On the eve of World War II
After Japan occupied part of China and created the puppet state of Manchukuo there, the partisan movement intensified in this region. Officially, Moscow had nothing to do with him. In practice, Chinese partisans regularly crossed the border rivers Amur and Ussuri to Soviet territory, where they received the necessary medical care, they were supplied with weapons and ammunition, radio communications, and money. And, what was no less important, the partisan commanders received instructions on further combat activities.
Such support for the Chinese insurgents became especially widespread immediately after the occupation of Manchuria by Japanese troops. Moreover, the command of the Soviet Separate Red Banner Far Eastern Army tried to coordinate actions partisan detachments, giving instructions not only on the methods of daily combat work, but also on the deployment of massive insurgency on Manchu territory in the event of the outbreak of war between Japan and the Soviet Union, considering the Chinese partisans as their own saboteurs and scouts thrown behind enemy lines.
On April 16, 1939, the heads of the NKVD departments of the Khabarovsk and Primorsky territories, the Chita region, as well as the chiefs of the border troops of the Khabarovsk, Primorsky and Chita districts received encrypted telegram No. 7770 from Moscow. It said the following:
"In order to make fuller use of Chinese partisan movement in Manchuria and its further organizational strengthening to the Military Councils of the 1st and 2nd OKA (Separate Red Banner Army. - Note auto) it is permitted, in cases of request from the leadership of Chinese partisan detachments, to provide assistance to the partisans with weapons, ammunition, food and medicine foreign origin or in an impersonal form, as well as direct their work.
From among the interned partisans, verified people will be transferred in small groups back to Manchuria for reconnaissance purposes and to assist the partisan movement.
Work with partisans should be carried out only by Military Councils.
The heads of the NKVD of the Khabarovsk and Primorsky Territories and the Chita Region are invited to provide full assistance to the Military Councils in the work being carried out, in particular in the verification and selection of partisans crossing from Manchuria and interned, transferring them to the Military Councils for use in reconnaissance purposes and transferring them back to Manchuria .
The chiefs of the border troops of the indicated districts are invited to provide assistance to the Military Councils both in terms of the free passage of groups formed by the councils transferred to the territory of Manchuria, and in terms of receiving those crossing Soviet border partisan groups and individual signalmen."
There were also regular meetings between the leaders of the Chinese partisans and the command of the Red Army. One of them took place in Khabarovsk on May 30, 1939. Participants included: Soviet side– Commander of the 2nd Army, Army Commander 2nd Rank Ivan Konev (future Marshal of the Soviet Union), member of the Military Council of the 2nd OKA, Corps Commissar Biryukov, and Head of the Army Intelligence Department, Major Aleshin; on the Chinese side - the leader of the partisan detachments in Northern Manchuria, Zhao-Shangzhi, and the commanders of the 6th and 11th detachments, Dai-Hongbin and Qi-Jijun.
The purpose of the meeting was to analyze the considerations presented by Zhao-Shangzhi: resolving issues of transfer, further work and connections with the USSR. First of all, the leader of the partisan movement was asked to contact the subordinate detachments operating in the Sungari River basin, unite their control, create a strong headquarters, clear the ranks of the insurgents from unstable, corrupt elements and Japanese agents, and also create a department to combat Japanese espionage among the partisans .
As a further task, the demand was put forward to strengthen and expand the partisan movement in Manchuria. For which, for example, it was considered useful to organize several large raids on Japanese garrisons in order to raise the morale of the rebels. It was also proposed to organize secret bases partisans in hard-to-reach areas of Lesser Khingan to accumulate weapons, ammunition and equipment. All this was recommended to be obtained during attacks on Japanese warehouses. Chinese commanders were advised to contact the local communist organization to launch political agitation among the population and carry out measures to disintegrate units of the Manchurian army and supply the partisans with everything they needed through propagandized military personnel.
The issue of supplying Chinese partisans with radio stations and codes, as well as training radio operators, was also discussed. It was planned to train at least ten people.
During the conversation, the Soviet military leaders also expressed their wishes: “It is desirable for us to receive from you maps of Manchuria, which you will obtain from the Japanese-Manchurian troops (maps made in Japan), Japanese and other documents - orders, reports, reports, codes. It is advisable that you supply us with samples of new Japanese weapons."
Several months have passed. Zhao-Shangzhi, together with his detachment, safely crossed the Amur River and established contact with other partisan detachments. Began joint operations against the Japanese-Manchurian troops. The fighting took place from with varying success. There were victories, but there were also defeats. We managed to capture some documents that were of great interest in Khabarovsk. The messengers left for Soviet territory, carrying samples of new military equipment and reports on the progress of hostilities. In the intelligence department of the 2nd OKA, after a thorough study of all materials received from across the Amur River and an analysis of the situation in Northern Manchuria, they drafted a new directive for the partisans.
This document indicated that the main task before winter was to strengthen and increase detachments, obtain weapons, ammunition and food. It was recommended, on the eve of winter, to create secret bases in inaccessible places, equip them with housing, and accumulate supplies of food and clothing. Bases must be prepared for defense. The partisans were advised to refrain from destroying the mines for now, railways and bridges, since they still have little strength and resources to carry out these tasks.
The rebels were encouraged to carry out smaller operations to attack railway trains, gold mines, warehouses, mines, police stations. The main purpose of such attacks is to obtain weapons, ammunition, food products and equipment. It was also pointed out that these actions must be carefully prepared: reconnaissance of the target of the attack, drawing up a plan and discussing it with the detachment commanders. Otherwise, losses and failures are inevitable.
