Total number of deaths in World War II. They did not return from the battle: the number of deaths in the Great Patriotic War has been declassified

What were the losses of the USSR population during World War II? Stalin said that they were 7 million, Khrushchev - 20. However, is there any reason to believe that they were significantly larger?
By the beginning of the war, the population of the USSR was 197,500,000 people. The “natural” population growth from 1941 to 1945 was 13,000,000 people... and the “natural” decline was 15,000,000 people, since the war was going on.
By 1946, the population of the USSR should have been 195,500,000 people. However, at this time it was only 168,500,000 people. Consequently, population losses during the war amounted to 27,000,000 people. An interesting fact: the population of the republics and territories annexed in 1939 is 22,000,000 people. However, in 1946 it was 13 million. The fact is that 9 million people emigrated. 2 million Germans (or those who called themselves Germans) moved to Germany, 2 million Poles (or those who knew a few words from the Polish dialect) to Poland, 5 million residents of the western regions of the USSR moved to Western countries.
So, direct losses from the war: 27 million - 9 million = 18 million people. 8 million people out of 18 million are civilians: 1 million Poles who died at the hands of Bandera, 1 million who died during the siege of Leningrad, 2 million civilians classified by the Nazis as persons capable of taking up arms (age from 15 to 65 years) and held in concentration camps along with Soviet prisoners of war, 4 million Soviet citizens, classified by the fascists as communists, partisans, etc. Every tenth Soviet person died.

Losses of the Red Army - 10 million people.

What were the population losses in Germany during World War II?By the beginning of the war, the population of Germany proper was 74,000,000 people. The population of the Third Reich is 93 million people.By the fall of 1945, the population of Germany (Vaterland, not the entire Third Reich) was 52,000,000 people. More than 5 million Germans immigrated to the country from among the Volksdeutsche. So, German losses: 74 million - 52 million + 5 million = 27 million people.

The Second World War, which involved four-fifths of the world's population, became the bloodiest in human history. Due to the fault of the imperialists, there was a massive extermination of people in various regions of the globe for six years.

More than 110 million people were mobilized into the armed forces. Many tens of millions were killed, injured, and left disabled. Civilian casualties increased sharply. They accounted for almost half of the total losses, while in the First World War - 5 percent.

It is extremely difficult to accurately determine the number of military and civilian deaths in a number of countries, since many of them do not have statistical data on population losses during the war as a whole, or these data do not reflect the actual situation. In addition, the fascists tried in every possible way to hide their atrocities, and after the war, their ideological lawyers deliberately distorted the indicators of human losses of individual countries. All this caused significant differences in estimates of the death toll. The most authoritative studies show that more than 50 million people died during the Second World War.

In addition to direct human losses, many warring states also suffered large indirect losses. The mobilization of a significant part of the male population into the armed forces, the forced involvement of women in the system of socially organized labor, material and everyday difficulties, etc. dramatically changed the population reproduction regime, reduced fertility rates and increased mortality.

The largest direct and indirect population losses were suffered by European countries. About 40 million people died here, that is, significantly more than on other continents combined. During the war years, in almost all European countries the conditions of existence and development of the population worsened for a long time.

In 1938, the population of European countries was 390.6 million people, and in 1945 - 380.9 million. If not for the war, with the previous birth and death rates, it would have increased over these years by about 12 million people . The war seriously deformed the age, gender, and family-marriage structure of the continent's population. The quality and, in many countries, the level of general education and professional training have decreased significantly.

Half of the casualties in Europe occurred in the USSR. They amounted to over 20 million people, a significant part of them were civilians who died in Hitler's death camps, as a result of fascist repressions, disease and hunger, and from enemy air raids. The losses of the USSR significantly exceed the human losses of its Western allies. The country has lost a large part of the population of the most working and productive ages, who had work experience and professional training. The great losses of the Soviet Union were due primarily to the fact that it bore the brunt of Nazi Germany and for a long time alone resisted the fascist bloc in Europe. They are explained by the particularly cruel policy of mass extermination of Soviet people, which was carried out by the aggressor.

A difficult demographic situation developed after the Second World War in Poland and Yugoslavia, which lost a significant part of their population: Poland - 6 million, Yugoslavia - 1.7 million people.

The fascist leadership set as its goal to change the demographic process in Europe, and subsequently throughout the world. For this purpose, mass physical extermination of the conquered peoples was envisaged, as well as forcible birth control. Along with this, the Nazis sought to stimulate the growth of the number of “chosen” nations in order to gain a foothold in the occupied territories. However, the war led to heavy losses for Germany itself - over 13 million people killed, wounded, captured, and missing. Fascist Italy lost 500 thousand people dead.

The population losses of countries such as France (600 thousand) and Great Britain (370 thousand) are less than the losses of a number of other states participating in the war, but they also had a negative impact on their post-war development.

The peoples of Asia suffered considerable human losses during the war. The number of killed and wounded in China was over 5 million people. Japan lost 2.5 million people - mostly military personnel. Of the 350 thousand civilians killed in Japan, most - over 270 thousand people - were victims of the atomic bombings of the cities of Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Compared to Europe and Asia, other continents suffered significantly lower human losses. In total, they amounted to 400 thousand people. The USA lost about 300 thousand people dead, Australia and New Zealand - over 40 thousand, Africa - 10 thousand people (206).

The large differences in human losses in relation to individual countries, groups of states, and regions of the world are due, on the one hand, to the nature and degree of their participation directly in the armed struggle, and on the other, to the class and political goals that the warring countries pursued. The latter determined their different attitudes towards prisoners of war and the civilian population of the enemy, as well as towards the fate of the population of the allied states and the world as a whole.

Many hundreds of thousands of prisoners of war and millions of civilians were destroyed in the territories occupied by the Nazi and Japanese invaders. With particular cruelty, the Nazis applied their carefully developed policy of physical extermination of the Soviet people. The Nazis carried out a massive deportation of the civilian population to Germany, where they ended up either in hard labor or in concentration camps. Executions, poisoning in gas chambers, beatings, torture, monstrous medical experiments, forced labor - all this led to the mass destruction of people. Thus, out of 18 million European citizens who ended up in Hitler’s concentration camps, over 11 million people were exterminated.

The aggressors themselves, although their armed forces were defeated and forced to unconditional surrender, suffered relatively fewer losses, which was evidence of the humane attitude towards prisoners of war and the civilian population of the defeated countries on the part of the victors, especially the USSR.

The war had a great impact not only on the natural reproduction of the population in all countries of the world, but also on its interstate and internal migration. The Nazis’ rise to power and the preparations they began for aggression caused the population to flee from Germany and other European countries to the countries of Africa, North and Latin America. The advance of the fascist armies led to population displacement in almost all European countries. In addition, the Nazis resorted to the massive forced removal of labor from the occupied areas to Germany. The internal migration caused by the war, accompanied by enormous hardships and hardships, contributed to an increase in mortality and a decrease in the birth rate. Similar processes took place in Asia.

Thus, the Second World War brought major changes to the population structure throughout the world. For a number of countries, including socialist ones, the demographic consequences of the war became one of the most unfavorable factors.

The Second World War confirmed the conclusions of Marxism-Leninism about the enormous impact of the economic factor on the occurrence of wars, methods of waging them, their course and results. In the Second World War, the bloodiest and most brutal, the interconnection and interdependence of economic, scientific, social, moral, political and military factors intensified. The results of the actions of the armed forces, along with other factors, were determined by the degree of their economic support. The volume and qualitative structure of the material needs of the armed forces have sharply expanded, and the importance of the timing of major military-economic activities has increased. The influence of the social system of states on the military economy and its ability to meet the needs of the front became particularly evident.

One of the important lessons of the Second World War is the increasing impact it had on the economy. The degree of subordination of the national economy to the needs of war increased sharply. Almost the entire sector of the economy worked for it to one degree or another. The credit and financial system of states, money circulation, and domestic and foreign trade underwent a profound restructuring.

In terms of the number of human and material losses, and their immediate and long-term consequences, the Second World War has no equal in history. It far surpassed the First World War in terms of human casualties, expended material resources, the volume of production of military equipment, the intensity of economic efforts and the hardships that most of its participants had to endure.

The experience of the Second World War reminds us that not only the war itself and its consequences, but also the preparation for it and the arms race lead to a serious aggravation of population problems and to the undermining of the economy. Only a lasting democratic peace creates the necessary conditions for the development of economic and demographic processes in directions that meet the interests of social progress.

In 1993, after the collapse of the USSR, the first public Soviet statistics of losses during World War II appeared, created under the leadership of General Grigory Krivosheev by order of the USSR Ministry of Defense. Here is an article by St. Petersburg amateur historian Vyacheslav Krasikov about what the Soviet military genius actually calculated.

The topic of Soviet losses in World War II still remains taboo in Russia, primarily due to the unwillingness of society and the state to look at this problem as an adult. The only “statistical” study on this topic is the work “The Classification of Secrecy Has Been Removed: Losses of the Armed Forces of the USSR in Wars, Combat Actions and Military Conflicts,” published in 1993. In 1997, an English-language edition of the study was published, and in 2001, the second edition of “Losses of the Armed Forces of the USSR in Wars, Combat Actions and Military Conflicts” appeared.

