Tatars. As a result of the unequal battle, all those who survived were captured. The wounded Tatars shot at point-blank range. The Italian soldiers arrived in time and sent some of the prisoners by car, and some by boat to Yalta.”

"IN. Mishchenko, who walked in one of the columns of prisoners, testifies that out of three thousand of their column, only half of the prisoners reached the “potato field” camp in Simferopol. The rest were shot along the way by a convoy of Germans and traitors from the Crimean Tatars."

“In the Sudak region, a self-defense group was involved in liquidating the landing force. At the same time, 12 paratroopers were burned alive. One of the punitive expeditions ended with a long blockade of partisans, as a result of which 90 people died of hunger."

Enough. I think that what has been said is quite enough.

In the 1970-1980s, a number of Russian “dissidents,” exposing “Stalin’s crimes,” proved to us that, they say, not all Tatars served the Germans, but only “separate groups,” while others were partisans at that time. However, there was also an anti-Hitler underground in Germany, so should we now count the Germans among our allies in World War II? Let's look at the specific numbers.

Let us turn to the data of the “democratic” historian N.F. Bugaya: “According to approximate data, the units of the German army stationed in Crimea consisted of more than 20 thousand Crimean Tatars.” That is, almost the entire Crimean Tatar population is of military age. It is significant that this unseemly circumstance is actually recognized in a very characteristic publication (“The book forms the documentary historical basis of the measures taken in the Russian Federation for the rehabilitation of abused and punished peoples”).

How many Crimean Tatars were among the partisans? On June 1, 1943, there were 262 people in the Crimean partisan detachments, of which 145 were Russians, 67 Ukrainians and... 6 Tatars.

On January 15, 1944, according to the party archive of the Crimean Regional Committee of the Communist Party of Ukraine, there were 3,733 partisans in Crimea, of which 1,944 were Russians, 348 were Ukrainians, and 598 were Tatars. Finally, according to a certificate on the party, national and age composition of the Crimean partisans as of April 1944, among the partisans there were: Russians - 2075, Tatars - 391, Ukrainians - 356, Belarusians - 71, others - 754.

So, even if we take the maximum of the given figures - 598, then the ratio of Tatars in the German army and in the partisans will be more than 30 to 1.

In connection with the advance of the Red Army in October 1943, the leaders of the Tatar nationalists began to leave Crimea. During the evacuation from the peninsula along with German units in March-April 1944, at least three thousand Crimean Tatars left. Most of them, like the refugees of 1943, settled in Romania, some were allowed to move to Germany.

The Tatar units taken from Crimea to Romania in June 1944 were consolidated into the Tatar SS Cavalry Regiment of three battalions. The regiment was trained at the Murlager training ground (Germany), where on July 8, 1944, by order of the SS headquarters, it was deployed to the First Tatar SS Mountain Jaeger Brigade under the command of Standartenführer W. Fortenbacher. The brigade had the following composition: 11 officers, 191 non-commissioned officers and 3,316 privates, of which about a third were Germans.

In mid-July 1944, the brigade was transferred to Hungary. On December 31, 1944, the brigade was disbanded and became part of the Eastern Turkic SS unit (combat group “Crimea” consisting of two infantry battalions and one cavalry hundred). These formations constantly suffered losses, and the remnants of the Tatars in March 1945 joined the Azerbaijani battle group as separate units.

Some of the Crimean Tatars were transported to France and entered the reserve battalion of the Volga Tatar Legion, which was stationed near the city of Le Puy. At the end of the war, several hundred Tatars joined the 35th SS Police Division and the air defense auxiliary service in France.

Now there are nationalists of all stripes - Finns, Estonians, Western Ukrainians, etc. They are trying in every possible way to distance their units that fought against the Red Army from the Wehrmacht. Like, we fought our war for independence against Bolshevism, but had nothing in common with Hitler. Modern Crimean Tatar nationalists take the same position. Therefore, it is worth saying a few words about what fate the Germans were preparing for both Crimea and the Tatars living there.

I will give the floor to Sevastopol historian V.B. Ivanov, who collected a large array of secret documents of the Third Reich: “Crimea must be liberated from all strangers and settled by Germans,” Hitler said at a meeting on July 19, 1941. At his proposal, Crimea was transformed into the imperial region of Gotenland (the country of the Goths). The center of the region, Simferopol, was renamed Gottsburg (the city of the Goths), and Sevastopol received the name Theodorichshafen (the harbor of Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, who lived in 493-526).

According to Himmler's project, Crimea was annexed directly to Germany. On June 9, 1942, at a meeting of SS and police chiefs, Himmler said that the war would not have made sense if after it, in particular, Crimea had not been completely colonized by the Germans for 20 years, and, moreover, only on the basis of race, on the principle of blood.

On July 16, 1941, Hitler decided to create at the first stage the General Commissariat of Taurida, including Crimea and Melitopol with the adjacent lands, as part of the Reichskommissariat of Ukraine. Alfred Frauenfeld was appointed head of the civil administration, although actual power during the occupation was in the hands of the military command.

According to data as of January 1, 1943, the area of ​​the Reichskommissariat of Ukraine was 339,276 square kilometers. It was divided into six general districts.