This directive also contained recommendations for Zhao-Shangzhi: “You yourself should not personally lead the attacks. Do not forget that you are the leader of the partisan movement, and not the commander of the detachment. You must organize the destruction of the entire system, and not individual detachments and groups. You can't take any chances. You must teach commanders."
Unfortunately, nothing is known about the participation of Soviet military instructors in the partisan movement in Manchuria, although these people were in Chinese detachments. The fact is that in the same directive, Khabarovsk promised to send instructors to train partisans in mine explosives. Another important aspect. Most of the partisans long time were located on the territory of the Soviet Far East. Many of them underwent special military training, so that someone could be recruited by Soviet military intelligence. Therefore, the history of the partisan movement in Manchuria in the late thirties of the last century and the participation of the Soviet military intelligence waiting for their researchers.
Although it is known that on Soviet territory two special camps were created for Chinese partisans: Northern, or camp “A”, near the city of Voroshilov (now the city of Ussuriysk, Primorsky Krai), and Southern, or camp “B”, on the outskirts of the city of Kerki (Turkmenistan ). For short time The capacity of the camps increased from 100 to 300 fighters. Classes with partisans were conducted by career officers of the Red Army under the leadership of Major V.A. Samarchenko.
Until mid-1942, Chinese partisans regularly crossed the border, rested and treated on Soviet territory, were checked by the NKVD to identify Japanese intelligence officers, and then returned to Manchuria. The former commander of such a detachment, General Wang Minggui, says in his memoirs:
“Our detachment, operating in the mountains of Greater Khingan, at the end of November 1940 was subjected to fierce enemy attack. Over two months of fighting, it was thinned by more than 2/3, only 60 people remained in the ranks, and most of them were wounded. In the created conditions, members of the party committee decided to move to the territory of the USSR, and then, after putting the detachment in order, replenishing ammunition, return to Greater Khingan to continue partisan actions.”
At the end of December 1940, the partisans crossed the Amur on ice, and two months later, rested, armed and equipped, they returned across the ice to Manchuria on fresh horses. The Military Council of the 2nd Separate Red Banner Army set before them the following combat missions: organizing partisan areas in the Khingan, recruiting new fighters of all nationalities into the detachment, organizing support bases for the partisan movement, conducting anti-Japanese agitation in the occupied territory.
In 1941, on the basis of these camps, the 88th separate rifle brigade was formed, intended for reconnaissance and sabotage activities behind Japanese lines. The commander of the brigade's 1st Battalion, which consisted mostly of Koreans, was a captain named Jing Zhicheng, who later became known throughout the world as Kim Il Sung, the head North Korea. His real name was Kim Sung-ju.
The brigade was supplemented with Soviet citizens of Chinese and Korean origin, as well as political emigrants. 70 participants in the military rebellion under the leadership of Zhang Weiguo and Wang Wenru joined its ranks. Soon the number of brigade personnel exceeded 1.5 thousand people. The brigade was commanded by Lieutenant Colonel Zhou Boazhong, the commissar was also a Chinese - Major Zhang Shoucan (in January 1943 he was replaced by Major V.E. Seregin), Major V.A. became the chief of staff. Samarchenko, head of intelligence - Feng Zhongyuan. According to its purpose, the 88th brigade was reconnaissance and sabotage and was subordinate to the intelligence department of the headquarters of the Far Eastern Front. Periodically, groups of fighters carried out raids across the Soviet-Chinese and Soviet-Korean borders, but the main combat work was carried out by scouts and messengers behind enemy lines.
However, the 88th Brigade was never involved in combat operations. The “Stalinist special forces” spent the entire Great Patriotic War in the rear, engaged in combat and political training. The superbly staffed and equipped unit (the brigade was armed with: 4312 rifles, 370 machine guns, 48 heavy and 63 light machine guns, 21 guns, 16 anti-tank rifles, 23 vehicles) were in no hurry to be thrown into battle, despite the ardent desire of the fighters. He had other tasks, more complex than participation in the front-line operations of the Red Army.
Chinese patriots actively and purposefully prepared to liberate their homeland from the Japanese occupiers, and such an opportunity arose in August 1945. Back in July, the command of the 88th brigade developed a plan for conducting combat operations. A landing party of 100 people, equipped with a walkie-talkie, was to be deployed to conduct reconnaissance and also participate in the offensive together with units of the Red Army in Dongbei. Well-trained soldiers and commanders, who knew the area perfectly and enjoyed the trust and support of the local population, could have provided significant assistance to the Red Army, but they did not have time. The war with Japan was fleeting, and the brigade’s operational plan simply did not have time to be carried out. On this occasion, Lieutenant Colonel Zhou Baozhong sent to the Commander-in-Chief Soviet troops on Far East To Marshal of the Soviet Union Vasilevsky the following memorandum:
I, commander of the 88th separate rifle brigade, as a subordinate to you and as a member of the fraternal Communist Party China has decided to contact you directly about the following.
The 88th brigade entrusted to me was organized in June 1942 on the personal instructions of Comrade Stalin. The brigade has about 400 soldiers and officers and up to 150 people. is outside the brigade (except for the Russian and Nanai personnel). Almost all the Chinese comrades are members of the Chinese Communist Party and the Communist Youth League, former leaders and participants in the guerrilla movement in Manchuria against the Japanese invaders. The brigade is directly led by the Military Council of the Far Eastern Front (Far Eastern Front. - Note auto.). The brigade received great attention and was given special role And political significance, as a Chinese national unit (following the example of the Polish, Czechoslovakian and other units that were on the territory of the USSR), and it was supposed to become the core of training military and political personnel. How military unit, the brigade was preparing to take an active part together with the Red Army in the struggle against the Japanese imperialists for the liberation of the Chinese people...