If you do not pay attention to the shamefully late appearance of statistics on Soviet losses in general (almost 50 years after the end of the war), the work of Krivosheev, who headed a team of employees of the Ministry of Defense, did not make a big splash in the scientific world (of course, for post-Soviet autochthons it became a balm per capita, since it brought Soviet losses to the same level as German ones). One of the main sources of data for the team of authors led by Krivosheev is the General Staff fund in the central archive of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation (TsAMO), which is still classified and where access is denied to researchers. That is, it is objectively impossible to verify the accuracy of the work of military archivists. For this reason, in the West, the scientific community, which has been dealing with the issue of losses in World War II for almost 60 years, reacted coolly to Krivosheev’s work and simply did not even notice it.

In Russia, numerous attempts were made to criticize the research of Grigory Krivosheev - critics reproached the general for methodological inaccuracies, the use of unverified and unproven data, purely arithmetic inconsistencies, and so on. As an example, you can look. We want to offer our readers not so much another criticism of Krivosheev’s work itself, but rather an attempt to introduce new, additional data (for example, party and Komsomol statistics), which will shed more light on the size of total Soviet losses. Perhaps this will further contribute to their gradual approach to reality and the development of normal, civilized scientific discussion in Russia. The article by Vyacheslav Krasikov, which contains all the links, can be downloaded in full. All scans of the books he refers to are

Soviet historiography: how many remain unforgotten?

After a war, civilized countries usually reflect on the course of battles by subjecting them to critical discussion in the light of enemy documents that have become available. Such work, of course, requires maximum objectivity. Otherwise, it is simply impossible to draw the right conclusions so as not to repeat past mistakes. However, the works that were published in the USSR in the first post-war decade cannot be called historical research even with great stretch. They consisted mainly of clichés on the theme of the inevitability of victory under the leadership of the Bolshevik Party, the original superiority of Soviet military art and the genius of Comrade Stalin. During the life of the “leader of the peoples,” almost no memoirs were published, and the little that came out of print looked more like science fiction literature. The censorship essentially had no serious work to do in such a situation. Unless to identify those who are not diligent enough in the work of glorification. Therefore, this institute turned out to be completely unprepared for the surprises and metamorphoses of the hectic Khrushchev “thaw”.

However, the information explosion of the 50s was not the merit of Nikita Sergeevich alone. The above-described blissful idyll was destroyed by banal human ambition.

The fact is that in the West the process of understanding the recent hostilities followed a normal, civilized path. The generals talked about their achievements and shared smart thoughts with the public. The Soviet military elite, of course, also wanted to participate in such an interesting and exciting process, but the “Kremlin highlander” did not like this kind of activity. But after March 1953, this obstacle disappeared. As a result, the Soviet censorship was immediately bombarded with an order to publish translations of certain works about World War II written by former enemies and allies. In this case, they limited themselves to only excerpts of particularly unpleasant pages and editorial comments that helped Soviet readers “correctly” understand the work of foreigners “prone to falsification.” But when, after this, a large number of their own gold-purchasing authors received permission to publish memoirs, the process of “comprehension” finally got out of control. And it led to results that were completely unexpected for its initiators. Many events and figures became public knowledge, which, complementing and clarifying each other, formed a completely different mosaic than the previously existing picture of the war. Just think about the threefold increase in the official figure of the total losses of the USSR from 7 to 20 million people.

Of course, the writers themselves understood what was going on and tried to pass over their own failures in silence. But something was reported about similar moments in the combat path of former comrades. As a result, side effects appeared. Such as the public scandal with written complaints against each other in the CPSU Central Committee of Marshals Zhukov and Chuikov, who did not share the victorious laurels. In addition, any fact that is pleasant at first glance can, in one fell swoop, destroy a myth that has been created over the years. For example, the information, flattering for high-ranking “home front workers,” that Soviet industry always produced more equipment than German industry, inevitably cast doubt on the general’s boast about victories “not in numbers, but in skill.”

Thus, military-historical science has taken, on the scale of the Soviet Union, a gigantic step forward. After which it became impossible to return to Stalin's times. However, with Brezhnev coming to power, they again tried to streamline matters in the field of covering the events of the Great Patriotic War.

Thus, by the mid-80s, the intellectual environment of domestic historiography of the Second World War was finally formed. Most of the specialists who are developing this topic today are also fed by its traditions. It cannot, of course, be said that all historians continue to cling to the stereotypes of “the times of Ochakov and the conquest of Crimea.” Suffice it to recall the “perestroika” euphoria of revelations, which ended in a grandiose scandal in 1991, when, in order to appease the generals from history, who had literally gone into “protective” hysteria, the editorial board was purged with a new 10-volume “History of the Great Patriotic War”, since its authors wanted to rise to objective analysis performed according to Western scientific standards. The result was the excommunication of “rootless cosmopolitans” from the archives, as well as corresponding organizational conclusions. The head of the Institute of Military History, General D. A. Volkogonov, was relieved of his post, and most of his young assistants were dismissed from the army. Control over the work on the preparation of the 10-volume work was tightened, for which purpose marshals and generals who had been tried and tested in their previous activities were involved in it. However, a fairly large amount of statistical information on this topic managed to escape through the archival doors during the post-war decades. Let's try to systematize it.

Official Soviet figures

If we carefully trace the history of how the “numerical equivalents” of the victims of World War II changed in the USSR, we will immediately discover that these changes were not in the nature of chaotic digital chaos, but were subject to easily traceable relationships and strict logic.

Until the end of the 80s of the last century, this logic boiled down to the fact that propaganda, although very, very slowly, was gradually giving way to science - albeit overly ideological, but based on archival materials. Therefore, Stalin’s 7,000,000 total military losses of the USSR under Khrushchev turned into 20,000,000, under Brezhnev into “more than 20,000,000,” and under Gorbachev into “more than 27,000,000.” The Armed Forces casualty figures also “danced” in the same direction. As a result, already in the early 60s it was officially recognized that more than 10,000,000 soldiers died at the front alone (not counting those who did not return from captivity). In the 70s of the last century, the figure “more than 10,000,000 died at the front” (not counting those killed in captivity) became generally accepted. It was cited in the most authoritative publications of the time. As an example, it is enough to recall the article by Corresponding Member of the Academy of Medical Sciences, Colonel General of the Medical Service E.I. Smirnov, published in a collection that was prepared jointly by the USSR Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Military History of the USSR Ministry of Defense, and was published by the Nauka publishing house "

By the way, in the same year, another “milestone” book was presented to readers - “The Soviet Union in the Great Patriotic War 1941-1945,” where the numbers of army losses and Red Army soldiers killed in captivity were made public. For example, in German concentration camps alone, up to 7 million civilians (?) and up to 4 million captured Red Army soldiers died, which gives a total of up to 14 million dead Red Army soldiers (10 million at the front and 4 million in captivity). Here, apparently, it is also appropriate to recall that at that time in the USSR, each such figure was an official state figure - it necessarily passed through the strictest censorship “sieve” - it was repeatedly double-checked and often reproduced in various reference and information publications.

In principle, in the USSR in the 70s, in fact, they admitted that the army’s losses in those killed at the front and in captivity for the years 1941-1945 amounted to approximately 16,000,000 - 17,000,000 people. True, the statistics were published in a somewhat veiled form.

Here in the 1st volume of the Soviet Military Encyclopedia (article “Combat losses”) it says: “ So, if in the 1st World War about 10 million people were killed and died from wounds, then in the 2nd World War only the losses killed on the fronts amounted to 27 million people". These are precisely army losses, since the total number of deaths in World War II in the same publication is determined to be 50 million people.

If we subtract from these 27,000,000 the losses of the Armed Forces of all participants in World War II, except the USSR, then the remainder will be about 16-17 million. These figures are the number of military personnel killed (at the front and in captivity) recognized in the USSR. It was then possible to count “everyone except the USSR” using the book “Wars and Population of Europe” by Boris Urlanis, which was first published in the Union in 1960. Now it is easy to find on the Internet under the title “History of War Losses”.

All of the above statistics on army losses were repeatedly reproduced in the USSR until the end of the 80s. But in 1990, the Russian General Staff published the results of its own new “refined” calculations of irretrievable army losses. Surprisingly, in some mysterious way they turned out not larger than the previous “stagnant” ones, but smaller. Moreover, less cool - almost in 2 times. Specifically - 8,668,400 people. The solution to the rebus here is simple - during the period of Gorbachev's perestroika, history was again politicized to the limit, turning into a propaganda tool. And the “big stripes” from the Ministry of Defense decided in this manner “on the sly” to improve the “patriotic” statistics.

Therefore, no explanation was given for such a strange arithmetic metamorphosis. On the contrary, soon these 8,668,400 (again without explanation) were “detailed” in the reference book “Classified as Classified”, which was then supplemented and republished. And what is most striking is that the Soviet figures were instantly forgotten - they simply quietly disappeared from books published under the patronage of the state. But the question about the logical absurdity of such a situation remains:

It turns out that for 3 decades in the USSR they tried to “denigrate” one of their most important achievements - the victory over Nazi Germany - they pretended that they fought worse than they really did and for this they published false data on army losses, inflated by two times. times.

