Mass Rapes of German Women in Berlin by Soviet Servicemen during the Second World War

By Andriy Borodiy
August 10, 2023

Russian Bolshevism, or communism, is a phenomenon in world history that brought a great deal of suffering to the peoples of Europe, perhaps even more than German Nazism. One subject that was silenced for a long time, but about which as many people as possible should learn, is the rape of German women by Soviet servicemen during the occupation of Germany, particularly Berlin. The publication iberlin.eu tells more about this dark page in the city’s history.

History and statistics of the rapes
Historical controversy
Gabriela “Gabi” Köpp
“A Woman in Berlin”
Crimes in Berlin

History and statistics of the rapes

As the BBC notes, mass rape during warfare is not an isolated phenomenon and was observed even before the twentieth century. But the largest phenomenon of mass rape in history occurred in Germany in 1944–1945. The main responsibility for this crime is attributed chiefly to Soviet servicemen, although such cases also occurred among American, British, and, to some extent, French troops.

Before the Soviet army arrived, German women joked that it was “better to have a Russian on top of me than a Yankee overhead.” In other words, they believed it was better to be raped than to continue being bombed by the Americans. But when Soviet soldiers arrived, reality proved darker.

Text in the reproduced Soviet document image: the scan is a partly illegible wartime order headed “Order of the Supreme Commander-in-Chief of the Soviet Army,” dated April 28, 1945, Moscow. The legible portions state that misconduct by some servicemen was damaging Soviet authority and describe looting and violence against the German population. The order calls for restoring strict military discipline, improving political-educational work among personnel, explaining the Red Army’s policy toward the German population, and decisively stopping arbitrary actions and abuses. Several words and lines in the surviving scan are too blurred to translate reliably and are therefore not reconstructed here.

The number of women raped is estimated at anywhere from tens of thousands to two million (the article notes that this figure may be inaccurate, while stating that 1.4 million women were raped in East Prussia, Pomerania, and Silesia alone, and more than 100,000 in Berlin). German women from eight to eighty years old were subjected to violence. The number of victims can be estimated approximately from the number of abortions performed at the time. In Berlin alone, more than 100,000 abortions were carried out. Almost 10,000 women died as a result of abortions.

Information about the number of cases of violence against women was obtained from German doctors who kept records of rape victims. Data from two Berlin hospitals indicate that the number of victims in the German capital was between 95,000 and 130,000. Doctors also noted that every tenth woman died because she could not endure the abuse. Among the other records of violence are accounts written in children’s hands. One girl wrote that she was raped at home, in the living room, in front of her parents.

In the town of Treuenbrietzen, during celebrations of the “victory day,” Soviet soldiers raped hundreds of local girls. When a Soviet officer was killed, 88 males (according to other data, about 1,000 people) were arrested and shot merely on suspicion of the killing.

In Hungary, where Soviet troops were also present, the command issued orders to restrain sexual crimes among soldiers and officers. By then, however, thousands of Hungarian women had been raped by servicemen of the workers’ and peasants’ army. In that country, towns and villages were subjected to three days of looting and sexual violence as punishment for resistance. In Budapest in particular, more than 50,000 women were raped.

Violence was committed not only against German women but also against Ukrainian, Belarusian, and Polish women whom the Reich authorities had deported to Germany for labor. A report by the head of the political department of the First Ukrainian Front contains information about these women being raped by soldiers from their own side. They had prayed for liberation, yet Red Army soldiers raped and abused them.

The English historian Antony Beevor found reports sent by Soviet NKVD officers to Lavrentiy Beria concerning an epidemic of sexual violence in Germany. This information was passed to Stalin. Women tried to kill themselves and their children in order to avoid being raped.

Historical controversy

Naturally, in the USSR the issue of violence against German and Hungarian women (and they were not the only victims of abuse) was suppressed. Moreover, in countries controlled by the Soviet authorities, historians and journalists were persecuted for attempts to cast a shadow over the great and mighty Red Army, which had saved the world from Nazism. After the collapse of the Soviet Union, the issue of rape slowly began to surface in post-Soviet countries. Some Russian historians admit that such acts may have occurred but argue that the scale was not as great as European and American historians claim. They therefore criticize both the sources used by their Western colleagues and the counting methodology. The English historian Richard Overy believes this position is connected with a Russian desire to continue writing history as victors and with the belief that Soviet soldiers justly took revenge on Germans for crimes committed in the USSR.

In Germany, the rape of women and the expulsion of Germans from East Prussia, followed by its transformation into the Soviet enclave of Kaliningrad, became important public topics. Germans in this discussion were portrayed as victims. After the 1960s, German leftists attempted to shift the discourse away from Germans as victims and toward condemnation of the Nazi past and the portrayal of Germans themselves as perpetrators.

Gabriela “Gabi” Köpp

One example used when discussing the abuse of German women during the Second World War is the story of Gabriela “Gabi” Köpp, a German physicist and author of an autobiography. She was born on the border between the Province of Posen and West Prussia. On January 26, 1945, Gabriela and her sister traveled farther into Germany to escape the advancing Soviet troops, whose “reputation” for crimes had preceded them. The train on which they were traveling was attacked and stopped. Her sister disappeared, and Gabriela spent fourteen days in the hands of Soviet “defenders,” where she was repeatedly raped. She later managed to escape and found her mother in Hamburg, but her mother forbade her to speak about these crimes. Only in 1992 did she write about the rape and her escape.

“A Woman in Berlin”

Another example of abuse against German women is the autobiography of Marta Hillers, who was in Berlin from April 20 to June 22, 1945 and was repeatedly raped. She describes life in an air-raid shelter, ordinary Germans, food shortages, air raids, the rape of women and girls, and what happened to her personally. She speaks of the boundary between rape and prostitution becoming blurred at that time. Hillers describes this as “sleeping for food.” Servicemen compete among themselves for the right to have a permanent woman. Payment comes in the form of alcohol, cigarettes, and food. Women try to find one soldier who will protect them and not hand them over to everyone else. The book presents different soldiers and officers, ranging from kind men to libertines and drunkards.

Crimes in Berlin

Of particular interest is the testimony of a Soviet officer, the Jewish lieutenant Vladimir Gelfand from Ukraine. His diary describes the lack of discipline in the Soviet army, lice, antisemitism, theft, and food shortages.

While preparing for the offensive on Berlin, his unit captured a German women’s battalion. The eyewitness writes that the women wanted revenge for their husbands and therefore, in his view, deserved to be executed for it.

While in Berlin, Vladimir Gelfand saw a group of women trying to move somewhere else. They told him about rapes committed on the first night after the Red Army arrived. Both younger and older women were raped. One of the girls asked the officer to stay with them and protect them.

Rape in Germany continued after the summer of 1945, although by that time some servicemen began to be punished for the crime. The violence ended only after 1947–1948, when the command removed soldiers from the cities and concentrated them on guarding camps and posts.

berlinfuture.eu
berlinka.info
berlinname.eu
berlintrend.eu
berlinski.net
berlin1.one
berlinyes.eu
iberlin.eu

© Ya
© Andriy Borodiy