For three years, all political and educational work with the brigade personnel was carried out according to a special program of the Military Council of the Far Eastern Fleet.
In combat training, the task was set to prepare an ordinary soldier and a sergeant for wartime commander of a platoon, company (detachment) and be able to conduct political work among the Chinese population of Manchuria, and train squad commanders from ordinary Nanais. By June 1945, this task was completed...
The political and moral condition of the brigade's personnel is healthy, and the brigade is well prepared in combat terms.
Soldiers, sergeants and officers prepared for three years and waited for the day when they could take an active part in the fight against the Japanese aggressor. This day came on August 9 this year. The Soviet Union declared war on imperialist Japan. The entire brigade personnel, inspired by the noble goals of the war, awaited the combat order to move against the Japanese samurai.
However, four days after the outbreak of hostilities, the brigade's operational plan was canceled, and its redeployment to Manchurian territory was delayed, and to this day the brigade has not been used.
My repeated requests to Major General Comrade. Sorokin and through him to the commander of the 2nd Far Eastern Fleet, Army General Comrade. To date, Purkaev has not received a positive decision on the use of the brigade.
Therefore, I am forced to turn to you, Comrade Marshal, with a request to resolve the issue of using the brigade and state my thoughts:
1. I consider it necessary to redeploy the brigade to the central city of Manchuria - Changchun, where we could immediately provide assistance to the Red Army in establishing and maintaining order. Organize an anti-Japanese democratic organization, which should form the basis for a future democratic people's power in Manchuria.
2. Carry out preparatory work to create people's army in Manchuria, the core of which should be the Chinese brigade.
3. Unite all members of the Chinese Communist Party in Manchuria, begin work to attract all progressive democratic groups and create a united front of the people of Manchuria against Japanese aggression. To fight against all reactionary elements and trends.
To carry out daily work among the masses and educate the Chinese people in the spirit of friendship and love for their great neighbor - the Soviet Union, for the peoples of the Soviet Union, for the Great Stalin.
If you find it impossible to accept my above considerations, then I ask for permission to send the Chinese composition of the brigade and individual Russian comrades to the disposal of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China or the commander of the 8th NRA, Comrade. Zhu De.
Commander of the 88th Independent Rifle Brigade, Lieutenant Colonel Zhou Baozhong.”
However, the appeal was not taken into account. The 88th separate rifle brigade was disbanded on the basis of an order from the commander of the Far Eastern Military District dated October 12, 1945. “Stalin’s special forces,” which had been trained throughout the war for sabotage reconnaissance, were not sent into battle. Chinese comrades found use in leadership positions in district commandant's offices and police stations in liberated Manchuria. The Korean fighters of the brigade, led by Captain Kim Il Sung, were sent to Korea.
The Korean Peninsula, liberated by units of the 25th Army of the 1st Far Eastern Front, in the vanguard of which were the marines V.N. Leonov, who became twice Hero of the Soviet Union, and M.A. Babikov, Hero of the Soviet Union, was waiting for the emergence of a new government. She appeared in the person of the Soviet Civil Administration (SGA). Its leaders served on the headquarters of the 25th Army, and the SGA was headed by Colonel General T.F. Shtykov, member of the Military Council of the 1st Far Eastern Front and future Soviet ambassador in North Korea. To the authorities local government Politically competent Red Army officers, Koreans by nationality, who arrived with the 25th Army, were sent to leadership positions. At the end of September, Captain Kim Il Sung arrived from Vladivostok to Wonsan on the steamship Pugachev with his 1st battalion of unique political special forces.
He was immediately appointed assistant to the military commandant of Pyongyang, Colonel General I.M. Chistyakova. And when the question of the head of North Korea arose, General Shtykov, after consulting with Moscow, decided on all possible support and the actual promotion of Red Army captain Kim Il Sung to this position. At a rally on October 14 in honor of the Red Army, General Chistyakov introduced him to the crowd as a “national hero” and “famous partisan leader.” Within a week, Kim Il Sung became a member of the bureau of the Communist Party of Korea, and two months later - chairman of the CPC bureau.
In February 1946, Kim Il Sung headed the Provisional People's Committee of North Korea, which included 11 bureau-ministries formed on the basis of the relevant departments of the State Administration. After the creation of the committee, the Soviet leadership declared that it had completed its task and power in the country was passing into the hands of local administrative bodies. By the end of 1947, an independent state with its own government, army, police, economy and finance was formed in the northern part of the peninsula. The last step towards consolidating the division of the country was the holding of elections to the Supreme People's Assembly of North Korea in August 1948. On September 9, the first session of the Supreme National Assembly proclaimed the Democratic People's Republic of Korea.
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Probably their task was to show a simple fighter workers' and peasants' army, torn from the plow and the machine, preferably unsightly. Like, look what he is, almost a meter tall with a cap - and he defeats Hitler! This image perfectly matches the muzzled, exhausted victim Stalin's regime. Which, since the late 1980s, post-Soviet historians and film directors put on a cart, gave them a “three-line gun” without cartridges and sent them towards the armored hordes of fascists - under the watchful supervision of barrier detachments.
In reality, of course, the Germans themselves entered the USSR on 300 thousand carts, and as for weapons, fascist Europe was inferior to us in the number of issued machine guns by 4 times, and by 10 times in terms of self-loading rifles.