Historically, the return of Crimea to Germany was based on the fact that in the second half of the 4th century, Taurica was invaded by German Gothic tribes who came from the shores of the Baltic Sea and lived here, along with other peoples, in the Middle Ages. In July 1942, Frauenfeld organized an archaeological expedition, led by the chief of the SS and police in Tauris, SS-Brigadeführer von Alvenslebe, with Colonel Werner Baumelburg serving as archaeologist. The ruins of Theodoro, the capital of the Greek-speaking principality of the same name, which was defeated by the troops of the Turkish Sultan Mehmed II in 1475, were examined. Conclusion: this is a typical example of German fortification. As a result of the expedition, Baumelburg wrote the work “Goths in Crimea”, in which he argued that Aluston (Alushta), Gorzuvitai (Gurzuf), Kalamita (Inkerman) were built by the Goths. Frauenfeld used the collected materials for his book “The Reasons and Meaning of Our Struggle.” He put forward a project for a highway that would connect Hamburg with Crimea and allow the journey to be completed in two days, and proposed using Crimean Tatars as servants for Germans vacationing at Crimean resorts.

On July 5, 1942, a meeting was held between the Wehrmacht command and the police, where the issue of methods for evicting racially “inferior” residents from Crimea was discussed. It was decided to create special camps to conduct a “racial survey” of the population.

By July 1942, the German leadership finally abandoned its plans to grant self-government to the Crimean Tatars. On July 27, at the Werwolf headquarters, over dinner, Hitler announced his desire to “cleanse” Crimea.

The reluctance of the Turkish leadership to enter the war on the side of Germany became the basis for stopping the discussion of issues about the future status of the Turkic peoples living in the occupied territories of the Soviet Union. And they stopped looking at the Crimean Tatars as a connecting link in German-Turkish relations.

So, in the event of Hitler’s victory, the Crimean Tatars would not go to Central Asia to their historical homeland, but to cultural European cities - Dachau, Auschwitz. And what’s worse about the Polish town of Treblinka?

Crimea during the Great Patriotic War. Collection of documents and materials. P. 217-218.. Efimov A.B. Some aspects of German occupation policy towards the Crimean Tatars in 1941-1944.

Ivanov V.B. Secrets of Sevastopol. Book 1. pp. 298-299.

According to Efimov A.B. Some aspects of German occupation policy towards the Crimean Tatars in 1941-1944.

During World War II, Crimea found itself at the epicenter of the confrontation between the USSR and Nazi Germany. We bring to your attention an interesting selection of photographs about the fighting in Crimea.

The sunken cruiser "Chervona Ukraine" at the Grafskaya pier in Sevastopol

Double mini-submarine in port. 1942

German officers in Yalta. 1942

Yalta embankment. July 1942

After a partisan attack. December 1941.

Yalta against the backdrop of snow-capped mountains. 1942

The destroyed Palace of Pioneers on Primorsky Boulevard (former building of the institute). Sevastopol. 1942

Refugees with their belongings. 1942

Vorontsov Palace. Alupka. July 1942

Vorontsov Palace. The inscription in German: “Do not touch the marble statue.” July 1942

Firing from a Flak 88 cannon at ships in Yalta Bay. 1942

German soldiers on the beach in Crimea. 1942

Bathing horses. Possibly a ford near the Kara-Su river

A detachment of Germans in a Tatar estate in Crimea. 1942

Sevastopol. July 1942

Southern Bay of Sevastopol, Panorama visible on the mountain on the right

Washing clothes in the port of Sevastopol. July 1942

Sunken destroyer in the port of Sevastopol

Destroyed guns of Fort Maxim Gorky

The Nazis requisitioned Ilyich's head. July 1942

Monument to sunken ships in Sevastopol. The symbol of the city, by some miracle, survived

Truck damaged by bombing

All inscriptions (posters and signs) are in German. Crimea. December 1941

German officers are walking in the Yalta area. 1942

The symbol and embodiment of the defense of Sevastopol is the girl sniper, Lyudmila Pavlichenko, who, by the end of the war, took the lives of 309 Germans (including 36 snipers), becoming the most successful female sniper in history

Destroyed turret gun mount No. 1 of the 35th coastal battery of Sevastopol.
The 35th tower coastal battery, together with the 30th battery, became the basis of the artillery power of the defenders of Sevastopol and fired at the enemy until the last shell. The Germans were never able to suppress our batteries either with artillery fire or with the help of aviation. On July 1, 1942, the 35th battery fired its last 6 direct-fire shells at the advancing enemy infantry, and on the night of July 2, the battery commander, Captain Leshchenko, organized the explosion of the battery. // Sevastopol, July 29, 1942

A damaged Soviet light double-turret machine-gun tank T-26 near Sevastopol. June 1942

Control bombing at the entrance to the Northern Bay of Sevastopol

One of the workshops produced by the Sevastopol underground military special plant No. 1. The plant was located in the adits of the Troitskaya Balka and produced 50-mm and 82-mm artillery mines, hand and anti-tank grenades, and mortars. He worked until the end of the defense of Sevastopol in June 1942.

Famous photo. Defense of Sevastopol.