But the real “beautiful” statistics were kept classified as “secret”...

Secrecy vulture eating the dead

By analyzing all the amazing data from Krivosheev’s “research”, several solid monographs can be written. Various authors are most often carried away by examples of analysis of the results of individual operations. These are, of course, good visual illustrations. However, they cast doubt only on specific figures – against the backdrop of overall losses, they are not very large.

Krivosheev hides the bulk of his losses among the “re-conscripts.” In “Statement of Secrecy” he indicates their number as “more than 2 million”, and in “Russia in Wars” he completely removes from the text of the book an indication of the number of this category of conscripts. He simply writes that the total number of mobilized people is 34,476,700 - excluding those re-conscripted. The exact number of re-conscripts - 2,237,000 people - was named by Krivosheev in only one article, published in a small-circulation collection sixteen years ago.

Who are the “recallees”? This is, for example, when a person was seriously wounded in 1941 and, after a long treatment, was “written off” from the army “due to health.” But, when in the second half of the war human resources were already coming to an end, the medical requirements were revised and lowered. As a result, the man was again declared fit for service and drafted into the army. And in 1944 he was killed. Thus, Krivosheev counts this person among the mobilized only once. But he is “removed” from the ranks of the army twice - first as a disabled person, and then as a dead man. Ultimately, it turns out that one of the “withdrawn” is hidden from being included in the total irrecoverable losses.

Another example. The man was mobilized, but was soon transferred to the NKVD troops. A few months later, this part of the NKVD was transferred back to the Red Army (for example, on the Leningrad Front in 1942, an entire division was transferred from the NKVD to the Red Army at once - they simply changed the number). But Krivosheev takes this soldier into account in the initial transfer from the army to the NKVD, but does not notice the return transfer from the NKVD to the Red Army (since his re-conscripts are excluded from the list of mobilized). Therefore, it turns out that the person is again “hidden” - he is actually a member of the post-war army, but is not taken into account by Krivosheev.

Another example. The man was mobilized, but in 1941 he went missing - he remained surrounded and “took root” among the civilian population. In 1943, this territory was liberated, and the Primak was again drafted into the army. However, in 1944 his leg was torn off. As a result, disability and write-off “clean”. Krivosheev deducts this person from 34,476,700 as many as three times - first as a missing person, then among the 939,700 encircled people called up in the former occupied territory, and also as a disabled person. It turns out that he is “hiding” two losses.

It would take a long time to list all the tricks used in the reference book to “improve” statistics. But it is much more productive to recalculate the figures that Krivosheev proposes as basic ones. But count in normal logic - without “patriotic” guile. To do this, let us again turn to the statistics indicated by the general in the already mentioned above-mentioned small-circulation collection on losses.

Then we get:
4,826,900 – the strength of the Red Army and the Red Army on June 22, 1941.
31,812,200 – Number of mobilized (including re-conscripts) during the entire war.
Total – 36,639,100 people.

After the end of hostilities in Europe (at the beginning of June 1945), there were a total of 12,839,800 people in the Red Army and the Red Red Army (including the wounded in hospitals). From here you can find out the total losses: 36.639.100 – 12.839.800 = 23.799.300

Next, we will count those who, for various reasons, left the USSR Armed Forces alive, but not at the front:
3,798,200 – commissioned due to health reasons.
3,614,600 – transferred to industry, MPVO and VOKhR.
1,174,600 - transferred to the NKVD.
250,400 - transferred to the Allied armies.
206,000 were expelled as unreliable.
436,600 – convicted and sent to prison.
212.400 – deserters not found.
Total – 9.692.800

Let us subtract these “living” from the total losses and thus find out how many people died at the front and in captivity, and were also released from captivity in the last weeks of the war.
23.799.300 – 9.692.800 = 14.106.500

To establish the final number of demographic losses suffered by the Armed Forces, it is necessary to subtract from 14,106,500 those who returned from captivity but did not re-enlist in the army. For a similar purpose, Krivosheev deducts 1,836,000 people registered by the repatriation authorities. This is another trick. In the collection “War and Society”, prepared by the Russian Academy of Sciences and the Institute of Russian History, an article by V. N. Zemskov “Repatriation of displaced Soviet citizens” was published, which reveals in detail all the components of the number of prisoners of war that interests us.

It turns out that 286,299 prisoners were released on the territory of the USSR before the end of 1944. Of these, 228,068 people were re-mobilized into the army. And in 1944-1945 (during the period of hostilities outside the USSR), 659,190 people were released and mobilized into the army. Simply put, they are also already included among the re-callers.

That is, 887,258 (228,068 + 659,190) former prisoners at the beginning of June 1945 were among the 12,839,800 souls who served in the Red Army and the Red Army. Consequently, from 14,106,500 it is necessary to subtract not 1.8 million, but approximately 950,000 who were released from captivity, but were not mobilized a second time into the army during the war.

As a result, we get at least 13,150,000 military personnel of the Red Army and the Red Army who died in 1941-1945 at the front, in captivity and were among the “defectors”. However, that's not all. Krivosheev also “hides” losses (killed, died in captivity and defectors) among those written off for health reasons. Here, “The classification of secrecy has been lifted” p. 136 (or “Russia in the wars...” p. 243). In the figure of 3,798,158 disabled people, he also takes into account those who were sent on leave due to injury. In other words, people did not leave the army - they were actually listed in its ranks, and the directory excludes them and thus “hides” at least several hundred thousand more killed.

That is, if we proceed from the figures that Krivosheev himself proposes as the initial basis for calculations, but treat them without the general’s manipulations, then we will get not 8,668,400 killed at the front, in captivity and “defectors,” but about 13,500. 000.

Through the prism of party statistics

However, the data on the number of mobilized in 1941-1945, which Krivosheev stated as “basic” figures for calculating losses, also seem to be underestimated. A similar conclusion arises if you check the reference book with information from official statistics of the CPSU (b) and the Komsomol. These calculations are much more accurate than army reports, since in the Red Army people often did not even have documents or even posthumous medallions (the Interpreter’s blog partially touched on the related topic of dog tags in the Red Army). But communists and Komsomol members were taken into account incomparably better. Each of them necessarily had a party card in hand and regularly participated in party meetings, the minutes of which (indicating the number of names of the “cell”) were sent to Moscow.

This data was sent separately from the army - along a parallel party line. And this figure was published much more willingly in the Khrushchev-Brezhnev USSR - censorship treated it more leniently - as indicators of ideological victories, where even losses were perceived as proof of the unity of society and the people’s devotion to the system of socialism.

The essence of the calculation comes down to the fact that the losses of the USSR Armed Forces in terms of Komsomol members and communists are known quite accurately. In total, by the beginning of the war in the USSR there were slightly less than 4,000,000 members of the CPSU (b). Of these, 563,000 were in the Armed Forces. During the war years, 5,319,297 people joined the party. And immediately after the end of hostilities, there were about 5,500,000 people in its ranks. Of which 3,324,000 served in the Armed Forces.

That is, the total losses of members of the CPSU (b) amounted to more than 3,800,000 people. Of which, about 3,000,000 died at the front in the ranks of the Armed Forces. In total, approximately 6,900,000 communists passed through the Armed Forces of the USSR in 1941-1945 (out of 9,300,000 in the party during the same period of time). This figure consists of 3,000,000 killed at the front, 3,324,000 who were in the Armed Forces immediately after the end of hostilities in Europe, as well as about 600,000 disabled people discharged from the Armed Forces in 1941-1945.

Here it is very useful to pay attention to the ratio of killed and disabled people: 3,000,000 to 600,000 = 5:1. And Krivosheev has 8,668,400 to 3,798,000 = 2.3:1. This is a very eloquent fact. Let us repeat once again that party members were taken into account incomparably more carefully than non-party members. They were obligatorily given a party card; each unit (up to the company level) had its own party cell, which registered each newly arrived party member. Therefore, party statistics were much more accurate than ordinary army statistics. And the difference in this very accuracy is clearly illustrated by the ratio between those killed and disabled among non-party members and communists in official Soviet figures and in Krivosheev.

Now let's move on to the Komsomol members. As of June 1941, the Komsomol numbered 1,926,000 people from the Red Army and the Red Army. At least several tens of thousands of people were also registered in the Komsomol organizations of the NKVD troops. Therefore, we can accept that in total there were about 2,000,000 members of the Komsomol in the Armed Forces of the USSR at the beginning of the war.

More than 3,500,000 more Komsomol members were drafted into the Armed Forces during the war years. In the Armed Forces themselves, during the war years, more than 5,000,000 people were accepted into the ranks of the Komsomol.

That is, in total, more than 10,500,000 people passed through the Komsomol in the Armed Forces in 1941-1945. Of these, 1,769,458 people joined the CPSU(b). Thus, it turns out that in total no less than 15,600,000 communists and Komsomol members passed through the Armed Forces in 1941-1945 (about 6,900,000 communists + more than 10,500,000 Komsomol members - 1,769,458 Komsomol members who joined the CPSU(b).