IN lately, of course, the view of the Great Patriotic War became different, society got tired of exaggerating the topic of “senseless victims,” and border guards-terminators, ninja scouts, daring crews of armored trains and other characters appeared on the screens - now hyperbolic. As they say, from one extreme to the other. Although
It should be noted that real border guards and reconnaissance officers (as well as paratroopers and marines) were indeed distinguished by good physical shape and training. In a country where sports were compulsory for the masses, there were much more “jocks” than there are now.
And only one branch of the military was never noticed by the screenwriters, although it deserves most attention. Because from all the parts special purpose(special forces) of the Second World War, the most numerous and strongest were the Soviet assault engineer brigades (SHISBr) of the reserve of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief.
As the war progressed, most of the belligerents realized that classic infantry could not perform many specific tasks. Therefore, Britain began to create “commando” battalions, the USA - detachments of army rangers, Germany reformed part of its motorized infantry into “panzergrenadiers”. The Red Army, having begun its great
offensive, faced the problem of heavy losses during the capture of German fortified areas and during street fighting.
In terms of creating fortifications, the Germans were great dockers. The bunkers, often concrete or steel, covered each other, and behind them stood batteries of anti-tank guns or self-propelled guns. All approaches were heavily mined and surrounded by barbed wire. In cities, every basement or sewer manhole was turned into a bunker; even ruins became impregnable forts.
It was possible to send penalty officers to storm them - meaninglessly laying down thousands of soldiers and officers to the delight of future denouncers of “Stalinism”. It was possible to throw yourself at the embrasure with your chest - heroically, but, let's be honest, it was pointless. Therefore, the Headquarters, realizing that it was time to stop fighting with the bayonet and “hurray,” took a different path.
The idea itself was taken from the Germans, or more precisely from the Kaiser’s army. Back in 1916, in the Battle of Verdun, the German army used special sapper assault groups that had special weapons (light machine guns and backpack flamethrowers) and underwent a specific training course. The Germans themselves forgot about their experience, apparently counting on a “blitzkrieg” - and then trampled for a long time near Sevastopol and Stalingrad. But it was adopted by the Red Army.
In the spring of 1943, the formation of the first 15 assault brigades began. The basis for them was the engineering units of the Red Army, since the new special forces required, first of all, technically competent specialists. After all, the range of their tasks was quite wide and complex.
To begin with, an engineering reconnaissance company examined enemy fortifications for their firepower and “architectural strength.” Composing detailed plan, where the bunkers and other firing points are located, what they are (earth, concrete or other) and what they are armed with, what kind of cover they have, where the minefields and obstacles are located. Based on this data, an assault plan was developed.
Such requirements were explained simply: firstly, an attack fighter carried a load several times greater than a simple infantryman. He was wearing a steel breastplate, which protected him from small fragments and pistol (machine gun) bullets, and he often had a heavy bag with a “detonation kit” hanging over his shoulders. The pouches contained increased grenade ammunition, and
also bottles with Molotov cocktails, which were thrown into embrasures or window openings. And from the end of 1943, backpack flamethrowers became available to them.
In addition to traditional machine guns (PPSh and PPS), assault units were armed to capacity with light machine guns and anti-tank rifles - the latter were used as large-caliber rifles to suppress firing points.
To teach the personnel to run nimbly with all this load on their shoulders, as well as to reduce their possible losses, they gave him tough training. In addition to the fact that the fighters were driven in full gear on an obstacle course, they were also heartily sprayed with live ammunition over their heads - so that the rule “keep your head down” was fixed on the level of instinct even before the first fight. The other half of the day was occupied by training shooting and explosions, and mine clearance. Plus to this - hand-to-hand combat, throwing knives, axes and sapper blades.
It was much more difficult than training, say, intelligence officers. After all, the scout went on the mission light, and the main thing for him was not to reveal himself. But the attack fighter did not have the opportunity to hide in the bushes; he could not quietly “sneak away.” And his goal was not isolated drunken “tongues”, but the most powerful fortifications of the Eastern Front.
The battle began suddenly, sometimes even without artillery preparation and without any cries of “hurray!” Through pre-made passages in minefields x detachments of machine gunners and submachine gunners quietly passed by, cutting off the German pillboxes from infantry support. The enemy bunker itself was dealt with by explosives or flamethrowers.
Even the most powerful fortifications were disabled by a charge placed in the ventilation hole. Where the path was blocked by a grate, they acted witty and angrily: they poured several cans of kerosene inside and threw a match.
In urban conditions, the fighters of the ShISBr were distinguished by their ability to appear suddenly from the most unexpected side for the Germans. It's very simple: they literally walked through the walls, making their way with TNT. For example, the Germans turned the basement of a house into a bunker. Our fighters came from behind or from the side, blew up the wall of the basement (or the floor of the first floor) and immediately
they fired jets of flamethrowers there.
A good service in replenishing the arsenal of the ShISBr was provided... by the Germans themselves. Since the summer of 1943, Faust cartridges (“Panzerfaust”) began to enter service with the Nazi army, which the retreating Germans threw in huge quantities. The SHISBr fighters immediately found a use for them: after all, the Faustpatron penetrated not only armor, but also walls. It's interesting that our
the fighters came up with a special portable rack for salvo firing of 6-10 faust cartridges at the same time.
Ingenious portable frames were also used to launch heavy domestic 300-mm M-31 rockets. They were brought into position, laid down, and hit with direct fire. Thus, in the battle on Lindenstraße (Berlin), three such shells were launched at a fortified house. No one survived inside the smoking ruins that remained of the building.
