by Stalingrad- The City that Defeated the Third Reich (epub)
If the Red Army continues its offensive as it is doing now, especially if they take Rostov and Kharkov, then that will be of great significance to the outcome of the war.10 Holding on to Kharkov and Rostov is the most important thing for the German army.
A second front in Europe is inconceivable. German forces are on standby in northern France, and the coast is fortified. An attack from Spain became impossible once the Germans took southern France. Nor could American and English forces land in Italy. The German navy wouldn’t allow it. To land in Europe, you’d have to plan extensively, but still it couldn’t happen.
“Germany has enough reserve forces and materials,” said the prisoner. “We can fight on as much as we like.”
The Russian leaflets often made the men and officers laugh. Russian propaganda hasn’t really taken into account the particular psychology of the German soldier, his unique sense of discipline. “So, for example, I saw one leaflet that called on soldiers to kill their officers because they were better fed and didn’t have to fight,” said the prisoner. “Another leaflet told them to kill all the fascists and join the Russians. First of all, officers and soldiers eat the same food. And we don’t understand the word ‘fascist,’ which makes us think of the system of government in Italy.”
During the surrender, German officers were worried about their own futures. People said that, if you were going to surrender, give yourself up to the Americans, the British, the French. It’s perfectly safe being a prisoner with them.
The prisoner asked: “Why are you going to so much trouble over us? We weren’t expecting such good treatment, especially from Russian officers. If your goal is to encourage German officers to surrender, then that’s very clever. Being allowed to send letters home was very effective in that regard. Now our soldiers say: ‘As prisoners we can see that the Russians aren’t bad people. Who knows why this war got started, why there’s so much bloodshed.’
“To us officers it’s clear that the war came about because of the Jews, who seized leadership roles in the governments of all nations except for Germany.”
Major Koltynin, Head of 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Major Lerenman, Instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
REPORT
on the political interrogation of POW Lieutenant Herrmann Strotmann, adjutant, 1st Battalion, 79th Panzer Grenadier Regiment, 16th Panzer Division
February 9, 1943
Interrogated by Captain Zayonchkovsky, senior instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Strotmann, Herrmann. German. Catholic. Not married. Born May 18, 1918, in Münster. Bank employee. Home address: Münster, Westfalen, Hermannstrasse 50.
He was drafted as a regular soldier in 1938. In 1941 he was made an officer. He was a company commander in the 79th Regiment from September 5 and throughout October 1942, and since September he has been an adjutant in the 1st Battalion under Major Wota.
“During the fighting to the north of Stalingrad (south of the village of Yerzovka), from September to November, the 79th Regiment lost between 80 and 90 percent of its men. Reinforcements were constantly being brought from the rear, but that entailed a significant drop in quality. [ . . . ] Most of our losses were the result of your mortars, which we called the böse Waffe.”11
When asked about the state of his unit in the encirclement, Strotmann stated the following: “The Stalingrad operation was risky. At first we thought we’d take Stalingrad in five weeks. That didn’t work out, and we couldn’t fall back because that would have left the Caucasus group wide open. Our commanders’ great mistake was attacking in late autumn, which meant we weren’t able to dig in and get ready for winter on the front lines. You took advantage of this both last year and this year. If we’d stopped at the Don, then we’d have been able to make the right preparations. Then this catastrophe wouldn’t have taken place. The main reason for our surrender: lack of food, men, shells, and also the impossibility of it all—it was physically impossible for us to continue fighting. The quality of our soldiers was very low (most of them had just been brought in in from the rear). We were starving, and most of us were frostbitten. Even the officers were so exhausted and hungry they could barely stand up. There’s a limit to what a man can take, and we reached that limit on February 2. We surrendered. The surrender was spontaneous. At 6:00 A.M. I was told that Russian tanks were at our bunker. I cried, got out of the bunker and laid down my weapon.”
Moving on to a question about our propaganda, Strotmann said that the quality of our leaflets had significantly improved as of late. “At the very beginning,” stated the lieutenant, “they were quite primitive. For example, you reported that we’d lost 4,100 guns at Stalingrad, but there weren’t that many guns in the whole army.”
Lieutenant Strotmann concluded with the following: “Every soldier believes in victory, but to tell you the truth, if America enters the war, then we’ll have a hard time winning.”
Major Koltynin, Head of 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Captain Zayonchkovsky, Senior instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
[Zayonchkovsky’s signature]
REPORT
on the political interrogation of POW Sergeant Wilhelm Vugeler, 3rd Company, 79th Panzer Grenadier Regiment, 16th Panzer Division
Dubovka, February 9, 1943
Interrogated by Captain Zayonchkovsky, senior instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Vugeler, Wilhelm. German. Lutheran. Born on March 1, 1916, in Nienburg/Weser. Member of the National Socialist party since 1934. Completed public school. Profession: commerce. Home address: Nienburg/Weser bei Hannover, Quellhorststrasse 10.