This is approximately 43% of the 36,639,100 people who, according to Krivosheev, passed through the Armed Forces during the war years. However, official Soviet statistics of the 60-80s do not confirm this ratio. It says that at the beginning of January 1942, there were 1,750,000 Komsomol members and 1,234,373 communists in the Armed Forces. This is slightly more than 25% of the entire armed forces, which numbered about 11.5 million people (including the wounded who were being treated).

Even twelve months later, the share of communists and Komsomol members was no more than 33%. At the beginning of January 1943, there were 1,938,327 communists and 2,200,200 Komsomol members in the Armed Forces. That is, 1,938,327 + 2,200,000 = 4,150,000 communists and Komsomol members from the Armed Forces, which had approximately 13,000,000 people.

13,000,000, since Krivosheev himself claims that since 1943 the USSR has supported the army at the level of 11,500,000 people (plus approximately 1,500,000 in hospitals). In mid-1943, the share of communists and non-party members did not increase very noticeably, reaching only 36% in July. At the beginning of January 1944, there were 2,702,566 communists and approximately 2,400,000 Komsomol members in the Armed Forces. I haven’t found a more accurate figure yet, but in December 1943 it was exactly 2,400,000 - the highest number for the entire war. That is, in January 1943 it could not have happened anymore. It turns out - 2,702,566 + 2,400,000 = approximately 5,100,000 communists and Komsomol members from an army of 13,000,000 people - about 40%.

At the beginning of January 1945, there were 3,030,758 communists and 2,202,945 Komsomol members in the Armed Forces. That is, at the beginning of 1945, the share of communists and Komsomol members (3,030,758 + 2,202,945) in the army of approximately 13,000,000 people was again approximately 40%. It is also appropriate to remember here that the bulk of the losses of the Red Army and the Red Army (and, accordingly, the number of mobilized people called to replace them) occurred in the first year and a half of the war, when the share of the All-Union Communist Party (Bolsheviks) and the Komsomol was less than 33%. That is, it turns out that on average during the war the share of communists and Komsomol members in the Armed Forces was no more than 35%. In other words, if we take as a basis the total number of communists and Komsomol members (15,600,000), then the number of people who passed through the Armed Forces of the USSR in 1941-1945 will be approximately 44,000,000. And not 36,639,100, as indicated by Krivosheev. Accordingly, total losses will increase.

By the way, the total losses of the Armed Forces of the USSR for 1941-1945 can also be approximately calculated if we start from the official Soviet data on losses among communists and Komsomol members, published in the 60-80s. They say that the army organizations of the CPSU (b) lost approximately 3,000,000 people. And the Komsomol organization has approximately 4,000,000 people. In other words, 35% of the army lost 7,000,000. Consequently, the entire Armed Forces lost about 19,000,000 – 20,000,000 souls (those killed at the front, those who died in captivity and those who became “defectors”).

Losses of 1941

By analyzing the dynamics of the number of communists and Komsomol members in the Armed Forces, it is possible to quite clearly calculate Soviet front-line losses by year of the war. They are also at least two times (usually more than two) higher than the data published in the Krivosheev directory.

For example, Krivosheev reports that in June-December 1941 the Red Army irretrievably lost (killed, missing, died from wounds and illnesses) 3,137,673 people. This figure is easy to check. The encyclopedia “The Great Patriotic War 1941-1945” reports that by June 1941 there were 563 thousand communists in the army and navy. It is further stated that in the first six months of the war, over 500,000 members of the CPSU (b) died. And that on January 1, 1942, there were 1,234,373 party members in the army and navy.

How do you know what meaning lies behind “above”? The twelfth volume of “The History of the Second World War 1939-1945” states that during the first six months of the war, more than 1,100,000 communists joined the army and navy organizations from the “civilian” era. It turns out: 563 (as of June 22) + “more than” 1,100,000 (mobilized) = “more than” 1,663,000 communists.
Further. In the sixth volume “History of the Great Patriotic War of the Soviet Union 1941-1945” from the plate “Numerical growth of the party” you can find out that military party organizations accepted 145,870 people into their ranks in July-December 1941.

It turns out: “More than” 1,663,000 + 145,870 = “more than” 1,808,870 communists were involved in the Red Army in June-December 1941. Now from this amount we subtract the amount that was on January 1, 1942:
“More”1.808.870 – 1.234.373 = “More” 574.497

It was we who received irrevocable losses of the CPSU (b) - killed, captured, missing.

Now let's decide on the Komsomol members. From the “Soviet Military Encyclopedia” you can find out that at the beginning of the war there were 1,926,000 Komsomol members in the army and navy. The encyclopedia “The Great Patriotic War of 1941-1945” reports that in the first six months of the war, over 2,000,000 Komsomol members were drafted into the army and navy and indicates that in addition to the Komsomol, 207,000 people were already accepted into the ranks of the Red Army and the Red Army. We also see there that by the end of 1941, the Komsomol organizations in the Armed Forces numbered 1,750,000 people.

Let’s count – 1,926,000 + “over” 2,000,000 + 207,000 = “over” 4,133,000. This is the total number of Komsomol members who passed through the Armed Forces in 1941. Now you can find out the deadweight loss. From the total quantity we subtract what we had on January 1, 1942: “Over” 4,133,000 – 1,750,000 = “over” 2,383,000.

It was we who received the killed, missing, and captured.

However, here the figure should be reduced a little - by the number of people who left the Komsomol by age. That is, approximately one tenth of those remaining in service. It is also necessary to take away the Komsomol members who joined the CPSU (b) - approximately 70,000 people. Thus, according to a very conservative estimate, the irretrievable losses of the Red Army and the Red Army among communists and Komsomol members amounted to at least 2,500,000 souls. And Krivosheev’s number in this column is 3,137,673. Of course, together with non-party members.

3,137,673 – 2,500,000 = 637,673 – this remains with non-party members.

How many non-party members were mobilized in 1941? Krivosheev writes that by the beginning of the war there were 4,826,907 souls in the Red Army and Navy. In addition, another 805,264 people were at training camps in the ranks of the Red Army at that time. It turns out - 4,826,907 + 805,264 = 5,632,171 people by June 22, 1941.

How many people were mobilized in June - December 1941? The answer is found in an article by General Gradoselsky published in the Military Historical Journal. From the analysis of the figures given there, we can conclude that during the two mobilizations of 1941, more than 14,000,000 people came to the Red Army and the Red Red Army (excluding militias). And in total, 5,632,171 + more than 14,000,000 = approximately 20,000,000 people were involved in the army in 1941. This means that from 20,000,000 we subtract “more” 1,808,870 communists and about 4,000,000 Komsomol members. We get about 14,000,000 non-party people.

And, if you look at these figures through the statistics of losses from the Krivosheev directory, it turns out that 6,000,000 communists and Komsomol members irretrievably lost 2,500,000 people. And 14,000,000 non-party people, 637,673 people...

Simply put, the losses of non-party members are underestimated by at least six times. And the total irretrievable losses of the Soviet Armed Forces in 1941 should be not 3,137,673, but 6-7 million. This is based on the most minimal estimates. Most likely more.

In this regard, it is useful to remember that the German Armed Forces in 1941 lost about 300,000 people killed and missing on the Eastern Front. That is, for each of their soldiers, the Germans took at least 20 souls from the Soviet side. Most likely, more - up to 25. This is approximately the same ratio with which European armies of the 19th-20th centuries beat African savages in colonial wars.

The difference in information that governments communicated to their people looks about the same. Hitler, in one of his last public speeches in March 1945, announced that Germany had lost 6,000,000 people in the war. Now historians believe that this was not very different from reality, determining the final result at 6,500,000-7,000,000 dead at the front and in the rear. Stalin said in 1946 that Soviet losses amounted to about 7,000,000 lives. Over the next half century, the number of human losses in the USSR increased to 27,000,000. And there is a strong suspicion that this is not the limit.

Before we go into explanations, statistics, etc., let’s immediately clarify what we mean. This article examines the losses suffered by the Red Army, the Wehrmacht and the troops of the satellite countries of the Third Reich, as well as the civilian population of the USSR and Germany, only in the period from 06/22/1941 until the end of hostilities in Europe (unfortunately, in the case of Germany this is practically unenforceable). The Soviet-Finnish war and the “liberation” campaign of the Red Army were deliberately excluded. The issue of losses of the USSR and Germany has been repeatedly raised in the press, there are endless debates on the Internet and on television, but researchers on this issue cannot come to a common denominator, because, as a rule, all arguments ultimately come down to emotional and politicized statements. This once again proves how painful this issue is in our country. The purpose of the article is not to “clarify” the final truth in this matter, but to attempt to summarize the various data contained in disparate sources. We will leave the right to draw conclusions to the reader.

With all the variety of literature and online resources about the Great Patriotic War, ideas about it largely suffer from a certain superficiality. The main reason for this is the ideological nature of this or that research or work, and it does not matter what kind of ideology it is - communist or anti-communist. The interpretation of such a grandiose event in the light of any ideology is obviously false.