In 1944, companies of flamethrower tanks and all kinds of amphibious transporters came to support the assault battalions. The power and effectiveness of the ShISBr, the number of which had already reached 20, increased sharply.
However, at first, the successes of the assault engineer brigades caused dizziness among the army command. There was a misconception that the ShISBr could do anything - and brigades began to be sent to all sectors of the front, without the support of other branches of the military. This was a fatal mistake.
If German positions were actively covered by artillery fire, which was not previously suppressed, the ShISBr was almost powerless. After all, no matter how prepared the soldiers were, they were just as vulnerable targets for German shells as recruits in greatcoats. It was even worse when the Germans recaptured their positions with a tank counterattack - here the special forces carried big losses. Only in December 1943 did the Headquarters establish strict regulations for the use of the ShISBr: now the brigades were necessarily supported by artillery, tanks and auxiliary infantry.
The rearguard of the ShISBr was mine clearance companies, including one company of mine-detecting dogs for each brigade. They followed assault battalions and cleared the main passages for the advancing army (the final clearance of the area was carried out by the rear sapper units). Miners also often used steel breastplates - as you know, sappers sometimes make mistakes, and two millimeters of steel could protect them from the explosion of small anti-personnel mines. In any case, it was at least some kind of cover for the chest and abdomen.
The golden pages in the history of the SISBr were the battles for Koenigsberg and Berlin, as well as the capture of the fortifications of the Kwantung Army. Military analysts confidently believe that without engineering assault special forces, these battles would have dragged on, and the losses of the Red Army would have been many times greater.
But, alas, already in 1946 the entire main staff of the ShISBr was demobilized, and then, one by one, the brigades were disbanded. At first, this was facilitated by the confidence of the next “Tukhachev’s” that the Third World War would be won with a lightning strike from the Soviet tank armies. With the advent of nuclear weapons, the Soviet General Staff began to believe that
An atomic bomb will cope perfectly with the enemy. Apparently, it never occurred to the old marshals that if anything would survive a nuclear cataclysm, it would be bunkers and underground forts. “Open” which, perhaps, only the ShISBr could.
The unique Soviet special forces were simply forgotten - so that subsequent generations did not even know about its existence. Thus, one of the most interesting and glorious pages of the Great Patriotic War was simply erased.
German special forces: SS saboteurs and special forces of Otto Skorzeny
By the spring of 1943, it became clear to everyone that the strategic initiative had passed from the Germans and Italians to the Allies. Behind was Stalingrad (300 thousand dead and captured German soldiers), 112 Wehrmacht divisions had already died in Eastern Front for 20 months of hostilities. In search of ways to change the course of events in their favor, leaders Nazi Germany proclaimed in February '43 the doctrine " total war».
Chief saboteur of the Third Reich: Otto Skorzeny.
New ideas required the promotion of new people to command positions in the army, navy, and intelligence services. Thus, Ernst Kaltenbrunner became the head of the Main Directorate of Reich Security (RSHA). He, in turn, made a number of changes in his department. Among other things, he appointed 35-year-old Hauptsturmführer Otto Skorzeny as head of department “C” (sabotage and terror) of the VI Directorate of the RSHA. It should be clarified that VI management is this is SS foreign intelligence. The track record of this athletic SS man (height 196 cm) by that time included such actions as participation in the forced annexation of Austria to Germany (March 38), a campaign in Holland (May 40), a campaign in Yugoslavia (May June 41), war on the territory of the USSR (June 41 - December 42).
Otto Skorzeny and Adolf Hitler. At the meeting, Hitler instructs the saboteur to free their ally from captivity - Benito Mussolini.
In the spirit of the ideas of “total war” it was required by forces department "C" organize sabotage operations around the world on the greatest scale in order to significantly increase the fascists' chances of success in an open war by secret means. He was ordered to arm and send against the British the mountaineer tribes in Iran, India, and Iraq; paralyze shipping along the Suez Canal; introduce terrorists and provocateurs into the ranks of the Yugoslav and French partisans; blow up or burn the main military factories USA and England; create a combat-ready “fifth column” in Brazil and Argentina; organize attacks on headquarters Soviet armies, destroy the commanders of the largest partisan detachments. Special attention focus on sabotage at enterprises of the Soviet defense industry in the regions of the Urals and Northern Kazakhstan, Western Siberia, absolutely inaccessible to German aviation. We must also remind you that the destruction of leaders anti-fascist coalition(Roosevelt, Stalin, Churchill) in Tehran and Casablanca were also prepared by Skorzeny and his department “C”.
Successful operation of German saboteurs Skorzeny: Benito Mussolini released
For the training and retraining of terrorist saboteurs, “Special courses” were opened special purpose"Oranienburg". They were located in the Friedenthal hunting castle, near the town of Sachsenhausen, an hour's drive from Berlin. The “students” of the courses arrived at the castle and left it at night, wearing only civilian clothes for camouflage. All of them, upon entering their studies, received new names and surnames. Among them, Germans predominated; there were also fascists from other countries. But what was not among them were newcomers. Each had solid experience of sabotage and terror behind them. These were seasoned killers: breaking a person’s spine or neck in one movement, piercing his Adam’s apple, stabbing him with a knife so that he could not even scream - all this was a mere trifle for them.
Benito Mussolini surrounded by German special forces led by Otto Skorzeny.