Fireworks at the grave of fellow pilots who died near Sevastopol on April 24, 1944.
The inscription on the tombstone from a fragment of the plane's stabilizer: “Here are buried those who died in the battles for Sevastopol, Guard Major Ilyin - attack pilot and air gunner of the Guard, Senior Sergeant Semchenko. Buried by comrades on May 14, 1944.” Photo taken in the suburbs of Sevastopol

German soldiers examine 19th-century cannons in Sudak.

Zander. Coastline, view of Cape Alchak

Zander. Coastline, view of the Genoese fortress

View of the coastline from the Genoese fortress

German soldier on the street of Sudak. Cape Alchak in the background

A tank against the backdrop of the current Detsky Mir (former garment factory) in Simferopol. Self-propelled gun SU-152 of the 1824th heavy self-propelled artillery regiment in Simferopol. April 13, 1944

T-34 tank on the street of liberated Sevastopol. May 1944

Simferopol, st. Rose Luxemburg. On the right is the current railway technical school

A Soviet soldier tears off a Nazi swastika from the gates of the metallurgical plant named after. Voykova in liberated Kerch. The city was finally liberated from the invaders on April 11, 1944

Kerch, 1943

Partisans in Yalta. April 16, 1944 - liberation of Yalta

Sevastopol is in ruins. Bolshaya Morskaya, 1944

Servicemen pose on a German Messerschmitt Bf.109 fighter jet abandoned in Crimea.
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

A German bomber shot down over the city. Sevastopol, Streletskaya Bay. 1941

Soviet prisoners of war. Most likely, the photo was taken on the Kerch Peninsula. May 1942

Soviet anti-aircraft gunners in liberated Sevastopol. 1944
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

Yak-9D fighters, 3rd squadron of the 6th GvIAP of the Black Sea Fleet Air Force.
May 1944, Sevastopol region

Column of captured Germans. 1944

Infantry detachments fight on the Primorsky Boulevard in Sevastopol

A German heavy 210 mm Moerser 18 gun is firing. Such guns, among others, were part of the siege artillery group near Sevastopol

Mortar "Karl" at a firing position near Sevastopol 1942

Unexploded 600 mm. a shell that fell on the 30th coastal defense battery. Sevastopol, 1942
According to some reports, the command of the Sevastopol defensive region at first did not believe that the Germans had guns of this class near Sevastopol, although the commander of the 30th battery, G. Alexander, reported that they were firing at him with unprecedented weapons. Only a special photograph of an unexploded shell with a person standing next to it (on the back there was an inscription: “The height of the person is 180 cm, the length of the shell is 240 cm”) convinced the commanders of the existence of monster guns, after which it was reported to Moscow. It was noted that approximately 40 percent of the Karlov shells did not explode at all or exploded without fragments into several large pieces

420-mm mortar "Gamma" (Gamma Mörser kurze marinekanone L/16), manufactured by Krupp.
Installed at a position near Sevastopol, it was in service with the 459th separate artillery battery of the 781st artillery regiment (1 gun)

German super-heavy gun "Dora" (caliber 800 mm, weight 1350 tons) in a position near Bakhchisarai. June 1942.
The gun was used during the assault on Sevastopol to destroy defensive fortifications, but due to the remoteness (minimum firing range - 25 km) of the position from the targets, the fire was ineffective. With 44 shots of seven-ton shells, only one successful hit was recorded, which caused an explosion of an ammunition depot on the northern shore of Severnaya Bay, located at a depth of 27 m

Construction of a firing position for the German super-heavy 800-mm Dora gun near Bakhchisarai. April-May 1942.
The firing position of the giant 1,350-ton gun required twin railroad tracks with two additional spurs for erection cranes. For engineering preparation of the position, 1,000 sappers and 1,500 workers, forcibly mobilized from among local residents, were allocated. The gun was used in the assault on Sevastopol to destroy defensive fortifications

The gun was transported using several trains; in particular, it was delivered to Sevastopol using two diesel locomotives with a power of 1050 hp. every. Dora's equipment was delivered in 106 wagons on five trains. The service personnel were transported in 43 carriages of the first train, and the kitchen and camouflage equipment were also located there. The installation crane and auxiliary equipment were transported in 16 cars of the second train. Parts of the gun itself and the workshop were transported in 17 carriages of the third train. The 20 cars of the fourth train carried a 400-ton, 32-meter barrel and loading mechanisms. The last fifth train, consisting of 10 wagons, transported shells and powder charges; an artificial climate was maintained in its wagons with a constant temperature of 15 degrees Celsius.

Direct maintenance of the gun was assigned to the special 672nd Artillery Division “E”, numbering about 500 people under the command of Colonel R. Bova and consisting of several units, including headquarters and fire batteries. The headquarters battery included computer groups that carried out all the calculations necessary for aiming at the target, as well as a platoon of artillery observers, which, in addition to the usual means (theodolites, stereo tubes), also used infrared technology that was new for that time. The gun crew also included a transport battalion, a commandant’s office, a camouflage company and a field bakery. In addition, the personnel included a field post office and a camp brothel. Plus, 20 engineers from the Krupp plant were assigned to the division. The commander of the gun was an artillery colonel. During the war, the total number of personnel involved in servicing the Dora gun was more than 4,000 officers and soldiers

Aerial photograph of Dora's position. Photos from the Ju 87 were taken by Hptm Otto Schmidt, 7. Staffel/St.G.77. A general look at Dora's position at the moment of the shot. In the foreground is obviously an anti-aircraft battery.