“There were eighty to a hundred men in our company when we got surrounded, and we were losing fifteen to twenty every day. Reinforcements were constantly coming in from the rear. Our situation improved a bit after December 30 because we built dugouts and were taking fewer casualties. I was transferred to the rear on January 4. In mid-January the remnants of the 16th Panzer Division were assigned to the 24th Panzer Division. All that was left of the 16th Panzer Division was the rear units.
“The men were feeling worse every day. Until January we were hoping to get help, but then in January, when we started retreating, our morale plummeted, and by the time we’d retreated right into the city, most of the soldiers understood the hopelessness of our situation. Still, the men were terrified of being captured by the Russians.
“I’ve read the Russian leaflets, and even listened to your radio broadcasts during the Christmas holidays. We were at the railroad northwest of Orlovka. All the men listened carefully to your broadcasts. Many of us started doubting that our officers were really telling us the truth. But our counterpropaganda was effective, so we didn’t believe you entirely.
“On February 1, I was wounded near the Tractor factory and wound up in a field hospital. On February 3, at 3:30 A.M. (Berlin time), the chief physician announced that the hospital was being handed over to the Russians in two hours. So I was captured.”
Major Koltynin, Head of 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Captain Zayonchkovsky, Senior instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
REPORT
on the political interrogation of POW Sergeant Heinz Hühnel, 12th Company, 554th Regiment, 389th Infantry Division
Army Headquarters
Interrogated by Major Lerenman, instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Heinz Hühnel. Home address: _____. Field Post no. 40886.
Born May 27, 1908. Education: Eight years of public school, Commercial High School. Married. Member of the National Socialist party since 1933.
Throughout the interrogation, Hühnel, a member of the National Socialist party since 1933, tried to convince the interrogator that he had become a new man after being taken prisoner. He claimed to have broken with Hitler’s party. He explained that he wanted to study our state
and ideological systems, that he wished to return to Germany as this new man or even remain in Russia to advance new ideas, to lead people toward communist ideology. He stated that he used to be far removed from politics. He fell under the influence of the mass psychosis of the National Socialist party, which, in addition to pressure from his wife’s family, led him to become a member. Now, after being a party member and seeing the true nature of National Socialism in Germany, he concluded that Hitler’s fascism was an ideology of conquest and enslavement.
What the Germans said about communism and Russia turned out to be completely wrong. Seeing what Russia was really like during the war [several words illegible] situation.
When they were first surrounded, the men hoped they would break out quickly. They expected help, but some soldiers understood even then that the situation was serious. They were thinking that they’d have to spend the winter in the encirclement before breaking out in March or April. The men’s spirits were falling by the day. They turned in to dull, automatic task-doers, completely stupefied.
Few even considered the possibility of running away because they were certain that being captured meant being shot. The men read the Russian leaflets, but few believed them.
Hühnel talked about a German soldier who returned from Russian captivity. He said that at around 8:00 P.M. on January 8 a certain Holzapfel appeared in the company’s bunker. He said he’d been a prisoner of the Russians for twenty-four hours. He’d been fed, given a lot of bread, offered tobacco. Holzapfel said he’d only seen German prisoners being treated well, that he saw how well dressed the Russian soldiers were, how well armed they were. Among those present was the commander, Sergeant Polte. He cut him off, saying that it was all propaganda, that they’d fed him on purpose, that it wasn’t really like that for prisoners. Polte brought Holzapfel to the battalion commander, Captain Bitermen. No one saw Holzapfel after that. Who knows where he disappeared to.
Three days before the Holzapfel incident there was talk among the soldiers that someone had come back from Russian captivity saying their prisoners were being treated well.
After Holzapfel’s disappearance people were saying that there must be some truth to his story. The prisoner stated: “I told the men to calm down. Let’s see what happens. Maybe we’ll be surrendering. Don’t be afraid, just do what you’re told.” On January 10, when units of the Red Army were beginning an attack, Hünel apparently ordered everyone to get dressed and head out: “I had seven men and two machine guns at my disposal. We were supposed to defend ourselves—and we could have—but when the Russians came, I ordered my men to put their hands up. Six of the seven did so, and the last one ran to the telephone to tell the company commander what was happening. He was killed by the approaching Russians, and the rest gave themselves up.”
All the men are ready to surrender, but they’ve got to have an order. Very few of them will surrender without an order from their superiors. They’ve grown so dull and weak that they’ve lost the ability to think for themselves. Another reason German soldiers don’t surrender is because they consider it cowardice and a betrayal of their comrades. But if they’re ordered to surrender, then whoever gave the order takes on the responsibility.
Supervision had to be stepped up because of the recent decline in morale. Everything possible was being done to reassure the men. The officers were always saying: Just wait, it’s all going to get better soon. At the beginning of January all the German newspapers published Göring’s speech where he said that everyone in the encirclement at Stalingrad would be going on leave and getting some sort of package from the Führer. He said that food was coming from the Ukraine and that the soldiers had nothing to worry about.
The men read that speech, and many of them laughed bitterly. All of them had spent the summer fighting in units that had taken heavy losses. Promises of relief came and went without anything happening. The units in the encirclement had been promised help before, but none had come. That made this speech impossible to believe.