Therefore, at Friedenthal Castle they improved their skills using individual programs and prepared for specific operations. Among the technical innovations used by SS agents, special mention should be made of plastic explosives and shaped charges; poisoned bullets that caused instant death when hit in any part of the body; portable means of arson (pencils with thermite filling, thermoses, suitcases, books, the shell of which was the flammable material); a device for evacuating a person from the ground without landing an aircraft. This invention was a trapezoidal structure of small rods, with a 4-meter long rope between them. The plane flying in low-level flight captured her with a special hook, along with the agent sitting in the lower part of the trapezoid! (After the war, this device was adopted by the Americans from the Germans).
Going on a mission, Friedenthal's pupils became acquainted with the directive of Reichsführer SS Himmler: “Not a single person from the RSHA has the right to fall alive into the hands of the enemy!” Accordingly, each of them received a couple of capsules with strong poison, so that in a hopeless situation they could instantly commit suicide. And we must pay tribute, very few SS spies and saboteurs were captured during the war. In addition to poison, they were supplied with perfectly crafted false documents and money, which, as a rule, was also fake. During the war, the V11I (technical) Directorate of the RSHA printed 350 million British pounds sterling alone! The quality of the counterfeits turned out to be so high that the British were unable to identify these banknotes until the end of hostilities. And then long-range aircraft from the 200th bomber squadron or submarines delivered Skorzeny's boys to different parts of Europe and the entire globe.
For example, in Tanganyika (present-day Tanzania) a group of six people operated under the command of 24-year-old Franz Wimmer-Lamkweta. Having recruited a couple of dozen local thugs, receiving explosives and ammunition by parachute from German aircraft, this group operated for about a year and a half. It caused a lot of trouble for the British: saboteurs blew up bridges and power plants, derailed trains, set fire to coffee and cotton plantations, poisoned wells and livestock, killed the families of white farmers...
The most high-profile operation Department "C" - the kidnapping of the leader of the Italian fascists Benito Mussolini on September 12, 1943. After the anti-fascist coup d'état on July 25 of the same year, the government of Marshal P. Badoglio arrested Mussolini and ordered 200 carabinieri to be kept under guard in a tourist hotel located in the inaccessible Gran Sasso mountain range, near the Abruzzo peak. There was only one cable car (cable car) leading there from the valley.
Skorzeny decided to land troops directly on a mountain meadow next to the hotel. Otherwise, it would have been necessary to capture the cable car station in the valley, and it was not possible to do this quickly and quietly. He used 12 cargo gliders of the DFS-230 type. Each such glider could take on board, in addition to the pilot, 9 people in full combat gear. The capture group consisted of 12 pilots, 90 airborne troops, 16 students of Friedenthal, Skorzeny himself and the Italian general Soletti, for a total of exactly 120 people. During the launch from the Pratica de Mare airfield, two overloaded gliders capsized. On the way, two more fell to the ground (the saboteurs were carrying machine guns, a mountain of ammunition and explosives to “recapture” Mussolini). And although they actually didn’t have to fire a single shot, as a result of the accidents, 31 people died and another 16 were seriously injured. But Mussolini was taken to Germany, and then for several months he headed the so-called “Republic of Italian Fascists” in the northern part of the country, which fought with the partisans and allied forces British and Americans.
Skorzeny's bold operation became widely known and appeared on the front pages of newspapers. She even impressed Hitler, and he instructed Skorzeny to create new special forces battalions among volunteers recruited from paratroopers and SS troops.
In the spring of 44, Skorzeny, who by that time had become a Sturmbannführer (major), formed 6 “killer battalions” of man hunters: “Ost”, “Center”, “Süd-Ost”, “Süd-West”, “Nord-West” and "Nord-Ost". Their main purpose was to conduct counter-guerrilla operations against Polish, Soviet, Czechoslovak, Yugoslav, Italian, and French partisans.
On May 25, 1944, one of the new formations, the 500th battalion of SS paratroopers, landed from the air on the Bosnian town of Drvar, where Marshal Tito's headquarters and the allied military mission in Yugoslavia were located. The German losses were great, but Tito was forced to abandon his residence and flee to the Adriatic island of Vis, which was under the control of the British.
Five months later, another battalion, this time under the command of Skorzeny himself, struck the center of Budapest. During the action, members of the government of Admiral Horthy, who were trying to negotiate the terms of surrender with the USSR, were kidnapped.
Thanks to his brave forays, Skorzeny gained great popularity. They even talked about him as "myself dangerous person in Europe".
When the Anglo-American troops landed in Normandy launched an offensive on the territory of Belgium and Northern France towards the Rhine, Skorzeny received the order: “You are obliged to capture several bridges over the Meuse in the area between Liege and Namur. When performing this task, you will all change into enemy uniforms for camouflage... In addition, it is necessary to send forward small teams, also in English and American uniform, which should disseminate misinforming orders, disrupt communications and bring confusion and panic to the ranks of the enemy troops" (in other words, do the same thing as the Brandenburg units on the Eastern Front in 41-42).
For this operation those soldiers and officers of the destroyer battalions and parachute units who spoke reasonable English. British and American non-commissioned officers were brought from prisoner of war camps; they were supposed to teach the German saboteurs the most common English phrases, American slang, teach them the forms of address and behavior of military personnel of the allied armies (then they were all shot to maintain secrecy). They also delivered British and American captured weapons (from pistols to machine guns, from jeeps to light tanks), uniforms, and personal documents of killed or captured soldiers, officers, and non-commissioned officers. Of course, the saboteurs were supplied with counterfeit pounds and dollars and given capsules containing poison.