The time to prepare a gun for firing consisted of the time to equip the firing position (from 3 to 6 weeks) and the time to assemble the entire artillery installation (three days). To equip the firing position, a section 4120-4370 meters long was required. During assembly, two cranes with 1000 hp diesel engines were used.

The commander of the 11th Army, which besieged Sevastopol, Field Marshal Erich von Manstein, wrote:
“... And the famous Dora cannon of 800 mm caliber. It was designed to destroy the most powerful structures of the Maginot Line, but it was not necessary to use it there for this purpose. It was a miracle of artillery technology. The trunk had a length of about 30 m, and the carriage reached the height of a three-story building. It took about 60 trains to deliver this monster to the firing position along specially laid tracks. To cover it, two divisions of anti-aircraft artillery were constantly at the ready. In general, these expenses undoubtedly did not correspond to the achieved effect. Nevertheless, this gun, with one shot, destroyed a large ammunition depot on the northern shore of Severnaya Bay, hidden in the rocks at a depth of 30 m.”

The gun's breech was wedge-type, with separate cartridge loading. The vertical guidance mechanism used an electro-hydraulic drive, and the horizontal guidance was carried out due to the fact that the railway tracks were made in the form of curves of a certain radius. The opening of the shutter and the delivery of projectiles were carried out by hydraulic devices. The gun had two lifts - one for shells, the other for cartridges. The gun's recoil devices were pneumohydraulic. The barrel had a rifling of variable depth - the first half of the barrel had a conical rifling, the second - cylindrical

Loading: projectile on the left, two half-charges and a cartridge case on the right.

Dora gun casing

American soldiers next to the shell and casing of the Dora gun.
Photo source: G. Taube. 500 Jahre deutsche Riesenkanonen

Partisans who participated in the liberation of Crimea. The village of Simeiz on the southern coast of the Crimean Peninsula. 1944
Photo by: Pavel Troshkin

An advertisement at the entrance to Primorsky Boulevard in Sevastopol, left over from the German administration. 1944

Sevastopol. South Bay. In the foreground is a German StuG III self-propelled artillery mount. 1944
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

The mountain rifle division of Lieutenant Kovalev carries out the task of delivering ammunition to the front line, using domestic donkeys as transport. Kerch Peninsula, April 1944.
Photo by: Max Alpert

Evacuation of Soviet soldiers from the Kerch Peninsula. The wounded are loaded into a special box on the wing of a Po-2 aircraft. 1942

A German machine gunner armed with an MG-34 machine gun in battle on the steppe in Crimea. January 7, 1942. To the left of the machine gunner is a spare drum magazine for the machine gun, to the right is a belt and elements of the ammunition rack. Behind the background is a PaK-36 anti-tank gun with a crew

German soldiers are observing Soviet positions from a trench on the Perekop Isthmus. October 1941.
Photo by: Weber

The Soviet ambulance transport "Abkhazia" sunk in the Sukharnaya Balka of Sevastopol. The ship was sunk on June 10, 1942 as a result of a German air raid and a bomb hitting the stern. The destroyer Svobodny was also sunk, which was hit by 9 bombs

Anti-aircraft gunners of the Zheleznyakov armored train (armored train No. 5 of the Coastal Defense of Sevastopol) with 12.7-mm DShK heavy machine guns (the machine guns are mounted on sea pedestals). 76.2 mm guns of 34-K naval turret mounts are visible in the background

Soviet fighters I-153 "Chaika" over Sevastopol. 1941

Captured French tank S35 from the 204th German tank regiment (Pz.Rgt.204) in Crimea. 1942

Having captured the French B-1 tanks, the Krauts thought for a long time about what they could do something obscene with them. And they did it: they turned 60 of these mastodons into flamethrowing machines. In particular, the 4th Tank Group on June 22, 1941 included the 102nd OBOT (a separate battalion of flamethrower tanks). The 102nd Tank Battalion had 30 B-1bis tanks, of which 24 were flamethrower tanks and 6 were regular line tanks.

A German armored personnel carrier among the ruins of a fortress in Sevastopol. August 1942

Soviet armored boats of the Black Sea Fleet Project 1125 at sea. The southern coast of Crimea in the Yalta region is visible in the background.
The photo shows a single-gun armored boat of Project 1125. This model has the following weapons: one 76-mm gun in the turret of a T-34 tank, two coaxial 12.7-mm machine guns and one standard machine gun in the aft turret

Marines of the Black Sea Fleet read newspapers. Sevastopol, 1942.
Apparently, the newspaper “Red Crimea”. The editorial office of this newspaper was located in Sevastopol from November 1941

Sevastopol, sailors' trophy.
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

Prisoners, Sevastopol. May 1944.
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

Sevastopol. May 1944.
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

Sevastopol. May 1944.
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

Laundry, Sevastopol, May 1944.
Author of the photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

Cape Khersones, 1944. This is all that remains of the conquerors

Yuri Sichkarenko

This terrible word “occupation”... What could be more terrible than living, or rather trying to exist, face to face, side by side with the enemy?