The men had recently begun to notice that those who showed dissatisfaction or a “harmful disposition” would be monitored. The Nazis volunteered to keep an eye on other soldiers because they wanted to gain favor through espionage. No one was ordered to spy on other soldiers, but the Nazis considered it their duty.
The soldiers often tell one another that the officers live for themselves, that they’re more interested in medals than the affairs of their company or the fate of their men.
Major Koltylin, Head of the 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Major Lerenman, Instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
REPORT
on the political interrogation of POW Sergeant Karl-Heinz Pütz, 64th Regiment, captured on January 10 by units of the 343rd Rifle Division
January 11, 1943
Interviewed by Captain Zayonchkovsky, senior instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Born on May 15, 1924, in Cologne. Home address: Cologne, Nippes, Escherstrasse 21. Father: Electrician. Completed primary and secondary school. German. Catholic.
He joined the army in September 1941 and was placed in a reserve motorcycle battalion stationed in Iserlohn. He worked as the battalion’s small-arms armorer. He arrived on the Russian front in September 1942 in the 64th Regiment of the 16th Panzer Division.
When the Russians were surrounded, the prisoner was in an independent detachment that was formed mostly out of units from the 16th Panzer Division. The detachment included two battalions of soldiers from the 64th and 79th Regiments and the 16th Motorcycle Battalion, and also one battalion from the 544th Regiment of the 389th Division.
The first battalion, which is where Pütz was, had forty-five to fifty men. There were about as many men in the second battalion. The infantry battalion was around 150–200 men. Captain Dornemann was in charge of the detachment. The first battalion had only one officer, Lieutenant Schlippa, who’d flown in straight from Germany on January 1. According to the prisoner, cargo planes are still bringing in ammunition, food, fuel, and also replacement officers.
The detachment occupied the area from Hill 137.8 to the southern slopes of Hill 139.7.
Food: The men are currently getting two hundred grams of bread per day—four hundred grams every second day—forty grams of canned meat, and cold soup without the least bit of fat (the horses have all been eaten). Vitamin tablets are also given out daily. During his time in the encirclement the prisoner once received eighty grams of butter. Three hundred grams of chocolate were issued on Christmas, and one hundred grams for New Year’s. “The men are starving,” said the prisoner. “What they gave us today for seven men is roughly equal to the daily rations of an entire battalion.”
The heating situation is also very bad: wood is brought in once a week, but only enough for one day, to heat a stove two or three times.
The men use timber from unoccupied bunkers for heating. But there’s not much of that. A lot of people have frostbite. For example, twenty-five to thirty men in the battalion got frostbite on December 25. Now they’re all with the baggage train since the hospital is full.
Morale is low. Most of them men think the situation is hopeless, though the officers do try to reassure them, saying that help is on the way, that the main forces of the German army are no more than forty kilometers from the encirclement.
The men are afraid of being captured by the Russians because the officers have convinced them they’ll be shot. Pütz learned the truth of the matter from the soldier Holzapfel, who visited him in his bunker on the night of January 9. Pütz was on duty at the time and saw Holzapfel cross over from the Russian side. Holzapfel came into the bunker all excited, and he started telling them right away about the good conditions in Russian captivity, and then he took some bread out from his pocket and shared it around. There were seven men in the bunker, along with a sergeant from the infantry battalion that Holzapfel belonged to.
The sergeant asked Holzapfel to come with
him to the baggage train. The next night another soldier told him: “That redhead Holz will be shot for betraying his country.” The soldiers sympathized with Holzapfel and blamed him only for not being careful enough.
Regarding the circumstances of his own capture, Pütz said the following: “On January 10, when the attacking Russians were coming right up to our bunker, the sergeant told us that resistance was futile and that we had to surrender. When we put our hands up, we started taking fire from the other bunkers. I got hit, and my comrade Private 1st Class Hilbeck was killed.”
Captain Zayonchkovsky
[Signature]
REPORT
on the political interrogation of POW Major Herrmann Lüben, deputy chief of staff and chief of logistics, 389th Panzer Division
Dubovka, February 5, 1943
Interrogated by Major Lerenman, instructor, 7th Section, Political Department, 66th Army
Major Herrmann Lüben. Born in 1908. In the army since 1939. Graduated from the General Staff Academy in 1940. Home address: Deutsch-Eylau, Hindenburgstrasse 32.
The prisoner worked for the German Ministry of War, after which, according to him, he took part in the design and construction of military fortifications in the Netherlands (after the German occupation). He was in France. He participated in the campaigns against Poland, Belgium, and the Netherlands, and he was involved in the disbanding of the French army. While working for the general staff, Lüben took part in and even directed the formation of new military units.
As part of his duties, Major Lüben rotated through a diverse range of officer circles in the German army.
During his interrogation the prisoner said that, because of the blows struck by the Red Army against the German war machine, the top brass were trying even harder to align their officer corps with the National Socialist party. With that in mind, they were propagandizing the theory that it was the policies of the National Socialist party which were responsible for the victories of the German army. And for the same reason the older military leaders, who were sympathetic to the political opposition, were being replaced by generals who were clear supporters of Hitler.