On December 14, 1944, Skorzeny announced to the commanders of three special groups (135 people each) their tasks in Operation Thunder. At dawn on December 16th it began German counter-offensive. First, two thousand German guns opened hurricane fire. This was followed by a strike by 11 battle groups, the backbone of which was made up of 8 tank divisions. Bad weather negated Allied air superiority. German tanks crushed their forward positions. And in their rear, in the columns of retreating troops, Skorzeny’s troops were already working at full speed. They gave false orders to unit commanders and violated telephone communication, destroyed and rearranged road signs, mined highways and railroad tracks, blew up ammunition and fuel depots, and killed commanders and staff officers. Soon "Tommies" and "amis" were unable to distinguish between where their front was and where their rear was. Thousands of them died or were captured in the first 24 hours. About 700 tanks and several thousand cars were lost. The front line rolled back several tens of kilometers. But Skorzeny’s troops also lost almost two-thirds of their personnel in the Ardennes: victory is not given to anyone for free!
In 1944, the situation of 1940 (the disaster at Dunkirk) was not repeated - instead of a general surrender, the Allies responded with a decisive counterattack. The communications center of the Ardennes was the city of Bastogne. The American 101st Airborne Division was there, cut off from the rest of the world. She was fired upon and attacked from all sides. The commander, Brigadier General Anthony McAuliffe, responded briefly to the Germans’ offer to surrender: “fuck you...”
The defense of Bastogne slowed the German advance. As a result of the cold snap on December 26, the low clouds and thick fog disappeared. Now the American Air Force was able to connect. The British were approaching from the north. SAS units penetrated into the eastern Ardennes and the Eifel hills. British four-wheel drive jeeps equipped with heavy machine guns threatened German communications. Thus, both opponents made equal use of special forces units. The Allies withstood the pressure of the Germans and forced them to retreat. The outcome of the war in the West was a foregone conclusion.
The Bradenburgers were members of a special German special forces unit in World War II and took part in covert operations throughout Eastern Europe, in South Africa, Afghanistan, the Middle East and the Caucasus. They tended to consist of collaborators or ethnic Germans, citizens of foreign countries where these commandos were used. At first they served as an Abwehr construction battalion, at the end of the war they became a separate division.
"Friends of Germany" from Brandenburg
The idea of creating a special unit “Bradenburgers”, which would participate in secret operations on the territory of foreign countries, belonged to Hauptmann Theodor von Hippel. This was long before the beginning wars of conquest Wehrmacht - in 1935. He approached the relevant department of the Reichswehr with this proposal and was refused. A few years later, he came to an appointment with the head of the military intelligence and counterintelligence service in Nazi Germany, Wilhelm Canaris, who at first was also against this initiative.
Working ahead
As you know, by 1939, that is, even before the start of the war with Poland, the German intelligence Abwehr consisted of three sections. “The First” was responsible for espionage and intelligence gathering, “The Second” was responsible for sabotage and special units, and the “Third” was for counterintelligence and competed with the SS security service (SD), which was headed by Reinhard Heydrich, known for his cruelty.
In Abwehr II, von Hippel headed the special operations department, so he had an interest in what was happening in Abwehr I, Abwehr III, and even in the SD. He studied works on the use of commandos in the African colonies of Germany in the 1st World War. Success, it turns out, accompanied those commanders who used local residents when executing special tasks, and also themselves engaged in intelligence and counterintelligence. At least in order not to blindly rely on the relevant intelligence services.
By this point, von Hippel had already recruited small groups of ethnic Germans from the border areas of the Sudetenland of Czechoslovakia and Silesia of Poland. These people not only knew the languages and traditions of their countries very well, but also possessed the qualities of special operations fighters. Hippel took only volunteers into his team, because he relied on their high spirit and fearlessness. Soon the secret “Construction Training Company No. 1” was formed from German Poles.
First success
A few days before the Wehrmacht invasion of Poland, a group of 80 people from the “Construction training company No. 1" penetrated into the area of particular importance, the Katowice Railway Junction. They pretended to be Polish railway workers so as not to attract attention Polish soldiers, which was preparing to repel the German army. When the Germans entered the territory of a neighboring state, “Hippel’s people” deceitfully captured a strategic facility and even convinced the defenders of the “Katowice Crossroads” to board the train and leave.
Then the operation went flawlessly, and German troops began to use the railway junction to their advantage, especially since all of its rolling stock was in perfect working condition. However, other divisions of Construction Training Company No. 1 were less fortunate: they were unable to prevent the destruction of bridges across the Vistula River at Dirschau and Graudenz. The capture of the Yablunka tunnel also failed.
Abwehr gave the go-ahead
Despite these setbacks, the German High Command was very impressed with the results of the operations and agreed to expand and develop von Hippel's concept. His immediate superior, Helmut Groskurt, took up the matter and, having convinced Canaris, on September 27, 1939, gave the order to create a special unit of saboteurs within Abwehr II. At first it was called “friends (comrades) of Germany” - Deutsche Kompagnie, but this team was given the name “Brandenburgers” after the name of the land where they were based. In the Wehrmacht list, this unit was listed as ordinary training construction battalion No. 800.
To the West
The Germans could not afford to get bogged down in bloody battles in Holland and set the goal of its speedy surrender. Otherwise, the plan to defeat France might not bring results. The Brandenburgers, who crossed the Dutch border on the night of May 9, 1940, were ideally suited to carry out this mission. The main target was the railway bridge at Gennap in the path of the 9th Panzer Division, the only armored formation involved in the invasion of the Netherlands.