Shock, shock, and confusion were experienced by the residents of Crimea, who literally overnight, at the very beginning of the war, found themselves under occupation.

On August 20, 1941, by decree of Adolf Hitler, the Reichskommissariat “Ukraine” (an administrative-territorial unit within the Third Reich), headed by Erich Koch, was established to manage the occupied territories. The Reichskommissariat included a significant territory of Ukraine and Crimea, the main part of which was occupied in November 1941, and in May and July 1942, after the fall of Kerch and Sevastopol, respectively, the peninsula was completely occupied.

The arrival of the Germans on the territory of the Crimean Peninsula was accompanied by terror, the killing of civilians, the confiscation of food, clothing, and everything necessary

The most important means of “pacifying” the occupied territories of the USSR was to be violence. The arrival of the Germans on the territory of the Crimean Peninsula was accompanied by terror, the killing of civilians, the confiscation of food, clothing, and everything necessary. In fact, the right to execute was granted to every German soldier, since, according to the directive of the Chief of Staff of the Supreme High Command of the German Armed Forces, General Field Marshal Keitel, “On military jurisdiction in the Barbarossa area and on special events of the troops,” signed by him on May 13, 1941 on the direct instructions of Hitler, Wehrmacht soldiers and officers were relieved of all responsibility for their behavior towards the population of the areas captured in the east. Special-purpose units were also created - Einsatz groups. Moving directly behind the troops, they ensured the seizure of material assets, documents, and carried out “actions” to liquidate the population. In addition to special detachments, in the rear of the troops there were operational detachments and groups with the same tasks.

On December 2, 1941, more than 7 thousand civilians were shot in the Bagerovo anti-tank ditch near Kerch.

Terrorist operations against the population were carried out regularly. People who found themselves virtually “locked” in occupied Crimea essentially became hostages of the war. According to an eyewitness to the events, Nariman Mamutov: “The Germans were afraid of the partisans, and in order to get through the forest, they made a “human shield” out of us residents, driving behind us at the end of the convoy.”

In this situation, the civilian population was forced to answer not only for their actions, but also for the operations of the Soviet partisans. Thus, on July 19, 1942, Red Star special correspondent Major Slesarev reported: “Unable to cope with the partisan movement in Crimea, the Germans are taking out their anger on the civilian population of Crimea. Rivers of blood of innocent Soviet citizens flow in every city. The other day, the Nazis shot 500 people in Simferopol. The corpses of those shot were taken out of the city and collected in an anti-tank ditch, near the Red Rose state farm. In the village of Neizats, the Germans shot 31 people, in the village of Beshui - 21, in Chermanlyk - 27 old people, women and children. Enraged, the fascist authorities began to resort to unheard-of threats. Thus, the military commandant of Karasubazar recently posted an order that for the murder of one officer 200 civilians would be shot, for the wounding of an officer - 100 citizens, and for the murder of one German soldier 100 would be shot and for the wounded 50 Soviet citizens.”

Violence was not the only method used by the occupiers. It would be more correct to say that the Nazi occupation policy was a policy of “carrot and stick”

Violence was not the only method used by the occupiers. It would be more correct to say that the Nazi occupation policy was a “carrot and stick” policy. Which is quite logical: the management of new territories - and the Germans intended to stay in Crimea forever - presupposed a flexible policy and manipulation of the population. The search for allies among all segments of the population and national groups was one of the components of this strategy.

The bodies of occupation power in Crimea became the City Administrations, whose functions included the management of the administration and departments of the same administration. The city administration of Simferopol was headed by Sevastyanov, a former employee of the Simferopol city committee. Power in rural areas was exercised by elders. A police force was created to monitor internal affairs and pro-Soviet elements.

If we characterize the general principle of the occupation authorities to build a new life, then it would not be a mistake to call it the restoration of the old, pre-Bolshevik order. So, for example, Crimea became the Tauride province, which was divided into districts according to the old, pre-revolutionary division; teaching in schools was conducted using pre-revolutionary textbooks, etc.

From the very beginning of their establishment in Crimea, the occupation authorities applied a pronounced stratification policy - along ethnic lines. This approach was quite understandable - it “worked” to divide peoples, to destroy the unity of Crimean society. “Divide and conquer” - this principle perfectly characterizes the nature of totalitarian regimes, including the Nazi one.

Hitler's pathological hatred was caused by Jews, who, according to the definition of Max Horkheimer and Theodor Adorno, were for the Nazis “not a minority, but an anti-race, a negative principle as such,” “the happiness of this world” directly depended “on their eradication.” Jews were subject to total extermination in all territories occupied by German troops, including Crimea.