It is especially bitter to read recently that the war of 1941–45. was just a clash between two totalitarian regimes, where one, they say, was completely consistent with the other. We will try to look at this war from the most justified point of view - geopolitical.

Germany in the 1930s, with all its Nazi “peculiarities,” directly and unswervingly continued that powerful desire for primacy in Europe, which for centuries determined the path of the German nation. Even the purely liberal German sociologist Max Weber wrote during World War I: “...we, 70 million Germans...are obliged to be an empire. We must do this, even if we are afraid of failure.” The roots of this aspiration of the Germans go back centuries; as a rule, the Nazis’ appeal to medieval and even pagan Germany is interpreted as a purely ideological event, as the construction of a myth mobilizing the nation.

From my point of view, everything is more complicated: it was the Germanic tribes that created the empire of Charlemagne, and later on its foundation the Holy Roman Empire of the German nation was formed. And it was the “empire of the German nation” that created what is called “European civilization” and began the aggressive policy of the Europeans with the sacramental “Drang nach osten” - “onslaught to the east”, because half of the “original” German lands, up until the 8th–10th centuries, belonged to Slavic tribes. Therefore, giving the plan of war against the “barbaric” USSR the name “Plan Barbarossa” is not a coincidence. This ideology of German “primacy” as the fundamental force of “European” civilization was the original cause of two world wars. Moreover, at the beginning of World War II, Germany was able to truly (albeit briefly) realize its aspiration.

Invading the borders of one or another European country, German troops met resistance that was amazing in its weakness and indecisiveness. Short-term battles between the armies of European countries and the invading German troops, with the exception of Poland, were more likely compliance with a certain “custom” of war than actual resistance.

Extremely much has been written about the exaggerated European “Resistance Movement,” which supposedly caused enormous damage to Germany and testified that Europe flatly rejected its unification under German leadership. But, with the exception of Yugoslavia, Albania, Poland and Greece, the scale of the Resistance is the same ideological myth. Undoubtedly, the regime established by Germany in the occupied countries did not suit large sections of the population. In Germany itself there was also resistance to the regime, but in neither case was it resistance of the country and the nation as a whole. For example, in the Resistance movement in France, 20 thousand people died in 5 years; Over the same 5 years, about 50 thousand Frenchmen died who fought on the side of the Germans, that is, 2.5 times more!

Thus, by 1941, almost all of continental Europe, one way or another, but without any major shocks, became part of the new empire with Germany at its head. Of the existing two dozen European countries, almost half - Spain, Italy, Denmark, Norway, Hungary, Romania, Slovakia, Finland, Croatia - together with Germany entered the war against the USSR, sending their armed forces to the Eastern Front (Denmark and Spain without a formal announcement war). The rest of the European countries did not take part in military operations against the USSR, but one way or another “worked” for Germany, or, rather, for the newly formed European Empire. Misconceptions about events in Europe have made us completely forget about many of the real events of that time. So, for example, the Anglo-American troops under the command of Eisenhower in November 1942 in North Africa initially fought not with the Germans, but with a 200,000-strong French army, despite the quick “victory” (Jean Darlan, due to the clear superiority of the Allied forces, ordered the surrender of the French troops), 584 Americans, 597 British and 1,600 French were killed in action. Of course, these are miniscule losses on the scale of the entire Second World War, but they show that the situation was somewhat more complicated than is usually thought.

In battles on the Eastern Front, the Red Army captured half a million prisoners, who were citizens of countries that did not seem to be at war with the USSR! It can be argued that these are “victims” of German violence, which drove them into Russian spaces. But the Germans were no more stupid than you and me and would hardly have allowed an unreliable contingent to the front. And while the next great and multinational army was winning victories in Russia, Europe was, by and large, on its side. Franz Halder, in his diary on June 30, 1941, wrote down Hitler's words: "European unity as a result of a joint war against Russia." And Hitler assessed the situation quite correctly. In fact, the geopolitical goals of the war against the USSR were carried out not only by the Germans, but by 300 million Europeans, united on various grounds - from forced submission to desired cooperation - but, one way or another, acting together. Only thanks to their reliance on continental Europe, the Germans were able to mobilize 25% of the entire population into the army (for reference: the USSR mobilized 17% of its citizens). In a word, the strength and technical equipment of the army that invaded the USSR was provided by tens of millions of skilled workers throughout Europe.

“Many documents of the Third Reich captured the image of the enemy - the Russian, deeply rooted in German history and society. Such views were characteristic even of those officers and soldiers who were not convinced or enthusiastic Nazis. They (these soldiers and officers) also shared ideas about “ the eternal struggle" of the Germans... about the defense of European culture from the "Asian hordes", about the cultural vocation and right of domination of the Germans in the East. The image of an enemy of this type was widespread in Germany, it belonged to "spiritual values."

And this geopolitical consciousness was not unique to the Germans as such. After June 22, 1941, volunteer legions appeared by leaps and bounds, later turning into the SS divisions “Nordland” (Scandinavian), “Langemarck” (Belgian-Flemish), “Charlemagne” (French). Guess where they defended “European civilization”? That’s right, quite far from Western Europe, in Belarus, Ukraine, Russia. German professor K. Pfeffer wrote in 1953: “Most of the volunteers from Western European countries went to the Eastern Front because they saw this as a COMMON task for the entire West...” It was with the forces of almost all of Europe that the USSR was destined to face, and not just with Germany, and this clash was not “two totalitarianisms,” but “civilized and progressive” Europe with the “barbaric state of subhumans” that had frightened Europeans from the east for so long.

1. USSR losses

According to official data from the 1939 population census, 170 million people lived in the USSR - significantly more than in any other single country in Europe. The entire population of Europe (without the USSR) was 400 million people. By the beginning of World War II, the population of the Soviet Union differed from the population of future enemies and allies in its high mortality rate and low life expectancy. However, the high birth rate ensured significant population growth (2% in 1938–39). Also different from Europe was the youth of the population of the USSR: the proportion of children under 15 years old was 35%. It was this feature that made it possible to restore the pre-war population relatively quickly (within 10 years). The share of the urban population was only 32% (for comparison: in Great Britain - more than 80%, in France - 50%, in Germany - 70%, in the USA - 60%, and only in Japan it had the same value as in THE USSR).

In 1939, the population of the USSR increased noticeably after the entry into the country of new regions (Western Ukraine and Belarus, the Baltics, Bukovina and Bessarabia), whose population ranged from 20 to 22.5 million people. The total population of the USSR, according to a certificate from the Central Statistical Office as of January 1, 1941, was determined to be 198,588 thousand people (including the RSFSR - 111,745 thousand people). According to modern estimates, it was still smaller, and on June 1, 1941 it was 196.7 million people.

Population of some countries for 1938–40

USSR - 170.6 (196.7) million people;
Germany - 77.4 million people;
France - 40.1 million people;
Great Britain - 51.1 million people;
Italy - 42.4 million people;
Finland - 3.8 million people;
USA - 132.1 million people;
Japan - 71.9 million people.

By 1940, the population of the Reich had increased to 90 million people, and taking into account the satellites and conquered countries - 297 million people. By December 1941, the USSR had lost 7% of the country's territory, where 74.5 million people lived before the start of the Second World War. This once again emphasizes that despite Hitler’s assurances, the USSR did not have an advantage in human resources over the Third Reich.

For a long time, the USSR did not talk about direct irretrievable losses of the Red Army. In a private conversation, Marshal Konev in 1962 named the figure 10 million people, a famous defector - Colonel Kalinov, who fled to the West in 1949 - 13.6 million people. The figure of 10 million people was published in the French version of the book “Wars and Population” by B. Ts. Urlanis, a famous Soviet demographer. The authors of the famous monograph “The Classification of Secrecy Has Been Removed” (edited by G. Krivosheev) in 1993 and in 2001 published the figure of 8.7 million people; at the moment, this is precisely what is indicated in most reference literature. But the authors themselves state that it does not include: 500 thousand people liable for military service, called up for mobilization and captured by the enemy, but not included in the lists of units and formations. Also, the almost completely dead militias of Moscow, Leningrad, Kyiv and other large cities are not taken into account. Currently, the most complete lists of irretrievable losses of Soviet soldiers amount to 13.7 million people, but approximately 12-15% of the records are repeated. According to the article “Dead Souls of the Great Patriotic War” (“NG”, 06.22.99), the historical and archival search center “Fate” of the association “War Memorials” established that due to double and even triple counting, the number of dead soldiers of the 43rd and 2 of the Shock Armies in the battles studied by the center was overestimated by 10-12%. Since these figures refer to a period when the accounting of losses in the Red Army was not careful enough, it can be assumed that in the war as a whole, due to double counting, the number of Red Army soldiers killed was overestimated by approximately 5–7%, i.e. by 0.2– 0.4 million people

Also, do not forget that approximately 1 million prisoners of war were transferred from captivity to the auxiliary units of the Wehrmacht. In many cases, this was the only chance for prisoners to survive. Again, most of these people, according to German data, tried to desert from Wehrmacht units and formations at the first opportunity. The local auxiliary forces of the German army included:

1) volunteer helpers (hivi)
2) order service (odi)
3) front auxiliary units (noise)
4) police and defense teams (gema).