A group of seven "German prisoners" - in fact Brandenburgers - accompanied by two supposedly Dutch guards arrived at the bridge 10 minutes before the planned attack. After the signal, they attacked the strongest forward guard post. Behind, where there was a post with remote detonation of the bridge, it was also captured by the “Dutch”, who allegedly came to help the defenders. Hippel's commandos also prevented the opening of the Newport airlock. During World War I, recall, the Belgians flooded the Iser Plain, which stopped the German advance.
Brandenburgers were a huge success with Western companies, and in the summer of 1940 they were poised to make a significant contribution to the upcoming invasion of the United Kingdom. When this operation failed, they moved to Kenzee, where they began preparations for Plan Barbarossa.
Many Brandenburgers entered our territory on June 21, 1941, literally the day before the start of Operation Barbarossa. They wore clothes familiar to these places. Despite the fact that each detachment was led by a special forces soldier who spoke fluent Russian, they did not know the Soviet passwords. Because of this, some of the saboteurs were captured by Soviet border guards, but a significant part still penetrated their positions.
They, for example, on June 27, 1941, managed to capture an important bridge in the Pripyat swamps. The Brandenburgers, dressed in Red Army uniforms and pretending to flee from the pursuing Germans, were able to drive onto the bridge in two trucks and capture the post where the demolition point for the structure was located. This largely happened because the Christian guards, in the spirit of generally accepted mutual assistance, took pity on the “exhausted and wounded soldiers of the Red Army.”
The Brandenburger commander, in the uniform of a senior NKVD officer, with threats to “rot the chief of security and his family in Siberia, they say, it is categorically impossible to blow up the bridge, since the Red Army is coming towards the enemy,” cut the wires of the detonator, but was shot dead Soviet officer. However, the most important overpass, sandwiched between forests and swamps, was captured by the Wehrmacht. And this was a typical operation that allowed German troops to quickly advance into the vast country.
Brandenburgers against the partisans
In October 1942, the number of Bradenburgers reached the division, and their main task was to fight the Soviet partisans, who successfully fought against the invaders. The people's avengers constantly attacked Wehrmacht supply lines, using ambush tactics and hiding in forests and swamps. But it was an obvious mistake to use the Bradenburgers in the role of ordinary partisans who were supposedly looking for “their” comrades.
These commandos were trained to offensive operations against an inexperienced enemy. By this time, both the Red Army soldiers and the partisans could easily identify the Bradenburgers even by appearance. And although their skills allowed them to achieve some success on this invisible front, the morale of the special forces fell. Having carried heavy losses, many of the Bradenburgers were transferred to a special forces detachment by SS Colonel Otto Skorzeny, where they were finally killed.
On July 5, 1941, by order of the NKVD of the USSR, a Special Group was created under the People's Commissar of Internal Affairs Lavrentiy Pavlovich Beria, headed by Senior State Security Major Pavel Anatolyevich Sudoplatov. The group was given very specific and especially important tasks - “to destroy the Nazi invaders and their minions in the enemy rear.” Due to the fact that the equipment and preparation huge amount There were no fighters at the time, the idea arose of creating a special military unit that would be engaged exclusively in reconnaissance and sabotage work. Only volunteers were enrolled. They included over 800 athletes - the entire color of Soviet sports.
After special training, the fighters operated as part of units in small groups and individually behind enemy lines. On October 3, 1941, the units formed by the Special Group were consolidated into the Separate motorized rifle brigade special purpose (OMSBON) consisting of two regiments, and on the basis of the Special Group the 2nd Department was formed, which was later transformed into the 4th Directorate of the NKVD of the USSR, the head of which was also Pavel Sudoplatov. In addition to intelligence activities, OMSBON was called upon to become the core of the unfolding partisan movement, provide it with comprehensive assistance, and create an underground in the cities.
The main tasks include: collecting intelligence and information of a military, economic and socio-political nature; destruction of strategic railways and highways and other communications in the front-line zone and deep behind enemy lines, disabling important transport hubs; disruption of rail and road transport of enemy personnel and equipment to the front; destruction of bridges and station structures; any obstacle to export to Germany Soviet citizens, equipment and national property of the Soviet people and property of citizens looted by the Germans; the defeat of military, gendarmerie and police garrisons; disablement industrial enterprises, power plants, communications.
The results of OMSBON's military operations on the fronts amaze everyone's imagination - not a single formation of the Red Army had such successes. Using the example of the first unit from the OMSBON - the Mitya detachment, under the command of Dmitry Nikolaevich Medvedev, thrown behind German troops in early September 1941. The detachment, consisting of 30 fighters, operated until January 1942 in the Smolensk, Bryansk and Mogilev regions. The detachment conducted over 50 major operations: three railway and seven highway bridges were blown up, nine enemy aircraft were destroyed, the railway track was severely destroyed in 13 places, and three enemy military echelons were derailed. The detachment's fighters defeated several garrisons and police posts, destroyed six telegraph communication points, disabled six factories that carried out military orders, killed two generals, 17 officers, more than 400 German soldiers. Fair retribution suffered 45 traitors to the Motherland.
In 1941-1943 alone, Omsbonovites prepared 128.5 kilometers for destruction railway tracks, highways and highways, dug 11,564 high-explosive craters on them, manufactured and reloaded 8,998 mines, laid 2,057 landmines, blew up 71.5 kilometers of highways and highways, laid 49,252 minefields, blew up 350 bridges, laid 94 kilometers of mine debris, disabled more than 36 industrial enterprises, trained 2,469 demolition workers from among workers and employees of local enterprises, etc.