The Fuhrer also treated the Slavs with great distrust; they were classified as “Untermensch” (literally “subhumans”, “below man”). As for the Turkic peoples and other “Asians”, they, of course, could not be considered equal to the “true Aryans” and were at the level of the “Untermensch”, and perhaps lower. As for Hitler’s plans for the statehood of the eastern peoples, as far as the latest research allows us to judge, the Germans did not have any serious intentions of granting them statehood. As historian Iskander Gilyazov writes with reference to Ulkusal, in January 1942, representatives of the Crimean Tatar emigration Jafer Seydamet and Mustedzhib Ulkusal visited Berlin, where they expressed a desire to create national self-government of the Crimean Tatars in Crimea, “but they did not find understanding and left certainly disappointed.” Thus, it is obvious that the formation of national committees during the occupation of Crimea - Crimean Tatars, Uzbeks, Turkmens, Armenians and Ukrainians - had a completely pragmatic goal - to implement the policies of the German leadership - and nothing more.

Continuing our consideration of the issue of stratification of the ethnic communities of Crimea, we note that at the highest level of the symbolic hierarchical ladder were the Germans and representatives of ethnic groups that were allies of the German troops (Romanians, Bulgarians, Italians). They also enjoyed the greatest privileges. So, the announcement published in the occupation newspaper “Voice of Crimea” looks more natural than unexpected: “All Romanians and Bulgarians living in the Simferopol City area must appear between September 10 and September 30 (inclusive) at the field gendarmerie of the city commandant’s office for registration and obtaining certificates. All Romanians and Bulgarians who receive certificates will enjoy the same rights and benefits as Germans. Belonging to a given nationality must be proven. City Commandant."

At first, the Crimean Tatars were considered by the German authorities as potential allies.

On November 23, 1941, the first composition of the Simferopol (Crimean) Muslim Committee was formed, the leadership of which included Dzhemil Abdureshidov, Ilmi Kermenchikli and Memet Osmanov. With their personal participation or through their representatives, meetings of the Crimean Tatar population were held in Yevpatoria, Bakhchisarai, Yalta, Alushta, Karasubazar, Old Crimea and Sudak, at which appeals were prepared to the German command asking for permission to create Tatar committees in their cities.

In January-March 1942, Muslim committees were formed in all cities of Crimea (except Sevastopol)

In January-March 1942, Muslim committees were formed in all cities of Crimea (except Sevastopol). According to the Statute, the committees were subordinate to the Crimean Police Fuehrer (who is also the commander of the Security Police and SD) and worked under his supervision. The board and its members were approved by him. The main task facing the committees was to support the interests of the Wehrmacht, the German civil administration and the German police and to represent the interests of the Tatar population.

Despite the accusatory nature of some publications addressed to Muslim committees, interpreting the events of the war from the anachronistic positions of Stalinist historiography, it is obvious that there were many positive aspects to his activities.

Muskoms dealt with a wide variety of issues related to the life of the Crimean Tatar community. For example, one of the newspaper issues for September 1943 reported that “The Culture Department of the Muslim Committee considered the issue of transferring the alphabet to the Latin alphabet, introduced in 1927 and soon cancelled.” The newspaper published information that the committees provided assistance in the construction of roads, mosques, and schools; were engaged in organizing Muslim holidays (Eid al-Adha, Kurban Bayram).

And, obviously, the most significant thing was that for the Crimean Tatars this body of national government served as a kind of protection. One of the eyewitnesses recalled the case of residents of the village of Biyuk-Ozenbash, who fell out of favor with the German leadership for helping the partisans, for which they were “sentenced” to certain repressive measures. The villagers were saved from imminent reprisals by a petition from the Muslim Committee. The existence and activities of Muslim committees during the occupation served as one of the reasons for the deportation of the Crimean Tatar people.

Over time, the Crimean Tatars ceased to be considered as effective allies of the Nazis, and more active propaganda work began to be carried out against the Russian population. The appeal to the Russian population took place under anti-Bolshevik and anti-Stalinist slogans (“the Russian people must throw off the yoke of Stalinist Bolshevism”). In Simferopol, the recruitment of volunteers from Russian youth for guard duty was organized. In the spring of 1943, the occupation authorities launched a wide propaganda campaign for recruitment into the Russian Liberation Army - for this purpose, meetings were held for the Russian, Ukrainian and Tatar populations. Researcher Oleg Romanko estimates the number of ROA formations in Crimea to be from 2,000 to 4,000 people.

The role of the main propagandist of the occupation forces was played by the press.

The most influential and widespread newspaper of the new authorities was “Voice of Crimea”, published by the Simferopol City Administration

The most influential and widespread newspaper of the new authorities was “Voice of Crimea”, published by the Simferopol city government. The first issue of the newspaper was published on December 12, 1941, and for the longest time - more than a year and a half from March 1942 to October 1943 - the editor was Alexander Buldeev - a poet and publicist, before the war - a legal consultant at the Sudak legal consultation. The last issue is dated April 4, 1944. According to the newspaper itself, the initial circulation was 3 thousand copies (it was published 2 times a week), and subsequently, 80 thousand copies with a frequency of 3 times a week.

The newspaper published materials about military operations and victories of German weapons; many articles were devoted to building a “new life” in Crimea. The newspaper had a pronounced anti-Bolshevik and anti-Semitic character.