At the beginning of 1943, the Wehrmacht operated: up to 400 thousand Khivi, from 60 to 70 thousand Odi, and 80 thousand in the eastern battalions.

Some of the prisoners of war and the population of the occupied territories made a conscious choice in favor of cooperation with the Germans. Thus, in the SS division “Galicia” there were 82,000 volunteers for 13,000 “places”. More than 100 thousand Latvians, 36 thousand Lithuanians and 10 thousand Estonians served in the German army, mainly in the SS troops.

In addition, several million people from the occupied territories were taken to forced labor in the Reich. The ChGK (Emergency State Commission) immediately after the war estimated their number at 4.259 million people. More recent studies give a figure of 5.45 million people, of whom 850-1000 thousand died.

Estimates of direct physical extermination of the civilian population, according to the ChGK data from 1946.

RSFSR - 706 thousand people.
Ukrainian SSR - 3256.2 thousand people.
BSSR - 1547 thousand people.
Lit. SSR - 437.5 thousand people.
Lat. SSR - 313.8 thousand people.
Est. SSR - 61.3 thousand people.
Mold. USSR - 61 thousand people.
Karelo-Fin. SSR - 8 thousand people. (10)

Such high figures for Lithuania and Latvia are explained by the fact that there were death camps and concentration camps for prisoners of war there. The population losses in the front line during the fighting were also enormous. However, it is virtually impossible to determine them. The minimum acceptable value is the number of deaths in besieged Leningrad, i.e. 800 thousand people. In 1942, the infant mortality rate in Leningrad reached 74.8%, that is, out of 100 newborns, about 75 babies died!

So, what are the losses of the Red Army, the civilian population of the USSR and the general demographic losses in the Great Patriotic War. For twenty years, the main estimate was the far-fetched figure of 20 million people by N. Khrushchev. In 1990, as a result of the work of a special commission of the General Staff and the State Statistics Committee of the USSR, a more reasonable estimate of 26.6 million people appeared. At the moment it is official. Noteworthy is the fact that back in 1948, the American sociologist Timashev gave an assessment of the USSR's losses in the war, which practically coincided with the assessment of the General Staff commission. Maksudov’s assessment made in 1977 also coincides with the data of the Krivosheev Commission. According to the commission of G.F. Krivosheev.

So let's summarize:

Post-war estimate of Red Army losses: 7 million people.
Timashev: Red Army - 12.2 million people, civilian population 14.2 million people, direct human losses 26.4 million people, total demographic 37.3 million.
Arntz and Khrushchev: direct human: 20 million people.
Biraben and Solzhenitsyn: Red Army 20 million people, civilian population 22.6 million people, direct human 42.6 million, general demographic 62.9 million people.
Maksudov: Red Army - 11.8 million people, civilian population 12.7 million people, direct casualties 24.5 million people. It is impossible not to make a reservation that S. Maksudov (A.P. Babenyshev, Harvard University USA) determined the purely combat losses of the spacecraft at 8.8 million people
Rybakovsky: direct human 30 million people.
Andreev, Darsky, Kharkov (General Staff, Krivosheev Commission): direct combat losses of the Red Army 8.7 million (11,994 including prisoners of war) people. Civilian population (including prisoners of war) 17.9 million people. Direct human losses: 26.6 million people.
B. Sokolov: losses of the Red Army - 26 million people
M. Harrison: total losses of the USSR - 23.9 - 25.8 million people.

What do we have in the “dry” residue? We will be guided by simple logic.

The estimate of the losses of the Red Army given in 1947 (7 million) does not inspire confidence, since not all calculations, even with the imperfections of the Soviet system, were completed.

Khrushchev's assessment is also not confirmed. On the other hand, “Solzhenitsyn’s” 20 million casualties in the army alone, or even 44 million, are just as unfounded (without denying some of A. Solzhenitsyn’s talent as a writer, all the facts and figures in his works are not confirmed by a single document and it’s difficult to understand where he comes from took - impossible).

Boris Sokolov is trying to explain to us that the losses of the USSR armed forces alone amounted to 26 million people. He is guided by the indirect method of calculations. The losses of the officers of the Red Army are known quite accurately, according to Sokolov this is 784 thousand people (1941–44). Mr. Sokolov, referring to the average statistical losses of Wehrmacht officers on the Eastern Front of 62,500 people (1941–44), and data from Müller-Hillebrandt , displays the ratio of losses of the officer corps to the rank and file of the Wehrmacht as 1:25, that is, 4%. And, without hesitation, he extrapolates this technique to the Red Army, receiving his 26 million irretrievable losses. However, upon closer examination, this approach turns out to be initially false. Firstly, 4% of officer losses is not an upper limit, for example, in the Polish campaign, the Wehrmacht lost 12% of officers to the total losses of the Armed Forces. Secondly, it would be useful for Mr. Sokolov to know that with the regular strength of the German infantry regiment being 3049 officers, there were 75 officers, that is, 2.5%. And in the Soviet infantry regiment, with a strength of 1582 people, there are 159 officers, i.e. 10%. Thirdly, appealing to the Wehrmacht, Sokolov forgets that the more combat experience in the troops, the fewer losses among officers. In the Polish campaign, the loss of German officers was −12%, in the French campaign - 7%, and on the Eastern Front already 4%.

The same can be applied to the Red Army: if at the end of the war the losses of officers (not according to Sokolov, but according to statistics) were 8-9%, then at the beginning of the Second World War they could have been 24%. It turns out, like a schizophrenic, everything is logical and correct, only the initial premise is incorrect. Why did we dwell on Sokolov’s theory in such detail? Yes, because Mr. Sokolov very often presents his figures in the media.

Taking into account the above, discarding the obviously underestimated and overestimated estimates of losses, we get: Krivosheev Commission - 8.7 million people (with prisoners of war 11.994 million, 2001 data), Maksudov - losses are even slightly lower than the official ones - 11.8 million people. (1977−93), Timashev - 12.2 million people. (1948). This can also include the opinion of M. Harrison, with the level of total losses indicated by him, the losses of the army should fit into this period. These data were obtained using different calculation methods, since Timashev and Maksudov, respectively, did not have access to the archives of the USSR and Russian Defense Ministry. It seems that the losses of the USSR Armed Forces in the Second World War lie very close to such a “heaped” group of results. Let's not forget that these figures include 2.6–3.2 million destroyed Soviet prisoners of war.

41% - aircraft losses (including prisoners of war)
35% - aircraft losses (without prisoners of war, i.e. direct combat)
39% - losses of the population of the occupied territories and the front line (45% with prisoners of war)
8% - rear population
6% - GULAG
6% - emigration outflow.

2. Losses of the Wehrmacht and SS troops

To date, there are no sufficiently reliable figures for the losses of the German army obtained by direct statistical calculation. This is explained by the absence, for various reasons, of reliable initial statistical materials on German losses.

In general, the information from the Wehrmacht loss department cannot serve as the initial data for calculating the losses of the German Armed Forces in the Great Patriotic War.

Firstly, this figure takes into account only the burials of Germans, and a large number of soldiers of other nationalities fought in the Wehrmacht: Austrians (270 thousand of them died), Sudeten Germans and Alsatians (230 thousand people died) and representatives of other nationalities and states (357 thousand people died). Of the total number of dead Wehrmacht soldiers of non-German nationality, the Soviet-German front accounts for 75-80%, i.e. 0.6–0.7 million people.

Secondly, this figure dates back to the early 90s of the last century. Since then, the search for German burials in Russia, the CIS countries and Eastern European countries has continued. And the messages that appeared on this topic were not informative enough. For example, the Russian Association of War Memorials, created in 1992, reported that over the 10 years of its existence it transferred information about the burials of 400 thousand Wehrmacht soldiers to the German Association for the Care of Military Graves. However, whether these were newly discovered burials or whether they had already been taken into account in the figure of 3 million 226 thousand is unclear. Unfortunately, it was not possible to find generalized statistics of newly discovered burials of Wehrmacht soldiers. Tentatively, we can assume that the number of graves of Wehrmacht soldiers newly discovered over the past 10 years is in the range of 0.2–0.4 million people.

Thirdly, many graves of dead Wehrmacht soldiers on Soviet soil have disappeared or were deliberately destroyed. Approximately 0.4–0.6 million Wehrmacht soldiers could have been buried in such disappeared and unmarked graves.

Fourthly, these data do not include the burials of German soldiers killed in battles with Soviet troops on the territory of Germany and Western European countries. According to R. Overmans, in the last three spring months of the war alone, about 1 million people died. (minimum estimate 700 thousand) In general, approximately 1.2–1.5 million Wehrmacht soldiers died on German soil and in Western European countries in battles with the Red Army.