In January 1942, the first issue of the newspaper “Azat Karym” (Free Crimea) was published - in the Crimean Tatar language. Materials were published here about the recruitment of volunteers from the Crimean Tatars into the German army, about Stalin’s repressions in 1920-1930, about the life of the Crimean Tatar diaspora in Turkey and Romania; literary and folklore pages appeared. The last issue of the newspaper is dated April 1944.

During the occupation, other publications were published: “Woman’s World”, “Volunteer” (for volunteers of the Russian Liberation Army), the German newspaper “Deutish Krym Zeitung”, “Feodosian Bulletin”, “Sakskie Izvestia” and others. Thus, propaganda was carried out not only towards representatives of ethnic groups, but also towards certain segments of the population - for example, women and the peasantry: the former made up the main population of the peninsula, the latter were the “breadwinners”.

(To be continued)

Gulnara Bekirova, Crimean historian, member of the Ukrainian PEN Club

During World War II, Crimea found itself at the epicenter of the confrontation between the USSR and Nazi Germany. The Soviet leadership viewed it as an unsinkable aircraft carrier on the Black Sea.

In turn, the leaders of Nazi Germany saw in Crimea a territory that should have been populated by the Germans.

According to Hitler's plans, Crimea was transformed into the imperial region of Gotenland (the country of the Goths). The center of the region - Simferopol - was renamed Gottsburg (the city of the Goths), and Sevastopol received the name Theodorichshafen (the harbor of Theodoric, king of the Ostrogoths, who lived in 493-526). According to Himmler's project, Crimea was annexed directly to Germany.

In 1941-1942, Crimea was the site of a fierce struggle between Soviet and German troops. Particularly stubborn ones developed in the Sevastopol area, which held out until June 1942. After its fall, Crimea was in the hands of the occupiers for almost two years.

In March 1944, the liberation of Crimea began from the German 17th Army, blocked on the peninsula by Soviet troops. The Crimean operation ended on May 12, 1944 with the complete destruction of the enemy group.

Italian mini-submarine. 1942

German officers in Yalta. 1942

July 1942 Yalta embankment

December 1941. After a partisan attack.

Yalta against the backdrop of snow-capped mountains. 1942

The destroyed Palace of Pioneers on Primorsky Boulevard (former building of the institute). Sevastopol. 1942

Refugees with their belongings. 1942

Vorontsov Palace. Alupka. July 1942

Vorontsov Palace. Inscription in German: “Do not touch the marble statue.” July 1942

1942 Firing a Flak 88 cannon at ships in Yalta Bay

1942 German soldiers on the beach in Crimea

Possibly a ford near the Kara-Su river

A detachment of Germans in a Tatar estate in Crimea. 1942

July 1942. Destroyed building in the port of Sevastopol.

The tip of the South Bay, Panorama is visible on the mountain on the right

July 1942. Washing clothes in the port of Sevastopol

The sunken cruiser "Chervona Ukraine" at the Grafskaya pier

A sunken destroyer in the port of Sevastopol.

Destroyed guns of Fort Maxim Gorky.

The Nazis requisitioned Ilyich's head. July 1942

Sevastopol. The monument to sunken ships, a symbol of the city, somehow miraculously survived

sea ​​mine

A burning truck after a bombing, 1942

Crimea. December 1941. All inscriptions (poster and signs) are in German.

German officers are walking in the Yalta area. 1942

The symbol and embodiment of the defense of Sevastopol, Crimea is the girl sniper, Lyudmila Pavlichenko, who, by the end of the war, took the lives of 309 Germans [incl. 36 snipers], becoming the most successful female sniper in history.

Destroyed turret gun mount No. 1 of the 35th coastal battery of Sevastopol.
The 35th tower coastal battery, together with the 30th battery, became the basis of the artillery power of the defenders of Sevastopol and fired at the enemy until the last shell. The Germans were never able to suppress our batteries either with artillery fire or with the help of aviation. On July 1, 1942, the 35th battery fired its last 6 direct-fire shells at the advancing enemy infantry, and on the night of July 2, the battery commander, Captain Leshchenko, organized the explosion of the battery.
Filming location: Sevastopol, Crimea
Time taken: 07/29/1942

A damaged Soviet light double-turret machine-gun tank T-26 near Sevastopol.
June 1942

Control bombing at the entrance to the Northern Bay of Sevastopol.

Women and children evacuated from Sevastopol disembark from the leader of the destroyers Tashkent in the port of Novorossiysk.
Filming location: Novorossiysk, Krasnodar region
Time taken: 1942

One of the workshops produced by the Sevastopol underground military special plant No. 1. The plant was located in the adits of the Troitskaya Balka and produced 50-mm and 82-mm artillery mines, hand and anti-tank grenades, and mortars. He worked until the end of the defense of Sevastopol in June 1942.

Fireworks at the grave of fellow pilots who died near Sevastopol on April 24, 1944.
The inscription on the tombstone from a fragment of the plane's stabilizer: “Here are buried those who died in the battles for Sevastopol, Guard Major Ilyin - attack pilot and air gunner of the Guard, Senior Sergeant Semchenko. Buried by comrades on May 14, 1944.” The photo was taken in the suburbs of Sevastopol.

Zander. German soldiers look at 19th century cannons.

German soldier on the street of Sudak. In the background is Cape Alchak.

Against the backdrop of the current Detsky Mir (former garment factory).
Self-propelled gun SU-152 of the 1824th heavy self-propelled artillery regiment in Simferopol.
Time taken: 04/13/1944

T-34 tank on the street of liberated Sevastopol. May 1944

A Soviet soldier tears off a Nazi swastika from the gates of the metallurgical plant named after. Voykova in liberated Kerch. The city was finally liberated from the invaders on April 11, 1944.

Servicemen pose on a German Messerschmitt Bf.109 fighter jet abandoned in Crimea.

Sevastopol, 1941.
A German bomber shot down over the city. Streletskaya Bay.

May 1942. Soviet prisoners of war. Most likely, the photo was taken on the Kerch Peninsula

Soviet anti-aircraft gunners in liberated Sevastopol. 1944

Column of German prisoners, 1944.

A German heavy 210 mm Moerser 18 gun is firing.
Such tools, among others, were part of
siege artillery groups near Sevastopol.

Mortar "Karl" at a firing position near Sevastopol 1942

Barrel of the 600 mm mortar "Karl"

According to some reports, the command of the Sevastopol defensive region at first did not believe that the Germans had guns of this class near Sevastopol, although the commander of the 30th battery, G. Alexander, reported that they were firing at him with unprecedented weapons. Only a special photograph of an unexploded shell with a person standing next to it (on the back there was an inscription: “The height of the person is 180 cm, the length of the shell is 240 cm”) convinced the commanders of the existence of monster guns, after which it was reported to Moscow. It was noted that approximately 40 percent of the Karlov shells did not explode at all or exploded without fragments into several large pieces.
Unexploded 600 mm. a shell that fell on the 30th coastal defense battery. Sevastopol, 1942

420-mm mortar "Gamma" (Gamma Mörser kurze marinekanone L/16), manufactured by Krupp.
Installed at a position near Sevastopol, it was in service with the 459th separate artillery battery of the 781st artillery regiment (1 gun)

German super-heavy gun "Dora" (caliber 800 mm, weight 1350 tons) in a position near Bakhchisarai. The gun was used during the assault on Sevastopol to destroy defensive fortifications, but due to the remoteness (minimum firing range - 25 km) of the position from the targets, the fire was ineffective. With 44 shots of seven-ton shells, only one successful hit was recorded, which caused an explosion of an ammunition depot on the northern shore of Severnaya Bay, located at a depth of 27 m.
Time taken: June 1942

Partisans who participated in the liberation of Crimea. The village of Simeiz on the southern coast of the Crimean Peninsula. 1944

An advertisement at the entrance to Primorsky Boulevard, left over from the German administration. 1944

Sevastopol. South Bay. In the foreground is a German StuG III self-propelled artillery mount. 1944

The mountain rifle division of Lieutenant Kovalev carries out the task of delivering ammunition to the front line, using domestic donkeys as transport. Crimea, April 1944.
Location: Crimea, Kerch Peninsula

Evacuation of Soviet soldiers from the Kerch Peninsula. The wounded are loaded into a special box on the wing of a Po-2 aircraft. 1942

A German machine gunner armed with an MG-34 machine gun in battle on the steppe in Crimea.
To the left of the machine gunner is a spare drum magazine for the machine gun, to the right is a belt and elements of the ammunition rack.
In the background is a PaK-36 anti-tank gun with a crew.
Time taken: 01/07/1942

German soldiers are observing Soviet positions from a trench on the Perekop Isthmus.
Filming location: Perekop, Ukraine, USSR
Time taken: October 1941

The Soviet ambulance transport "Abkhazia" sunk in the Sukharnaya Balka of Sevastopol. The ship was sunk on June 10, 1942 as a result of a German air raid when a bomb hit the stern. The destroyer Svobodny was also sunk, which was hit by 9 bombs.
Sevastopol. 1942

Anti-aircraft gunners of the armored train "Zheleznyakov" (armored train No. 5 of the Coastal Defense of Sevastopol) with 12.7-mm heavy-caliber DShK machine guns (the machine guns are mounted on sea pedestals). The 76.2 mm guns of the 34-K naval turret mounts are visible in the background.

B-2 heavy flamethrower tank (f)
Having captured the French B-1 tanks, the Krauts thought for a long time about what they could do something obscene with them. And they did it: they turned 60 of these mastodons into flamethrowing machines. In particular, the 4th Tank Group on June 22, 1941 included the 102nd OBOT (a separate battalion of flamethrower tanks). The 102nd Tank Battalion had 30 B-1bis tanks, of which 24 were flamethrower tanks and 6 were regular line tanks.

Soviet armored boats of the Black Sea Fleet Project 1125 at sea. The southern coast of Crimea in the Yalta region is visible in the background.
The photo shows a single-gun armored boat of Project 1125. The sample in the photo has the following armament option: one 76-mm gun in the turret of the T-34 tank, two coaxial 12.7-mm machine guns and one standard machine gun in the aft turret.

Partisans in liberated Simferopol

Prisoners, Sevastopol. May 1944
Photo: Evgeniy Khaldey

Cape Chersonese, 1944