Finally, fifthly, the number of those buried also included Wehrmacht soldiers who died a “natural” death (0.1–0.2 million people)

The number of Wehrmacht prisoners of war was determined by V. Gurkin by summing up the prisoners of war taken by the Red Army (3.178 million people) and the Allied forces (4.209 million people) before May 9, 1945. In my opinion, this number is overestimated: it also included prisoners of war who were not Wehrmacht soldiers. In the book “German Prisoners of War of the Second World War” by Paul Karel and Ponter Boeddecker, it is reported: “...In June 1945, the Allied Command became aware that there were 7,614,794 prisoners of war and unarmed military personnel in the “camps, of which 4,209,000 by the time capitulation were already in captivity." Among the indicated 4.2 million German prisoners of war, in addition to the Wehrmacht soldiers, there were many other people. For example, in the French camp of Vitril-Francois, among the prisoners, "the youngest was 15 years old, the oldest was almost 70." The authors write about captured Volksturm soldiers, about the organization by the Americans of special “children’s” camps, where captured twelve-thirteen-year-old boys from the “Hitler Youth” and “Werewolf” were collected. Even the disabled are placed in camps in the article “My path to Ryazan captivity” (“. Map" No. 1, 1992) Heinrich Schippmann noted:

Overall, among the 4.2 million prisoners of war taken by the Allies before May 9, 1945, approximately 20–25% were not Wehrmacht soldiers. This means that the Allies had 3.1–3.3 million Wehrmacht soldiers in captivity.

The total number of Wehrmacht soldiers captured before the surrender was 6.3–6.5 million people.

There is another way to “calculate” the losses of Germany and the Third Reich in the war against the USSR. Quite correct, by the way. Let’s try to “substitute” the figures relating to Germany into the methodology for calculating the total demographic losses of the USSR. Moreover, we will use ONLY official data from the German side. So, the population of Germany in 1939, according to Müller-Hillebrandt (p. 700 of his work, so beloved by supporters of the “filling up with corpses” theory), was 80.6 million people. At the same time, you and I, the reader, must take into account that this includes 6.76 million Austrians, and the population of the Sudetenland - another 3.64 million people. That is, the population of Germany proper within the borders of 1933 in 1939 was (80.6 - 6.76 - 3.64) 70.2 million people. We figured out these simple mathematical operations. Further: natural mortality in the USSR was 1.5% per year, but in Western European countries the mortality rate was much lower and amounted to 0.6 - 0.8% per year, Germany was no exception. However, the birth rate in the USSR was approximately the same proportion as it was in Europe, due to which the USSR had consistently high population growth throughout the pre-war years, starting from 1934.

Soviet occupation zone (without East Berlin): men - 7.419 million, women - 9.914 million, total: 17.333 million people.

All western zones of occupation (without western Berlin): men - 20.614 million, women - 24.804 million, total: 45.418 million people.

Berlin (all sectors of occupation), men - 1.29 million, women - 1.89 million, total: 3.18 million people.

The total population of Germany is 65,931,000 people. A purely arithmetic operation of 70.2 million - 66 million seems to give a loss of only 4.2 million. However, everything is not so simple.

At the time of the population census in the USSR, the number of children born since the beginning of 1941 was about 11 million; the birth rate in the USSR during the war years fell sharply and amounted to only 1.37% per year of the pre-war population. The birth rate in Germany even in peacetime did not exceed 2% per year of the population. Suppose it fell only 2 times, and not 3, as in the USSR. That is, the natural population growth during the war years and the first post-war year was about 5% of the pre-war population, and in figures amounted to 3.5–3.8 million children. This figure must be added to the final figure for the population decline in Germany. Now the arithmetic is different: the total population decline is 4.2 million + 3.5 million = 7.7 million people. But this is not the final figure; To complete the calculations, we need to subtract from the population decline figure the natural mortality rate during the war years and 1946, which is 2.8 million people (let’s take the figure 0.8% to make it “higher”). Now the total population loss in Germany caused by the war is 4.9 million people. Which, in general, is very “similar” to the figure for irretrievable losses of the Reich ground forces given by Müller-Hillebrandt. So did the USSR, which lost 26.6 million of its citizens in the war, really “fill up with corpses” of its enemy? Patience, dear reader, let’s bring our calculations to their logical conclusion.

The fact is that the population of Germany proper in 1946 grew by at least another 6.5 million people, and presumably even by 8 million! By the time of the 1946 census (according to German data, by the way, published back in 1996 by the “Union of Exiles”, about 15 million Germans were “forcibly displaced”) only from the Sudetenland, Poznan and Upper Silesia were evicted to German territory 6.5 million Germans. About 1 - 1.5 million Germans fled from Alsace and Lorraine (unfortunately, there are no more accurate data). That is, these 6.5 - 8 million must be added to the losses of Germany itself. And these are “slightly” different numbers: 4.9 million + 7.25 million (arithmetic average of the number of Germans “expelled” to their homeland) = 12.15 million. Actually, this is 17.3% (!) of the German population in 1939. Well, that's not all!

These are all territories that were officially included in the Reich, and whose inhabitants were subject to conscription into the Wehrmacht. We will not take into account the “Imperial Protectorate of Bohemia and Moravia” and the “Government General of Poland” here (although ethnic Germans were drafted into the Wehrmacht from these territories). And ALL of these territories remained under Nazi control until the beginning of 1945. Now we get the “final calculation” if we take into account that Austria’s losses are known to us and amount to 300,000 people, that is, 4.43% of the country’s population (which in %, of course, is much less than that of Germany). It would not be much of a stretch to assume that the population of the remaining regions of the Reich suffered the same percentage losses as a result of the war, which would give us another 673,000 people. As a result, the total human losses of the Third Reich are 12.15 million + 0.3 million + 0.6 million people. = 13.05 million people. This “number” is already more like the truth. Taking into account the fact that these losses include 0.5 - 0.75 million dead civilians (and not 3.5 million), we obtain the losses of the Third Reich Armed Forces equal to 12.3 million people irrevocably. If we consider that even the Germans admit the losses of their Armed Forces in the East at 75-80% of all losses on all fronts, then the Reich Armed Forces lost about 9.2 million (75% of 12.3 million) in battles with the Red Army. person irrevocably. Of course, not all of them were killed, but having data on those released (2.35 million), as well as prisoners of war who died in captivity (0.38 million), we can say quite accurately that those actually killed and those who died from wounds and in captivity, and also missing, but not captured (read “killed”, which is 0.7 million!), the Armed Forces of the Third Reich lost approximately 5.6-6 million people during the campaign to the East. According to these calculations, the irretrievable losses of the USSR Armed Forces and the Third Reich (without allies) are correlated as 1.3:1, and the combat losses of the Red Army (data from the team led by Krivosheev) and the Reich Armed Forces as 1.6:1.

The procedure for calculating the total human losses in Germany

The population in 1939 was 70.2 million people.
The population in 1946 was 65.93 million people.
Natural mortality 2.8 million people.
Natural increase (birth rate) 3.5 million people.
Emigration influx of 7.25 million people.
Total losses ((70.2 - 65.93 - 2.8) + 3.5 + 7.25 = 12.22) 12.15 million people.

Every tenth German died! Every twelfth person was captured!!!

The irretrievable losses of the USSR Armed Forces in the Second World War amount to 11.5 - 12.0 million irrevocably, with actual combat demographic losses of 8.7–9.3 million people. The losses of the Wehrmacht and SS troops on the Eastern Front amount to 8.0 - 8.9 million irrevocably, of which purely combat demographic 5.2-6.1 million people (including those who died in captivity) people. Plus, to the losses of the German Armed Forces proper on the Eastern Front, it is necessary to add the losses of the satellite countries, and this is no less than 850 thousand (including those who died in captivity) people killed and more than 600 thousand captured. Total 12.0 (largest number) million versus 9.05 (smallest number) million people.

A logical question: where is the “filling with corpses” that Western and now domestic “open” and “democratic” sources talk about so much? The percentage of dead Soviet prisoners of war, even according to the most gentle estimates, is no less than 55%, and of German prisoners, according to the largest, no more than 23%. Maybe the whole difference in losses is explained simply by the inhumane conditions in which the prisoners were kept?

The author is aware that these articles differ from the latest officially announced version of losses: losses of the USSR Armed Forces - 6.8 million military personnel killed, and 4.4 million captured and missing, German losses - 4.046 million military personnel killed, died from wounds, missing in action (including 442.1 thousand killed in captivity), losses of satellite countries - 806 thousand killed and 662 thousand captured. Irreversible losses of the armies of the USSR and Germany (including prisoners of war) - 11.5 million and 8.6 million people. The total losses of Germany are 11.2 million people. (for example on Wikipedia)

The issue with the civilian population is more terrible against the 14.4 (smallest number) million victims of the Second World War in the USSR - 3.2 million people (largest number) of victims on the German side. So who fought and with whom? It is also necessary to mention that without denying the Holocaust of the Jews, German society still does not perceive the “Slavic” Holocaust; if everything is known about the suffering of the Jewish people in the West (thousands of works), then they prefer to “modestly” remain silent about the crimes against the Slavic peoples. The non-participation of our researchers, for example, in the all-German “dispute of historians” only aggravates this situation.

I would like to end the article with a phrase from an unknown British officer. When he saw a column of Soviet prisoners of war being driven past the “international” camp, he said: “I forgive the Russians in advance for everything they will do to Germany.”

The article was written in 2007. Since then, the author has not changed his opinion. That is, there was no “stupid” inundation of corpses on the part of the Red Army, however, there was no special numerical superiority. This is also proven by the recent emergence of a large layer of Russian “oral history,” that is, memoirs of ordinary participants in the Second World War. For example, Elektron Priklonsky, the author of “The Diary of a Self-propelled Gun,” mentions that throughout the war he saw two “death fields”: when our troops attacked in the Baltic states and came under flanking fire from machine guns, and when the Germans broke through from the Korsun-Shevchenkovsky pocket. This is an isolated example, but nevertheless, it is valuable because it is a wartime diary, and therefore quite objective.

Estimation of the loss ratio based on the results of a comparative analysis of losses in wars of the last two centuries

The application of the method of comparative analysis, the foundations of which were laid by Jomini, to assess the ratio of losses requires statistical data on wars of different eras. Unfortunately, more or less complete statistics are available only for wars of the last two centuries. Data on irretrievable combat losses in the wars of the 19th and 20th centuries, summarized based on the results of the work of domestic and foreign historians, are given in Table. The last three columns of the table demonstrate the obvious dependence of the results of the war on the magnitude of relative losses (losses expressed as a percentage of the total army size) - the relative losses of the winner in a war are always less than those of the vanquished, and this dependence has a stable, repeating character (it is true for all types of wars), that is, it has all the signs of law.

Note that the absolute numbers of irretrievable losses for the victorious side can be either less (Patriotic War of 1812, Russian-Turkish, Franco-Prussian wars) or greater than for the defeated side (Crimean, World War I, Soviet-Finnish) , but the relative losses of the winner are always less than those of the loser.

The difference between the relative losses of the winner and the loser characterizes the degree of convincingness of the victory. Wars with close relative losses of the parties end in peace treaties with the defeated side retaining the existing political system and army (for example, the Russo-Japanese War). In wars that end, like the Great Patriotic War, with the complete surrender of the enemy (Napoleonic Wars, Franco-Prussian War of 1870–1871), the relative losses of the winner are significantly less than the relative losses of the vanquished (by no less than 30%). In other words, the greater the losses, the larger the army must be in order to win a landslide victory. If the army's losses are 2 times greater than those of the enemy, then to win the war its strength must be at least 2.6 times greater than the size of the opposing army.

Now let’s return to the Great Patriotic War and see what human resources the USSR and Nazi Germany had during the war. Available data on the numbers of warring parties on the Soviet-German front are given in Table. 6.

The figures for the ratio of irretrievable combat losses given in table. 6, do not exceed the upper limit of the loss ratio obtained above. This, however, does not mean that they are final and cannot be changed. As new documents, statistical materials, and research results appear, the figures for the losses of the Red Army and the Wehrmacht (Tables 1-5) may be clarified, change in one direction or another, their ratio may also change, but it cannot be higher than the value of 1.3 :1.

Sources:
1. Central Statistical Office of the USSR “Number, composition and movement of the population of the USSR” M 1965
2. “Population of Russia in the 20th century” M. 2001
3. Arntz “Human losses in the Second World War” M. 1957
4. Frumkin G. Population Changes in Europe since 1939 N.Y. 1951
5. Dallin A. German rule in Russia 1941–1945 N.Y.- London 1957
6. “Russia and the USSR in the wars of the 20th century” M. 2001
7. Polyan P. Victims of two dictatorships M. 1996.
8. Thorwald J. The Illusion. Soviet soldiers in Hitler,s Army N. Y. 1975
9. Collection of messages of the Extraordinary State Commission M. 1946
10. Zemskov. Birth of the second emigration 1944–1952 SI 1991 No. 4
11. Timasheff N. S. The postwar population of the Soviet Union 1948
13 Timasheff N. S. The postwar population of the Soviet Union 1948
14. Arntz. Human losses in the Second World War M. 1957; "International Affairs" 1961 No. 12
15. Biraben J. N. Population 1976.
16. Maksudov S. Population losses of the USSR Benson (Vt) 1989; “On the front-line losses of the SA during the Second World War” “Free Thought” 1993. No. 10
17. Population of the USSR over 70 years. Edited by Rybakovsky L. L. M 1988
18. Andreev, Darsky, Kharkov. "Population of the Soviet Union 1922–1991." M 1993
19. Sokolov B. “Novaya Gazeta” No. 22, 2005, “The Price of Victory -” M. 1991.
20. “Germany’s War against the Soviet Union 1941-1945” edited by Reinhard Rürup 1991. Berlin
21. Müller-Hillebrand. “German Land Army 1933-1945” M. 1998
22. “Germany’s War against the Soviet Union 1941-1945” edited by Reinhard Rürup 1991. Berlin
23. Gurkin V.V. About human losses on the Soviet-German front 1941–45. NiNI No. 3 1992
24. M. B. Denisenko. WWII in the demographic dimension "Eksmo" 2005
25. S. Maksudov. Population losses of the USSR during the Second World War. "Population and Society" 1995
26. Yu. Mukhin. If it weren't for the generals. "Yauza" 2006
27. V. Kozhinov. The Great Russian War. A series of lectures on the 1000th anniversary of the Russian wars. "Yauza" 2005
28. Materials from the newspaper “Duel”
29. E. Beevor “The Fall of Berlin” M. 2003

The United States was forced into the war on December 7, 1941, as a result of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. And although the scale of the battles was not the same as on the Eastern Front, this does not negate their fierceness. Having gotten bogged down in battles with the Japanese, the United States was able to secure the rear of the USSR, and by subsequently opening a second front, it brought Germany’s defeat closer and made its collapse inevitable. In total, the main losses in World War II were due to the following factors:

The Allied contribution to the victory cannot be underestimated. In fact, while fierce battles were going on in the east and the blitzkrieg was thundering, Great Britain and the USA also did not sit idly by, stretching the forces of the Germans and their allies in several directions, thereby reducing the pressure on the USSR.

During the entire war, a huge number of recruits were mobilized in the United States - more than 16 million people. Such reserves were enough to fight long wars of attrition; in addition, American soldiers did not have the worst level of training, which allowed them to withstand even superior enemy forces.

After the surprise attack on Pearl Harbor and the destruction of one of the most powerful military bases, the United States entered the war. Just hours after the attack, the Americans declared war on Japan and began planning a response.

Already starting in 1942, the Japanese army lost its advantage and ceased to win significant victories, which led to defeat in the Battle of Midway, and dealt a crushing blow to the imperial troops.

After this, the Americans continued their systematic offensive, liberating all the islands that came along the way. The Japanese refused to capitulate even when they found themselves in a completely hopeless situation in 1945. Anticipating heavy losses at the beginning of the assault on the main island of Japan, the US command decided to drop two atomic bombs, which finally broke the spirit of the Japanese and led to the subsequent complete surrender.

In total, during the war with the Japanese, the Americans lost about 300 thousand soldiers and sailors killed, captured and subsequently died from wounds. In addition, civilian casualties are also known. So the Japanese managed to intern more than 12 thousand civilians.

One of the main "meat grinders" - the place where the Allies suffered the greatest losses - was the beaches during Operation Overlord. The infantry had to storm enemy bunkers, advancing across open ground under fierce artillery and machine gun fire. However, due to disagreements between the German commanders, who as a result were unable to provide assistance to each other in an organized manner, the defense was broken through. The Battle of Normandy lasted for about two months. The main task of the Allies was to capture, expand and strengthen coastal bridgeheads in order to create favorable conditions for subsequent attacks on the enemy. This operation went down in history as the largest amphibious operation, as it involved more than 3 million soldiers who crossed the English Channel.

Powerful German armored vehicles inflicted heavy losses on the Allies - the outdated military doctrine had its effect. The main tank of the US Army at that time was the M4 Sherman, equipped with a short-barreled 75 mm gun, which was not capable of adequately fighting enemy tanks that destroyed Shermans at distances of more than a kilometer. The use of specialized self-propelled guns did not produce significant results, which is why the Americans lost greatly to the mechanized divisions of the Wehrmacht. As a result, due to heavy casualties, the Americans had to quickly develop new types of tanks, as well as figure out how to modernize the current ones that remained in service.

Even despite the complete dominance of the Americans in the air, German forces continued to put up serious resistance. The Hitler Youth especially managed to distinguish itself here. Teenagers, under the leadership of experienced officers, managed to inflict enormous damage on American forces, turning French vineyards into a real hell. However, they did not stand a chance, since the Americans were more prepared and already had combat skills by the time the operation began. Some units had real combat experience gained during battles with the Japanese. This played a cruel joke on the American Marines, since the Germans used completely different battle tactics, which also led to heavy losses at first.

In total, during the bloody battles in Europe, the United States lost almost 186 thousand military personnel, which, of course, is quite small when compared with the losses of the USSR.

Conclusion

Undoubtedly, he made the greatest contribution to the victory over the Third Reich. The Allies could only indirectly help the Soviet troops, diverting the attention of the Wehrmacht command and forcing them to disperse their forces. They also supplied additional weapons to the Soviet army under the Lend-Lease program. In total, US losses in World War II amounted to 405 thousand killed and 671 thousand wounded.